Richard Ellis Talks

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis. Thanks for
allowing us to share this time with you. Honestly, it's
our favorite time of the day where we get to
hang out together and talk about how the truth of
God's word can.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Make a huge difference in your life.

Speaker 1 (00:15):
And that's what we're going to hear from Richard in
a way that only he can do with words of hope, insight,
and humor. You may be stuck in traffic or stuck
in life. Either way, today's message is going to help
get you on the right track as you learn how
much God loves you right where you are. So let's
get right into today's talk. Here's Richard Ellis.

Speaker 3 (00:37):
The title today's message is the Proto. On our visit
to Madrid, Spain, Rebecca and I stayed in a hotel
room that overlooked the Prato and she thought it was
the Proda Museum. We're going to see purses for a
while there, but it's.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
The Proto Museum.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
We're on a trip, wasn't a business trip, just the
two of us, and we've got a nice room. You
can see this museum, I'm telling you, like right out
the wind and it's right there. People come from all
over the world to go They go to Madrid for
no other reason but to go see that museum. There's
a couple other big ones in Madrid and they go.
And we're at the front desk down there in the

(01:12):
hotel and said, you know, well, we're thinking about going.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
To the Prado. How long will that take to see?
What you think?

Speaker 3 (01:18):
And the guy said, well, they could take eleven days.
I was like, what, I'm not spend eleven days in
a museum. I'm like no, I'm like, what's the short version,
like two or three hours? How long would it take
us to just walk through and kind of speed look,
you know whatever that is. So she likes to shop,
and you know, do all of these things just kind
of get out kick around together. And I keep seeing

(01:39):
this museum sitting out there, and there's a part of
me that thinks, you know, how do you go to
Madrid and not go to the Prado, especially when it's
across the street.

Speaker 2 (01:47):
But do I really want to go look at art?
You know? Does that really what I want to do?

Speaker 3 (01:52):
Do I want to be with my wife or be
with my wife walking around looking at art? So I
wrestle with that, and finally I realize, you know what,
this is crazy. You gotta go to the museum. So
we get in there and I got you know how,
like you're in a car you get carsick, or you
get in a boat you get seasick. Well, I got
art sick. Is what happened to me. So and it
turns out it wasn't a bad way. It's just it

(02:14):
was so crazy overwhelming. I physically begin to react. I
could not absorb the greatness of the art that was
in this building. The sculpture, the marble, statues, the paintings.
Every turn, every you need to go around a corner
and there'd be some twenty five foot painting just that.
You had to build a building big enough just to
house the art. He said, well, I'm not into art.

(02:35):
I don't even know that I'm really into art. I
am once I get into it, and once I see
it and get my head around it. I just can't
imagine how people know how to do that. But over
in that building was all this stuff, and I almost
missed it that close, and I almost missed it. There
was a painting in you know some of it it's

(02:56):
you know, there's some art. You really you do have
to be like smoking weed or something for it to
make complete sense.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
But you know this is mostly understandable stuff.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
I get in there and there is a painting of
two little boys, and you know, when you're speeding museum,
mean whatever that is. You know, you're kind of looking
and looking and did we get that haul? You know,
we would say we covered it. We're not gonna go
Unlet's we see every He's thinking, p's art in the
whole place. But you're flying through the thing and then
all of a sudden you have to stop. And the
one painting was of two little kids, like maybe two

(03:29):
year old's, you know, kind of a sixteenth century looking
two year olds and a sheep, and one of them
had a staff, and I stopped.

Speaker 2 (03:36):
I thought, well, what's up with that?

Speaker 3 (03:38):
Then you go read the little plaques and it's John
the Baptist and Jesus playing together.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
And that was my reaction. I just stood there and
I thought, and this is what I thought, What if
I had missed this painting? He said, well, why did
that hit you so strong? Because my mind works titles
and words.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
And trying to think of ways to see things in
a different way, and all of a sudden, that picture,
you know, I just I think, do we understand?

Speaker 2 (04:07):
You know who these people were.

