Only Three Things are Necessary
So, I’m reading “Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire” (Jim Cymbala) for a Bible study. (Why it’s called a Bible study when it’s really a book group is beyond me. The thought of reading a book that talks about scripture or that has scripture references in it somehow stirs people to read the Bible more than going through a book of the Bible leaves me quite confused, and wanting to shout, “What!?! Are you serious?!?”… but I digress).
In chapter five, Cymbala is making an observation about Mark’s account of Jesus opening a can of righteous wrath in the temple. The thing that Cymbala lands (and harps, in my opinion) on is Jesus’ quote from Isaiah: “My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.” He brings up the point that the temple was being used for purposes other than what was intended and moves on to the logical conclusion that “Jesus is not terribly impressed with religious commercialism. He is concerned not only whether we’re doing God’s work, but also how and why we’re doing it.” (pg 69, paperback) I’m in total agreement, and had this been a sermon I was listening to I would have given an “Amen” (all be it silently, but still… it’s the thought that counts).
A few paragraphs later, however, I would raise my hand, and politely say, “Um, I think you’re off on this one buddy.” Cymbala says,
“God no longer centers His presence in one particular building. In fact, the new Testament teaches that we are now his dwelling place; he lives in his people. How much more important then is Jesus’ message about the primacy of prayer?… Preaching, music, the reading of the Word- these things are fine; I believe in and practice all of them. But they must never override prayer as the defining mark of God’s dwelling.” (pg 71, paperback, emphasis mine)
In all fairness, I have never heard Pastor Cymballa preach, nor have I had any real contact with his ministry apart from this book and its sequel, “Fresh Faith“. But, this statement bothers me to no end.
I live in a state that is dominated by Latter Day Saint’s ( LDS or Mormons) and their culture, and one aspect of their religion is prayer. They pray, but does that mark them as God’s dwelling? Or what about Muslims? They pray five times a day, and their discipline and devotion puts most of us Christians to shame. But does their practice of prayer mark them as God’s people?
Prayer is one strand of a three braided rope that binds us to God in orthodoxy and devotion. Study, prayer, and worship: these are the necessary disciplines of the Christian life. These do not mark us as belonging to Christ (that is what our love for each other does) but they do give us the defining mark of God’s dwelling. Each of these three depend on the other two, and without any one of the three, our faith becomes either religious habit or esoteric experience and thus ceases to be faith.
Study: I am not advocating that everyone should be an intellectual and surround themselves with language resources, commentaries, multiple versions of the Bible, and all the rest that so seems to mark the scholarly class. Let’s call it biblical intake for the sake of clarity. We need to have the written Word of God hidden in our hearts. We need to hear what God has always said, to discover the truth of scripture, and to be brought to a place of understanding the person of God.
Prayer: I like to define prayer as conversing with the Word. It is our talking and listening to God in the midst of our broken lives. It is petitioning and pleading for change, and then rejoicing over the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob working in our lives – the same as He worked in theirs. It is talking with Jesus about the scripture we have ingested, learning from the true rabbi, and having our perspective changed.
Worship: Don’t ever insult such a heavenly affair as this by reducing it to some simple chords and crappy lyrics! Worship is God revealing who he is, our responding to this revelation, and God responding to our response. Worship is birthed out of scripture, and is expressed in prayer. It is the doxology that erupts as your perspective is changed in the heat of prayer, and the resulting hunger for the Word that results.
These three are indispensable and interdependent. To exalt one over the others is to throw your relationship with the Almighty into chaos. To ignore one strand is to be shipwrecked on the rocks of experience or the sandbar of pride.
This truth can be seen in any realm of ministry. Take preaching: it cannot be done without in-taking the word; how will you understand and be empowered to speak what you have seen in scripture if you are not at the feet of the Almighty? And if your sermon does not drive people to doxology, adoration, and changed lives in light of the truth, what then have you spoken for? Or what about our times of corporate worship? Singing songs is a ritual that any sub-culture is well adept at (just look at any punk rock show or country concert for proof). What makes us different is that our songs are rooted in the truth of the Living Word as revealed in the written word, and thus they become the cry of our heart as we seek to bring our hearts to a place of worship and express our praise.
Study, prayer, and worship often overlap… and when they don’t it may be proper to question why they are not. These are the three necessities for growing up in Christ. Let us embrace all these things and find ourselves at a place of harmony, brilliance, and joy as we live life in the full truth and experience of The Word of God.
