but it's a rhetorical question. It's a good question for a pastor to ask his people. It's also a good question that a pastor asks himself. Have you ever had one of those weeks? Months, years even. Have you ever had one of those weeks? You felt like an absolute, miserable failure. spiritually and perhaps in every other way imaginable. Have you ever had one of those weeks? A lot of saints here this morning. There's even more sinners today. I thank God that this text was next up in our study of 1 Kings. It's a story of grace to as I say there in the title, soul-crushed saints. Notice, grace to soul-crushed saints. I didn't say sinners. We normally would think, oh, it's a good sermon title, pastor. Grace to soul-crushed sinners. Brought a sinner this morning to church with me who needs to hear about God's grace, but the story teaches us that there's even grace to saints. Do you believe that? God in his grace is gracious and good to you, to you, saints. And so we see here in 1 Kings 19 this morning, you see that little theme there I gave you on that sermon notes page, that even saintly prophets of old who performed mighty miracles felt depressed, despondent, and disillusioned. when the Lord didn't seem to grant success. We just read about that in the prophet Jonah as well. And in this we see a shadow of the Messiah who would identify with us and be a man of sorrows so that we, you, might experience the outpouring of God's amazing grace, amen? So even saintly prophets of old who performed mighty miracles felt depressed, despondent, and disillusioned when God the Lord didn't seem to grant them success. Elijah. Elijah. When you think of the Old Testament, there's Moses and Elijah. The law, Moses, the prophets, Elijah. When Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration in Matthew's Gospel, chapter 17, the disciples, Peter, James, and John went up with him and Jesus was transfigured. They saw a vision of his glory. His divine glory. And who appeared on that mountain? With Jesus. Moses and Elijah. Moses and Elijah. But Elijah, the great prophet of all, the saint himself, the mighty worker of wonders, needed grace when his biggest hopes came crashing down. The story begins with King Ahab telling his wonderful wife Jezebel, saintly, godly wife Jezebel, all that Elijah had done. Notice how he killed all the prophets with the sword. Note the emphasis there in verse one, the word all appears twice. All that he did, all the prophets. All that he did and how he killed all the false prophets of Baal, Baal and Asherah. Ahab, remember last Sunday from the story before, Ahab crumbled before the word of the prophets and the people all confessed when they saw the fire of God himself consuming the offering that Elijah had poured out, had slayed and put out on the altar and he filled it, this moat he built with water, he drenched the sacrifice, the prophets of Baal, 850 of them, they prayed, they chanted, they cut themselves, they danced, they did all they could to get their God to bring down fire from heaven to consume an offering. That God didn't, our God did, not by Elijah's mighty things and not by his many words and his eloquent prayers, but just by simply praying. And the people, when they saw God, they confessed. We saw the Lord is God, Yahweh is God. And the false prophets of Baal and Asherah were eliminated. It seemed like a revival. It seemed like a revival. The people who had been serving Baal, who had been worshiping false gods, who had been serving and following after a wicked queen and her husband, the king, they seemed to have been revived in an instance. The Lord is God. But you see, the sea of the serpents wouldn't go down without a fight. Jezebel sent a messenger to find Elijah, and this messenger recounts to him the oath that the queen took. So King Ahab has crumbled, and he's just telling her, this is what, can you believe this? Elijah has caused the people to repent and trust the Lord, and all of our prophets are dead. So she takes an oath, she swears an oath. So may the gods do to me, meaning may they kill me like you've killed my prophets, and more also, If I don't make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow. Hold up on that revival. Hold up on that mass conversion, not so fast. Now our text tells us something interesting here in verse number three. This is one of the, it's the opening words there, then he was afraid. This is the ESV translation, then he was afraid. Our text is something here that, it makes it a little bit necessary just for a moment or two to comment on the text, on the Hebrew text that's here. It's an important, there's an important variant reading here that leads us to see what it means. So, verse three. It either begins, and or then he was afraid. Or, and or then, that's the translation of one little letter, either and or then. So then he was afraid, and he was afraid. Or it could be translated as then or and he saw. The reason for that is this verb that's being used here, it looks, There's two different ways it can be taken because it looks the same. And he saw is a Hebrew verb, vayar. And he was afraid, vayira. They look close and