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I'm already glad I came. Thank
the Lord for the wonderful truth that we have, uh, we've just
heard. Let's keep our Bibles open in, uh, first Corinthians
chapter one. And let us, uh, let us look to
the Lord in prayer again. Father, we praise you, we bless
you for the rich truths that we've just heard. We beg you
that you would cause these truths and the ones that we will hear
throughout this weekend. Lord, please press them in upon
our hearts. Let them take good root there
and bear fruit for your glory. Bless our time now, both for
this speaker and the hearers. In Jesus' name, amen. So my text
is verse four of chapter, I'm sorry, verse five of chapter
one. that says that in everything ye are enriched by him, in all
utterance and in all knowledge. that in everything ye are, Corinthian
church and believers here tonight, enriched by him. The word enriched means to make
wealthy, that we are made wealthy by the grace of God. I was just
thinking as brother Bradley was finishing up there, and as he
said, that's lots of grace. And we're all made to chuckle
and say, that's so true. That's lots of grace. We easily
forget how rich and how wealthy that God has made us to be because
of what he's done for us and in us. So he says here that you're
enriched by him. He specifically mentions to the
Corinthian saints in all utterance and in all knowledge. The Corinthian
church, as you probably know, had some gifts that we don't
typically have today. But nevertheless, the principle
remains true that we are enriched in the knowledge of the gospel
of Jesus Christ. We are enriched in the word of
God that he's given to us. And for my task tonight is to
point out to us how rich that God has made us, how he has enriched
us by giving us the eyes of faith to see his beautiful wisdom. And so we want to read several
sections in chapter one and chapter two. So let's read in chapter
one, verse 18, starting out. And these verses will be no doubt
hit on again throughout this weekend. So one preacher won't
exhaust it all. For the preaching of the cross,
verse 18, the word of the cross literally is to them that perish
foolishness. But to us, which are saved, it
is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy
the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding
of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the
scribe? Where is the disputer of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For
after that in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not
God. It pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require
a sign and the Greeks seek after wisdom. but we preach Christ
crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block and unto the Greeks foolishness,
but unto them which are called both Jews and Greeks Christ,
the power of God and the wisdom of God. And then in chapter two,
verse six, Paul elaborating even further on this of this wisdom
of God says, how be it we speak wisdom among them that are perfect,
that are made perfect in Christ, that are made mature by the grace
of God giving them this wisdom. We speak wisdom among them that
are perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes
of this world that comes to naught or is coming to nothing. But
we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom,
which God ordained before the world unto our glory, which none
of the princes of this world knew, for had they known it,
they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it
is written, I hath not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered
into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them
that love him. But God hath revealed them unto
us by his Spirit. For the Spirit searcheth all
things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth
the things of a man, say the spirit of a man which is in him.
Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the spirit of God.
Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the
spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that
are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not
in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy
Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,
for they're foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them,
because they're spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth
all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. For who hath
known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have
the mind of Christ. So tonight, the thrust of this
message is to show us, again, that God has enriched his people. to see his perfect wisdom. And this wisdom is found, this
wisdom is associated with the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. This cross of Christ, which is
the power of God and is the wisdom of God. But in this passage,
as you can see, Paul is doing a contrast between two wisdoms,
the wisdom of this world and the wisdom of God. And so I want
to go through and just list several characteristics of the wisdom
of the world, the bad stuff, so that we can really, really
appreciate the good stuff, so that we can see how rich that
God has made us to be. And you know, it's true. I don't
know who all is here tonight. Every person here, I hope every
one of you is a lover of Christ and fully believes in him. But
whoever you are and wherever you are tonight, everybody here
and everybody in this world believes something. Everybody's operating
on some way through which they see life. through some how of
who human beings are and how we are to function and how we
relate to God and how that we should live. Everybody is living
by some wisdom and every wisdom that is not the cross of Christ
is a flawed wisdom, it's a wisdom of this world. There's only one
true wisdom and that is what God has given to us in the cross
of Jesus Christ. Everybody should embrace it,
as the passage says, but only those who God brings to faith,
gives eyes to see, opens their eyes up to see this wonderful
wisdom. So let's look and see some of
these characteristics of the wisdom of the world. First of
all, One characteristic of the wisdom of the world is this,
is that God is going to destroy it. In verse 19, he says, for
it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise. He calls it the wisdom of the
wise. The wisdom of the world, people
don't think they're foolish. They think they've got it together.