No longer will you call me 'my Baal'
I was asked to preach last Sunday (9.18.05) at my congragation. Even though I had about a month to prepare, I didn’t finish until Sunday 2:00 am. It was difficult for me to convey what Hosea 2.16-17 and 19-20 stirred in me. This is the sermon I gave, but you might see some additional thoughts on these passages in the posts to come.
What do we think we can hide from our God? Is there some corner of your heart that is veiled from His sight? Is there some thought you keep in the depths of your mind that is somehow kept from His knowledge? The book of Hebrews says,
” For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” (4.12-13)
This is an echo and a reiteration of Proverbs 15.11:
“Sheol and Abaddon lie open before the LORD; how much more the hearts of the children of man!“
The realm of the dead and the abyss are not hidden from God; so, is there some deep part of your life you think to hide from His eye?
We are all laid open and bare before our God, and this fact is the reason John exhorts us to walk in the light.
” This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” (1 John 1.5-10)
Don’t misread this: John is not telling us that we have to get everything perfect before we can walk with God. No, he is telling us that we might as well be honest about the fact that we have sinned. Only then can we receive forgiveness; you have to honestly admit you’ve done wrong before you can receive forgiveness.
Real honesty is a hard thing. It is easy to be general with our statements (i.e.- we are all sinners; I’m just like everyone else), but that is only surface honesty. Dig down deep: What are your indulgences? What wrongful or shameful acts do you justify as not that bad? What double standards do you hold others to? What idols do you keep polished and well fed? When we answer these questions honestly, we find our selves in the same boat as Israel. Sure, we may not engage in out right worship to false god’s and goddesses, but still… however subtle the ways, we play the whore with our unfaithfulness to God.
The book of Hosea is a record of God dealing with an unfaithful people whom He still loves. Never forget this: however unfaithful our actions might be, God always loves us the same. Saint or sinner, God sent His only son to die for you… for me… for anyone who would believe and receive eternal life. His love for us is ever unchanging. It is who He is; it is His nature, His essence. God is Love (1 John 4.16). But let us not be fooled; God’s love is not the mush, fuzzy, feel good imposer thing that we humans think it is. God’s justice is part of His love, just as mercy, compassion, and patience are. Look at Exodus 33.18-23 and 34.5-7 with me. I want us to understand who our God is; who it is that loves us with agape love, unconditional love; who it is that we are unfaithful to.
Ex. 33.18-23 (RSV)
Moses said, ‘show me your glory, I pray.’ and He(Yahweh) said, ‘I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you the name ‘Yahweh’; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,’ He said, ‘you (Moses) cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live.’ And Yahweh continued, ‘See, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock; and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen.’
Ex 34.5-7 (RSV)
Yahweh descended in the cloud and stood with him (Moses) there, and proclaimed the name ‘Yahweh’. Yahweh passed before him (Moses) and proclaimed, ‘Yahweh! Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parents upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the forth generation.’
First of all, our God has a name. His name is not a way to get His attention or to address Him as I would use anyone else’s name (i.e. ‘Hey Adrien’ or ‘Jenipher, could you…’) . His name is not a way for me to label Him, like the names we give to objects and animals (i.e. chair, table, cat, dog). His name is *everything* He is, His character, His nature. It is the fullness of all that He is, the reason He does what He does and speaks what He speaks. Moses first heard God proclaim His name when He spoke through a burning bush. Ex 3.13-15:
Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.
The name of God is: ‘I AM WHO I AM’. There is no condition, there is no explanation, there is no other way to describe the self-extant one. Now, we don’t say ‘I AM’ when we say the name of God; we say Yahweh. This is connected to a Hebrew verb that means ‘to be’. Literally, Yahweh translates out ‘HE BE’. (There’s some Biblical ebonics for you) For grammatical purposes, we translate it ‘HE IS’ or ‘YOU ARE’. Whenever you read in the Bible ‘LORD’ in all capital letters, it is ‘Yahweh’
Yahweh is our way of saying ‘You are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means clearing the guilty…’ Yahweh is our way of saying ‘He is merciful, full of grace, patient with us, overflowing in kindness and faithfulness, and forgiving. Yet, to those who will not accept the atonement gift He offers, He hold them to their guilt.’ Yahweh is another way of saying ‘God is love’.