they sound close. Now, one problem with translating it and taking it the way of some translations, and he saw, is that there's no object to the verb. And he saw. Well, what did he see? We're not told. The next thing we read, he rose, he ran for his life. So if it's taken as and he saw or then he saw, not telling us what he saw, he rose, he ran away for his life. This is the most difficult reading of the passage. It's the most difficult reading of In fact, one Jewish commentator, because it is a difficult reading, says that it's a meaningless reading. It makes no sense. It makes no sense. But if we take it as the ESV here, then he was afraid, it does make some sense. He was afraid, then he arose, then he ran away for his life. but translated as and he saw so if you have like a king james bible uh brother johnny got your king jimmy this morning no it's in your head right The King James and older translations, the most ancient Hebrew manuscripts say, and he saw, and he saw. It's a more ancient and it's a more difficult reading. Again, because there's no object to the verb, and he saw, and it kind of doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense. But copies of documents, copies of ancient documents usually make things easier. not harder, so it would make more sense to say that they sort of smoothed it out and say he was afraid versus making it, which is easier, he was afraid, he arose, he ran for his life. But to make, to miscopy something, to make it sound like he saw something, then he arose and ran for his life, that would be more difficult. Elijah, brothers and sisters, Elijah, the reason why I mention this is that Elijah isn't afraid of Jezebel any more than he was afraid of Ahab. He stood before the king and said, gather everybody up, bring your prophets. We're gonna have a little contest here about the gods. But he saw in the aftermath, what he saw was that she, the Queen Jezebel, and more importantly, the king, wasn't gonna go along with what the Lord had just done. So he saw, and we infer that he saw and he heard this report, and he sort of metaphorically saw all that was going to happen. And he got up from where he was, and he ran for his life, not out of fear, but out of a feeling that everything he hoped for, everything he prayed for, everything he worked for to get the people to confess the Lord was God, all of it came crashing down. He's not afraid in the story ever. Elijah is a prophet who proclaims the word of the Lord. And so he saw, it's a more difficult reading, but he saw what was going on, he inferred what was about to happen, he arose, he ran for his life. In other words, again, he's not afraid of her, but he sees what's going on and he has this feeling of complete disillusionment. His life has come crashing down. None of us can identify that, right? the feelings of our biggest dreams, our biggest hopes, biggest prayers come crashing down. You've prayed big prayers, you've dreamt big dreams, you've hoped big hopes, but God isn't making it happen. And so he runs for his life. Yet, as we'll see, God's grace To this soul-crushed Saint, Elijah was right there with him. Just like when we pray, when we labor, when we hope, when we dream and God doesn't give the thing that we've prayed for and we seemingly worked for, God is just right there with you too, amen? God in his grace is with us just as he was with Elijah. We'll see that. Secondly, notice Elijah needed grace when his life felt meaningless. He needed grace when his life felt meaningless, just like he did when all of his biggest hopes came tumbling and crashing down. So he's fleeing for his life in the story here. And he's going from the northern kingdom down to Beersheba, which belongs to the region, the tribe of Judah, way down in the south of the Promised Land. And then verse 4 says, he goes even further south, a day's journey out into the wilderness. So kids, the wilderness, right? This is like going out to the desert to go on a camping trip. You've got to bring water with you because there's typically, if you just go out in the middle of nowhere, you're not going to find a faucet. You're not going to find water bottles for sale out there in the wilderness. This is a place of desolation. It's a place of heat. It's a place of death. And so as like a wasteland out there in the wilderness, as far as he possibly can get, He sits down, verse four says, under a broom tree, and he asks God, like we just read from Jonah, that he might die. It's enough, he says. Now, O Lord, take my life, for I'm no better than my father's. He's done his duty, comes to realize his own human frailty and weakness. He's done no better. than his fathers. He's done no better than those who've gone before him. He's done no better than Moses. He's done no better than the prophets before him. He's done no better than any of them. Lord, I've done my job. You've called me to preach. I've preached. I did it with boldness. I stood before the king. I told him to get all the prophets together, I put on this challenge, and you answered the call, and you consumed the offering, and then you, through my hands, put all these false