Speaker 3 (04:08):
Jesus comes born of a virgin, sinless life, but he
was an infant, he was in a womb, he was
a little baby.

Speaker 2 (04:15):
He grew up with John the Baptist. These were cousins.
I mean, it's just you've got to stop and slow.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
Down, and sometimes God will use something like art to
slow you down. Then I'm going down with these big
hallways and I look up and there's a life size
marble statue of a woman kind of scantily clad, we'll
go with that technical term, and she's looking off, nothing erotic,
nothing sexual about it. And then there's an older gentleman

(04:42):
breastfeeding from this woman. And I was like, okay, what
in the world that stopped the whole speed art deal, right, Like,
what is this about? Because here's this young woman, this
old man. There's got to be some explanation. So I
go over and read the plaque and this is no
some new thing in art, because it's not some new

(05:03):
thing in life. The story behind this piece of sculpture
and multiple paintings trying to depict this was of a
daughter going into prison to visit her father, who was
going to die, was starving to death, and the only
way to keep him alive was with her own milk.

(05:23):
You say, well, that's grotesque, that's ah, I would never
do that. You know what, You don't know what you
would do if you were on the verge of death. Now,
why do I bring this whole thing up. There are
things that you read in your Bible. If I take
just this book and what I'm trying to say today,
and we'll get.

Speaker 2 (05:43):
Into this, hopefully, and it'll make more sense.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
This book, this Bible, for some of us and for
some people in the world, is kind of like a
museum filled with treasures that just sits and it can
literally be not across the street, can be right by
your bed, can be right on your coffee table, can
be multiple copies in your house, and it is filled

(06:09):
with treasures. And you say, yeah, but I've looked in
I've walked through the museum, and I've seen stuff that
I don't get.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
I don't understand.

Speaker 3 (06:16):
It's grotesque, it doesn't make sense, it seems unfair. Don't
give up on the treasure just because you don't get it.
And you say, well, I read something to him, but
then find someone who it does make sense to keep studying,
keep searching, keep walking through it, and give God a
chance to speak to you. Because this is not a museum.

(06:36):
This is the stuff of life. This is milk to
a new born spiritual baby. This is meat to a
Christian who is trying to make their way. And if
you've been a Christian for any period of time and
you have neglected this, this treasure, then sooner or later

(06:56):
you get hungry. You get thirsty, and you almost can
take it anymore, and you find yourself crossing the street,
so to speak, entering into this thing and saying, God,
you got to talk to me again. I need to
see the master pieces again. I need to be reminded.
I can't miss this.

Speaker 2 (07:15):
Now.

Speaker 3 (07:15):
I'm going to read you some verses and I'm gonna
try to as I normally try to do, go left
to right, and let's start in Joshua chapter one and
highlight why this thing is so important. Joshua chapter one,
verse eight says this, this book of the Law shall
not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in

(07:36):
it day and night, that you may observe to do
according to all that is written in it. For then
you will make your way prosperous, and then you will
have good success. You want your life to work. You
are not gonna make it without God's word. You say, well,
I just don't agree with that. There's a couple of
things are going to happen. Either you'll have enough time

(07:57):
to arrive at a place where all you're mats aren't
going to work anymore, or tragically, some people die living
next door to the museum and never go in, never
see it, never experience it.

Speaker 2 (08:09):
And you can be that close. You can be this close.

Speaker 3 (08:13):
God is pursuing you, and he sets up these places
and puts these people along the way and tries to
give you opportunity over and over and over again.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
And today this literally could be your shot.

Speaker 3 (08:27):
They say, okay, well, then you're going after people who
are not Christians, not just them because you may be
a Christian. So you got your little ticket and you're
just waiting for the you know, waiting.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
For him to show up. That's not all there is
to this.

