There Is No Other Foundation
Ezek 13:9-14 And mine hand shall be upon the prophets that
see vanity, and that divine lies: they shall not be in the assembly of my
people, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel,
neither shall they enter into the land of Israel; and ye shall know that I am
the Lord GOD. 10 Because, even because
they have seduced my people, saying, Peace; and there was no peace; and one
built up a wall, and, lo, others daubed it with untempered morter: 11 Say unto them which daub it with
untempered morter, that it shall fall: there shall be an overflowing shower;
and ye, O great hailstones, shall fall; and a stormy wind shall rend it. 12 Lo, when the wall is fallen, shall it not
be said unto you, Where is the daubing wherewith ye have daubed it? 13 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; I will
even rend it with a stormy wind in my fury; and there shall be an overflowing
shower in mine anger, and great hailstones in my fury to consume it. 14 So will I break down the wall that ye have
daubed with untempered morter, and bring it down to the ground, so that the
foundation thereof shall be discovered, and it shall fall, and ye shall be
consumed in the midst thereof: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
1 Cor 3:9-11 For we are labourers together with God: ye
are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
10 According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise
masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation , and another buildeth thereon. But
let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. 11 For other foundation can no man lay
than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
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I remember when I was about
thirteen years of age, my family had been living in the small southern town,
near Lake Ponchatrain for a couple of years.
Moving there was quite a shock to us because my father had given up a
very well-paying business in the oil fields to move into full-time ministry as
pastor of a small church there. We had
been used to a large two-story house on about 60 acres right by the lake with a
barn, and trees and fields and such, and when we moved to South Louisiana we
had moved into a parsonage right by the church which had started out life a few
decades before as a one bedroom, "shotgun" house and had then been
added on to three times to accommodate the pastor's growing families. It was now a very tiny three bedroom, two
bath house and unfortunately whomever had done the construction had never quite
got the floor levels right so almost every room that you entered involved a
step up or a step down of just a few inches.
(My father would forget about these little steps and sometimes almost
take out a piece of furniture during the night). The house also had the unique characteristic
that if you dropped a marble anywhere at random in the house, it would roll
away from you! I mean this house was
small. I had a queen size bed in my room
and, no exaggeration I had only about two and a half feet to walk around two
sides of it.
My father had to sell
insurance the first two years or so to help make ends meet and so we were
thankful for the little rickety house, but after the church began to grow and
the finances got better, we were all looking forward to moving into something a
bit bigger and nicer. I'll never forget
the day my father came home excitedly and told us that we were going to look at
a house a few miles up the road in the town of Talisheek. We had been praying for a house that would be
big and yet affordable, and this house was priced way below what it was worth,
my dad said. When we saw the house, it
was a magnificent three story southern mansion with a huge porch and big white
columns going all the way around three sides.
There were big oak trees in the front yard and a huge garage and shop
area off to one side. As we looked at
the house, we begin to feel as if it was an answer from God. The rooms were big and spacious. There was a game/recreation room in addition
to a big den and kitchen and dining area.
Quite frankly, it was our dream house and when we heard the price, we
couldn't believe that they would offer such a beautiful home site for such a
ridiculously low offer. And even more
remarkable was the fact that the realtor said that we were the only ones who
had inquired about the house. God, or so
it seemed, had kept it just for us!
We walked around and talked
about how great it would be to get out of the shack that we were living in and
we all felt like we had found God's will.
That is, we felt that way, until my father, as he was walking down the
hall to exit the house, noticed a small, thin crack running the length of the
hall ceiling. He paused, and then
entered some other rooms and sure enough the crack continued throughout the entire
house. He didn't say anything about it
then, but when we got home, he called for an inspector to go view the house and
give him an assessment. That inspector
ended all of our day dreams when he reported back to us that the foundation was
faulty and had not been installed right and that's why the house was empty and
no one was interested. The foundation
was so bad that the house was eventually going to split in two and just fall
apart and in South Louisiana with hurricanes a regular occurrence, nobody
wanted to live in such a place. My dad
did some further checking and found out that it was going to cost almost as
much to raise the house and fix the foundation as it did to buy the house in
the first place, and even then they couldn't guarantee it. So much for the nice big southern
mansion. So much for it being God's
will. The big beautiful place, to my
knowledge is still falling down unoccupied because it was built with a faulty
foundation. The building appeared to
have a foundation, and it sure liked a foundation, but because it was not a
solid foundation and a right foundation, it was as if it had none.