prophets to death. The people confess that you're God, and now it means nothing. That's what he's saying here. Now it means nothing. Such is the life of the preacher, the prophet of God's word. Like Isaiah, to come, Elijah heard the call of God. Whom shall I send? And who will go for us? And Elijah has stood up and said, I will go. Here am I, send me. Elijah heard the voice of God. He heard the call of God. He heeded the call of God. He's heard the word of God. He's proclaimed it. But not everybody listens. The prophet Isaiah would go on to say this in Isaiah 6. Go and say to this people, Keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of those people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed. Again, even saintly prophets of old who performed mighty miracles felt depressed, despondent, disillusioned. when the Lord didn't seem to grant success, loved ones. But in this, we see a shadow of Jesus, right? So it's, humanly speaking, this is just depressing, it's bad news. But in that, we see Jesus. The Messiah was going to come who would identify himself with us as human beings, and he would be, as the prophet would say, a man of sorrows acquainted with grief, why? The Messiah would come in a greater way and he would identify himself with us as human beings, he would identify himself with you. With you, saints, with you. When you feel depressed, when you feel despondent, when you feel disillusioned, your Savior has come to identify with that, to feel your weaknesses, to be tempted as you are in every single way that you can possibly be tempted, Why? So that you, as a saintly sinner, a sinful saint, might experience grace. As Jesus would say, the Gospel of Matthew, a prophet is not without honor. Prophets are honored, except in his hometown and in his city. in his own household. Again, such is the life of the prophets, the proclaimer, the preacher of the word. He hears the call, he heeds the call, he hears the word, he preaches the word, but it's never good enough. Yet, yet, it's God's means. Preaching the word is God's method to save sinners or to harden sinners, amen? This is the main, this is the method. This is how God works. Humanly speaking, it's utterly disappointing and brings disillusionment and despondency. We pray for our children. They wander away, they stray, they fall. When are they gonna come back? We just be faithful to the word. We just give ourselves to God. because that's his means and his method to bring sinners to their knees or to harden their hearts. Back to our story, Elijah, we read in verse five, he lay down and slept under a broom tree. Then God got busy. Notice he's asleep, God's at work here in the story. Behold, an angel touched him and said to him, arise and eat. I just went to sleep. Arise and eat, I just went to bed. I've traveled an entire day from Beersheba all the way out into the wilderness, and before that I traveled from the very top of the promised land all the way down to the bottom. This is like over 100 miles. And to do this by foot, this takes days, right? This takes day upon day upon day. So there he is laying down under this tree. An angel touches him and says, arise and eat. And next to his head there is a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. Bread and water, notice. Bread and water. This is exactly what the Lord had already provided for him in the stories before. Remember the story? Who provided him bread and water in the story before this? The widow. Right? The widow. So again, he's provided bread, he's provided water. He had received that before through a widow. So he eats it, he drinks it. What does he do? He goes back to sleep. Verse six. Fine, God give me a little snack, revive me, so it's all good. He just wants to die, you see. His hopes, his dreams have been crushed into nothing. He's depressed. He just wants to die. but he wasn't getting the message, right? He wasn't getting the message. We read a second time that the angel of the Lord, notice it's the angel of the Lord here. Not just an angel, but the angel of the Lord. This is Jesus in an Old Testament way. Touched him again and said, arise and eat, verse seven. Why? Because the journey is too great for you. Well, what do you mean? I just made the journey, and I made it down here. It wasn't too great, I made it. What do you think the Lord's talking about? Get up and eat some more food, more bread, drink more water. The journey's too great for you. What journey is he talking about? More to come, right? There's something, he wants to die, and God's saying, no, no, no, no, you're not dead yet. I have something else for you. God hasn't granted his request to just lie down and die. He says, strengthen up, you've got work to do. God was showing grace to him. And so Elijah arose and ate and drank, and notice this time, the second time, he went in the strength of that food 40 days and 40 nights to Horeb, the mountain of God. What's so important about Mount Horeb, the mountain of God as it's called here? So we're in 1 Kings 19, if you go backwards, when's the last time God's people were at Mount Horeb? When's the last time you read about Mount