All right, if you'll take your
Bibles now and turn with me to John chapter 12. John chapter 12. We look at verse 20. Begin our
reading in verse 20. And we'll go down to verse 26. The Scripture says, And there
were certain Greeks among them that came up to worship at the
feast. The same came therefore to Philip,
which is of Bethsaida of Galilee, and desired him saying, Sir,
we would see Jesus. And Philip cometh and telleth
Andrew, and again Andrew and Philip tell Jesus." We'll stop
right there for a second. And I've entitled this message,
I Would See Christ. I Would See Christ. I'll start
this message by asking you a question. Who did you come to see? I love you, but I pray you never come to
see me. I do pray you hear what I say. but I pray you never come to
hear me. It is always my desire to set
forth Christ crucified among you. Christ was crucified 2,000
plus years ago, but it is my desire to set Him forth, crucified
among you, that you might see Christ. that you might see Him,
that you might hear Him, that you would have the desire as
these men had, and we'll see why they had this desire, that you have a desire to see
Him. I would see Christ. Would you? When I preach Christ,
I desire to see Christ. Every time I preach Him, that's
what I want to see. I want to see Christ. Without that, our
time is wasted. Your time is wasted. Don't waste
it. Cry to God and tell Him, I would
seek Christ. Lord, give me grace to seek Christ. Now I want to preface this by
giving a little introduction before of what has happened thus
far in this book. In the previous chapters, Our
Lord Jesus Christ goes out and sets forth this doctrine, this
truth concerning His person, concerning His deity. If you
were to go back to John chapter 8, you remember how He said in
verse 58, Before Abraham was, I am. And then to prove his deity,
you read in chapter 9 of his healing of that man that was
born blind. There was never an instance in
the history of man where there was a man born blind who was
healed. This was the proof of his deity. That he was God manifest in the
flesh. Only God could heal a man born
blind. It had never been done. Only
God could. And then you remember in chapter
10, chapter 10, he said this, I and my father are one. And
the Jews picked up stones ready to kill him because he made himself
equal with God. He was. He was. And therefore in chapter 11,
we read the history of his friend Lazarus who had died. So in order
to prove his deity, He allowed His friend, Lazarus, to die so
that He might manifest His power in resurrecting Lazarus from
the dead. You see, He was proving His deity. Is that not proof enough? What
was proof enough is He said it. That should have been proof enough.
But God more willing, more abundantly to show the heirs of promise,
immutability of His counsel, what did He do? He showed us.
He manifested in His power. But what did He give us also
by this? He did not just declare His deity
by these miracles, but He preached to us through these miracles. If we take every miracle that
our Lord Jesus Christ performed, we can hear the Gospel in it. It is a Gospel message. Our Lord
was declaring the Gospel through these healings. You remember
this man born blind. What a picture that is of us.
We are born blind. We cannot know God. We cannot
understand the things of God. We cannot know our own nature.
We cannot know our need of Christ. Why? We were born blind. Cannot
see it. And as the Lord Jesus Christ
came to this man and revealed, give him sight. What a picture
of our salvation when the Lord Jesus Christ came to us. I like this blind born blind.
You know what? He didn't see it coming. He didn't see it coming,
did he? He was blind. He woke up the
same way He did every morning. Went out to beg the same way
He had done for years and years and years. He had no thought
or intent of being healed. And the Lord passed by and had
mercy. That's exactly what He did with
us, isn't it? We had no intent. We had no need of healing. We
didn't know it until when He passed by us He healed us. The Apostle said this in 1 Corinthians
chapter 2. He said, My preaching is not
with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration
of the Spirit and of power. How much power did it take to
heal this man? How much more power did it take to heal our
souls? You see this preaching of the
gospel, we don't use wisdom of men. We don't use the words of
men. We use the Word of God. And we forsake the wisdom of
men because it comes to nothing. It comes to nothing. He said, that your faith should
not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. How
be it we speak the wisdom of God among them that are perfect
and not the wisdom of the world. Nor the princes of the world
that come to nothing, but we speak the wisdom of God in a
mystery. The hidden wisdom of God, which God ordained before
the world to our glory. How is it then that you understand
the Gospel? How is it that you who believe,
that you believe and others do not? How is it? Paul said this, But God hath
revealed them unto us. Just as God opened the eyes of
that blind man, He opened the eyes of this blind man. And not
only that, we see that in the resurrection of Lazarus. That's
a picture of our salvation, isn't it? We were born not only blind,
we were born dead. Dead. And you lay a man who's
dead out in front of you, and you could kick him, you could
beat him, you could try to make him feel guilty, you can tell
him how condemned he is, and he don't feel a thing. That's
what happened with us. You'd preach the gospel to us
until you were blue in the face and we didn't feel a thing. We
were dead. Until when? Until Christ came
to us and called us to life. And you hath He quickened who
were dated in trespasses and sin. So then we get this by both of
these miracles that no man is able or willing to come to Christ.