Speaker 3 (08:38):
Read the scriptures, the one I just read Joshua one eight.
The Book of the Laws shall not depart from your mouth.
You shall meditate in it day and night, that you
may observe to do according to all that is written
in it. For then you will make your way prosperous,
and then you will have good success. And those are
the things that supposedly we all want a prosperous way. Hey,

(09:00):
good success, that's the way you get it. Go to
Jeremiah twenty nine for some of you who go, oh,
I know exactly where he's going. But some of you
have never heard this stuff. Jeremiah twenty nine. And let's
jump down to verse ten. For thus says the Lord,
after seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit
you and perform my good word toward you and cause

(09:22):
you to return to this place. Now, please, you got
to stay with me. You have got to see this painting.

Speaker 2 (09:31):
You have got to.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
Sit down and listen and look and see what it
is that God is trying to say to you. Now,
look at what he says. For I know this is
God speaking in his word, and this is a timeless truth.
For I know the thoughts that I think towards you.
What does God think about you? Till I was twenty
something years old, I thought God had a massive cosmic

(09:53):
club and was just waiting to knock that you know
what out of me. Any shot he got, just waiting angry,
just on the edge of his throne.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
Just give me a reason.

Speaker 3 (10:04):
I'm gonna pop you so hard into yesterday.

Speaker 2 (10:06):
I'll hit you so hard. That's what I thought God
was about.

Speaker 3 (10:09):
So you're just gonna walk around like, Oh, don't hit me,
I'll be good, and then you do something wrong and go, oh,
here it comes.

Speaker 2 (10:15):
He's gonna kill me. He's gonna wipe me out.

Speaker 3 (10:17):
And I lived in complete fear of this God who
loved me. And it turns out that was not what
he was thinking about me.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
And I didn't know that. I kind of knew it
in my head, but I didn't know it in my heart.

Speaker 3 (10:28):
Look what he says, he thinks, I know the thoughts
that I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
Of peace and not of evil, to give you a
future and a hope.

Speaker 3 (10:40):
Then you will call upon me and go and pray
to me, and I will listen to you, and you
will seek me and find me when you search for
me with all your heart. Now that I'm trying to use,
I understand art and museum. This is the kind of thing.
You take one verse and you go somewhere and you
sit down and you put that verse up on the

(11:00):
wall and you stare at it and you think about
it and you absorb it, and you ask the artist,
what did you mean when you wrote that?

Speaker 2 (11:08):
When you painted that picture for me?

Speaker 3 (11:10):
And as you meditate on it and the Holy Spirit
works in your heart and through you, you start to
understand and he starts to communicate to you just those words,
I know what I think about you. It's thoughts of peace,
not of evil. I don't want bad for you, I
want good, fear. I want peace for you, to give
you a future.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
And a hope.

Speaker 3 (11:29):
Who doesn't want a future and a hope? And all
of a sudden you start to internalize it, and it
starts to make sense, and you begin to believe it,
and then you begin to live because you know it's true.
And then you start to think of God differently, because
now you understand how he thinks about you. You can
trust to God who is thinking these thoughts about you.

(11:51):
I didn't trust God for a long time because I
didn't know if that's really what he was about. If
God was out to destroy you, you'd be gone think
about it. Think of the crap we have collectively generated.
You can just pick one little thing you've done in
your life. He go boom, that's it.

Speaker 2 (12:09):
You're out. The wages of sin is death. That's what
we all deserve.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
But yet he's merciful, he's patient, he's gracious, he's filled
with grace, and he still puts up with us it
in waits and gives us every opportunity. Go to Matthew
twenty two New Testament, Matthew twenty two, twenty nine. And
I'm not going to read this whole chapter, but in
Matthew twenty two, part of the discussion, and here in
the verses before twenty nine is they get in some

(12:35):
argument and they're trying to trick him and say, well,
if a guy's married and his wife dies, and or
a woman's marrying, her husband dies and she marries the
brother and then you know, goes through all the brothers,
then who's she married to in heaven? And this is
what he comes back with Matthew twenty two, twenty nine.
Jesus answered and said to them, you are mistaken, not

(12:57):
knowing the scriptures nor the power of God. There's a
lot of stuff that would get answered in our lives
if we would read his word. You're walking around confused,
trying to make your little deal work and arguing and.

