Robert Morris - Apostles
Alright. So we are beginning a new series called The Gifts of Jesus. And this is not to be confused with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. And yet there are many categories of gifts. So there are many that take these five and join them with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Now I want to say, most of you know this, but we believe fully in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, the person of the Holy Spirit, and the work of the Holy Spirit. So this is not to minimize the gifts of the Spirit at all, but these five are gifts of Jesus. And many, many people don't know that Jesus himself gave these gifts, and it actually follows up on Pastor Josh's series, to humanity, is the the Greek word here, to humanity, or to mankind. Jesus himself gave these gifts and they're in Ephesians 4.
So we're going to go through them: apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, teacher. But what we're going to talk about is, How does an apostle help me? How does a prophet help me? How does an evangelist help me? In other words, Why did Jesus give you these gifts? This series, let me give you the story of how this series came about, the burden for it. We have some friends that we went to high school with that we've reconnected with and we just have a blast with them. And we get together normally every Memorial Day weekend and talk during the year when we can. And one of them, he's a great, great, great guy. He sent an email to five friends and very, very honest and with a good spirit, very good spirit. And just said, "Why do I need a pastor"? And he said, "I've been trying to read the Bible, study the Bible on my own".
And he's been a believer for years but he was just admitting that, "Hey, I don't know everything and I see deacons in the Bible. I see elders. I even see overseers, but why do I need a pastor? I grow. I read the Word. I study. I pray. I have friends that speak into my life. My wife speaks into my life. I'm just wondering, scripturally, why do I need a pastor"? And so I called him and said, "Hey, I want to answer your question, but I want to use humor. I want to joke with you a little bit, if that's okay". And he said, "Absolutely, go for it". So I said, "Well, you're asking the wrong person this question. You should be asking Jesus because Jesus is the one who gave the gift of a pastor. So you ought to ask Jesus, 'Why did you give me this gift?' And the other thing is, you might want to tell him". I said, "Can I joke a little further with you"? He said, "Yes". I said, "You might want to tell him that you want to return one of gifts. That after your study of the Bible, this one doesn't apply".
And he didn't, you know, I'm just joking with the guy 'cause I know him so well. I've known him since high school. Jesus just missed it on this gift. So it's obviously a joke. And then I explained to him that Ephesians 4 actually tells us why he gave us these gifts. And so that's what we're going to look at during this series. Let me just show you Ephesians 4, verse 8. It says, "Therefore He says: 'When He ascended...'" and this He is capitalized, referring to Jesus. "'When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.'" "He" is the subject. He ascended. He led captivity captive, referring to the Old Testament saints, and He gave gifts to men. So these are the gifts of Jesus. These are the only five gifts we're told He gave to men. And this word for men here is humanity. And then look at verse 11, "And He, Himself gave..." He Himself gave, Jesus Himself gave "some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers". And then verse 12 tells us why, "for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry".
So the reason he gave us these gifts are for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry. Now I'm one of these gifts. I don't know if you've ever thought about that but I just want you to know I am a gift from Jesus to you. And you can't return me, okay? Now, but here's the thing. As a saint, as a believer in Christ, I do the work of the ministry. But as a pastor, I equip you to do the work of the ministry. In other words, when you say, "I have a friend who's going through some marriage problems. Pastor, will you talk to them"? Yes, I do have some experience in that area. There are a lot of people who have more experience and are much better at marriage counseling than I am. But that's something you can do. You can be equipped to help people in their marriage. And sometimes they do need professional help.
You can... "Pastor, I have a friend who needs to accept Christ. Will you lead him to Christ"? What I'd rather do is equip you to lead people to Christ. You see what I'm saying? So as a saint. I can lead people to Christ. But as a pastor, I equip you to lead people to Christ. Are you all following me? So that's what we do. So I asked my friend, I said, "Okay, let me give you an example. So this is what pastors will do, they equip, this is what all five of them do, they equip the saints for the work of the ministry". So I said to him, "Do you listen to my messages? Have you ever listened to any of my messages"? He said, "We listen nearly every week on television". I said, "Okay, have any of my messages helped you"? And he said, "They've all helped me tremendously". I said, "That's because I'm an equipper. That's because I'm gifted by God".