There is enough in these verses for an entire sermon series. But I want us to look now at Hosea, and keep in mind who Yahweh is as we see how He deals with unfaithful people. The book is made up of several words or oracles given to Hosea from Yahweh. The first word (chapters 1-3) is God indictment of Israel for playing the whore with other god’s (the Baals). The core of Yahweh’s charge and judgment against His people is found starting in 2.5:
For their mother (Israel) has played the whore; she who conceived them has acted shamefully. For she said, ‘I will go after my lovers, who give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.’ Therefore I will hedge up her way with thorns, and I will build a wall against her, so that she cannot find her paths. She shall pursue her lovers but not overtake them, and she shall seek them but shall not find them. Then she shall say, ‘I will go and return to my first husband, for it was better for me then than now.’ And she did not know that it was I who gave her the grain, the wine, and the oil, and who lavished on her silver and gold, which they used for Baal. Therefore I will take back my grain in its time, and my wine in its season, and I will take away my wool and my flax, which were to cover her nakedness. Now I will uncover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and no one shall rescue her out of my hand. And I will put an end to all her mirth, her feasts, her new moons, her Sabbaths, and all her appointed feasts. And I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, of which she said, ‘These are my wages, which my lovers have given me.’ I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall devour them. And I will punish her for the feast days of the Baals when she burned offerings to them and adorned herself with her ring and jewelry, and went after her lovers and forgot me, declares the LORD.
Israel chased after ‘other lovers’; they decided that these Baal’s could provide for them better than Yahweh. In fact, Israel forgot that it was Yahweh alone who truly gave them grain, wine, oil… the essentials of life; It was Yahweh Himself who gave them silver and gold as well… the luxuries of life. They choose to spend these essentials and these luxuries on false god’s.
So, what do we spend the things of our lives on? Are we chasing after a lover other than Yahweh? Are we using the necessities of life we are given to honer someone other than God? Perhaps even to honor ourselves?
Israel offered worship to false god’s called Baal’s. The word Baal simply means ‘master’, and there were ‘masters’ for everything. In one Bible dictionary I found 10 listings of different Baal’s mentioned in scripture, and there were hundreds more. These were Canaanite deities, and the worship practice varied from one to another. Some required a simple offering of goods; some demanded sexual orgies to ensure the harvest; some even called for the sacrifice of children in a fire.
Compare these false god’s with Yahweh: they are not merciful and compassionate, there is no love. These idols demanded and demanded and took and took, and could never give the things they promised. But still Israel chased after them. Instead of being Yahweh’s people, Israel wanted to be like the nations around them. They wanted to be successful and rich; they wanted to be well liked; they wanted to have security and protection from a human army and a human king. They were just like we are. We forget that the Lord takes care of us. We try and attain success according to man’s standard. We think we need more and more and more… It is much more subtle, but things and people all around us (even our selves) want to be our master, our Baal.
So Yahweh proved that He alone is truly God, and He frustrated Israel’s plans and efforts. The whole reason the nation went into exile was because it was the only course of action that God had left to take to save them from their own unfaithfulness without utterly destroying them.
We rarely think of hard times as discipline. As soon as something goes wrong in out lives, or as soon as something gets uncomfortable for us or threatens our security we start calling it an attack from the enemy, and start pleading for God to fix it and make it all better. In some cases, we act like spoiled children who just didn’t get their way, so we throw a temper tantrum of sorts and expect God to fix it according to our ideas.
Now, I am not by any means advocating that the enemy never attacks. We know He does, and we need to understand what is a spiritual attack that we might be apart of God’s work to heal and counter that attack. And I am not suggesting that when ever something in our life goes wrong we should try and figure out what we are doing wrong… God is not into giving us a cold or a flat tire because we didn’t pray enough. That is not who Yahweh is. But, He does direct and orchestrate our lives in such a way that all things (good or bad) can and are used by Him to direct and lead us to deeper intimacy with Him. He is sovereign and omnipotent; He can do things like that. He has it under control, and we can trust that Yahweh is all about love… and love seeks the best for the beloved. Our best is only found in intimacy with Him.
This is why God disciplined Israel. Hosea 2.14-16:
Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Trouble a door of hope. And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.
And in that day, declares the LORD, you will call me ‘My Husband,’ and no longer will you call me ‘My Baal.’ For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be remembered by name no more.