Speaker 2 (13:12):
Rationalizing all that. If you really want answers, go to
the truth.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
You say, well, you know, some people really don't want
to know the truth.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
That's why they don't read the Bible. They don't go
to truth.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
They don't want to be around people who are going
to tell them the truth. But the truth is the
only thing that will ever set you truly free. You
were mistaken not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God.
And he goes on explaining that in the Resurrection they
neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like
the angels of God in heaven. So you say, oh,
I'm going to spend eternity with my wife and we'll
be married. Let me tell you something, marriage is a

(13:43):
gift for life and for women. That's really a comforting thought,
because being married forever would be terrifying for most women.
You say, well, how am I supposed to know what
the Bible says? You're supposed to read it?

Speaker 2 (13:54):
Now?

Speaker 3 (13:54):
Look, I know this is no brainer. Kind of this
almost stupid sound and stuff. This is how simple this is.
You just got to do it. You gotta study it.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
You have to take time.

Speaker 3 (14:03):
And as it turns out, it took us longer than
two hours to do the product because we slowed down.

Speaker 2 (14:07):
We couldn't just blow through. You have to stop to
absorb it.

Speaker 3 (14:13):
Go to Luke, chapter eleven, few pages to the right,
Luke eleven, verse nine. Jesus speaking here, and he says,
so I say to you, ask and it will be
given to you.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Seek and you will find. Knock it. It will be
open to you. For everyone who asks receives, he who seeks.

Speaker 3 (14:32):
Finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.
And the tens in these things is not ask one time.
It's a keep asking, keep asking, keep knocking, keep seeking.
It's every day, all the time. You cannot give up.
You cannot quit. You gotta go at it. You say, well,
I ask God for that ten years ago, and well,

(14:54):
don't quit. If it's really that important, you go at it.
Go to John chapter five. I've again without reading this
entire passage. Let's jump in at verse thirty one. John
chapter five, verse thirty one, and this is Jesus speaking.
He says, if I bear witness of myself. My witness

(15:15):
is not true. There is another one who bears witness
of me, and I know that the witness which he
witnesses of me is true. You have sent to John,
and he has borne witness to the truth. Yet I
do not receive testimony from man. But I say these
things that you may be saved. He was the burning
and shining lamp, and you were willing for a time
to rejoice in his light. So talking about John the Baptist,

(15:36):
But I have a greater witness than John's for the
works which the Father has given me to finish, the
very works that I do bear witness of me that
the Father has sent me, and the Father himself, who
sent me, has testified of me.

Speaker 2 (15:51):
You have neither heard his voice at any time, nor
seen his form.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
But you do not have his word abiding in you,
because whom he sent him you do not believe. Now
read that again with me, verse thirty eight. You do
not have his word abiding in you because whom he
sent him you do not believe. At some point you're
gonna have to come with terms, especially if you're not
a believer.

Speaker 2 (16:14):
You have to.

Speaker 3 (16:15):
Do something with Jesus. You can't get around it. You say, well,
I don't believe anything about Jesus. And by the way,
it's not to get in some big theological discussion. If
you are even thinking you believe something about Jesus, then
that even that is a gift of God. You people
say well, I'll get to that when I decide to
It doesn't work that way. You don't just up one

(16:37):
day and say well, I think I'm gonna go find God,
and I've decided that I have.

Speaker 2 (16:40):
Decided I'm going to be a Christian.

Speaker 3 (16:42):
The faith that you need to believe even is a
gift of God, not of works. Lest anyone should boast
and say, well look what I did. You do nothing
almost except hold out your hands and say thank you.
It is all Him, all Him. So if God has
been gracious and mercy, and someone has been praying for you,
and you feel any stir whatsoever and across the street

(17:05):
and walk into the museum.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
That is a God thing.