And of course, all of us have gifts. All us have gifts, but we have to develop a skill even in those gifts. I'm gifted by God, called by God, and I've developed my skill to equip you. So that's why. Let me just... There's one reason why you need a pastor. Because pastors equip people for the work of the ministry. And I said, "Now you might be asking this question, you might not, but some people would ask this question. 'Why do I need a pastor?'" Because there are some bad pastors, and there are some abusive pastors. There are some pastors who want to be, who want to Lord over you. Jesus even said, "We're not like that. We don't Lord it over people. I came to serve, not to be served and you need to do the same thing. The greatest is the servant". So he was saying, servant leadership.
Now listen to me, we need servant leaders, but let say another way. We need leaders but we don't need lords because we already have a Lord. So you don't need a Lord. You don't need me to be your Lord but you do need me to be your leader. And that doesn't mean that... I'm not your lord. I don't boss you around. Don't tell you what you do. But I do lead you to learn how to hear the Holy Spirit and make godly decisions on your own. Are you following me? With godly counsel. That's what pastors do. So let's talk about how apostles help us 'cause we'll get to pastors in the fourth week. Let's talk about apostles. And so the title of the message today, Apostles, okay? So we're going to talk about apostles. First of all, you need to know there are more than 12. That's a common misunderstanding in the church, "the 12 apostles".
Let me just kind of blow it away early because some will say, "Well, the apostles were sent by Jesus". The only problem with that is that one of them betrayed him. So now they're only 11 and they say, "Well, Paul took his place because he was sent by Jesus". And we're going to talk about Paul. Paul was an apostle but let me just show you where the apostles first came from, alright? In Luke 9, verse 1, "Then he called..." I just want you to notice the word called because we're going to talk about the difference between being called and being sent here in a moment. "Then He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases. He sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick".
Now this word "sent" is the verb for apostle. It's apostello. The noun is apostolos which is an apostle, a person. But the verb, and the verb means send. So he sent them. And again, this is the verb for the noun, apostle, okay? Everyone got that? So he sends them, and then in verse 10, it says, "And the apostles..." Let me say it another way, the sent ones. I just need to stop for a minute. So apostle means,this is what it means in the Greek, a person sent with a message. That's what it means. A person sent with a message. And it comes from a verb which means to send. Alright? "And the apostles," verse 10, the sent ones, "when they had returned told Him all that they had done". Okay, so there are 12 of them, right? Alright. The only problem is then Luke 10. "After these things the Lord appointed 70 others also," And apostello them. Sent them. Same word. "...two by two before His face into every city and place where he went".
Okay. So there weren't just 12. The very next chapter, he appointed 70 other "sent ones," and sends them. Apostles. Here's my question. Are you a sent one? Are there some people that God would like to send you to minister to? So that's why we want to talk about apostles because they send us. I took some business leaders to Israel a few years ago and I told them, "You guys are apostles in the business world". In other words, God has sent you to the business world. Now you're not apostles in that you don't equip others to be sent. That's what God's called me to do. But you are sent ones. Every one of you are sent. You might be sent to educators because that might be your field. You might be sent to medical workers. You might be sent to construction workers. You might be sent to engineers. I don't know where you're sent. You might be sent... You are sent, I can tell you this, to your neighborhood.
An apostle is a person sent by Jesus with a message. And if you don't think you've been sent by Jesus just read the great commission. He's sending us all, but apostles help us to be sent. Now, is there a process between being called and being sent? I have a lot of people that don't understand that there's a process. There was even a process with God's own son, Jesus. And Josh hit it in the first message, "The Humanity of Jesus". He was a carpenter until he was 30. Is it possible he made crutches when he was a carpenter for people he could have healed. Is it possible he was a, I was thinking about people who have died on the next one. Is it possible he made caskets for people he could have healed? See, for 30 years he didn't do a miracle. What was God doing? The Bible says he was learning obedience during that time as a human. obviously he was fully divine and fully human, as Josh pointed out, but he was learning things. So there was a process even for Jesus. So there's a process between the call and the send.