They think they can see and interpret life well. They're confident
in their view of things. But God says, the wisdom of the
world, I'm going to destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring
to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the
wise? Where is the scribe? Where's the disputer of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? In
chapter 2, verse 6, he speaks of the wisdom of the world that
is coming to naught, that's coming to nothing. There are lots of
ideas. There's lots of popular opinion.
In fact, in popular culture here is what happens all the time,
but we can see it very clearly in our day. There's some thought,
there's some philosophy, there's some idea, whether it be the
LGBT philosophy that we see so prominent today, whether it be
that there's many roads to God philosophy, whether it be you
can't judge me, you can't tell me what to do, I'm my own boss,
I'll live. All these philosophies, all these ideas, and here's how
it typically works in the wisdom of the world. It's like a snowball,
the proverbial snowball rolling down the hill. As it rolls down
the hill, what happens? It gets faster and faster and
bigger and bigger and more snow. In this case, people jump on
the bandwagon. Maybe there's some powerful corporation,
and they don't really believe what's being said, but they don't
want to lose their power and their clout, so they jump on. And then
there's an athlete, and he jumps on. He endorses whatever this
philosophy or idea is. And then a Hollywood star, some
popular person jumps on. And then a politician, he doesn't
really care. He just wants to keep his vote. So he jumps on.
And the snowball, and it takes millions, it takes so many. People
are saying, yes, this must be the way to think. This must be
the new idea, new freedom. And if we're not careful, it'll
jump us too, won't it? But let's remember what God says about
the wisdom of the world. It's like the snowball. As it
goes down the hill, it gets bigger and bigger, and it's rolling
faster and faster until, It hits a huge rock at the bottom of
the hill. And what happens? That huge snowball is now a billion
bits of snow, just snow powder. God is going to bring to nothing
the wisdom of this world. Somebody likened it one time
to like a cruise ship, that everybody on the fancy cruise ship is having
a wonderful time. There's lights, there's music,
there's dancing, there's great food. Everybody's having a great
time. What's wrong with that cruise
ship? Only one problem, it has a small leak and the ship is
slowly sinking and it's going to be submerged. Listen, the
wisdom of this world, it can be popular, it can have all the
lights, it can have all the glitz and glamour. My brothers and
sisters, it's going to end in eternal destruction. We have to see that. We have
to understand what he's saying here so that we will see how
blessed, how privileged we are that God has opened our eyes
to true wisdom. We see this wisdom of the world
is coming to nothing. God is going to destroy it. What
else? God's going to destroy this wisdom.
Well, also the wisdom of the world, it is a blinding wisdom. It's blinding. This is amazing,
in chapter two, when he says in verse six, we speak wisdom
among them that are perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world,
nor of the princes of this world that's coming to nothing. He
speaks in verse eight, he says, which none of the princes of
this world knew, they didn't know God's wisdom, for had they
known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. So he's speaking here about the
elites of Jesus' day. So, and perhaps, no doubt, the
Jewish leaders, the religious leaders, who knew the law, who
had the position, and they had the respect of the people, and
they had the titles and the clout. In our Bible study Wednesday
night at church, we were studying 1 Samuel, they're like the sons of Eli.
