Being a Christian is the greatest way to live. Knowing that, in Christ, your sins have been and are being forgiven daily and that life is not without meaning gives us a unique perspective on life that most will never fully grasp – I don’t think even we will fully grasp that until we enter into eternity in the presence of our glorious Lord and Saviour.

A great part of that is knowing that life has a purpose. Ephesians 1:11 tells us that our God works all  things according to the purpose of His will – and as much as we would love that to mean all the good things, that sometimes includes things we wouldn’t particularly will for ourselves.

I often wonder why a 5’11″, 135 kg young adult is as incredibly shy and ‘loner-like’ as I am. I’m not a people person, I literally can’t meet new people without wanting to jump out of my skin with fear and I usually function with the assumption that I’m not very liked by even those who know me. I’ve lost many a night of sleep wondering why some days I feel like I could conquer the world (a little optimistic, but whatever it takes to get you through the day, right?) while some days, even getting out of bed feels like Mission Impossible. If God does work all things to a plan, then how does your and my struggle with depression factor into that? I won’t sit and tell you I have all the answers, but here are a few Biblical truths that help me when times are tough:

1. No suffering is without purpose

A while back, I taught a Bible study which, while not the greatest in terms of delivery, was a life-changing study for me as the one ministering. It was called “Riding Out the Storm” and it was based on 2 Cor 1:3-11. I will spare you the awful lesson I gave, but out of that text, three things ring clear:

(1) Suffering is only bearable when we know who our God is  - we serve a God who is mercifully saving, incredibly sovereign and unceasingly sympathetic

(2) Suffering is only bearable when we know what He does – He comforts us in all our affliction (note that it doesn’t say he’ll take us out)

(3) Suffering is only bearable when we begin to understand it’s not just about is. Paul says it like this in 2 Cor 1:

³ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, ⁴who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

No suffering just happens – ultimately, it deepens our knowledge of the person and work of our God and enables us to better serve others in their times of affliction. Speaking for myself, I know what it is to feel alone, even in a crowd of people and with God’s help, it made me more sensitive towards those who feel the same. I know what it is to feel like you’re an inconvenience to everyone around you and so I am quicker to try and make every person like they are the most important and valued person in the world. (At this point, a smart, perceptive person might say, ‘And that makes you different from a motivational speaker, how? Well, the Bible tells me to prefer others above myself in Romans 12:10 – and if I can do that with every person I can, then I will, regardless of whether that is misconstrued as being overly ‘motivational’)

2. God carries greater burdens than we ever will

There’s a song I grew up with that says, “These hands were not made to carry cares” and it is pretty true. Were it God’s will for us to carry our burdens alone, the following verses would make no sense as we find them in 1 Peter 1:

⁶ Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, ⁷ casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.

Now let’s think through verse 7. The Bible says that we are to cast all our burdens on Him and why? Because HE CARES FOR US!!! He carries our burdens in a way we never could. The temptation for us who struggle with depression is to do three things: (1) get withdrawn, (2) get quiet, (3) get sad. But may I humbly suggest that rather than get withdrawn, we draw near to the Saviour? In place of quietness, cry out to God? In times of sadness, run to the God of all comfort? I’m still learning to do that but God is faithful and He carries our burdens. He asks us, burdened as we are, to come to Him – and to keep coming to Him – and He will give us rest (Matt 11:28-30)

Friend, I’m praying for you. It’s hard when you feel abnormal to everyone else because you’re always sad and everyone around you seems so ‘together’, but remember that you are not alone in the struggle. Talk to someone – your mother, your pastors, friends – but most importantly, talk to God. It’s safe to say He has handled greater burdens – one more could do Him no harm.

In Christ,

Your friend and brother Doug

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…is just not appealing to us. It’s too cerebral, too based on the brain, too intellectual. “Christianity is not intellectual, it’s faith, the heart, the soul” – according to a preacher friend of my dad’s. That attitude is pervasive in evangelical Christianity in general, but I seem to encounter it a lot in black churches.

