For our text this morning, turn
with me to Matthew chapter 16. Matthew chapter 16. Matthew chapter 16 and let's
look at verse 13. When Jesus came into the coast
of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, Whom do
men say that I, the Son of Man, am? Whom do men say that I, the
Son of Man, am? As our brother mentioned in his
message this morning, This is the question of all questions,
truly. This is the most important question
that there is. Who do men say that I, the Son
of Man, am? Who do people believe Jesus? Popular name. Who do people believe
Jesus, the Son of Man, to be? Now look at their response here,
verse 14. And they said, some say that thou art John the Baptist. That's what Herod thought. When
he heard the works of Jesus, he thought, well this is John
the Baptist, risen from the dead. That's what he thought. Go on,
it says, some say thou art John the Baptist, some Elijah, and
others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. Like the woman at the
well we just read about. When the Lord started dealing
with her, what did she say? Sir, I perceive thou art a prophet. I'm thankful for every prophet
God has ever raised up. But here's the fact of the matter
concerning each one of them, and all God's preachers, and
all God's people for that matter. They were sinners saved by the
grace of God. What I mean by that is, there
wasn't anything special in them, except what God had done in them.
They were just men, alright? Well, I'm here to tell you our
Lord, and that's who Jesus the Son of Man is, He's our Lord.
And He is no mere man. We're sinners. He knew no sin. He wasn't a sinner. You know,
you ask somebody, who do you say that He is? Here's a couple
things you'll get. He was a good man. We have no
idea just how good a man He was and is, but He's much more than
that. We read He went about doing good
everywhere He went, every single day. He was a good man, yes,
but He's more than that. They may say He set a good example
for us to follow. You better believe it. No better
example than the example He set. He is our example in everything. Oh, but He's more than an example.
He did some great things. He sure did. He healed many. He did the impossible. He raised
the dead. He did more than do great things. Whom do men say that I am? Look
at Peter's response here in verse 15. I'm sorry, I'm getting ahead
of myself. Verse 15, it says, He saith unto
them, but whom say ye that I am? Now when our Lord asked His disciples
this question, He said, whom do men say I am? And then He
said, who do you say I am? We all need to ask ourselves
this question. We're all going to have to answer this question.
And I'll tell you this, the Lord asked this question, He already
knows the answer. He knows everything. Nothing
is hid from Him. He searches the heart. He knows
every thought. And yet He asks the question.
We need to ask ourselves this question. What do we think of
Him? And we need to give an honest answer. What do we really, truly
think of Him? What do we believe about Him?
Who do we believe Him to be? Now, upon asking that question,
I must say, I hope and pray that we don't think of Him what this
whole religious world thinks of Him. He wants, He tries, He
hopes, He begs, He's making an effort. It saddens me to acknowledge
this obvious fact. If you step outside your door,
if you get online, and again, this is all of us until God saves
us, okay? But this whole world views Him,
you can sum it up with this, this whole world views Him as
a failure. If He wants me to be saved and
I'm not saved, What good is His desire? What
good is His will if He can't accomplish it? What good is His
purpose if He can't bring it to pass? He sent Christ to die
to redeem His people. Well, if one for whom Christ
died isn't going to be redeemed... Well, if you have any common
sense, the only deduction is he's a failure. What'd God say
about him in Isaiah 42 when he said, this is my servant, mine
elect whom I uphold and whom my soul delights. What'd he say?
He said, he shall bring forth judgment unto the Gentiles. The
isles are gonna wait for his law and he shall not fail. He's no failure. Any Jesus that
is preached to not have His way in everything, especially with
a poor pitiful sinner like myself, who can do nothing, Any such false Jesus is not the
Jesus of the Scriptures. It's not the Jesus, the Son of
Man we're reading about. That's why He asked this question,
because we need to know who He is. We need to know who He is. Now, our answer to this question,
whatever we truly think about Him, that answer, and like I
said, God knows, that answer, just like He knew with that woman,
manifests whether or not we're saved. What did He tell that
woman before He revealed Himself to her? He said, you don't know. He said, if you knew who it is
that's talking to you, if you knew who it is that said, give
me to drink, what would you have done? You'd have asked of Him.