They were priests. but it says they knew not the
Lord. So these priests are going, they
can know about God, they know God's name. They know he doesn't
like sin, he requires sacrifices for it. They know all the outward
stuff, but they don't know the Lord. And so these same individuals
here, these princes of this world are maybe referring also to the
Romans who were literally on top of the world. They had conquered
and they had the command of the respect and admiration of so
many. but the wisdom of this world is blinding so that even
these elites could stand right in the presence of who the text
calls the Lord of Glory. the Lord of glory, who spoke
words of wisdom. He said, remember, the greater
than Solomon is here, Solomon's the wise one. Well, the greater
than Solomon is here, the wise one, the Lord of glory, and yet
they're so blinded by the wisdom of this world. Not an ignorant,
not an innocent ignorance, culpable ignorance, but they're blinded
to the point that they destroy the Lord of glory. The wisdom
of this world, God's gonna destroy it, It is blinding, and then
verse 14 of chapter two, it tells us this, that this wisdom of
the world is embraced by those who spiritually are incapacitated. Verse 14, the natural man, the
man who doesn't have the spirit, the man who does not have eyes
to see, he does not receive the things of the spirit of God,
for they are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them,
because they are spiritually discerned. So it's not just that
the natural man can't spiritually add two plus two. There are some,
they just can't get the concept. But it's not just that, because
there are some who can be like Eli's sons, they can know the
concepts, God's holy, he requires sacrifices, he doesn't like sin,
he has to have an atonement. There's people who don't know
the Lord who just have the wisdom of this world who can mentally
grasp aspects of the gospel. But the word receive here is
also, it's not just the idea of an intellectual reception,
it's also the idea, it's the word used of how you'd welcome
a guest into your home. So those who don't have the wisdom
of God, they don't want the wisdom of God. They have an appetite
that's biased to the wisdom of God. And so they were to say
to the cross of Christ, we don't want that. We don't desire that.
We don't want to be led by this wisdom. That's foolishness to
them. They can't know them. They can't
know and love the wisdom of God because it is spiritually discerned. Darkness, they're bound by the
love of sin and darkness. Think about that for a moment. Think about the low condition
that it is. Those who have only the wisdom
of this world, they can have great minds. I'm watching a documentary
right now called The Men Who Built America, fascinating about
Rockefeller and Vanderbilt and Carnegie. Men with ideas and
ingenuity and just the ability to take risks. These guys, they
were cutthroat, they were awful, morally speaking, but wow, impressive
men. They would get up, they had drive,
they had ambition, they had passion, they had creativity, they had
diligence, willing to make sacrifices, willing to take risks. But they're
incapacitated to the wisdom of the cross. The wisdom of the
cross to them is foolishness. What? Die to yourself? Victory
through death? Victory through suffering? A
Jesus who wins by dying? That's foolishness. You win by
getting ahead, by being on top. That's the wisdom of this world.
That's the wisdom of this world. The cross, not welcome here.
Jesus, not welcome here. But that's the wisdom of the
world. Look at what Paul says in verse 10. But God hath revealed
this wisdom to us by his spirit. And literally in the original
language, the words to us come first as emphasis saying, hey,
wait a second. They don't see it. They don't
embrace it. It's foolishness to them. But
then Paul says, wait a second. But to us, the privileged ones,
the blessed ones, the favored ones, through no merits or abilities
of our own, as Brother Bradley just preached, but to us, God
has revealed these things to us by His Spirit. He is saying,
look, Corinthian church, at how wealthy you are, that God has
shown you the wisdom of the cross. And they needed to see that,
because as you read 1 Corinthians, you see the Corinthian church,
they were very self-conscious. They desperately wanted, to be
impressive in the eyes of the world. They did. And even though
most of them weren't, because Paul said in chapter 1, not many
of you are wise and noble and mighty and all this. Most of
them were not in the upper echelons of society, but they wanted to
be seen as wise in the eyes of the world. They wanted to be
impressive. And Paul's saying, you don't need that. Why go down
that dead end road? You already have all that you
need as far as wisdom is concerned in the cross of Christ and what
he has given to you. So brothers and sisters, why
do I keep saying that? Sisters, bless their hearts.
Brother believers, Brother believers who love the Christ of the cross
and trust in his cross, you can see by the grace of God what
the elites of society in Jesus's day and today cannot see. Not
because you put the pieces together, not because you did your due
diligence, but because God in love and mercy by his spirit
opened your eyes to see this glorious wisdom And this wisdom,
again, is connected to the cross, and that'll probably be addressed
further in this meeting. Foolishness to the world, but
the power of God to those who were saved. See, the wisdom of
the cross tells us about the reality of sin. It tells us that
this life is not a playground. It tells us that God has authority.