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You do not have to be a
master builder to understand the importance of a solid and sure foundation
underneath a structure. Without a proper
foundation, a building is practically
worthless, and maybe that's why there is so much in scripture about the
importance of a proper foundation in spiritual things because what is true in
the natural is also true in the spiritual.
It doesn't matter how big or how beautiful the structure is, without a
solid and a proper foundation, it's not going to last or make it through the
storms. This is what Jesus taught, this
is what Paul taught, and this was also taught by the Apostle Peter. All three men were concerned that in living
for God that people not just become religious or appear Christian like, but
build on the right foundation. They were
not desiring people to just build a relationship with God, but to build it the
right way! And the right way is on the
proper foundation. And not just appear
to have a foundation, but to make the foundation out of the right
material.
It is with all of this in
mind that causes our text in Ezekiel to stand out to us. God is prophesying judgment to the people and
to the ministers who have been ministering to them falsely and in doing so,
Ezekiel uses an analogy of the walls of a house. In it, God says that He has a problem with
their spiritual condition because they have been "daubed with untempered
morter" by so called "men of God" that will tell them what they
want to hear. In the text, God says that
He will ensure that the walls daubed with "untempered morter" will
fall and crumble, and will also confront those who applied the morter, meaning
the false prophets. It's an interesting
passage of scripture that grabbed my attention a few weeks ago and I began to
study exactly what untempered morter was and began to try to understand exactly
what God was talking about here.
Morter was mixed in the olden
times in the formula 1 part sand to 2 parts ash to 3 parts lime. Hay stubble or clay was then mixed in to add
some tenacity to the mix. This was the
morter used in such times to build rock and brick walls and houses and
such. If the mix was a little off and
had too much of some ingredients or not enough of others, then the morter was
termed "untempered morter" and was reserved to be used as an outer
coating to the wall and not for the wall itself. Where we today build a wall or brick home and
allow the brick or rock to be seen and exposed and think the morter lines as
something that is symmetrically beautiful, it was the nature of the Jewish
people to cover the outside of the brick or rock with untempered morter and
then smooth it over producing a white-washed finish. In other words, they would take this
untempered morter which wasn't good for holding the rocks together themselves
and smear on the outside and the inside of the wall so that it looked uniform
and smoothly white. It gave a unique and
finished look to the Jewish buildings and since it had to be reapplied every
few years, lended a fresh look to their architecture.
All of that is well and good,
and God had no problem with the practice, except He compared Israel's spiritual
condition to another common problem of the day.
If a structure has problems and is settling wrong and such, the proof is
that the wall and the stones and brick begin to shift, becoming loose or even
crumbling. You can tell if a stone or
brick home is settling or has foundation problems because cracks will begin to
appear in the walls and down the morter lines.
In modern homes, the cracks will appear in the sheetrock, similar to the
crack that my father noticed in the house in Talisheek. In the Jewish homes, such problems would
appear noticeable when the untempered morter finish on the outside would begin
to crack. And some dishonest people
(times haven't changed that much) would, instead of tearing the wall apart and
fixing whatever the issue was, just take some more untempered morter and daub
over the cracks and "hide the problem" and then sell it to some
unsuspecting buyer. Those who
"daubed the untempered morter" came then to mean someone who glossed
over the problems desiring to ignore them rather than deal with the problems
that were the root cause.
And so through the prophet
Ezekiel, God thundered against the ministry of the day. Israel had a group of ministers who would
simply tell the people whatever they wanted to hear rather than identifying the
things that they needed to change in their life. They were content to preach good little
sermons that just "daubed up the cracks" rather than admitting that
there was a foundational problem underneath.
The ministry of Ezekiel's day were content to just "white
wash" the outside and no matter what the foundation looked like, just make
it appear good and holy for a time, and if that didn't work, then daub it some
more. "Don't really change
anything, just let me keep applying layer of masks" was their ministerial
theme. They said "doctrine doesn't
matter, just appear like you are living for God."
And God thundered against
them! He said that He would send the
storm of His fury against them and that He would break down the faultily built
wall and expose the foundation, which was the root of the problem to begin
with! And then God would turn upon the
ministers who had just white-washed over the problems and consume them in His
wrath for not laying the proper foundation and just preaching what the people
wanted to hear! He would do this, God
said, so that you "know that I am the Lord." And in doing so, God taught us, even in
Ezekiel, the importance of a proper spiritual foundation!
________________________________________________________________________
Let me preach to you
today. I have made up in my mind that
I'm not going to be a preacher of untempered morter. I am not going to apply a message that does
not have all of the necessary part, or that leaves something out, or that is
too heavy on one ingredient or another.