Not for physical water to quench your physical thirst. He'd have
given you living water that would spring up in you, life eternal,
everlasting life, everlasting water. He told her, you don't
know what you worship. But what she'd go home saying,
what she'd go marching into that city saying, come see a man who
told me everything that ever I did is not this, the Christ. That's who He is, the Christ.
And that's what Peter tells us right here in verse 16. Simon
Peter answered and said, thou art the Christ, the Son of the
living, You know, we looked at our brother
Peter a little bit last night, and Peter, he erred often. He often had a foolish thing
to say, just like me and you, alright? If we were there, I'd
have been much worse, I guarantee it. Just like Peter, I'm so swift
to hear, so slow to listen. God forgive me. But praise God,
right here, the Lord gave Peter the words to say, didn't He?
Who do you say I am? You're the Christ. You're the
one and only Christ. You're the God-man. You're the
Savior. You're God's anointed, God's Messiah, the Savior of
sinners. Thou art the Christ. You're the
Son of Man and the Son of God. He's both. 100% both. Amazing. He said, Lord, you're no mere
prophet. Now he knew Christ is our prophet, priest, and king.
The only one there is. He's the preacher. He's the true
and faithful one. The only one. Kind of like Thomas. He said, my Lord and my God. That's who He is, brethren. Nothing
less. is infinitely greater than we
could possibly imagine Him to be. And I love just the very
thought of that. And we don't worship a pathetic
Savior. That's the Jesus of this world
that men talk about. You know, people love to just
flippantly say, Jesus this, Jesus that. May God cause us to reverence
Him If He ever makes Himself known to us, we're going to reverence
Him. We're going to call Him Lord. We're going to call Him
Lord Jesus Christ, my Lord. We're going to own Him as Lord,
my Lord. We're going to ascribe greatness unto Him. I love what
Peter declared at Pentecost when God through the preaching of
His Word, the preaching of Christ crucified, when He saved 5,000
souls. And God saved them. He used Peter.
God did the saving. Through His Word, He pricked
their hearts. He said, man and brethren, what
shall we do? Here's what Peter told them. I love this. He said,
let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made
that same Jesus, whom you've crucified, both Lord and Christ." Peter was preaching to people
who were physically there crucifying the Lord. And Peter was no better. He forsook and fled and was scared
of a little girl, just like our Lord told him he would, okay?
We crucified our Lord, ignorantly, and yet full of the hatred that
we are, the hatred against God that we naturally have. And Peter
said, you did that, but He was delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God. He said, God made Him Lord
and Christ. You know, people want to talk
about making Him King. God made Him King. Make Him Lord of your
heart. God made Him Lord. And when He
saves us, we're gladly going to bow to Him as Lord of our
heart, Lord of everything. He is Lord. He is Lord. Look at verse 17 here with me.
Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon
Bar-Jonah. He said, Peter, you're a blessed
man. You're a blessed man. Why was
he a blessed man? Because He knew Jesus, the Son
of Man, to be the Christ. That's why He was blessed. You
know, we talk about so many things, saying, oh I'm so blessed, I'm
so blessed. And we are blessed in many ways.
But if we belong to God, that's the only person who's truly blessed,
is the person that knows Christ. Material blessings, sure. I'm
sure we all have them. But that's not the blessing.
The blessing is that we know Him and believe on Him whom God
hath sent. That's a blessed man. I want
to be one of those men, don't you? Oh my. In John chapter 6, a familiar
passage, we won't turn. Some men had followed the Lord,
who did not know Him. The Lord had performed a miracle. He had filled the multitude with
the loaves and fishes. He multiplied it, and multiplied
it, and multiplied it, filled them all, and there was a bunch
left over. signifying God's abundant grace provision. These men followed
Him very shortly. And then our Lord began preaching
to them. He began telling them who He
is. I am the bread come down from
heaven. I fed your belly, but unless
I feed your soul, no hope for you. You got to eat my flesh
and drink my blood or there's no life in you. That's what He
told them. You read it yourself. And our Lord's sayings offended
them. It said they went back and walked
no more with Him. They turned their back on Him.