It tells us that God is just and righteous. And it tells us
that we are lawbreakers. Because it took that, that kind
of suffering, that kind of wrath, that kind of judgment to make
sinful men right with a holy God. But the wisdom of the cross
tells us about what love, what grace, what generous mercy that
this holy God, at no obligation to himself outside of himself,
would come to earth and take on human flesh and would suffer
the penalty of God for His people to bring us to be right with
God. This wisdom of the cross shows us what love really is.
It shows us the reality of sin and grace and God's goodness.
It shows us the ugly fruits of rejecting God's wisdom. And it
shows us the precious fruits of what God has done for His
people in the Lord Jesus Christ. So we are enriched by him to
see this wisdom. Think about this. Take a step
back for a minute. In this text, in this whole text, what do we
see? We see God the Father who planned and sent his son. As
Brother Bradley already quoted verse 30 of chapter 1, but of
him But of God the Father are you in Christ Jesus, who of God
the Father has made to us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification
and redemption. So God planned it, the Father
planned it, and he ordered it, and he sent his Son. So you have
the Father on your behalf. And then you have the Son who
actually came and was crucified and went to the cross. And then
you have the Holy Spirit just showing out in this passage.
The Holy Spirit doesn't talk about Himself a whole lot, but
here He's talking about Himself. He's telling us about Himself. You have the
Spirit who's the teacher, who's the revealer, who's the communicator,
who's the one who enlightens us. Brothers, this is amazing. The Father is for us. The Son
is for us. And the Spirit is for us. So think about that if you're
like me, a father who knows you desperately need wisdom every
day to try to raise your children. That'll keep me going. The father's
for me, the son is for me, the spirit's for me. Think about
that in your marriage. Think about that single young
man who's trying to be faithful and pure and dedicate your singlehood
to the Lord. As you seek to live this life
faithfully and ordered according to God's word, look at the resources.
Look at how God's blessed us. The Father, the Son, and the
Spirit all for us, all working and have worked and will work
on our behalf. So we've seen the holes in the
wisdom of the world. God's going to destroy it. It's
blinding and it's embraced by those who can't see. They're
spiritually incapacitated but look at this text how it highlights
the preciousness and I'm excited this is beautiful preciousness
of the wisdom that God gives us well first of all it is a
wisdom verse 7 that is an ancient wisdom it's an ancient wisdom
verse 7 he sees of chapter 2 but we speak the wisdom of God in
a mystery even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the
world unto our glory. Listen, the wisdom of God in
the cross of Jesus Christ, it's not an overnight sensation. You
know, there's many things like that. A fad that come and people
jump on and then it's over, it's done. But this wisdom has been
around from all eternity. which before the world began
that God had ordained and laid out this plan of salvation, laid
out the wisdom of the cross by which he would make sinful men
right with God. It's an ancient wisdom. You know
what that tells me? It's stable. It's secure. It's unshakable. That's good. That's good. That's
valuable. That's precious to live in a crazy world and know
that this wisdom that God has revealed to me, it is ancient. It has eternal origins. It's
not going away. It's not fading away. It's not
going to lose its value. It will not lose its truth. It
came from God's heart. It came from God's mind. It came
from God's wisdom. in his plan. Well, what else? So it's a wisdom that has eternal
origins, it's ancient. But in that same verse seven,
it is a wisdom, my brothers, that will lead us to glory. A
wisdom that will lead us to glory. He says that the hidden wisdom
which God ordained before the world unto our glory. This wisdom, this ancient wisdom
that God ordained is gonna take us who were naked, and ashamed,
and condemned, and broken, and defiled, and it makes us just,
it makes us God's sons, it makes us clean, it makes us strong,
and it's gonna take us all the way to glory. Now the wisdom
of the world, I assure you, will provide you and I with all the
rationalizations for sin that we will take. The wisdom of this
world will pump us up and make us think much of ourselves. The
wisdom of this world will give us an out from following the
Lord anytime that we want, but this wisdom can't, that wisdom
of the world, it can't take us to glory. It just leads to ruin. It takes those that go with it,
it takes them to perishing. But this wisdom of God and the
cross of Christ and the truth of his word is gonna take us
all the way to glory. So it's ancient, it's gonna take
us to glory, But, as we've already alluded to, but I want to focus
on this, this is a wisdom that is revealed by the Holy Spirit. You hear what I said? Underline
that one, by the Holy Spirit. as we call him, the third person
of the Trinity. He opens our eyes to his gospel,
and he teaches us. Isn't that precious? Now I know
that I believe the gospel because somebody taught me the gospel.