And so many people will say to me, "Pastor Robert you just don't understand, I have a call on my life". What I want to say is, "You don't understand. Everybody has a call on their lives". It doesn't matter to me what your call is. I'd like to know, have you been sent? Have you gone through the process to have the authority to function in your call, because the process develops you to fulfill the responsibility of the call and the process... The call is the the what and the where and the to whom, but the send is the authority and the anointing to minister in that area. And God develops a process in your life for that. So, I'll give you a couple examples. Abraham was called at 75 to be the father of many nations, but he wasn't sent until he was a hundred. Isaac wasn't born until he was a hundred. By the way, the temptation between the call and the send is to produce the call in the flesh.
Now that was better than you thought. You don't have to applaud. That's just better than you thought. God called him to be a father when he was 75. He wasn't sent till he was a hundred, but when he was 86, he and Sarah figured out how to produce the call in the flesh. Moses was called to be a deliverer to Israel at birth, actually. But he wasn't sent until he was 80 years old. And at 40, he decided to produce the call in the flesh. As a matter of fact, he was so arrogant he decided that he could deliver Israel one Egyptian at a time. And then God says, "You're not ready". So he sends him to a desert to herd sheep for 40 years. And then when God shows up and says to him, "Now you go deliver Israel from Egypt". Remember what Moses said? "I can't talk". Well, you wouldn't be able to talk either if you'd been talking to sheep for 40 years. And here's what God said when Moses said, "I can't do this". God said, "Now you're ready". 'Cause at 40, you thought you could do it on your own. But now you'll know that I'm the one doing it through you.
Alright, so what I want to do is look at one of, I want to look at what we believe as theologians the preeminent apostle of the New Testament, who was not one of the 12, and that's Paul. And we know he was an apostle. A third of the time the word apostle is used in the New Testament, it's referring to Paul. There's no doubt he was an apostle. Just one verse, Romans 1:1. "Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle..." I'm going to show you when he was called and when he was sent. In Acts 9 is when he got saved. That's when he was called. And this is what God told Ananias, who laid hands on him and prayed for him to receive his sight, this is what God told him to say. "But the Lord said to him, 'Go, for he is a chosen vessel of Mine to bear My name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel.'"
There's the what and the where and the when. I mean, and the whom he was going to do it. This is what I've called him to do, where I've called him to do it, and to whom he's going to do it, but the when wasn't yet. Alright, so, there are three things, you all knew I'd have three, there are three things that you need to develop in your life to be able to fulfill the call that's on your life. In other words, to get to where the Holy Spirit can send you. Alright? Here's number one: Relationship. Relationship. Acts 9, and we're looking at the life of Paul. Acts 9, right after Paul gets saved, verse 26. And he was called Saul until he was called Paul. "And when Saul had come to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples; but they were all afraid of him and did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the..." sent ones, or to the people who equip others to be sent, to the apostles. "And he declared to them how he had seen the Lord on the road and that He had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus. So he was with them at Jerusalem, coming in and going out".
How long was he with them coming in and going out? How long was he building relationship? Well, let me say another way. How long did it take the preeminent apostle of the New Testament to go from his calling to his sending? He was called in 34 A.D., one year after Christ was crucified. Some say four years, say he was crucified in 29 A.D., which I actually believe that because he was born in 4 B.C., and we've talked about that. But the point is, a few years after Christ resurrected. He was called in 34 A.D. He was sent in 48 A.D. 14 years. It took the preeminent apostle 14 years. Hey, it took Jesus 30 years. This is going to be, this is a process God's taking you through. That doesn't mean you don't minister to people during the process because you're saints, and we all minister to people, and we're all witnesses, and Paul even did some preaching during this time. But in Acts 9 he's called, in Acts 13 he's sent, and there's 14 years between.
Now, relationship is so important to your calling and to you being able to fulfill your call. It's very important. Let me just show you something. This is the way sometimes we have to hire people. In our company, your business, your organization, sometimes in the church, we have to look outside instead of raising up from within. Sometimes it just has to be done. But this is what happens, and I want to show you this process, alright? The first thing we give this person when we hire this person is a position, and with that position comes authority. That's the first thing we give them. Okay, you're hired to be this manager, and you have this amount of authority. Now with that position authority comes responsibility. We hope he or she can fulfill that responsibility, and the next thing, we hope we can trust them. We hope we can trust them. And we hope that we'll have time to develop a relationship with them, but we probably won't because we'll both probably be too busy.