Like we all do. All of us went astray. We went
our own way. Off they went. And our Lord let them go. God
just might give us what we want. We don't want Him. Okay? We need
to acknowledge that. We don't want Him. Until He draws
us to Himself. And that's what He told them.
No man can come to Me, except the Father which I sent Me draw him. And
I'll raise him up at the last day. That's exactly what He said.
Then after they went back, our Lord turned to His disciples.
Peter was right there. He said, will you also go away?
Another question we need to ask ourselves. And here's the answer.
But for the grace of God, there we go. Alright? He's the one
keeping us. We're not keeping ourselves.
But here's what Peter said. He said, Lord, to whom shall
we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life." And he didn't stop there. He said, we believe and are sure
that thou art that Christ. Has God put that kind of answer
in our heart? Oh, I pray He would. Thou art the Christ. Peter's hope wasn't in what he
knew. You know, by nature we love to brag about how much we
know. Oh, I just know so much. The
religion of this world, they know so much. But if we don't
know Him, it don't matter what we know. We need to know Him. Now I want to show you a couple
of verses. I probably mentioned all these last night, but turn
over with me. John 17. John 17. I want us to understand the importance
of this, of knowing who He is, believing on Him. John 17, verse
1. These words spake Jesus, and
lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is
come. Glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son
also may glorify Thee, as Thou hast given Him power over all
flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast
given Him. And this is life eternal. that they might know Thee, the
only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent." Look at
verse 4. He said, "...I have glorified
Thee on the earth, I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me
to do." You see, people who don't know Him don't understand He
finished the work. God gave Him a work to do. Save
your people. God gave them to Him. He committed
them to His trust and He trusted. He first trusted in Christ that
He should come and save us. And He told us right here, I
did it. I finished the work. And He tells
us this is life eternal that they know Thee. We need to know
Him. We need to know Him. That's life
eternal. It's knowing Christ our Savior. Turn over a few pages
to 2 Timothy chapter 1. Another familiar verse here.
Paul writing to Timothy. He confirms this blessed hope. 2
Timothy 1 verse 12. For the witch cause, I also suffer
these things. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed,
for I know." God's people know this, okay? Just like Romans
8, 28, we know all things are working together for good to
them that love God, to them who are the called according to His
purpose. We know this. Now look at this. He said, I
know whom I have believed. And I'm persuaded that He is
able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that
day. Let me ask you a question. Do
you know whom you've believed? And here's what it comes down
to. We either believe ourselves and some preacher, or we believe
Christ. Any time a man, and I'm telling
you myself included, any time a man stands and dare speaks
in the name of God, we better do our due diligence to make
sure we're hearing the truth. You test the Scriptures, tell
us this. Try the spirits, whether they be of God. You verify, this
is an accounting phrase, I'm an accountant. Trust, but verify,
okay? But honestly, we can take it
one step further. Don't trust me, trust God. You make sure
that what I'm saying is exactly what God has said. Otherwise,
we may be believing a lie. Alright? We need to know that
we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Alright? And Paul said,
we know. By the precious faith God gives
His saints, we can know this. We can be sure of this. He said,
we believe and we're sure. The faith God gives us to believe
Him is sure. There are things we wonder about,
aren't there? I don't. I'm not going to pretend
I know everything. I don't. I know nothing. By God's grace,
I know Him. And that's all I need to know.
That's all I need to know. I was going to have you turn,
but I won't. In 2 Peter 3, we saw it last
night, Peter, he ended his words to the brethren with this. He
said, he warned of false religion. He warned of believing a lie.
He said, grow in grace. And if we've experienced God's
grace, God will grow us in that grace as He's pleased to grow
us. He said, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ. There are a lot of questions
this flesh wants answered. You can read the scriptures,
and I wonder how that... We need to grow in knowledge
of Him. We don't need to have our ears tickled. There are men
that love to... got an itch, got scratching. We just need to know Him, okay?