I believe because God used people to teach me, and he uses instruments,
and we praise him for that. But listen, without the work
of the Spirit, we would not know. We would not embrace. But think
about the personal aspect of this. that at some point the
Holy Spirit came to little old Timothy, yes, and opened my ears
and opened my heart. And you, brother believer, He
came to you because He loved you. And He would open your eyes
to show you what Christ had done for you and lead you to trust
and believe and to embrace. The Spirit taught us these things.
Here again, Paul says, Brother Bradley mentioned all those times
God and Christ are mentioned in chapter one, I think the Spirit
is five times in this section. So he's saying the Spirit has
done this. Verse nine, I'm sorry, verse 10, but God hath revealed
this wisdom to us by his Spirit. For the spirit searches all things,
yea, the deep things of God. Paul's saying he's qualified.
He's capable. He's able to teach us God's wisdom.
For what man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of a
man which is in him. You don't know what I think unless I tell
you. Only my spirit knows what I'm thinking. He says, in like
manner, so the things of God knows no man but the spirit of
God. He knows. He's able to teach. Now we have
received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is
of God. that we might know the things that are freely given
to us of God, which things we speak not with man's wisdom,
he says, but which the Holy Ghost teaches, this personal teacher
who opens our eyes to the precious wisdom of God in the cross. So again, it's not just, it's
not because that we figured out the puzzle pieces, we did our
due diligence, we were smart enough, and we come to the conclusion. Yes, there are those who are
curious about the faith, and they study, and they search,
and they learn, and finally they come to believe. There's glorious
testimonies like that. But again, without the work of
the Spirit, they won't see, they won't know, they won't embrace,
they won't receive, they won't love. I love this word in verse
10, but God hath revealed them to us by His Spirit. The word
there, it literally means to uncover or to unveil. So you think about sometimes
when there's a great work of art that's done at the gallery,
and they're going to have the showing, and all the lights are
there, and the guests are there, and the people are there, and
they have the covering over the piece of art. or the sculpture, and
everybody's ready, and they're waiting, and they pull off the
curtain. They have the unveiling, and everybody's like, ooh, ah,
wow. That's a neat work of art. That's what the Spirit's done.
He's pulled the veil off. He says, look, wow, there's Jesus.
There's the Son of God. There's the Lamb of God. There's
the Redeemer. There's the Savior. Isn't it
good? He's revealed it. He's uncovered
it. He's unveiled it for us. Yes, we are enriched. We're enriched
by him to see, to know this wonderful wisdom. So what else about this
wisdom of God? It's ancient. It will take us
to glory. It's revealed to us by the Spirit
himself. But I love this as well in verse
12, that this wisdom reveals God's generosity towards us. Because he says in verse 12,
Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit
which is of God that we might know the things, get this expression,
that are freely given to us of God. God wants us to know. I think
it's one of the brothers prayed his love that he would save us
and then want us to have the assurance of that salvation.
that God wants us to know the things He's freely, gratuitously,
graciously given to us. So we think about He's given
us His Son. He's given us adoption into His
family. He's given us justification,
made us, declared us to be right. He gives us sanctification where
we're set apart. He gives us wisdom through His
Word. He equips us with tools to live in godliness and to grow
in this process of holiness. He gives us the equipping to
serve him and to serve others in his kingdom. And of course,
one day he's going to take us to glory. What is it? Again,
it's blessing upon blessing and mercy upon mercy that God the
Spirit opens our eyes to see. So this wisdom shows to us the
generosity of God. But then finally, This wisdom
equips us to discern. That's so valuable, isn't it?