Yahweh was not competing for the position of Israel’s master; Yahweh wanted to be her only lover, her husband to whom she would be faithful. He wanted Israel to remember the covenant He had made with her at Sinai, to remember that the covenant was based upon His name… the one he declared to Moses. God’s desire was and still is to live among His people in such an intimate way that the only picture we have to try and describe it is marriage.
He says ‘No more will you remember the names of other lovers you chased after. No more will you ignore me and distract your self with these false masters. No, you will understand that this trouble you find your self in is actually bringing you Hope, because you will walk through it and find yourself closer to me.’
God wants to be our husband, not our master. He wants to have an intimate relationship with us. Look down at vs 19-20:
And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.
This isn’t a picture of religious rules and fear of punishment. This isn’t a picture of us trying our best and hoping that it is good enough to find the favor of God. This is Yahweh making us His own forever, giving us righteousness and justice, showing us steadfast love and mercy. This is Yahweh producing faithfulness in us so that finally we might cling only to Him. This is our God keeping His word to Ezekiel (36.26-27):
I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
And you shall know Yahweh!
In keeping with the picture of us as the bride, I would say that this knowledge is not academic head knowledge, neither is it some deep belief that can never be shaken. To know God in this context is to experience Him in the deepest, most intimate way possible. In Genesis 4.1 is says that Adam knew Eve. This is the kind of knowing we are talking about. Intimately knowing Yahweh.
So, how do you know Yahweh now? Do you know Him by some of the titles He holds: savior, healer, redeemer, provider, King of kings, Father, God, Lord… These are all words we have to express some small aspect of who Yahweh is and what He does in our lives. These are all good… but none of them are all of who ‘He is’ is. Sometimes, we use these titles as if we are trying to get His attention… like some spiritual intercom. We don’t get God’s attention; we acknowledge His continual presence and converse with the one who is omnipresent and with us always.
This, and so much more, is intimacy. But, we need help getting there. We have already admitted that we play the whore just as Israel did. We might be more subtle about it, but that doesn’t change the fact that we are unfaithful. We do not know Yahweh as we should! How could we ever hide this gaping wound of infidelity? We need healing; we need His discipline. Hebrews 12.5-13 says:
And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.
I need this! We as a congregation need this! The body of Christ needs this! We are called the bride of Christ; let us have the desire and perseverance to be intimate with Yahweh just as He desires and perseveres to be intimate with us.
Hosea 2.19-20:
And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the LORD.
Oh God, let us know You!
The Hope of Salvation 1.5: an apologetic interlude
I must apologize. I started this thinking in a misleading place. By it’s self, sanctification will turn us into moral people. But, this is not what God really wants, and I now ask for forgiveness if I have lead people to believe that. Ravi Zacharius once said, “Jesus did not come to make sinners into moral people; Jesus came to make dead men alive!” After reading John 1:4-5 and 10:10-11, I tend to agree with him. As we continue to think over the good news we need to keep in mind what salvation is: giving life to dead people. So, I guess the place to begin would be with what we need saving from… namely ourselves.
I have long contended that sin is not *what* you do, rather it is *how* you are. Sin is a state of being separated from God; a place of standing if you will. Yes, there are certain actions that will move you into this state of existence (i.e. – sorcery, extramarital sex, same sex romance, idolatry, coveting, murder, un-honoring your parents, etc.), but these are symptoms of a nature that is separated from God, not merely deeds that God detests. Sanctification alone cannot deal with this situation; this is why sanctification is only truly present after justification. Otherwise, it is just broken people trying on morality.
We cannot ever hope to fix ourselves. This is what humanists strive for, why eastern mysticism wants to obliterate the self, what cosmic “new-age” -ism hopes for, and the very thing that Christ needs us to put down if we are to find life in Him. Jesus does not ask us to come to Him so that He can help us become successful, all-American people who are nice, have good families, a squeaky clean life, and are admired by all. Jesus came to heal any and all who would admit they were sick with sin and that He was there only hope.
As we discuss righteousness and godly living on “this side of the cross”, I fear we often forget Genesis 2:16-17. This is a reality that we cannot afford to lose sight of. It is all too easy to convince our selves that our sin nature means that we are just big screw ups. Its easy to delineate sinful actions as bad things that we can’t help but do. It’s easy to make this into only a moral issue. But this is an issue of life it’s self! The fact is that Adam and Eve *died* the very day they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. What else could you call being separated from the source of life with out any way to reconcile the breach?