You go home with this thought in mind, Oh, that I may know
Him. and be founded, not having mine
own righteousness which is by the law, but that which is through
the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith." That's
it, brethren. That's it. Now look back in our
text. Matthew 16, verse 17. Jesus answered and said unto
him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood
hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven."
What he's saying is, Peter, you're a blessed man because you know
who I am. You believe on me as your Savior.
He said, but flesh and blood didn't reveal it to you. He said, my Father revealed it
to you. God must reveal Himself to us. See, this is spiritual. Again, it's like what our Lord
told that Samaritan woman. He said, if you're going to worship
Me, it must be in spirit and in truth. It's the only way to
worship God. God must reveal these things
to us. Job asked a question, can man
by searching find out God? We can't. He must speak to us. Just like He came to where that
woman was, He must come to us. Turn the light on. The light
of the knowledge of the glory of Christ must shine in our hearts
and only God can shine it. Only God can say, let there be
light. And when He does, there's light and He sees that it's good.
Praise the Lord. I thought about when our Lord
called Peter to be His disciple. What was Peter doing? He was
fishing. He was fishing. And the Lord
comes to him and his brother, Andrew, and here they are fishing
with their father. I'm sorry, James and John with
their father's abode in the ship. Our Lord comes and he says, follow
me. Do they sit down and have a round
table and have a discussion and well, you know, I think it makes
sense to follow you. It says immediately, they forsook
the nets, they forsook the ship. James and John left their father
in the ship because the Lord didn't call him. We need to understand
that. Those whom he called, follow
him. He said, my sheep hear my voice.
I know them and they follow me. Every time. Every time. You know what Paul said in Galatians
1, he said, When it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's
womb and called me by His grace to reveal His Son in me, that
I might preach Him among the heathen, immediately I conferred
not with flesh and blood. When are you saved? When it pleased
God. How are you saved? He revealed His Son in me. What
are you going to preach? Him. Why did this happen? How did this happen? It wasn't
by flesh and blood. Please God. Please God to reveal
Christ to us and in us. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Here in our text, look at verse
18. And before I move on, I just
want us to acknowledge, hopefully it's obvious. Salvation is not
a cooperation between God and man. Well, you need to do this
and I'll God said, I will and ye shall. Not you might. Not
I will if you shall. I will and ye shall. He's not trying to save us. When
He saves us, we're not going to confer. We're not going to think
about it. We're going to follow Him. Because His call is effectual.
His grace is irresistible. It's the only kind of grace that's
going to help me. That's the only kind of call that's going
to do anything for me. You know, it says, He hath saved us, it's
done, and He hath called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which
was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. Had nothing
to do with us, brethren. Nothing. As we saw last night,
it's according to His promise. Wouldn't have it any other way,
would we? Oh, by God's grace. Verse 18, And I say also unto
thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my
church. Who's the rock that our Lord's
talking about here? Is it Peter? Is he the rock upon
whom God's going to build His church? That's what the Catholics
claim. but they do so erring, not knowing
the Scriptures." They read the next verse and say, oh well,
God's given him the keys of the kingdom of heaven and hell. Whatever
he binds is going to be bound in heaven. Whatever he loosens
is going to be loosed in heaven, or on earth in heaven. It's not
so. It's not so. Peter ain't the rock. What he's
saying is, you preach the gospel, you bind someone by condemning
them because you preach, believe on Christ, and they don't believe
on Christ, they're going to be condemned. You preach to them and I set
them free through the liberty that's in Christ Jesus, they're
going to be loosed in heaven. That's what he's saying. He's
not saying, I'm going to build my church on you. He's not saying,
oh Peter. You know it's Peter that said,
let's build three tabernacles, one for the Lord, one for Moses,
one for Elijah. If Peter was the rock, the Lord would have
built one right then and there for Peter. But he didn't. He rebuked Peter. He shut Peter's mouth and he
said, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased, hear
ye him. And God brought Peter down flat on his face, and he
looked up and saw no man save Jesus only. He's the rock. He's the rock. Turn with me to
1 Peter chapter 2. 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 2. As newborn babes desire the sincere
milk of the word that you may grow thereby, if so be ye have
tasted that the Lord is gracious. To whom coming? As unto a living
stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious,
Christ is the precious rock upon which God will build His church. I mentioned Peter's writing to
the elect, the chosen of God. Well, we're electing Christ.