So important. To be able to think how God would
have us to think. To be able to see and assess
and value how God would have us to see and assess and value.
Look, Proverbs means it when it says there are fools and there
are wise people, where there's foolish actions and then there's
wise actions. As you go through Proverbs, you
see, whoa, this author really means business. This foolishness
business is really bad. It's really destructive. He that
walketh with wise men shall be wise, the companion of fools
shall be what? Shall be destroyed. Wow, I need to pay attention.
This wisdom is more precious than rubies and diamonds and
all the rest that we find there in Proverbs. So this is a monumental
blessing that God would give to us the ability spiritually
to discern and value and judge and understand. He says that
in verse 15. He's contrasting it with 14,
the natural man can't discern it, can't see it. But he that's
spiritual, one in whom the spirit dwells, he judgeth all things.
The word judge, again, means to discern, to apprise, appreciate,
to value. So this man, he's spiritual,
he can judge all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
Paul's telling the Corinthians, don't worry about what the world
thinks. They can't judge a spiritual man rightly. Don't worry about
that. But you, in Christ, have the ability to discern and understand
spiritual things. When he means all things here,
he doesn't mean all things universally, that you're an expert in everything.
But he's telling us, because there's obviously a need to grow
and learn in discernment, but what he's telling us, again in
verse 16, he says, but we have the mind of Christ. That is that
when God the Spirit invades a sinner's life and brings them to know
and love our Lord, he equips that individual with the ability
to think and discern and apprise spiritually. Now, some of us
are in maybe one and a half grade in that, right? And some may
be in 10th grade and farther beyond. But tonight, Sometimes
we hear this and we understand this Brother Timothy, I can't
I can't think like you can because you're a preacher and you you
just you you're on a different track with God than me and I
just don't know very much and I the Bible's hard for me and
I'm sympathetic to all those things But brother don't sell
what the Lord has done in you short. I If the Lord dwells within
you, you may not understand everything in this book, but you're gonna
get some good stuff. And the more that you apply yourself,
and the more that you lean into that wisdom, and you apply yourself
to that wisdom, the more that God's gonna open it up to you,
and make you richer, and enable you to, through practice, through
training, through a process, to be able to discern, and think,
and understand more wisely. Is there anything we need more
in this world than well, mature, discerning brothers in Christ?
And God's equipped us for it. Yes, we're going to miss it sometimes.
Yes, we're going to fall short sometimes. But you have, believing
brother, what that elite of the world did not have. You have
what Carnegie didn't have. He had a lot of money, a lot
of steel, but apparently he didn't have this. But brother believer,
you got this. And so lean into this wisdom
and seek the Lord for more strength and apply yourself that you might
grow and learn and be able to discern more of these things
that God has freely given to you so that we might live and
walk through life under the wisdom of Christ crucified. See, if
we could live that way more faithfully, that's where we need to be, living
in light of the wisdom of Christ crucified, that the fruit of
sin will take me no good place. but Christ's grace and his mercy
has cleansed me and washed me and equipped me to live for his
glory. So through the gift of faith,
through the gift and the work of the Father and the Son and
the Spirit of the Lord within you, through all these things,
grow in discernment and lean into the scriptures and the word
of God, rejoicing in what God has given to you in this marvelous
rich gift of wisdom. In everything, he tells the Corinthian
saints, you are made wealthy. Brothers, you are made wealthy
through the work of God for you. Praise the Lord for this glorious
wisdom of the cross. Thank you for your attention.
Enriched By Him
Series 2020 Mens Conference
| Sermon ID | 39201333234050 |
| Duration | 33:20 |
| Date | |
| Category | Special Meeting |
| Bible Text | 1 Corinthians 1:5 |
| Language | English |
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