No man. And this is proven because I
preach Christ to you all the time. I preach to people all
the time. And I know this. Some believe
and some do not. Why then will men not believe? I tell you of a perfect Savior.
I'm telling you of a perfect salvation. I'm telling you of
salvation that requires nothing from you. Free! Everybody wants something for
free. I mean, you want to scam somebody,
just tell them it's free. You can get anybody to do anything
you want to, except this. Men want to still bring something
to it. This is free. Matter of fact,
if you bring something, it is the only way you are rejected.
Come and bring nothing. Wherefore do you spend your money
for that which satisfies not? Come, buy wine and milk without
money and without price. I tell you of a free salvation.
I tell you of a perfect salvation. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. Bring nothing. And yet men still
refuse. You know what that proves? It
proves they're dead. If you had any life at all in
you, you would come. If you had life, you would come. Scriptures are plain that there
is none righteous, there's none that understandeth, there's none
that seeketh after God. Is that plain speech? None righteous? That means you, right? That means
me. None. That means your parents, your
children, your grandchildren. None righteous. No, not one. None of us seek after God. You
hear religious people saying, well, I'm seeking after God.
God said you ain't. None that seeketh after God.
There's none that understandeth. There's none that doeth good,
no, not one. Therefore, by the deeds of the
law shall no flesh be justified in this sight. God demands righteousness, absolute
perfection. Cursed is everyone that continueth
not in all things written in the book of the law to do them. No man is justified by the law
in the sight of God. That's evident. That's evident. But behold the grace and mercy
of God to send His own Son. Is there anything greater that
God could have sent? Is there anything of more value
to the Father than His Son? He sent His Son into the world
to save sinners. Save rebels and His Son. How great is His Son? I tell
you, He was so great that He actually saved everyone He intended
to save. He saved them. He accomplished
their salvation for them. Completely accomplished. He said,
it is finished, and to prove it, God raised him from the dead
and set him on the throne of God. And now He has sent His
Spirit into the world to give life and sight to dead, blind
sinners. That's what the Spirit of God
does. He comes and gives life and sight through the preaching
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And yet men still will not come. Why will they not come? Why will
you still not believe? Even because you have no need.
If you don't believe, it's because you have no need. You that believe. Why do you believe? You have
a need. Do you not have a need? Does not Christ fulfill all that
you need? The Lord is my shepherd, I shall
not want." What do you lack? Now don't talk to your flesh.
Your flesh tells you you lack a bunch of stuff. Talk to the
inner man, the new man. Ask the new man what you lack. Nothing. Christ fulfilled all
my righteousness and paid for all my sins. I am accepted of
God. I have the love of God. I have
the righteousness of God. I have eternal life. I have the
Spirit of God dwelling in me. What do we lack? Nothing. And we received this through
the preaching of the Gospel, didn't we? This was the means
that God used. What the world considers foolishness. Why do you suppose God's churches
are not foolish? Well, they think it's foolishness
what you're doing. The gospel, the preaching of
the gospel to them that perish is foolishness. But unto us,
which are saved, we recognize it is the power of God. Not the power of preaching, power
of positive thinking. It's the power of God that saved
us. We recognize that. It is the
gospel of Jesus Christ. And so now we come to our text.