He's God's elect. He's the one in whom God is well
pleased and whom His soul delights. Verse 5 says, He also, as lively
stones, are built up a spiritual house and holy priesthood, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture, Behold, I lay
in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he that
believeth on him shall not be confounded. Now look at verse
7 here. Unto you therefore which believe.
He is precious. But unto them which be disobedient
or unbelieving, the stone which the builders disallowed, the
same is made the head of the corner, and a stone of stumbling
and a rock of offense, even to them which stumble at the word
being disobedient, whereunto they also were appointed. God leaves us to ourselves. How
do you explain God appointed them to that? God just lets the
men have their way. He lets them have what they want.
We didn't want Him. God made us believe He's precious. We want what we want, don't we?
Aren't you glad God's overruled your will? Aren't you glad He
made you willing in the day of His power to believe on Christ?
I'd have no hope had He not. I pray we truly believe Christ
to be precious. I really do. I really do. David
said this, he said, the Lord is my rock, and my fortress,
my deliverer, my God, my strength, in whom I will trust, my buckler,
and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. He's the rock
of our salvation, isn't he? Read Psalm 62. It's good. Christ
was precious to Peter. He was precious to David. He's
precious to all His people. Peter didn't trust in himself. By God's grace, he trusted in
Christ alone. And I love what it said here
about how we're not going to be confounded. It means put to
shame. We're not going to be put to shame in that day when
the day of God shall come. We're not going to be put to
shame having believed on Christ. We're going to be accepted. God
is well pleased with us right now in Him. right now. Seated in the heavenlies in Him,
right now. The Lord Jesus Christ is the church's one foundation. Other foundation can no man lay
than that which is laid in Jesus Christ. He's the only foundation
there is. The only rock upon which God
will build His church. Look back at our text. Matthew
16, verse 18. I say unto thee, thou art Peter,
and upon this rock I will build my church." What is God's church? Just quickly, it's not a what,
it's a who. It's His people. You know, we conglory in churches.
We're just sinners saved by His grace. That's the church, brother.
We know that. I mentioned some last night. You can go look in
1 and 2 Peter, see who he's writing to. And that's who the scriptures
are for, God's elect, those who believe He's precious, those
who have not seen Christ, we love Christ, those redeemed by
Christ, those looking to Christ, that's who it is, that's the
church, brethren. And I love this, Peter, one thing
he mentioned there in 1 Peter 1, he said, there are strangers
scattered throughout. I heard your pastor say this,
I listened to him a little bit last night in Ashland, and he
made a point to say, your brethren in San Diego send their love
and greetings. And he said, in case you didn't
know, you have brothers and sisters in San Diego. Made me chuckle. You know, sometimes we forget
God's got a people. Ain't just the local assembly. It always
seems like we're few in number, don't it? Don't despise the day
of small things, brethren. God's people may appear to be
few in number, but he said it's a multitude no man can number.
Again, I'm a numbers guy. That makes me rejoice. I've seen
what I believe to be some pretty large numbers, and then I think
of that and think, praise the Lord. Though we're scattered
now, we're going to be one with Him in glory. In fact, we're
one with Him right now. One in Him right now. I love how he said here, he said,
I will build my church. I will. That's certain. That's
sure. We can rest in that promise. Every day this earth is still
moving along, still going. God's building His church. He's
calling us out into the light and knowledge of Christ. Calling
us out of darkness into His marvelous light. Now, I will say this concerning
Peter. In that sense, God used Peter
to build His church. He uses, pleased the Lord, by
the foolishness of preaching. Preaching Christ and Him crucified,
nothing else. To save His people from their
sins. That's what He said, 1 Corinthians 1. I told you He used Peter to
preach a message and boom, the Lord saved 5,000 people. I think
a couple of days later He preached again and the Lord saved another
3,000. Or maybe I have it backwards, 3,000, 5,000, it don't matter. God's saving His people. And
it ain't got anything to do with us. It don't depend on us. I pray that makes you rejoice
like it does me, honestly. And it's a great honor to stand
and preach the gospel. I know the Lord may use this.