Speaker 3 (17:08):
So you better respond to it and pay attention and listen,
because your very life could be at stake. Keep reading
with me in this passage. You do not have His
word abiding in you because him whom he sent him.
You do not believe and then he takes it further,
these religious people. He's writing to verse thirty nine. He says,
you search the scriptures. You say, well, that shouldn't be

(17:31):
a bad thing. You search the scriptures for in them
you think you have eternal life. And these are they
which testify of me. But you are not willing to
come to me that you may have life. Now, this
is how crazy it is. Some people say, okay, well
I'm going to go read the Bible, and their presupposition
is I'm going to read it, but I refuse to

(17:53):
believe that Jesus is the answer. And he literally says
that to them right here. You search the scriptures for
in them you think you have eternal life. So people say, well,
I think the answers in the Bible. I'll read the Bible.
And then they discover that the answer is Jesus, and
they go, I don't like that answer. This Jesus thing
is a problem, big problem. One of the number one

(18:13):
throwbacks I get in my faces. Well it's too narrow.
You know, you cannot be that exclusive. You can't say
the only way to God is Jesus. I'm not saying that.
He's saying that. I'm repeating what he said. You say, well,
I don't like that. I won't be popular, people won't
like me. It doesn't matter. You have to find out
what is true because if you drop dead and you

(18:36):
make hell and you go wait a minute, So the
Jesus thing was it? Like, yeah, that was it? Well,
I'm not so happy right now about that? And what
about all my friends. It's not about your friends. It's
about you in that moment, figure out what you believe,
what you're gonna do with Jesus, and that will change
your life. No matter what you do with him, it's
gonna change your life if you're reject him, it's gonna

(18:56):
change your life if you accept him.

Speaker 2 (18:59):
Now, I'm gonna take a minute and be really, really
honest with you. I got Jesus. I believe this stuff.
I know. If I dropped dead right now for no
reason of my own, nothing that.

Speaker 3 (19:10):
I've done, I will hit heaven at mock speed because
of what Jesus has done for me. So all that's settled.
I've been married a long time, I got three kids.
I'm trying to do the right thing.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
I still screw up, and sometimes I just get tired.

Speaker 3 (19:25):
I just get tired, and I think I've lived this long,
and my question every once in a while is what
am I going to do?

Speaker 2 (19:32):
If I live?

Speaker 3 (19:33):
You're a certain age and you realize this is life,
and you've decided you're not going to be a drunk
the rest of your life. You're not going to smoke
weed the rest of your life. You're not going to
smoke meth. You're not going to steal. You know, you've
cleaned up your act. Now you're going to live the
way you're supposed to, you know God intending.

Speaker 2 (19:46):
For you to live.

Speaker 3 (19:47):
And then you realize, I'm just like, this is normal,
this is my new normal.

Speaker 2 (19:51):
How am I going to do this? And do I
even want to do this?

Speaker 3 (19:55):
And life just keeps coming and the challenges keep coming,
and I spend most of my week sitting look look
at people and talking to people who go, dude, this
is it?

Speaker 2 (20:02):
Like, yeah, this is it?

Speaker 3 (20:04):
So where the high highs? Why do you think people
shoot themselves up? They want to feel something boom. I
want to be alive.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
If you want to.

Speaker 3 (20:15):
Live and really be alive the way God intended, you
ain't gonna get it done without this book. Now, I
will promise you something. It never comes back void never
And if you give him a shot and you try
it his way, you can't imagine what a few minutes.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
His spirit, his word can do to your life.

Speaker 3 (20:40):
And no matter how discouraged you are, he has ways
of helping you lift up the hands that hang down,
strengthen the feeble knees, and you begin to run when
there's no reason you could run, to walk and not faint.
All this stuff's in the Bible. You go, I'm gonna
try it just a little bit longer my way. I'm
gonna I'm gonna go rip my teeth and make it

(21:01):
work my way. It's not gonna work your way. Look
around you. We got a room full of idiots that
have proven it doesn't work. Can I get a witness
a hand on any of that?

Speaker 2 (21:10):
Amen? There we go.

Speaker 3 (21:13):
And the ones who have made it this far and
trying and trusting and got their chips for being sober and.

Speaker 2 (21:19):
All these things, they've made it five.