This is the way most people are hired, are given authority in companies, churches, businesses, all over, even volunteers. We give them a position that has authority with it. They have responsibility. We hope we can trust them. And we hope that we can build a relationship with them. Now, by the way, I got this from Pastor Olen years and years ago at Shady Grove Church. When he put it on the board, it was so eye opening for me. But the Bible actually turns this process around. The Bible says, the first thing I want you to do is develop a relationship with them. As you develop a relationship with them, you learn to trust them or not to trust them. Everyone understand that? Some of 'em you learn not to promote, not to trust. But if you learn to trust them, then you give them some responsibility, and if they fulfill that responsibility, then you give them a position. And with that position, God gives them authority, 'cause authority comes from God. Are y'all with me?
This is the way. Relationship is so important. I was thinking about, Pastor Thomas has been here 21 years. We started 22 years ago. Pastor Todd, 20 years. Pastor Tom Lane, Kevin Grove, I've known for 30 years. Pastor Steve Dulin for 30, over 30 years. But pastor Olen, 40 years. Pastor James Robinson, who's one of our apostolic elders, Pastor Olen is one of our apostolic elders,40 years. These are people I've known. I built relationship them. They know me. They can speak into my life, I speak into their life. Listen to this scripture, I love this scripture. Proverbs 27:17, "As iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend". In other words, of someone he's in relationship with. Now this word countenance does mean face, but it goes deeper than that. It means your personhood or your character, your personality. It means what's going on inside of you that causes your face to look like it looks. Your countenance. In other words, if your personhood, your soul is sad, your face is sad. If you're excited, your face is excited. And your personhood is made up of the experiences that you have had in life so far.
So let me say another way. If you were bullied as a child, and you haven't been healed of that yet, and Jesus is the only one that can heal you, but you haven't been healed of that yet, and he uses the Word, and he uses counselors. There are people who have the gift, a gift to help you get through these things. But if you haven't been healed of it, when you're given authority, you'll be a bully. But the people who can help you with it are people you're in relationship with. And as iron sharpens iron... You know, I was thinking about the over 30 years how Steve Dulin and I have spoken in each other's lives, and he's helped me, and I've helped him. But it's because we have relationship. So you will never fulfill the call of God on your life and be sent, be a sent one, until you first develop relationship with some people that can help you.
Here's the second thing you need to develop: Stewardship. Now I'm not talking about money, okay? We will talk about money a little bit because that's part of it, but I'm going to talk about other areas of stewardship. Acts 11, verse 27, "And in these days prophets came..." Now remember, Paul got saved in Acts 9. This is Acts 11. "And in these days prophets came from Jerusalem to Antioch. Then one of them, named Agabus, stood up and showed by the Spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout all the world, which also happened in the days of Claudius Caesar. Then the disciples, each according to his ability..." That's the way we give, by the way. "...determined to send relief to the brethren dwelling in Judea".
Now I just need to say something I didn't say earlier. We're obviously already helping refugees from Ukraine. Obviously. We have in place church partners that do this. If you want to know how you can be involved you can go to our website, alright. But we're already doing that. When a crisis happens in the world, by the time you see it on whichever news channel you watch, Gateway church is already on the way. That's just normal for us, okay? So we're already there, so. And if you ever want to give to it, great. That's fine. I don't want any begrudging givers, but if you want to give, then you can, but each according to ability. That's the way we give. Okay. Verse 30 says, "This they also did and sent it", same verb in the Greek for to be an apostle, "to the elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul".
Now, here's what I want you to notice. This was their first task given to them by the elders of the church, or the leadership of the church. But it wasn't to go preach a citywide crusade. It was to carry a bank bag from one city to another city. See, if you can't be faithful in little things, you can't be faithful in much. And Barnabas and Saul were considered teachers at the time, not apostles yet, teachers, and they also said, and stay and teach the people something. And they stayed for a year. So this is part of it. It has to do with more than money, but it has to do with money. You know, when Elaine started dating Ethan, you know some of them were standing around joking about it, at the Young Adults after the service, and they got to joking about what's it like to date the pastor's daughter? And one of 'em said, "Your dad is so serious about tithing", they said this to Elaine, "I'll bet he even checks the tithing records of the guys that want to date you". And my daughter said, "he does". And I did.