He just might use this to speak to somebody. And it's going to
be in spite of this wicked sinner talking to you. He said this, he said, I've planted,
Apollos watered, who gave the increase? God. He said, neither
is he that planteth anything, nor he that watereth, but God
which giveth the increase. Oh, praise the Lord. We worship
a mighty, sovereign God, don't we, brothers and sisters? I know whom I believe. I know
He's able. What a great thing to think on. He's able to do
exceeding abundantly above anything we could ask or think. That's
who He is. Alright, verse 18 again. I say unto thee, thou art Peter,
and upon this rock I will build my church, now look at this,
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. You want
some encouragement? God ain't gonna lose one of His
sheep. He's not gonna lose a single one of His sheep. Not one. You mean He'd go out
of His way to go through Samaria and have something to do with
this Samaritan woman? Absolutely He would. You mean
He'd go to this tree, He'd walk through this multitude of people
thronging Him, and He'd look up and see this wee little man
and say, come down, I must abide in your house today. You mean
God would do that? You mean our Lord would be in
a multitude on another occasion, getting touched by who knows
how many people, rubbing shoulders and whatnot, and then this poor,
pitiful woman crawling up to Him, touches the hem of His garment,
And he said, who touched me? You mean he would notice that?
Such virtue went out of him. You see how the Lord cares for
each of his own? And people want to say, well,
God died for you, but it's up to you. Oh, what a slap in his
face. God's going to save his people. You know, my love ain't much,
but God's love is my salvation. If God loves you, He said, I've
betrothed myself to you forever. He said, I'm your husband. He
gave Himself for you. You know, you marry someone. Everything that you have, you're
giving it to them. Oh, if I could give myself to
my wife like Christ gave himself to his bride. That makes me seem like a pretty
terrible husband, don't it? In light of him, that's exactly
what I am. Now, Peter here, he ends this
Well, it wasn't Peter. The Lord tells Peter, He said,
the gates of hell aren't going to prevail against my church.
I'm going to have my bride. Now, the gates of hell are going
to try. I'm not going to read it for
time's sake, but right here after our Lord says this, calls Peter
a blessed man. He starts telling Peter and his
disciples how that he must go to Jerusalem, how he must die,
and how he must rise again the third day. And Peter responds
by saying, Be it far from thee, Lord. This is not going to happen
to you, Lord. He rebuked the Lord. And God rebuked him. And you can look at it for yourself.
He told him, he said, get thee behind me, Satan. You know, he uttered those exact
words to Satan himself when he was tempting him. Well, I thought
Peter was a blessed man. He is. He is. Peter, by experience,
warned us of the temptations of the adversary. Here's what
Peter said, 1 Peter 5a. He warned us that our adversary
the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he
may devour. We know that the devil is having
his time in all these false churches. God's letting him. But did you
know He seeks among God's people? That's who He really wants, is
those whom He knows He can't have. Christ told Peter, when He said,
Satan hath desire to have you. Oh Peter, he's just wanting to
sift you like wheat. And if it weren't for the grace
of God, he would have. Here's what he told Peter. He
said, Peter, I prayed for you that your faith fail not. What was Peter's hope? That Christ,
his Savior, who loved him, who died for him, gave himself for
him, who prayed for him. It's no wonder Peter said in
his epistle, we're kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. What do you think of Him? Jesus, the Son of Man. Who do
we say that He is? Who do we really in our heart
of hearts believe Him to be? Who do we believe Him to be? Thou art the Christ. I pray we
truly believe that. Thou art the Christ, the Son
of the living God. He's the rock. Praise God upon
this rock. God will build His church and
the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Brethren, that's
a promise. We can hang our soul on that. Praise the Lord, Thou art the
Christ. May He be pleased to reveal Himself to each of us.
It's been a pleasure being with you.