Horeb? Anybody? Out in the wilderness. Out in the wilderness. This is the mountain upon which the Lord appeared to Moses at the burning bush, Exodus 3. This is where Moses, at the base of this mountain, struck a rock out in the desert, and what happened? Water came gushing forth. The last time we saw Mount Horeb, in the story of Scripture, the Lord was commanding Israel to depart from Mount Horeb to go into the Promised Land, Exodus 33. In that story, God said, go, I'm not going with you. I'm tired of you guys. You've sinned too many times, go. And Moses, of course, intercedes, Lord, Lord, you must go with us. How can we survive without you and your presence? And so God relented and God went. So the last time they were there, the Israelites left and went towards the promised land. So here's Elijah departing the promised land. Notice it's all in reverse now. Elijah leaves the promised land to traverse back through the wilderness to the mountain of God's presence. It's the opposite. Israel was at Mount Horeb, through the wilderness, promised land. Elijah's in the promised land, through the wilderness, back to the mountain. So Elijah is sort of reenacting Israel's experience in reverse. He goes into the wilderness. He's provided bread and water. Did the Lord provide bread and water in the wilderness for the Israelites? Manna from heaven, bread, right? Water out of a rock. So here's Elijah, and here's Elijah meeting God on his mountain like when the Lord met with the Israelites and made his covenant with them. And so Elijah here, Elijah here is acting on behalf of Israel as a recipient of a new covenant, as it were. He's identifying with the Israelites as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Here is a prophetic picture of Jesus, just for you. Just like you, he would himself be a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Just like Elijah, and just like for you, Jesus would go out to the land, into the wilderness, be tempted 40 days and 40 nights, does that sound familiar? 40 days, 40 nights, he travels, 40 days, 40 nights, Jesus is tempted out there in the wilderness. Why? So that soul-crushed saints like you might receive the outpouring of God's grace. Jesus had to do all this, not just what Elijah did, but what the Israelites did, and he had to actually obey. He had to actually love God, love neighbor, keep the commandments, do the things that God said to do, and he did that. He did that, all for you. So this is grace, God's grace, the soul crushed sinners. And so again, even saintly prophets of old who performed mighty miracles felt depressed, despondent, disillusioned when the Lord didn't seem to grant success. And so after all this, his hopes are crushed, he wants to just die, God provided grace for a fresh calling upon Elijah's life. Although he feels his hopes and prayers were crushed and that his life was meaningless to go on, right, so he sort of undergoes a death and now a resurrection, God had something more for him. At that mountain, Mount Horeb, the mountain of God, he came to a cave, verse nine, he lodged in it, and like before, the word of the Lord came to him, verse nine. the word of the Lord came to him. So notice in the story here, we have the angel of the Lord, we have the word of the Lord coming to him. As I've said before, we looked in our series on God's presence in the Old Testament, the language of the word of the Lord coming, right? This is Old Testament ways of describing what's called a theophany, an appearance of God in some way. And notice how this word is a very personal word. It's not just impersonal sounds upon his eardrums. It was a very personal word. He, notice verse nine, isn't that interesting? The word of the Lord came to him and he said, who said? The word of the Lord. How can that be? This is the Son of God and before He became Jesus. This is the Son of God before He became human flesh. This is the Son of God before the incarnation. The Word of the Lord in the beginning was the Word, right? We know that, right, John 1? In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God, the Word was God. So here's the Word of the Lord, here's the Word of God, the pre-incarnate Christ. We're getting a shadowy revelation of this wonderful picture of who God is. It's made clear in the New Testament that God is triune, he's Father, Son, Holy Spirit. And so here Elijah meets the word before the word became flesh and tabernacled amongst us. He said to Elijah, notice, but then Elijah responds. Elijah goes on to express what's going on with him inside of his heart. Lord, I've been very jealous for you. Jealousy, we think of that as a bad thing, right? Jealousy is to, you know, it's... related to coveting and being envious, dissatisfied in yourself because you want something else that someone else has that God gave them, he didn't give to you. You're jealous, right? You want to be like that other person. You want the things that the other person has, so on and so forth. But jealousy in the Bible in relationship to God means that Elijah's saying, I've served you alone, Lord. I've been very jealous for you. God is jealous for his people because he