After all that the Lord had done, after all that the Lord had declared
of His deity, After all the Lord had preached through the miracles
that He had performed and the gospel that He had preached,
these Gentiles, look at this, and there were certain Greeks
among them that came up to worship at the feast. These Greeks They
were proselytes of the Jewish religion. They believed in Jehovah. They believed in what God had
said in the Old Testament, and they were proselytes of this
Jewish religion. And so, as they were required,
they came to this feast three times a year. Every male was
required to come to Jerusalem. And as proselytes of this religion,
they too came with them. But something happened to these
men. They came all that way to Jerusalem. And what did they
find? They found the very ones that
proselyted them to be nothing more than evil and hateful men
who desired nothing more than to kill Christ, to kill the Lord
Jesus. In the verse before that, the
Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive ye how you
prevail nothing. Behold the world that's gone
after them. They wanted to kill Him. They sought to kill Him. They were angry at what He had
said. But consider how the Lord used
this in affecting these Gentiles. These Gentiles, they just went
up like they did every year. Wait, something's wrong. What
are these people so angry about? Oh, and they started to hear. And they said this to Philip,
Sir, we would see Jesus. We would see Jesus. When God
moves the heart of a sinner to come to Christ, when his sin
is exposed, when the holiness of God is revealed, there is
no word of man or religious deeds, no amount of works that will
ever satisfy his soul unless he sees Christ Himself. This religion that they had adopted,
it satisfied for a while. These religious deeds that they
had done satisfied for a little while. But now, these deeds were
no longer enough. They knew it was not sufficient.
Therefore, they sought out Christ. Now listen, I always desire to
know, am I preaching to any sinners? Is there anyone who seeks to
be accepted with God and receive eternal life? Then listen, you
yourself must come to Christ. You yourself. You yourself must come to Christ
alone. You must come like these Greeks. You must see that every effort
of religion is not enough. That the sacrifices of bulls
and goats can never remove sin and neither can your works. They
came to Christ because the religious sacrifices was not sufficient
to quench their guilt. It was not sufficient to remove
their sins. They needed someone else. They
needed something else. You'll never come to Christ unless
you see that your works are not sufficient. That your religion
is not sufficient. I like this. In Micah chapter
6, it talks about that king of Balak. Remember, Balak talked
to Balaam. Micah brings this up for one
purpose. He said, that you may know the
righteousness of the Lord. I'm going to call this to your
mind, that you may know the righteousness of the Lord. And then he recounts
this. Balak said, whither shall I come
before the Lord? And bow myself before the high
God? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves
of a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of
rams and with ten thousands rivers of water? Shall I give my firstborn
for my transgression the fruit of my body for the sin of my
soul? He's asking a question. How may I come before God? What does God require of me? That you may know the righteousness
of the Lord. Listen to the answer of this.
He has showed thee. He has showed thee, O man, what
is good. And what doth the LORD require
of thee? Here it is. Do justly. Paraphrase it here. Be perfect. You got it? Do justly and you'll be accepted. That's
that lawyer that came to him and he said, what must I do to
be saved? This is how religious people
come. What must I do? In other words, they think that
they have some capacity, some ability, and they come to the
preacher and they say, what do I have to do to inherit eternal
life? And our Lord Jesus Christ, knowing
that man's heart, He pointed him to the law. If you want to
do something, look at the law. And he said, what does it say?
Love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, with all
your strength, with all your mind, with all your body, and your
neighbor as yourself. He said, okay, do that and live. Friends, that is an impossibility
if you have any honesty with yourself at all. Now that lawyer, he didn't. He
tried to justify himself. If you want to justify yourself,
go ahead, try. You'll fail. No. Be perfect. Walk humbly with
your God. That's what God requires. Therefore,
what do you find in religion? You find this. Religion is never
enough. It's never enough. Somebody says, well, you just
have to do this. And when you've done that, guess
what? You think that's enough? Enough is a never enough. We
were talking about creeds back in the back. Creeds and traditions. Why do these things get thicker
as the years go on? I suppose the Catholic church
probably started out with one piece of paper. One little thing
they had to add. And then the next time they met,
they'd have to have another page. And pretty soon you've got a
big stack and it's with Baptists or anybody else. A bunch of stack
of things to do. What these Greeks found was this.
Those bulls could not take away their sin. They found that out. If God will
ever save you, He's got to bring you here first. He's got to show
you that there is nothing you can do. But this Western philosophy,
we always think there's got to be something we can do. Isn't
that right? I was hearing a man going over to Europe one time
and he had made a reservation and somebody else took his room.