I want my message to be perfectly mixed, not leaving anything out, and
not putting anything extra within. The
message of Ezekiel is clear to preachers:
when God returns, you do not want to be found preaching such a
compromising message. You do not want to
be one who ignores the proper foundation and that is content to daub untempered
morter to try to hide the faults in people's lives.
I read recently about the
record church attendance in the Midwest.
It was set in a Baptist church in Hammond, Indiana in December,
1972. They had 12,350
"worshippers" that Sunday that were brought in by sixty-eight buses,
picking up people from as far as fifty miles away. That certainly sounds noble until I found out
that their advertised service program for "Heaven Sunday" included a
well-known politician, an organist without arms or legs, a karate expert to
break boards, a former Hollywood stunt cowboy, an ex-football hero, a rodeo
star, Santa Claus, and a ventriloquist.
It wasn't church, it was a circus show!
But there are many that would term that day a success even though their
"service" did nothing for the spiritual betterment of the
congregation or with the foundational issues at stake in their relationship
with God. And if that lineup is
"heaven" then "heaven help us!"
There are many so called
"preachers" today in America who conduct all kinds of
"services." There are so many
different schools of thought in America today, that you can find a
"minister" who will preach a message to tickle your ears and make you
feel good and you can find a church that will have an entertainment package to
suit your fancy. You can order the music
in all styles and the preaching how you like it. There are
ministers who are the master of "untempered morter" and can
preach a powerful message and give pretty points and yet really never hit
anything deep down inside and never mess around with the foundation and the
root of the trouble of the people's lives, but just gloss over their sin and
gloss over their evil and make them feel and look like they are
Christians! Such people are masters of
untempered morter and they always invariably leave out an important ingredient
of the scripture. Or they focus the
majority of their time on one aspect of salvation and never get around to the
other things that Jesus commanded us to do.
They claim to specialize in "love" when really all they are
doing is preaching non-confrontational messages that avoid such foundational
issues as sin and ungodliness and disobedience and such and just allow people
to come be a part of a church without really changing anything or ever making
them feel uncomfortable. Times haven't
changed so much after all, because the "daubers of untempered morter"
of Ezekiel's day are still around.
But I'm proclaiming to you
today, that God is not impressed with the untempered morter nor the height of
your wall and buildings. God is not
impressed with how many you run in Sunday School or how big a church building
you have or how many stunts you can pull to get a record crowd to a
circus. God is not impressed with how
much money tele-evangelists have nor what great miracles they
"perform" in using God and faith for their personal gain. Because my Bible tells me that when God comes
back, He is going to hit their walls and if the wall is not built upon the
right foundation, despite how many times they have been whitewashed and glossed
over by these so called "ministers" and despite their physical
appearance of righteousness, their foundation will be exposed and if your
building is built on the right foundation then all of you grand achievements
and all of your righteousness will be for nought, consumed in the wrath of God
who cares more about the quality of your foundation in your spiritual
walk!
So I'm not going to gloss
over anything today. I'm not really
going to try to make you feel good just to avoid any issues, because I don't
want to be in that number of ministers that God will destroy! But, for the rest of this message, I am going
to talk to you about your foundation, and the right ingredients that you better
have in the foundation to your walk with God, according to scripture! God doesn't care how close you say you are to
Him, or how long you've served Him or how holy you look or talk, if your
foundation is off, then you're not going to make it! You've got to have the right foundation!
________________________________________________________________________
As we read in our text, the first
element of our spiritual foundation is Jesus Christ. Everything has got to start with Him. Allah won't bring you salvation. Islam is a lie from the pits of hell. The occult won't save you. Religions that demote Jesus Christ as not being
chief won't help. Jesus Christ has to be
number one. As Paul said in our text,
"there is no other foundation!"
Paul called Jesus the
"chief cornerstone" of people whose lives were a building for the
Spirit of God to live:
Eph 2:19-22 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and
foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of
God; 20 And are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the
chief corner stone; 21 In whom all
the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the
Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded
together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
The chief cornerstone was the
perfectly shaped stone set first at one corner which kept every one of the walls
in line and perfectly plumb and level.
If the cornerstone was even a little off, then the rest of the building
would be way off. For our lives to be in
"plumb" with the will and plan of God in every area, then Jesus
Christ has to be number one! It was
after Peter got the revelation of who Jesus Christ really was -- that He was
more than just an ordinary man -- that Jesus said "upon this rock, I will
build my church." Not upon Peter,
but upon the revelation that Peter received.