only has his people and he loves his people with a very jealous love. And so Elijah says, Lord, I've been very jealous for you. I've served you alone. They've served the Baals. They've served Asherah. They've all fallen away, Lord. Your people have forsaken your covenants. They've thrown down your altars. They've killed your prophet of the sword. I, even I, only am left. and they seek my life and take it away? What's he saying? My soul is crushed, my life is meaningless, I've served God with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength, and what has it gotten me? Nothing. It's gotten me running out into the middle of the desert to hide from a queen that wants to put me to death. That's what it's gotten me. Lord, I've been very jealous for you. Why aren't you jealous for me? He's crushed. His life feels meaningless. But it's usually in those times and places in the Bible, and in our own experience, that we find the Lord revealing a fresh outpouring of his grace to refresh Elijah, to commission Elijah to do something else. You ever felt that way? Lord, I've been jealous for you. Lord, I've served you. Lord, I've prayed to you. Lord, I've done all that you've asked me to do. What has it gotten me? What am I doing here? My life is meaningless. Can I not just go do something else for a while? Give me a break. But usually the Lord allows us to fall into those sort of patterns and those feelings and that even the sense of meaninglessness to feel absolutely and utterly crushed. That's when God revives. That's when God restores, that's when God renews. And so here's Elijah, he's sort of undergoing a death and a resurrection. And so God tells him, and notice again, it's the word of the Lord who commands him, stand by the mountain before the Lord, meaning in his presence. As in Exodus 34, with Moses, so too with Elijah, the Lord passed by. the Lord passed by. He's in a cave, he gets up off the ground, he's done confessing and telling God how he feels, and the Lord says, stand up, stand before the mountain before me, I'm gonna pass by, I'm gonna reveal myself. Again, this is what we call a theophany, an appearance of God, revelation of God. How? Well, notice this, it's very interesting. This is one of those familiar passages from the story. And we read this, that God appeared first of all, or we read here first of all that God, as he's passing by, there's all these sort of meteorological phenomena that are happening. First, a great strong wind tore the mountains in broken pieces, the rocks. But, verse 11, the Lord was not in the wind. So a great strong wind, but the Lord's under it. That's strange. Wind can be a picture of the presence of God in the Old Testament. But secondly, then there's an earthquake. But, verse 11, again, the Lord was not in the earthquake. Third, a fire. But the Lord was not, verse 12, in the fire. Do you remember at Mount Sinai in the wilderness? when people were at the bottom making their golden cows, golden cow, and the elders were in the middle of the mountain, that's as high as they could go, and then at the top was Moses, and they looked up, and what did they see on top of the mountain? They saw a cloud, they saw fire. What did they feel? They felt an earthquake. What did they hear? They heard the sound of trumpets, loud winds. So here's God. Revealing himself once again, just like Moses, to Moses and to the Israelites. But again, the text makes the point, the Lord was not in the wind, he was not in the earthquake, he was not in the fire. But then finally, verse 12, the sound of a low whisper. The more familiar King James-ish language, a still, small voice. A still, small voice. It's important to notice here, just like we saw back in our series on God's presence, that God doesn't exist, or God isn't contained by the elements. That's how the gods of the nations were described. Baal was the god of storms. He lived inside of clouds. He was contained by the rain clouds. That was Baal, that was Baal. The God who is, the God who's revealed himself in scripture is not contained inside of these phenomena. He uses them. He rides upon the clouds, the Bible tells us at times. He reveals himself as cloud or as fire, but these things aren't him and they don't contain him. God is bigger than that. God is more transcendent than that. But then why we read that there's this still small voice, this sound of a low whisper as it's translated here? What is God saying to Elijah? What is he saying to us? What he's saying is this, that I don't need to appear in the powerful and the monumental things like earthquakes, huge storms of wind, fire upon a mountain. Instead, I'm present, he's telling Elijah. I'm present in my simple, quiet, yet powerful word. That's what he's saying to us. Elijah's like, I've done all these miracles. I've done all these signs and wonders. Lord, what has it gotten me? And God says, I've been with you the entire time. Forget about all the miracles. I've been with you the entire time in my word. I've been with you in my still, small voice. And so when Elijah heard it, whatever he heard, the still, small voice, the sound of a low whisper, he wraps his