Somebody else paid more than he paid and they took his room. And he said, well, surely there
must be something you can do. The manager said, nope. And he had to sleep outside. Friends, there is nothing you
can do to merit the favor of God. Nothing you can do. If God is ever going to save
you, He's going to bring you there first. He's going to bring you
there first. He's going to show you the depravity
of your nature, the vanity of your self-righteousness. He will
show you the blasphemy of your works religion. Just like these Greeks found
that their obedience was insufficient. Therefore, they said, sir, we
would see Jesus. We would see Jesus. Do you desire
to see Christ this evening? Then come near and hear what
Christ said to these men. If you're going to come to Christ,
wouldn't you want to hear what He told these guys? Because what He told them is
what He tells you if you desire to seek Him, if you desire to
come unto Him. Look now at verse 23 in your
text. And so you see, he hears them
and he said, I don't know if we should bring them. He comes
over to Andrew and he said, Andrew, you think we should tell Jesus
about them? Andrew said, I don't know, but okay, let's both go
over there because I'm scared. I don't want to get upset with
us. And he comes to Christ, and they
tell him. And Jesus answered them, saying, listen, the hour
is come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Verily, verily,
I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground
and die, it abideth alone. But, but if it die, it bringeth
forth much fruit." The gospel of Jesus' death. Christ here
is preaching to them His death. You know this, there is no gospel
without the death of Christ. Without blood, there is no remission
of sins. Not just any blood. of Jesus
Christ. And the first thing Christ reveals
to them is His death. His death. Except the corn of
wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone. But if
it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. Here Jesus sets Himself
forth as a picture of this corn of wheat. You have a little seed
of wheat. You take that seed of wheat and you put it right
here. You leave it alone. How much fruit is it going to
bring? None. You have to take this seed. You
have to plant it in the ground. The seed has to die in order
to bring forth what's in it. There's something in the seed,
isn't it? It's already programmed. It's
already in there. And when you kill it, it sprouts. That's what Christ says about
Himself. I am the corn of wheat. Now consider this. If Christ
abode alone, there would have been no salvation. None. If Jesus Christ did not come
to die, if He remained in His holiest state as the Son of God,
which was His right, Surely we would have been like
the fallen angels. The fallen angels have no savior.
They are now reserved in chains of darkness until His coming
judgment and they will forever be cast into eternal hell and
there is no hope for them. Consider if God left Adam in
the fig leaves of his sins. If God did not condescend and
come down to Adam, we all would have been like the fallen angels. But, that's not what happened.
That's not what happened. God did not leave Adam alone. God came down to Adam and preached
to him of a Savior. of a Savior. In sovereign mercy,
He revealed His purpose and grace to save men. That message God
gave was a message of salvation, a message not of works, a message
not of merit, but of salvation by the work of another. You remember,
He said, the seed of the woman shall crush the head of the serpent."
In other words, another man is coming. Another man. He's going to be not the seed
of Adam because Adam's seed was condemned. He should be the seed
of the woman and he is going to crush, destroy the work of
the devil which is sin. Satan is the father of sin. And
He says He's going to destroy that work. And He's going to
do it in a very specific way, by the bruising of His heel. And we understand this by the
crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ, by His death. You see,
it was by sin that death came. It was by one man's sin, death
came and entered into this world. God purposed that also righteousness
should come by one man's obedience. It's astounding that God deals
with all men in these two men. Representative men. You weren't
born neutral. You were born under a representative
man. Adam. You died under a representative
man, Adam. You were born a sinner because
you were born of Adam's race. But here's hope that God has
given to another man a race of people. And by this man, by his
obedience and death, he should bring forth fruit. He should bring forth life. So God purposed to save them
by one man. And see then the horror of sin. The horror that sin brought was
nothing but death. And the Son of God would come
to remove death. Can you imagine the day when
there will be no more death? You see, that day is coming because
Christ has already did it. He has already removed it. I
like when He told Martha, He said, Whosoever liveth and believeth
in Me shall never die. Do you believe this? So when we die, we don't die.