Speaker 3 (21:21):
Years, ten years, whatever it is they've survived, They'll tell
you straight up.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
They get discouraged, they get tired.

Speaker 3 (21:26):
They do think about going back every once in a while,
but they stay in their lane and they press on
for the mark because it's too painful to go back,
and there's nothing to go back to. One more second
Timothy chapter three, And some of you know these by heart.

Speaker 2 (21:42):
I get that.

Speaker 3 (21:43):
I love the fact that people say it that way.
Very rarely do you hear someone say.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
Oh, I know that verse by head. Unfortunately, that is
the truth. Though.

Speaker 3 (21:54):
There are a lot of people who know a lot
of Scripture by head, and not many that know it
by heart. And you know scripture by heart. That'll change
your life because I got stuff in here that's mine
now that I didn't know for a long time. And
now when I read it and think about it and
quote it and meditate on it.

Speaker 2 (22:15):
It's not just words. It's His word internalized in my
own heart and life. And I can breathe again, and
I know I'm gonna be okay. He will never leave
me or forsake me. Those are not just words.

Speaker 3 (22:28):
That's a fact, and you need to know that as
a fact in your own life. Things like I have
not seen, nor ear heard, nor has entered into the
heart of man, the things that God has prepared for
those that love him.

Speaker 1 (22:43):
Before Richard comes back to wrap things up for us today,
I'd like to share a couple important things with you.
Let me encourage you to take a minute and check
out our website, Richard Ellis Talks dot com. You'll find
today's talk right there in the talks page, along with
all of Richard's messages. You can and forward them to
a friend so they can hear them too. You'll also

(23:03):
find the prayer wall to add your prayer requests, a
link to connect with us, the contribute page for you
to be able to give to this ministry, a radio
station finder, all of our social media links, and much more.

Speaker 2 (23:15):
So.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
Check it out Richard Ellis Talks dot com and Richard's
back now to wrap up today's.

Speaker 3 (23:22):
Talk and part of our trip with Rebecca. We saw
some amazing palaces about as good as you can get
on this side. And yet I've got a carpenter on
the other side who left here and went there to
prepare a place for me, And I has not seen,

(23:42):
nor ear heard, nor has entered into the heart of
man the things that God has prepared for those that
love him. And that's on the other side. So you say, well,
my life sucks down here. You're not gonna be here
much longer, so hang in there, and when you get home.
It will be worth it all, tewod Timothy Chatter three,
verse fourteen. But you must continue in the things which

(24:03):
you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom
you have learned them, and that from childhood you have
known the holy scriptures what you're able to make you
wise for salvation through faith, which is in Christ Jesus.
All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is
profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction and righteousness,

(24:24):
that the Man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped
for every good work.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
That's why you need the scriptures.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
Oddly enough, the same trip in Madrid, we did the
museum and we also did the bullfight. It's very hard
to fight the bull without knowing the truth. And everywhere
I go and the people I interact with, a lot
of it is just that it's just a bunch of bull.
When you spend time in this book, you have a

(24:53):
way to fight the bull. Know what he says, how
it applies to your life, how it applies to someone
else's life, and you'd be amazed at what he can do.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
This has been Richard Ellis Talks with Richard Ellis there's
only one reason we do this program, to take the
planet with the good news of Jesus Christ. That's our
message and our mission, and you have a vital part
of doing that along with us. If you've been encouraged
by these talks with Richard, be sure to share with
someone about the change they've made in your life. And
we'd love to hear your story as to how the

(25:25):
talks have made a difference to you.

Speaker 2 (25:27):
Give us a.

Speaker 1 (25:28):
Call, we'd love to talk with you eight five five
six Richard. You can also reach us through our website,
Richard Ellis talks dot com, and while you're there, check
out all the fun and informative pages we've put together
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sure to click on the contribute tab at the top
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(25:49):
a difference to you, your gift will make a big
difference to us. Until next time, Thanks so much for
listening to Richard Ellis Talks.

Speaker 3 (26:00):
Yeah,