For our lives to be built upon the right foundation, we must have a
revelation of who Jesus Christ really is!
The scriptures say that He is "God manifest in the flesh" or
"God made visible in the flesh" (1 Timothy 3:16). Scriptures say that Jesus was "the image
of the invisible God" (Colossians 1:15).
The Bible says that Jesus, this son born of the virgin was "the
mighty God, the everlasting Father" (Isaiah 9:6)! Jesus told Phillip, that "if you have
seen me, you have seen the Father" (John 14:9)! Paul went on to say about Jesus:
Col 1:16-20 For by him were all things created, that are
in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be
thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by
him, and for him: 17 And he is before
all things, and by him all things consist.
18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the
beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the
preeminence. 19 For it pleased the
Father that in him should all fulness dwell;
20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to
reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in
earth, or things in heaven.
Jesus, the Creator, is also
the same God who died for you and I! All
the fulness of God dwelt in Him bodily (Colossians 2:9)! Jesus was not a junior God or another God or
another person of a trio of Gods, but He is the One, Almighty God in Flesh
coming to pay the price of sin for you and I!
"Hereby perceive we the love of God, that HE laid down HIS life for
us (1 John 3:16)! We are commanded to
pray for healing in his name. Every time
someone was baptized in scripture it was in the name of Jesus. Even when we come together with fellow
believers, we are to come together in the name of Jesus, worshipping Him and
the scriptures say that He is as close as the mention of His name! In fact Paul instructed us to:
Col 3:17a And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all
in the name of the Lord Jesus . . .
Any religious belief that
deemphasizes the name of Jesus, or the deity of Jesus Christ or the importance
of such things, is not built upon the right foundation! No matter how pretty it looks or how grand a
spiritual structure it may have, it's not going to last! The chief cornerstone has to be laid first,
if it is added later to the structure, then the whole thing will be messed
up! It has to be the foundational focal
point!
John 1 teaches us that Jesus
Christ was the "Living Word" so it follows that to not obey the Word
of God is to remove Jesus Christ from your building. Jesus, Himself, taught this in a very
well-known passage of scripture:
Luke 6:46-49 And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not
the things which I say? 47 Whosoever
cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will shew you to whom
he is like: 48 He is like a man which
built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when
the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not
shake it: for it was founded upon a rock.
49 But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a
foundation built an house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat
vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great.
The message is clear, if
Jesus Christ is really the center piece of your spiritual foundation then you
are not going to just hear the Word of God, but you will obey what it tells you
to do! That's the right foundation! Without Jesus, there is no foundation!
Going back to Ephesians
chapter 2, we find that there is another part of the foundation:
Eph 2:19-22 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and
foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of
God; 20 And are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the
chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the
building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for
an habitation of God through the Spirit.
Jesus Christ is the chief
cornerstone, but another chief element of our foundation is the "apostles
and prophets." Most preachers don't
have any problems with the "acts of the prophets" recorded in the Old
Testament, but when they come to the "Acts of the Apostles" better
known as the "book of Acts" that's when they begin crawfish and leave
things out. The Apostles are Peter,
James, John, Andrew, Paul, Phillip and such.
They are the ones that evangelized their world with the message of
Repentance and turning from willful sin, being baptized in the name of Jesus
Christ by full immersion in water, and receiving the Holy Ghost with the
evidence of speaking in other tongues and then living a Godly, Holy lifestyle,
separated from this sinful world in deeds and actions! That's what the Apostles taught throughout
the Book of Acts and even throughout the rest of the New Testament. But for some reason, most preachers want to
leave that out of their foundation! The
writer of Hebrews summed up the foundational teachings of the Apostles in
chapter 6:
Heb 6:1-2 Therefore leaving the principles of the
doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the
foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, 2 Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying
on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.
In other words, to lay the
proper foundation, you must believe the same as the Apostles when it comes to
repentance, faith, the baptismS (water baptism and spirit baptism), laying on
of hands (spiritual authority and submission to it), resurrection of the dead
(the coming back of Jesus Christ), and eternal judgment (heaven and hell and
what it takes to go there...)! And yet
it seems that these subjects -- called foundational here -- are the very
subjects that many preachers say don't matter and that they avoid like the
plague. Indeed, these subjects are not
popular with the masses who want a "dauber of untempered morter"
rather than someone who will get to the root of the spiritual issues in their
foundation! This is the foundation of
the Apostles, which is a necessary element of your foundation!
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The importance of the
Apostles' doctrine is compounded by the vision of John in Revelation chapter
21. In it, John sees a golden city, the
New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven to the new earth. It is a literal city, and it really has gates
of pearl, streets of gold, and walls of jasper.
But in verses 2-3 of the chapter we find out that because this is the
city where God will dwell with His people one day, it represents the
"bride of Christ" or the church.
In other words, there are two ways of looking at this golden city, and
both are true. First, it is a literal
city, and second, it is to teach us about what kind of temple and spiritual
building that our lives are to be like.
At the close of this message, let's look at the city from that view
point:
Rev 21:10-13 And he carried me away in the spirit to a
great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem,
descending out of heaven from God, 11
Having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even
like a jasper stone, clear as crystal;
12 And had a wall great and high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates
twelve angels, and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve
tribes of the children of Israel: 13 On
the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and
on the west three gates.
Notice that the
characteristics of the city are the characteristics of a saint whose body is a
temple of the Holy Ghost in the right way:
1. They have the glory of God -- they have the
Holy Ghost living within them.
2. Their light from that glory shines out clear
and strong -- they allow not only God to work on their inside, but for that
light of truth to shine forth into this world as an example to others of what
God can do.
3. They have a wall of protection built around
them. They have drawn lines that they
and their families will not cross that serve as a separation mark from them and
the rest of the world. Their separation
from the world serves as protection.
4. They have angels at each gate. They submit to Godly authority as deciding
what comes in and out of their lives.
They trust Godly minister's teachings and decisions on everyday things.
Skip down to verse 25 and
you'll find some other characteristics of God's bride, the church member who is
a "Godly building:"
Rev 21:25-27 And the gates of it shall not be shut at all
by day: for there shall be no night there.
26 And they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it. 27 And there shall in no wise enter into it
any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a
lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.
5. There is no night there. They walk in the light of truth and don't
give way to the darkness of this world's philosophies or their flesh.
6. They bring the glory and honour of the
nations into it. They are not prejudice
but are reaching out to all nations, believing that God wants to be Lord of ALL
the people in the earth.
7. There shall in no wise enter into it anything
that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie. Sin does not enter in willfully, neither do
they give in to abominations or things that God hates, or lies or deceitful
living.
And all of this is good, and
there are many people trying to build such a spiritual walk with God that could
be described by these characteristics and we definitely need all of this, but
notice verse 14:
Rev 21:14 And the wall of
the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles
of the Lamb.
The city had twelve
foundations, and they were named after the "twelve apostles of the
Lamb." The true saint of God, the
true church of God, the people that are going to be considered the "bride
of Christ" and live forever with Him, are going to be people whose
foundation is the Apostles of the Lamb!
You can try to overcome sin and draw some lines of separation and even
go to church and submit to a pastor, and try to allow God's light to shine from
you, and even be filled with the Holy Ghost, but if your foundation is not
based upon the Apostles doctrine. If
your foundations don't have the crucial element of what the Apostles taught,
then your spiritual building is going to crumble! Doctrine does matter. You will be judged according to what premises
that you build upon! Your foundation is
important, and Jesus Christ better be the chief cornerstone, but you'd better
have the prophets and the Apostles in the mix along with obedience to the Word
of God! There's just no way around
it! It's the only foundation that will
stand and endure until the end, therefore there is no other foundation upon
which to build!
________________________________________________________________________
Like Ezekiel, Jesus thundered
against the white-washer, untempered morter daubers of His day. He said:
Matt 23:27-28 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear
beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. 28 Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous
unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
When God comes back, He will
not be impressed with how religious you seem or how mighty our church
looks. You will not be judged on your
actions around the church people, and the preacher. But you will be judged on your
foundation. What did you build
upon. What did you believe so strongly
that everything was based upon it! Was
it Jesus Christ as the chief cornerstone?
Was it the doctrine of the Apostles?
Or was it something else.
Something that really shouldn't be involved in a spiritual
foundation?
The words of Peter -- spoken
with all of the Apostles standing by him and agreeing with him -- ring loud and
clear today:
Acts 2:37-40 Now when they heard this, they were pricked
in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and
brethren, what shall we do? 38 Then
Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of
Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the
Holy Ghost. 39 For the promise is unto
you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the
Lord our God shall call. 40 And with
many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this
untoward generation.
And then the words of the
Apostle Paul, with whom Peter supported:
1 Cor 3:16-17 Know ye not that ye are the temple of God,
and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?
17 If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the
temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.
1 Cor 6:19-7:1 What? know ye not that your body is the
temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not
your own? 20 For ye are bought with a
price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.
That's truth. There is no other foundation!