When this body falls into the ground, it doesn't die. Why? Because Christ is our life and
He has brought forth life by His obedience, by His death. And except a corn of wheat fall
into the ground, if it abides alone, no one be saved. But He
says this, but if it dies, and that word if, I believe is better
translated when. It was coming. He said the hour
has come. So it was a death in an hour
and it was come. Christ said it was come. He said, but when
it dies, it bringeth forth much fruit. See then by the Gospel,
it was God's purpose and will that Christ should die. That
He should die for the sins of His people. Christ had died and rose again.
You remember He's talking to His disciples on the road to
Emmaus, and they were sad. They were sad. They said, we
thought, we thought He was the one. Well, you were right, you just
missed it. You missed the whole thing. And Christ, in His mercy,
He said, ought not Christ to have suffered and entered into
His glory? Ought not Christ to suffer these
things and enter into His glory? And beginning at Moses and all
the prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures things
concerning Himself." Our Lord Jesus, in the face of
Pilate, He said, you know, this is why I came into the world.
You have no power over me except it were not given to you. That's how silly are religious
people. Some people go watch that Jesus movie and I remember
some guy talking about it and he was crying because they crucified
him. Like he could do something about
it. You know, if I was there, if
I was there, we would have gotten together. You know, there was
nothing to stop this death. As a matter of fact, the Pharisees
that wanted to kill him the most, they said, we can't do it on
Passover. We can't do it. You know, oh yes you will. You
do it exactly the way I told you to do it. And they did it
exactly the way God determined, right? There was nothing to stop
this corn of wheat from falling into the ground. It was the will
and purpose of God. And behold, He has come. Christ
has come. He has died. His blood has been
shed. And as the Passover lamb, by
the grace and love of God, He bore our sins in His own body
on the tree. It was there He died. It was
there that the justice of God rained down on Him in full measure
without mercy. It was there He suffered and
died under the strict justice of God for our sins. Do you suppose that you can count
your own sins? Yet, He poured all the sins of
all His in His own body on the tree. God had found a
ransom. Christ was the ransom. God found
a ransom. And behold, the representative
of man, He represented all that the Father had given Him. And
as this corn of wheat fell into the ground, by His one work,
by His one death, He had forever removed our sins from us. Listen to what it says. Hebrews
9 and verse 12. Neither by the blood of goats
and calves. That's what these Greeks found
out. They were dissatisfied with those calves and goats. They
knew that wasn't going to work. But by His own blood, He entered
in once into the holy place. How many deaths did it take? One. How many times did he enter
into God with his blood? Once. Where were you? What did we have to do with that? Nothing. It was done by God for
us. And listen, and having obtained
eternal redemption for us. You see what this corn of wheat
did? It fell into the ground and died. for His people, and what was
the result of His death? Life. When a corn of wheat falls
into the ground and dies, it bringeth forth much life fruit. When Christ died and entered
into that tomb, life sprang out. God raised Him from the dead,
therefore we are sure of this. If anyone would see Christ, if
anyone would see Christ, you must see this, you and I are
failures. But He was successful. Matter of fact, that's why I
want to see Him. I want to see Him because He is successful. He has accomplished the salvation
of His people. God raised Him from the dead,
seated Him on the throne of glory. And behold, the ransom has been
paid, the representative man has fallen, His work is accomplished. The wrath of God is forever satisfied. Our Lord Jesus said this, I lay
down my life for the sheep. and other sheep I have which
are not of this foal, them I also must bring." I must bring them. Do you not see the blasphemy
then of works religion? Do you not see the blasphemy
of a religion that says that Christ died for everybody? If Christ died for everybody,
then He's a failure. What can you say? If He died
for a man in hell, what good was His death? But we know this, that Jesus
Christ was a victorious Savior and His death has accomplished
the salvation of His people. He has obtained eternal redemption
and we are sure of His victory because God raised Him from the
dead. Now look at this. I want you to see how sure you
could be. If you would see Christ, you're
going to see a victor. You're going to see a champion. You're going to see a risen king. A risen Lord. And I want you
to know that His success is tied to the glory of God. Look what
Christ says in our text. Go back to your text and look
at this. Verse 23, He says, the hour has
come. What is He talking about? He's
talking about that hour when the corn of wheat is going to
fall on the ground. He's talking about His death. He says, the
hour of my death has come for this purpose, that the Son of
Man should be glorified. Glorified. This is the same thing He said
in John 17. Flip over there. John 17, the High Priestly Prayer.