face in a cloak because you cannot see God and live. He goes outside, he stands at the entrance. Then came a voice. Asking him the same question, what are you doing here? He responds as before. And the Lord provided a fresh outpouring of his grace for a further calling. What's the call? To go back. To go back. Go back north. Go to the wilderness of Damascus in the land of Syria. Above and beyond, north of the promised land, you're going to anoint a man named Hazael. He's gonna be king of Syria. You're going to anoint another man, Jehu, who's gonna become king of Israel. And you're also going to anoint your successor prophet, Elisha. Notice. And he does all this. He does all this as an obedient prophet. He does this because he's now experienced, again, a fresh experience and outpouring of God's grace to him as a soul-crushed saint. Lord, all of my hopes and dreams have been crashed down. Lord, my life is utterly meaningless. I just want to die. God says, not yet. I've got something more for you to do, one last task. My grace is sufficient for you. When we are weak, Paul says, then we know the grace of God is strong, amen? God is strong in him. And so he gets up and he obeys and he goes and he's experienced this grace and he is empowered by this grace. And the Lord even, notice, encourages him that after Hazael and Jehu and Elisha, verse 17, put to death all the idolaters in the land as a judgment of God upon them, That's what all these ancient, in the Bible, all these judgments, all these wars and so forth, they're all just pictures of God's judgment that's gonna happen in the last day upon the whole world. But the Lord is saying, even when I wipe out all these false worshipers who hate me by Hazael's hand, Jehu's hand, even Elijah the prophet, notice this. Verse 18. Remember what Elijah said? Lord, I'm the only one left. I'm the only one left. The king is a pagan, the queen is an unbeliever, the people have falsely repented, everyone has turned their backs on God, and God says, I'm gonna wipe out the land, I'm gonna cleanse it, yet I will leave 7,000 in Israel. All the knees that have not bowed to Baal. That's grace, loved ones. That's grace, even to those 7,000. whose souls, no doubt, felt crushed as well. Lord, we serve you. Lord, we've been very jealous for your name. And God says, I have a remnant of grace of 7,000 who receive my grace as soul-crushed saints. Let me conclude by saying this this morning. We learn a couple of things from the story for us to sort of ponder for a moment or two before we leave, but this. We learn from the story of Elijah that saints are sinners too. Saints are sinners too. Saints are sinners too. Again, even saintly prophets of old who performed mighty miracles felt depressed, despondent, and disillusioned when God didn't seem to grant them success. Saints are sinners too, amen? Are you a saint? Then you're a sinner, okay? Then you're a sinner too. But in this, secondly, in this reality that saints are sinners too, and even saints like Elijah felt all the lowliness of human experience, in this we see a shadow of the Messiah to come. A Savior who is going to come who would identify fully and completely with you and me. He would become, as the prophet said, as I mentioned earlier, a man of sorrows, acquainted with greed. so that we who are sorrowful and full of grief in this life would experience the outpouring of God's grace. The Son of God, the Word that became flesh, became human for you in all that it means to be human, body and soul. He became human for you to bear your sorrows and griefs. so that by his stripes, the stripes that are upon his back because he was whipped before his crucifixion, by his stripes we are healed. We see a picture of the Messiah here coming in lowliness and in sorrow and in suffering and in putting upon himself all of our sorrows and sufferings so that we might become saints and be saved, amen? In other words, our God is the kind of God who knows us so well. He knows us and all that it is to be us as human beings. And he knows that you too, beloved brothers and sisters, you too this morning as a saint, as a believer, as a follower of Jesus Christ, he knows you too need grace. He knows that your soul, crushed, despondent, despairing, depressed at times. He knows that you too, not just sinners out there, but you too. You too need grace, amen? Let's pray. Lord, pour upon us your grace today. By the power of your Holy Spirit, Lord, in all the feelings of life that we might have similar to Elijah, and we know that even Jesus had, his soul was sorrowful even unto death, that we find in Elijah as a picture of Jesus, we find in Jesus as a fulfillment of that picture, we find our Savior made low for us that we might be raised up. And so, raise us up today, we pray, with the power of your Holy Spirit. Use your words to encourage us, Lord, and as we come to the Lord's Supper, may it be a seal, may it be an outward way of impressing upon our hearts and minds and souls that all that Jesus did was, for me, a soul-crushed saint. Pour out your grace upon us, we pray, in Jesus' name, and all of God's people say, amen. Let's respond.