Why would I give my daughter to a man to steward who can't even steward money? I mean, that's the easiest thing to steward. I mean, that's, it's dollars and cents, they add up. Two plus two, always equals four. If you make four, you can't spend five. It's the... Please tell our government that somebody, please. So it's, that is the easiest thing to steward is money. And because you can, it's math, it's just that easy. And you say, "I'm not good at math". Well, a lot of us are. We can help you, okay? We can tell you, if you make $4000 a month, you can't spend $5000 You know, that's just simple math. Alright, so that's easy, but I want to tell you three things about the assets that God gives us all to steward: money, time, and energy. And I just want to give you a little wisdom about them, alright.
So first of all is money. He gives us all money to steward. Alright? As you get older, you get more money, I hope. In other words, hopefully you're making more in your 50s than you were in your 20s, hopefully. If you're not, contact us, we'll help you, okay. But hopefully you are. So God gives us, so you're to steward money, and you've got to get really good at it because you're going to have more one day. Alright? The second thing we're to steward, the second asset is time. What you need to know about time is it's the same for everyone. You never get more time. Now, as you make more money, it seems like you have less time actually. People say, "I want to make more money, so I'll have more time with my family," and it works the opposite, because you also have more responsibility. So you actually have to steward your time better the more you make. You all are getting real quiet. Some of you don't believe me, just let it happen to you, 'cause the more you make, the more you work many times, and you think, "The less I'll have to work," but it's not right. It's the more responsibility you have, unless you steward your time well.
So I just want you to understand that time, every one of you, I don't care how rich or how poor you are, you only have 24 hours a day. Nobody has more time or less time. Everybody has the same. The third thing is energy. It's the third asset God gives you to steward. You have to steward your energy. Now I hate to tell you this, but as you get older, you will have less. Less, so you won't be able to do as much in your 60s that you did in your 30s or 40s. You won't have as much energy as you did. So you have to adjust this. I've been pretty good, most of my life, stewarding money, resources. I've made a lot of mistakes in stewarding time and energy, because I didn't realize that as my responsibilities got bigger, that my time seemed to get less. It didn't get less, it was this same, but I didn't realize my responsibilities got more, which meant I had to do... And I didn't realize as I've gotten older than my energy got less.
So that's just a little about stewardship. But is there any area of your life that you're not stewarding well? Because if there is, it can affect your calling and your sending. One thing I've been very honest with you guys about is another thing I've not stewarded well is eating and exercising. When it comes to eating, I love Blue Bell. I have a relationship with it, a long-term relationship. You know, when I got out of the hospital a few years ago, I think it was the CEO or the president, or one of the high executives, sent me 52 coupons for a half gallon each of Blue Bell, so I could have a half gallon a week to recover. So, and I, by the first time I could speak at staff chapel, I thought, "I don't need 52, and plus I can afford my own Blue Bell, but this could be a blessing to our staff". We have 600 paid staff full-time, 700 part-time, so 1,300 of them. So I took the 52 coupons, and I put 'em down here on the stage, everybody's sitting out there, and I said, "You can have one per person, one per family in essence, so not five if you have a family of five, one per family". And I said, "I'm just going to step over to the side, and the first 52..." It was like hogs at the trough.
And there were a few fights, just to be honest with you. Just, just, okay, I'm just joking with you, alright. But you got to learn to steward. Debbie and I now have, we used to ride bikes, 'cause I like to do things in the outdoors. I've never been good at indoor exercise. I just don't care for it. I don't care to watch the news while I'm doing, you know. I'll watch sermons if I have to do something indoors. But we used to have these bikes, and now we don't. But we went a few months go and bought electric bikes. Have you heard of these? They're the greatest thing in the world. But you have to pedal, so you do get some exercise, but there's four speeds, so you can keep it on a lower speed, so you have to work harder. But if there's a hill, you can put it on turbo. It's great going up a hill, and riding past those arrogant bike riders with the yellow shirts, you know, all just...