We are tripartite beings, meaning we are spirit, we are soul, and we are body. All three of these are essential to who we are. We are not just shells that house some eternal intelligence. God formed our bodies from the dust, breathed the breath (or spirit) of life into us, and we became a living soul (being). All was as it should be. Then our parents chose disobedience, ate from the tree, and broke right relationship with God. They stopped saying “yes” where God said “yes” and “no” where God said “no”. They took their lives and very beings away from their rightful owner and creator, God, and claimed their independence.
Now follow with me:
- -According to John 1 and John 5, God is the source of life.
-Independent means: 1)Not governed by a foreign power; self-governing. 2) Free from the influence, guidance, or control of another or others; self-reliant
- Therefore, having independence from God is freedom from dependence (or non-dependence) on the source of life. - In all reality, Adam and Eve disconnected us all from the only source of life.
It is important to understand the different meanings conveyed by the word “life”. When I first came across this in chapter 2 of Watchman Nee’s The Spiritual Man, I found it immensely clarifying of the issue of spiritual death. The greek language has several words for life: bios, psyche, and zoe. Bios refers to the means of life or living. It is how we stay alive, what our body needs to remain healthy and functioning. This is the word used when Jesus speaks of the widow and her mite. Psyche speaks of the animated life of man, our natural life or the life of the soul. The Bible makes use of this term when it describes the human life. Zoe is the life of the spirit, and the Bible uses this word to speak of Eternal Life. Zoe life is what Adam and Eve cut themselves and their decedents off from when they chose sin.
Think on this: Adam and Eve did not drop dead the evening after their sin. In fact, God told Adam that from now on his means of living (bios) would have to be worked for . Our bodies might be degenerating, but they are still alive, animate, and functioning, as are our souls (psyche). The soul is give to us in the event of creation. Conception is a once per life time thing… you are not conceived more than once, ever. The soul is the seat of “I”. It is the real self, and “I” still exists, and will exist for eternity. “I” is who Jesus came to save. Zoe, however, is not given in an event. Spiritual life comes to us in an ongoing flow through right relationship (or right standing) with God. Jesus says in John 17, “This is eternal life (zoe), that they know You, the one true God and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” Knowing here denotes an on-going, experiential, relationship in which we are known and go on knowing God. Think of it in terms of intimacy, much in the same way of Genesis 4:1, “Now Adam knew Eve his wife…”
So again, I say Zoe life is what Adam and Eve cut themselves and their decedents off from when they choose sin; and that is why sanctification is *not* a moral issue, but rather it is an issue of life. When we use christianise terms like “born again”, “regeneration”, and the like, we are speaking of re-connecting with the source of life, not learning to live according to some set of morals. Our only hope of finding life is to re-connect with God in right relationship. But we cannot do this on our own. For one thing, we are naturally sinful. It is not action or choice; it is our nature. C.S. Lewis put it in terms of having a bent nature, and to me this is an apt description. We were created to have a life that was directed toward and moving with our creator. Adam and Eve have marred that by birthing all of humanity into a disobedient, independent nature that is incapable of having the correct relationship with God. I want to be very clear on this, so please hear me well. We are not separated from God by the things we do. We are separated from God because of how we are, because of our very nature. On our own, we can never change how we are. We can no more change how we are than we could change into birds. It is impossible. Even if on our own we could somehow change how we are, our debt is still too great. As creator, God owns His creation. The problem is, we are born into the independence of our primeval parents. In essence, we are born into a life that has been usurped from its proper owner; we are born into rebellion. This is not just something simple God can over look. His very nature (Ex 34:5-7) gives us our definition of true justice, so for God to not require justice would be for God to cease being who He is. That would be the same as reality ceasing to be real. It is nonsense.
So we are left to either a hopeless existence that at best can be moral or to trust that God has provided a way. The good news is that God has made provision for us to have life again. He has made the way for how we are to be changed, and our debt to be paid. This is the foundation of the process of sanctification, and in this light sanctification can be seen for what it is: learning to live out the reality of our right standing (justification) with God through our faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
Father, Husband, Theological Dreamer, Web Designer, Photographer, Coffee Chugger... Jesus obsessed & dreaming of a better Christianity. It's kind of like listening to a cross between guerrilla radio and a street corner prophet with a bad case of tourettes.