Look at verse 1. Our Lord spake this to the Father
and He said, Father, the hour has come. Same words, right?
The hour has come. Glorify Thy Son that Thy Son
may also glorify Thee. How in the world does this...
Listen, God glorified the Son when He raised Him from the dead
and set Him on the throne. God glorified Him because He
earned it. He merited it. God set Him on
the throne. And then how then is the Son
to glorify the Father? Here it is. As thou hast given
Him power over all flesh. Now this is going to glorify
God right here. This is going to honor God. That He should
give eternal life to as many as thou hast given Him. Let me ask you this, will the
glory of God fail? Will the glory of God fail? If
Christ died for a sinner, and that sinner died in His sin,
then the glory of God has failed. Christ has failed! to bring as
many as the Father had given Him. If God gave Him a man and
that man should not come and be saved, then this, the glory
of God had failed. Shall the glory of God fail?
We know it will not fail. Therefore, everyone who would
seek Christ, see this, if you come to Christ, if you are saved
and redeemed by Christ, It will not fail. Your salvation is tied to the
glory of God. And only if God's glory fails,
you will die in your sins. That's the only way. We are sure of His glory. Even
because the Father purposed to save the elect, Christ died to
save the elect, and the Spirit of God will surely call the elect
and keep the elect. Paul said, We are bound to give
thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord,
because God has from the beginning chosen you to salvation. Through the means of this, the
sanctification of the Spirit. The sanctification of the Spirit,
the work of the Spirit in the new birth, the work of the Spirit
in giving you the new nature, the sanctification of the Spirit,
and what's the result of the sanctification of the Spirit?
Belief of the truth. Who's the truth? Truth is not
a what, it's a who. It's not what Christ said. He
said, I am the way, the truth. The belief of the truth. And how did you hear the truth?
Whereunto He called you by our gospel. What are we preaching? If you
would see Jesus, we're always going to preach this. Except
a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone. But when it died, it'll bring
forth much fruit. We preach this, that the glory
of God is tied to the salvation of Christ. And so that if you
would see Christ, you would see a Savior. A successful, victorious,
glorified Savior. Is that what you desire? These
Greeks sought a Savior. And when they saw Him, what did
they see? They saw a Savior. What good is a Savior that doesn't
save? What good is a Savior that can't
save? He's not a Savior. Christ is a Savior. And I tell
you this. I would see Him. I would see Him. Would you see
Him? Friends, there is nothing else
I want to see. Christ is all. Christ is all. If you go on to read this, the
Lord describes those who who are affected by this salvation,
they serve Him. They abandon this life. He said
if a man loved this life, he'll lose it. But if a man hate this
life, what is he talking about? He's talking about his sin, talking
about his self-righteousness, talking about his religion, talking
about his false God. That's what we hate. Believers,
is there anything you hate more than you? There's no one I hate more than
me. I despise myself. God promised
that in the covenant. You read that in Ezekiel 36.
It says, then when I give you a new heart, it's then you will
loathe yourselves. And the more I live in this world,
the more I loathe it. Is that not true? I hate this life, but I love Him. Therefore, we live for Him. We serve Him. I know I'm gone, but how do you serve
Him? Obey His commandments. John tells us this in 1 John
chapter 3. Verse 26, I believe it is, this
is His commandment, that you believe on Him whom He has sent. Is that commandment grievous
to you? Is that grievous to believe on Him? And love one another
as He gave us commandments. Are these grievous commandments?
That's what is assertive. I was talking with a fellow today,
and he said, you know, I'm doing this and doing this, I'm building
the kingdom of God. I just cringe at language like
that. Maybe he didn't mean it. I hope
he didn't mean it. I'm serving God. I'm not building
His kingdom. His kingdom is built. My kingdom
is not of this world, what he said. We serve Him by obeying
Him. What's His obeying? Believe on
Him and love His. That's how we serve Him. I would see Jesus. Would you? Would you? I pray you would. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer.