26-1007wc Neighborly Apologetics

Del Tackett opens by thanking Marc and greeting everyone who has taken time from busy schedules for the session. He says the night will take up a pretty difficult issue, and that the team has been praying that God will draw all of them closer to Him. He shares his screen, notes that he has a lot of slides, and prays that the Lord will let them get through the material.

He places the session in the larger series, whose overall title he states as Liberty Apologetics, and says that tonight they are looking at religious pluralism and the question of whether Jesus is really the only way. He returns to the reason they call the work neighborly apologetics: the law of Jesus, the royal law, that we are to love our neighbor. As far as the Lord allows, he intends to spend the rest of his life casting a vision to God’s people that God has entrusted the primary work of the kingdom to the common Christian family. That family has a priestly role; they are part of the royal priesthood, and that role is exercised in the neighborhood where God has placed them.

Engaging the neighbor, he says, means building a deep, trusted relationship, being fervent in intercessory prayer, and then praying that God will open a conversation in which they can respond to the neighbor’s questions. If those questions fall into one of the apologetic categories, the aim of the training is readiness. He uses Mrs. Smith across the street as the running example: if she has a problem with Jesus being the only way, tonight’s material should prepare the family not merely with knowledge to thump her with, but with knowledge that, through love, can help her see what will be discussed.

He identifies this topic as number three. They have already covered number nine, and they did so earlier because they judged it important to lay groundwork for the other categories. He says tonight will refer back to that material, especially Jesus' claim that He was truly God in the flesh, that He was divine.

Religious pluralism, he explains, is the belief that every religion is true and has provided a valid pathway to God. Its counterpart is religious relativism, which does not claim that every religion is true. Relativism says there is no objective truth in any religion; if people believe something, it is true for them, but it is not objectively true. A person does not need to master the distinction except in conversation: when a neighbor says every religion has its own way to God, or that it does not matter what you believe and that Islam is true for the person who believes it, that claim stands contrary to the third category.

That third category is religious exclusivism, the claim that only one way is true and all others are false. He acknowledges that even a believer can feel grated by that claim at this point, but he states plainly that this is Christianity. Christianity believes there is only one way, that Jesus is the only way, and that there is no other way. That is what the session will deal with.

He turns to why an exclusive statement produces that grating feeling. He ties it to something the series has already treated: the culture’s prime ethic is compassion, but it is a malevolent compassion, because it is not bridled by truth, by wisdom, or by righteousness. That kind of compassion moves people to embrace and even affirm things that are evil, things that in the sight of God are abominations, and things that will hurt people rather than help them.

God’s compassion, by contrast, always comes in the form of what is true, good, and righteous. Tackett is careful to say that God is not really bridled, but that His compassion always arrives in that form. That is why He can be compassionate toward us while He disciplines us: compassion also drives Him to do what He knows is for our good. Hebrews, he notes, teaches that when God does this we are trained by discipline and trained by adversity. Malevolent compassion will not allow that. It kicks back at any notion that someone could be wrong, because that would hurt their feelings. He says this dynamic is part of everything they will discuss tonight.

He then takes up charges that come from the pluralist position. The first is intolerance. People who hold, for example, that Jesus is the only way are charged with being intolerant. A side note, he says, is that pluralists are very intolerant of exclusivists, so the issue is not really tolerance. It is intolerance of the view that Jesus is the only way. The intolerance charge functions as a trump card. It is difficult because no one wants to be called intolerant, a bully, a bigot, or the other labels that get applied.

For the conversation with Mrs. Smith, he hopes the trusted relationship is already in place, that she is beginning to realize she is cared for, and that she is following the ordinary path of people in such a relationship by asking questions. If those questions lead her to this issue and she says the claim sounds intolerant, the relationship may be strong enough to answer that the charge itself sounds intolerant, and to be understood in saying so.

Narrow-mindedness is treated as the same kind of charge in different words. Pluralism, he says, is also very narrow; it has the same narrowness it attributes to exclusivists, and it does not allow people like them. He connects this to the previous session on truth: all truth is narrow. Narrowness is almost a defining characteristic of truth. Truth does not say the grass is green and orange at the same time, that up is down, or that good is evil. Truth is narrow by definition.

The third charge is one a neighbor may not phrase in these words, but academic apologetics states it this way, and he thinks it is worth understanding: intellectual imperialism. Exclusiveness, and even truth and meaning, are labeled fascist, a term he says is thrown around today at people who will not sway from the judgment that certain things are wrong, evil, or wicked. Behind that is the claim that truth should be more democratic. They dealt last time with the point that truth is not derived by 51 percent of the vote; 51 percent of people can be wrong. There is no democratic process that leads to truth. When a culture walks away from truth, from God, and from the foundations of absolute truth, it has to find some other way to decide right and wrong, and in a culture like ours democracy is sometimes used for that.

As an illustration that a majority can be wrong, he notes that in many Hindu cultures in the past it was religious practice, when a man died, to burn his widow with him. He hopes people can see that something is not right about that even if 90 percent of the culture followed or believed it. He says they will now deal with that under the presuppositions associated with pluralism.

Presuppositions, he explains, is a big word for the truth claims buried and hidden behind religious pluralism, or behind the claim that Jesus cannot be the only way. One interesting feature is the assumption that something truly moral transcends each religion. People say that if you look at all these religions, each has kindness and each wants love. What they have done, he argues, is establish a priori that certain absolute moral values are present in these religions. That conflicts with the presupposition of naturalism, so there is a conflict inside the position.

He frames this as a way of asking Mrs. Smith questions that may reveal an inconsistency. Much religious pluralism rests on a naturalistic philosophy, because that philosophy discounts the miracles of Jesus, the resurrection, and anything supernatural. Yet, as the first point said, the same position tries in the background to pull out moral absolutes. These are contradictions in the presuppositions of religious pluralism.

Another presupposition is that the world is religiously ambiguous, meaning you really cannot know the truth. The religions are all different, even while the contradictory claim is made that they all lead to Rome. The stated reason they differ is that truth cannot really be known; the religions are going after amorphous things. Religious pluralists often end by saying dialogue is the only way to truth, so religious people must be gathered to find a common denominator. Classes survey the religions in order to help people become tolerant as they read them.

Tolerance, he says, is an important part of Christianity, but tolerance does not lead us to deny what is true. Tolerance belongs to the kindness and love extended to people, and that love and kindness is not unbridled. The last presupposition is that relativism is true. They already treated this: it is a self-defeating argument. If someone says relativism is true, they are stating that there is no truth, and that this is absolutely true; they say there are no absolute truths, while asserting an absolute truth anyway. You get wrapped around the axle. These are ways for a family to discuss presumptions that may be floating around in Mrs. Smith, to see what she is struggling with, to help her, and to pray for her.

He then turns to problems with the position. One question may be asked directly, or it may simply ground other, better questions: what is the basis for the truth claim that all religions are the same? Pluralism says they are the same, but that itself is a truth claim. Where does it come from, why is it made, and what brings a person to it? He calls it a very discerning question.

The second problem is the both-and claim. Pluralism says all these religions are the same. If that both-and is true rather than an either-or, we are put in the position discussed last time of embracing contradictions and violating the law of non-contradiction. We would end up allowing square circles and one-way streets that go both ways. We cannot have that. The whole world operates on truth that is not contradictory.

He gives mutually exclusive cases. Hindu pantheism is totally contrary to Christian theism. A fundamental essence of Hinduism is pantheism, and a fundamental essence of Christianity is its view of God and theism; those exclude each other, so it is hard to say the religions are all the same. Islam denies that Jesus died and rose again; Christianity proclaims it. When they discussed the resurrection, they said it is the key apologetic in Christianity. Islam and Christianity are therefore at odds and mutually exclusive; both cannot be true on one of Christianity’s key claims. With Mrs. Smith, who says all religions are the same, one can ask whether she thinks Islam and Christianity are the same, and then point to this fundamental difference on one of the key issues, if not the key position, of Christianity. The transcript of this part ends as he closes that point.

Tackett turns from the claim that all religions are the same to the question at the heart of it: is Jesus the only way? A lot of people talk about "religion" as if the religions are all the same, but the real issue underneath is that question. Years earlier he taught a series titled "Who is Jesus?" whose part nine was "Is Jesus the Only Way?" Looking back at those slides, he decided he could not recreate them any better, so he walks through some of them.

The big question, which is why they already covered category nine, is whether Jesus is God, whether He is divine, whether He is God in the flesh, and whether He Himself declared that. They tried to give a solid basis for helping Mrs. Smith see that Jesus clearly made the claim, and that it was not something people invented later. That is the big question. The hard question is whether Jesus is the only way, and that is what they take up now.

It is hard because of the phrases thrown at them, and he apologizes for the sound effects as he names them. No one likes to be called a bigot or narrow-minded. People can look at you with a side slant of hatred when you say Jesus is the only way. It is also hard because of the culture, which is why they talked about malevolent compassion. Things a neighbor might say include: how could anyone assert that Jesus is the only way to God; how can Christians be so sure they are right and everyone else is wrong; it is arrogant to think Jesus is the only way; many religions essentially teach the same thing; Christianity is intolerant because it thinks it is the only true religion; all religious paths lead to God; no religion can claim to be the only one; I cannot buy the arrogance of Christianity thinking it has a lock on truth; so you think you are right and all good Buddhists are going to hell; what about my atheist neighbor, a good husband, great father, and great friend; what about the nice guy who grows up in the jungle of Africa and never hears about Jesus?

He tells them not to slough these off. They are not easy, and in most cases the neighbor is not asking them to trick anyone. The neighbor really feels them. The easiest move, and he says he feels the pull himself, is to say, "Oh, well, I’m not saying that Jesus is the only way." All the negative words then disappear. You can make it all go away by saying that, but that is not what Christians hold, and it is not what Jesus taught. That is what they will deal with.

This pressure is not new. The early Christians faced the same thing. They were not persecuted in the early days because they believed in Jesus. They were hated because they would not accept the other gods, because Jesus was the only way. That is why they were thrown into the pit and the arena. Today there is not a whole lot of difference. You can be thrown into the social arena, thrown out of it, and shunned, and increasingly you can be hurt economically for these positions. This is not merely an academic issue. The world does not want you to say Jesus is the only way. It wants you to say Jesus is a way, not the way.

Tim Keller, in "The Reason for God," wrote that during nearly two decades in New York City he often asked people their biggest problem with Christianity, what troubled them most about its beliefs or practice. One of the most frequent answers came down to one word: exclusivity. So the essence of the pushback is that you say Jesus is the only way.

Mahatma Gandhi said the soul of religion is one, but encased in a multitude of forms, which Tackett calls a religious pluralistic statement. Gandhi was informed and influenced by Christianity, but he held that pluralistic form. President Obama said Jesus is the only way for him, but he was not in a position to judge other people, which reverts to the religious relativism already discussed. The Second Vatican Council, in "Lumen Gentium" 16, taught that people who sincerely seek God and strive to do His will according to their conscience can be saved even if they do not know the gospel of Christ. Tackett calls that a pluralistic statement that basically said Jesus is not the only way and that there are other ways to God. When Charles Gibson interviewed President George W. Bush after 9/11 and asked whether Christians and Muslims all worship the same God, Bush answered that he thought they do, and that they have different routes of getting to the Almighty. Gibson asked whether Christians and non-Christians and Muslims go to heaven in his mind. Bush said yes, they do, with different routes of getting there. Tackett marks that as religious pluralism.

This is the easy way forward if the aim is to fit the surrounding culture. In the early days you could get past Roman persecution by saying Jesus is not the only way and that the other gods are equally valid. The same is true now. Saying Jesus is the only way gets you called all these names.

He points to "coexist" bumper stickers and the movement that pushes people to treat all these religions as compatible. There are many formalized religions, and some of the listed ones are not even the major ones. The accusation is that, with all of these, it is arrogant to think yours is the only one that is right. The slide runs from Dianic witchcraft to occult experiences, a "Haters" group, a demonology group, and all kinds of others.

One question he wants them at least to ponder, and to ask Mrs. Smith when the time is right if this is her position, is whether she thinks any of these are wrong. It is a very interesting question. If you can move her past the well-known religions and help her see that there are tons of religions, even if they lack size, then you can ask whether demonology and the things it practices are wrong. That forces a pause. The statement that all religions are the same and all are ways to heaven has to be weighed against religions that worship Satan and practices Mrs. Smith might call absolutely wrong. If she grants that, there is a basis to say that not all religions are true, and not all are right and good. That is a good starting point.

He asks how to deal with the question, because it is not easy, and it does not logically make sense as the first way to think about it. He returns to Mrs. Smith: you do not want to tell her that what she is saying is stupid, or that it does not logically make sense. You might be able to say something like that inside a trusted relationship, but the more important point is for the family to recognize the issue themselves. Christians often struggle with it. Someone on the call may be dealing with it and may not be comfortable with the topic. This is for them as well as for Mrs. Smith.

The first point is that, thought through, it does not logically make sense to say all these roads lead to the same place and all religions are the same. He plays Lee Strobel. Strobel says it makes no sense that God would go to one part of the world and say He is a triune God, Jesus is His Son, people come through repentance and faith, and it is a gift of grace, then go elsewhere and say that is not true, His name is Allah, He has no son, He is transcendent, aloof, and distant, and people reach Him by a works-based mentality, then go somewhere else and say something else again. If God did that, He would be schizophrenic. It makes sense that there is a reality about who God is, and that through His revelation we can discover it. It does not make sense that multiple contradictory beliefs about God are all equally true. That is logically ridiculous.

Tackett says what Strobel is saying matters. For religions that claim God gave them their directives, the important question is why they are so radically different if they come from the same God. Reality is our best friend, because we live in a very one-way world. That is another way to help people see that we should not be so deeply struck by how wrong it seems for someone to think there is one way. You cannot tell the officer that the sign said one way, but that is bigotry, exclusivity, and wrong. We have a way to print money and do everything we can to stop counterfeiting, because there is only one valid $100 bill or $10 bill, and a pluralistic view of money will not be accepted. A gas station owner cannot invent a gallon one-third the real size and sell it as a gallon. We have scales. You cannot decide that red means gold, or that a pound does not mean a pound. Water flows down. You cannot say you want it to flow up, or that something is wrong with it flowing down. This is the world we live in, and that is the nature of truth, which they have already discussed. Families need to talk about truth itself and the nature of truth.

When the accusations come, he wants them to realize they are standing on reality. Jesus saying He was the only way is not contrary to the world around us. It fits that world. Pluralism does not fit it as easily as exclusivity does.

The second way to deal with it is probably the most important: we are not the ones making it exclusive. Jesus made it exclusive. The argument is not with me. The argument is with Jesus. He plays Greg Koukl. Koukl says one of the most powerful ways to show that Jesus is the only way of salvation, and to get people off your back on the tolerance issue, is to say you did not make this up. It is not your idea that Jesus is the only way. You might not even be comfortable with it. Jesus said it, time and time again, and the people He trained, who wrote about Him, all said the same thing. This was His message. If you are a follower of Jesus, you are going to say what He said. Since He is the one saying it, anyone upset about it has to take it up with Him. It is easy to dismiss me. It is much harder to dismiss Jesus of Nazareth, because He was a person to be contended with. A lot of people like Jesus. Most people do. When Jesus said He was the only way, He is the authority to make that claim. Deal with Him. Do you think He was wrong? That is the question to ask.

Tackett says that changes the dynamic. Once you do that, you are talking about the statements Jesus made, and the question, as Koukl put it, is whether you think He was wrong, whether He was a liar, whether He was trying to deceive, because it is clear this is what Jesus thought. In Matthew 11, all things have been handed over to Him by the Father; no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him. In John 6, the Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life, and He will raise them up at the last day. In Matthew 10, everyone who acknowledges Him before men, He will acknowledge before the Father in heaven, but whoever denies Him before men, He will deny before the Father. In John 14, Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

This is why Koukl said what he said, and why Christians from the beginning, when they decided they would face the fire in the Roman arena, would not back down from saying Jesus is the only way. The Lord and Savior said it, taught it, and obviously believed it. The resurrection proved who He was, they believed it, and we should believe it. In John 3, the famous passage we never get past the first part of, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. God did not send the Son to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

Jesus made the exclusivity real. He spoke it, taught it, and believed it. That is the reality. He is the only way to the Father. He said He was the only way, and He declared that the other way was not the way, that it was a false way. Truly, truly, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way is a thief and a robber. "I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved." Tackett calls it an incredible passage. Jesus says He is the only way and the only door, and if you try to get in another way you are a thief and a robber. He knows that would not fly today, but that is what Jesus said. Beware false prophets who come in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. Many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. False christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. Jesus was saying there will be people and religions, false prophets who come and say they are the way, and they are not true prophets and are leading you astray. He is not saying they have another route and that is okay, or that another prophet over there will show another way, or that other teachers will come and show another way. He is saying they will lay out different paths and religions, and the false ones lead astray.

The disciples did not misunderstand. In 1 Corinthians, Paul writes that although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth, for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist. In Acts 4, Peter tells the rulers and elders that if they are being examined concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, and by what means he was healed, let it be known to all of them and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom they crucified and whom God raised from the dead, this man stands before them well. This Jesus is the stone rejected by the builders, which has become the cornerstone, and there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. Jesus was clear. The disciples were clear. Jesus was the only way.

We struggle with this, he says, because we end up thinking too little of Jesus and too little of what He did, and along with that we begin to think too much of ourselves. They dealt with this in the Engagement Project, trying to help people understand the depth of what it means that Jesus was the atonement for our sins. No other major religion makes the claim of the atonement of Jesus, that Jesus was going to die for our sins. If Jesus is only one of many ways, what other ways could satisfy the wrath of a holy God? That is an important question to ponder, and maybe at some point to ponder with Mrs. Smith. If there are many other ways, at least as a third point, why did Jesus die? Why did God go through the horrific sending of His Son, having Him scourged, beaten, and nailed to a cross, dying a horrible death, if there are many other ways, a whole lot easier, for people to get to God? It does not make any sense at all.

When Mrs. Smith says all religious roads lead to the same place, you might say, tell me about that place. Tell me about the place you think all these roads lead to. If she says all major religions are equally valid, basically teach the same thing, and worship the same God, ask her to tell you about those same things and about that same God. Let’s talk about that. If she says Jesus never intended His followers to make Him exclusive and that this was just a power move by them, ask whether you can share some of His statements, and look at them. If she says each religion sees part of the spirit of truth but none can see the whole truth, ask what that whole truth is. If she says all belief is rooted in social constructs and cannot really be truth, then if you were born in Morocco you might be saying the opposite, because you would be in another social construct that sees all of this differently. That would mean her claim that all belief is rooted in social constructs is merely the product of her own social construct, and so cannot really be true. If she says it is arrogant to insist your religion is right and to convert others to it, ask whether it is arrogant to believe that as well. If she says there cannot be only one absolute way, ask why not. Our world is full of absolutes, as they have been saying.

They review that the big question is whether Jesus is God, and ask whether the answer to the big question can help with the hard question, whether Jesus is the only way. He thinks it can, and they can go back to what it means that Jesus declared Himself divine. What is the problem with that answer? "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one." "I am God. There is no other." "Let us make man in our image." "He has become like one of us." "Let us go down and confuse." This is the reality that God is a socially complex being. Jesus is God in the flesh. If Jesus is merely man, He is one of billions. If He is a prophet, He is one of dozens. If He is a founder, He is one of many. If He is just a good man, there is one among a pantheon of deities. But if there is only one God and Jesus is that God, and He says He is the only way, then there is no other. The higher you see Jesus, the more the only way makes sense. The lower one sees Jesus, the less it makes sense. There is no middle ground. Jesus is either with me or against me. So which is it?

Logic and reality are friends. Do not let people make you the author of Jesus' exclusivity. If you are the problem, you are an insufficient answer to it, and Jesus then becomes a liar. If Jesus claims He is God, He has authority and proof to back it up. It is still a really tough question, especially if you are on a show with Oprah. He plays a clip so they can see how hard it is. The panel has been discussing spirituality and the forces of God. A speaker says there are two forces with us, a God we can depend on and a power of darkness, and that is where the choice begins, and that you can choose between one or the other. Another voice cites a woman who says in "Return to Love" that we are always walking toward one or the other, fear or love, darkness or light, and mentions Daniel Quinn’s "Ishmael," the gorilla talking, which says one mistake human beings make is believing there is only one way to live, and that we do not accept diverse ways of being, millions of ways to be a human being, and many paths to what you call God. Her path might be something else, and when she gets there she might call it the light, but if her loving, kindness, and generosity bring her to the same point, it does not matter whether she called it God along the way. Someone notes the danger: it sounds great at the onset, but looking at both sides, there could possibly be just one way. The question comes, what about Jesus? The answer is that there is one way and only one way, and that is through Jesus. The pushback is that there is some possibility we can all do the same thing, and that intellectualizing it and saying there is not only one way is buying into the lie. The further challenge is the person somewhere on the planet who never hears the name of Jesus, yet lives with a loving heart, lives as Jesus would have had them live, lives for the same purpose Jesus came to teach, in some remote part of the earth: you think that person cannot get to heaven. The clip is cut there. Tackett says it is not an easy question. It is a tough question, and you may find yourself in those situations.

If circumstances were different and they were in a classroom, he would ask how they would handle that. What they are hoping and praying is that they will handle it through a trusted relationship, backed with fervent, sincere, intercessory prayer. They are not going to deal with this on the set with Oprah. They are going to deal with it in the living room with someone they have built a trusted relationship with, who knows they care. If Mrs. Smith says all roads lead to Rome, how would you handle it? Maybe they can discuss it among themselves. He might say he has been to a lot of places where roads do not lead to Rome. I-80 does not lead to Rome. Route 1 in Iceland does not lead to Rome. It is a circle route. It goes around and around. You can stay on that road all your life and never get to Rome. The statement is nice, and a lot of people make it, but it is not true. They are not dealing with just a destination. They are dealing with destinations as different as Rome and the Mariana Trench or the moon. The question is whether we have any indication that there is only one way to God. Yes, we do, from Jesus Himself, proven by His resurrection, and here are the statements He made. He hopes they will think those things through.

When people make these statements, the only statement they can really make that is true is that all religions except Christianity lead to the same place. That is not really true either, and they could spend time on other religions. He has put up a whole list, and he guarantees they are not headed in the same direction. People might say some religions are all headed to the same place, and it may be safe to say that may be true for those, but you would have to say except for Christianity, because Christianity does not lead to the same place as the others. That is part of speaking about Jesus being the only way. It is a tough thing to say, especially in a culture that does not receive exclusivity well. That is why he believes the royal law calls them to deal with these issues not in the public square as much as in a trusted relationship, with a background of deep, fervent intercessory prayer, and the love and concern Jesus calls them to. That is number three.

Number four, the next task when they get together, will be the whole category of faith and reason in neighborly apologetics. He hopes to see them there, and turns the time back to Marc. Marc thanks Dr. Tackett and reminds anyone who came in late that the presentation was recorded as a livestream. He will send that link out probably early the next day, along with Dr. Tackett’s slides, so anyone who wants to go back through the scriptures and the points will have them in PDF. They will also post the link to next month’s registration. He thanks them for taking the time, and asks whether Dr. Tackett has any last comments, otherwise he will ask him to close in prayer.

Tackett has no further comments. He thanks them again for being there and prays the Lord will use the session somehow in their relationships with their neighbors. He prays: Father, thank you for your goodness and kindness to us. Thank you for the Lord Jesus. Thank you for the very clear statements He made about who He was and about the only way for us. We pray that You would give us these opportunities with our neighbors through a deep relationship, through our loving and kindness and the way we interact with them, to build a trusted relationship. In those relationships we might be able to discuss these things and respond to their questions, all for Your glory, in Jesus' name. Amen. Marc says amen, thanks everyone, and says they will see them next month. God bless.