So I like turbo. So we did go riding a while back, and I got down to one bar, and the batteries have done so well, they said, "Try to get it down as low as you can before you charge the battery". We were about two miles from home, and the battery ran out. And so that will never happen again. But okay, so here's the third area you need to steward: Leadership. Leadership. Look at Acts 13:2, Acts 13. This is when Paul's finally sent. "And as they ministered to the Lord and fasted", now that's the leadership of the church, "the Holy Spirit said, 'Now'", remember the send is the when, "'Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.'" He called Saul 14 years before. And then verse 3, "Then, having fasted and prayed, they laid hands on them, and they sent them", apostello, "away". The verb. "So, being sent by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia, and from there they sailed to Cyprus".
I want you to notice something, the leadership sent them, laid hand and sent them, and the Bible says, "So, being sent by the Holy Spirit". Now please hear me. This really follows up on Josh's, Pastor Josh's message last week. And we didn't talk about what we were going to preach, you know, but apparently we're talking to the same person. So you need to know from the Holy Spirit, he's saying something about being committed to your church. He's saying something. The preeminent apostle of the New Testament was committed to the local church, and he was committed to leadership, servant leadership. And because he was sent by the leadership of the church, the Bible tells us he was sent by the Holy Spirit. Is that incredible? Because he was sent by the leadership, he was sent by the Holy Spirit. So God wants to send you. And listen to this, God wants to send you somewhere he wants you to go, to do something he wants you to do, to minister to someone he wants you to help. He wants to send you to somewhere he wants you to go, and something he wants you to do, and there's someone he wants you to help. But will you develop some character qualities in your life, so that when you step into the call of God, you have the character to support the sending, or the anointing of God?
Years ago, there's a guy that I'm not going to tell you his name, because you would know the name of the company, but there's a guy that owns a national and international company. It's a hunting company, so if you're not involved in hunting or sports, you might not know it. But if you were involved in sporting, you would know this company. It's the leader in this particular area of hunting supplies. And the Lord just spoke to me one day and said, "I want you to pray for this man, want you to pray for this founder and CEO of this company". So I started praying for him. Well, a few years later, Franklin Graham introduced us to each other, and we started texting and calling, and sending pictures, you know, between each other and things like that.
About a year ago, he texted me, he said, "My wife and I watched you on television this morning, and I just felt like we ought to ask for prayer and help, because a month ago we lost our 35-year-old son to cancer". And you know, it just breaks your heart when you hear something like that. But immediately I thought about a couple in our church that lost a grown son as well, and that minister to other people now. And so I called him and said, I told him about him, and I said, "This is a business guy, too, and he owns a ranch and he's a hunter as well. And he has some of your products, but they lost their son a few years ago. Can I hook you up"? And you can't imagine how many times he's texted me and said, "Thank you. They have helped us more than anybody".
Here's what I want to tell you, is you may be even going through some things right now that are really difficult. But God could be using those things so that one day he can send you to help someone. This is why we need apostles, because apostles equip us to be sent with a message. I want to ask you to bow your heads and close your eyes. So every weekend we ask the Holy Spirit, "What are you saying to me"? I talked about relationship.
You know, are you really developing deep relationships through the church especially, through a small group, strong believers who can help you? We talked about stewardship, and again, that doesn't just involve money, but it does, it includes it, but are you really learning how to steward your time, your energy, your resources, so that you can steward more responsibility when the Lord gives it to you? And we talked about leadership. I hope you haven't been hurt by bad church leadership, but maybe you have. I want to see you healed, so that you can trust, and really belong to a church, and trust the leadership, even though they're humans, but trust that the Holy Spirit's going to lead that church to help you, and to minister to you, and to equip you to be sent. So let the Holy Spirit speak to you whatever he wants to speak to you through this message.
Lord, I want to tell you thank you for the gifts of Jesus. I tell you thank you that you gave us these five gifts, and I pray, Lord, that as we look at these five gifts over the next few weeks, that you will show us how you are trying to equip us, so that we can minister to others, in Jesus' name, amen.