Pundayschool · Episode 30 companion
Please Say Fine: a devotional for when someone actually answers
A quick devotional for busy people: 3 to 5 minutes, start to finish. Read it or listen to it, whichever fits your morning: a coffee break, a commute, or the two minutes before the rest of the house wakes up. When you reach the bottom, you have done today's devotional.
1 John 4:11 says, "Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." It means our love for each other is not optional or generic, it is a direct response to how God has already loved us. This devotional, from Pundayschool Episode 30, "Please Say Fine," is about the moment a routine "How are you?" gets a real answer, and the small panic that follows. It ends with an honest invitation: leave room for the truth, and do not look for the exit.
Press play: watch the short
"Please Say Fine" is on its way to YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook at @pundayschool. Check back soon, or follow along there so you do not miss it.
Reading 1 John 4:11
"Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another."
1 John 4:11, NIV
Prefer to listen?
1 John 4:11, read aloud in the King James Version. About 4 seconds.
Most of us are good at asking "How are you?" We are less good at meaning it.
There is a version of that question we ask on autopilot. We already know the correct answer before we finish asking. "Fine, thanks. You?" Then we move on with our lives, having technically checked in on someone without learning a single true thing about them.
But sometimes someone actually tells us. The difficult phone call. The problem at home. And the moment a real answer arrives, something in us starts looking for a way out. Not our feet, our attention. The clock on the wall. The open door. Someone else across the room who suddenly, urgently, needs us.
We asked how they were. We just did not expect an answer.
1 John 4:11 says, "Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another."
Notice the shape of that sentence. It is not a suggestion floating on its own. It is an obligation built on something that already happened. God so loved us. Therefore, we ought to love one another. Our love for people is not a personality trait some of us happen to have. It is the natural next step after being loved first.
And loving one another is not the same thing as greeting one another efficiently. It is not smiling, shaking hands, and escaping with your morning intact. Love usually costs something. Sometimes only five minutes. Sometimes just our attention. Sometimes simply staying in a conversation when it would be so much easier to leave.
We asked how they were. We just did not expect an answer.
Honest questions
Just three quiet questions, between us and God.
- When someone last gave you a real answer to "how are you," where did your attention go first? What were you actually looking for?
- Is there a difference, for you, between greeting someone and actually loving them? What does that difference look like in practice?
- Who in your life gave you a real answer recently that you have not fully sat with yet? What would it cost to go back and actually listen?
A short prayer
Pray it slowly, in these words or your own.
God, thank You that You loved us first, before we had anything to offer back. Forgive me for the times I have asked how someone is doing while already planning my exit. When someone gives me a real answer, give me the grace to actually stay, to let my attention rest fully on them instead of drifting to the clock or the door. Help me love one another the way You have already loved me. Amen.
One step for today
The conversation you had today is not over. There is a whole rest of your day today, and it needs exactly one thing from you.
Next time you ask, "How are you?" leave enough room for the truth. And if they say, "Actually," do not look for the exit. Let your feet stay planted and let your attention stay with them, even past the point where it would be easier to check the time.
The end
That is the whole thing. No sign up, no series to binge. Just a foyer, a mug going cold, and someone you may have just been given to love.
More questions
What does 1 John 4:11 mean?
It means our love for other people is a direct response to how God has already loved us, not a separate decision we get to opt out of. The verse builds an obligation on a fact: "since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." Because we were loved first, loving others is not optional.
Why is it so hard to really listen when someone tells us something hard?
Often because a real answer costs more than we planned to spend. We came prepared for "fine," not for a genuine need, and our attention looks for an exit because staying feels expensive. Naming that reflex honestly is the first step to overriding it.
How do I actually listen better when someone opens up to me?
Start smaller than "become a great listener." Just notice your own wandering attention the next time it happens, and gently bring your eyes and your posture back to the person in front of you. Staying present for one extra minute is more valuable than a perfect response.
Where can I watch Please Say Fine?
Right at the top of this page once it is live, or on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook at @pundayschool.