For instance, I recently went with my Dad to go and visit a church. Now, whenever I go somewhere with Dad and people see this burly (well, kinda) guy right next to him, they usually think I’m one of his elders and so my Dad will point out that I’m actually his son. (I look more like Mum than Dad, so folks don’t make the connection that quickly). After the service, the pastor of the church, who used to pastor in the same denomination as my Dad when we lived in Germany, came and sat with Dad and myself and asked me what I was studying. Before I could even muster up an answer, my Dad mentioned what my degree is in and then (incorrectly) said I was also studying theology. Aside from the fact I was mildly annoyed – I am 20 and rather capable of answering direct questions, the pastor’s response was telling. The pastor immediately said, “Why?”, followed by a comment to my dad about how theologically-minded people are always the first to criticise his ministry. I said nothing – after all, I’m smart enough not to challenge someone in their own house, especially when I didn’t particularly want to be there. I kindly corrected my dad in the car home, reminding him that I don’t formally study theology and that he really didn’t need to mention that in the first place.

To be honest, the experience of a mild telling-off for no real reason had gotten to me, but it got me thinking. Why is it that the pastor in question, my dad (himself a pastor of many years’ experience), other pastors I’ve had the opportunity to come in contact with and loads of “lay people” have this aversion for the theological? What is it about theology makes Christians -  and especially black Christians, I would argue – so frightened of doctrine?

In his fantastic work Essential Truths of the Christian Faith, Dr R.C. Sproul lists ten reasons why Christians in general tend to have an aversion to doctrine and theology – ten reasons I find all too easily in much of the black church as I get to see it.

1. The “Childlike Faith” Error

Time would fail me to deal with just how prevalent this idea is. Basically it goes a little like this: in places like Mark 10:15, Jesus says: “Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.” Receiving the kingdom of God like a child is then taken to mean that like children don’t have all the knowledge in the world but just believe, so we should adopt that kind of attitude.

Now my gripe isn’t so much with Mark 10:15 – Scripture is Scripture. My gripe is with a reading of this text which equates to childish, not childlike faith. Dr Sproul explains:

There is a vast difference, however, between a childlike faith and a childish faith, though the two are often confused. A childish faith balks at learning the things of God in depth. It refuses the meat of the gospel while clinging to a diet of milk. For this, the childish Christian receives an admonition:

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. (Hebrews 5:12-14)

A refusal to go deeper into the name of maintaining a misguided innocence is childish. In fact the Bible expressly commands us to grow up in terms of understanding:

[14] so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.

(Ephesians 4:14 ESV)

[20] Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature.

(1 Corinthians 14:20 ESV)

Childlike faith is childlike in its dependence and trust, not in its inability to understand. The Bible calls us paradoxically to be mature yet childlike. It is foolish to pick one and reject the other.

2. Fear of Theological Skepticism

Let’s face facts – there are many unbelieving people with an interest with theology. As I write, I’m reminded of the name of Leslie Weatherhead. Weatherhead, a Methodist, was pastor of  City Temple, here in the city of London. To say he was a theological liberal would be something of an understatement. For instance, here is his take and you can read his words for yourself if you don’t believe I’m telling the truth:

The doctrine of Jesus’s “Virgin Birth” was not part of the missionary message of the early Church. As far as we know, Jesus did not mention it to His apostles. Certainly, Mark, Peter, Paul and John show no knowledge of such a miracle. And if it really had been a “Divine Conception”, surely Mary would have told her Son? If she had, then He and His apostles would undoubtedly have regarded it as highly significant, and included it in their teachings.

However, in St. Matthew’s Gospel we read that Joseph seemed shocked at Mary’s pregnancy and was “minded to put her away privily”, “not willing to make her a public example” [chapter 1, verses 18-19]. References elsewhere to his being “a righteous man” rule out premarital intimacy. Besides, if the child were his, Jewish law would have demanded his care for Mary and her unborn child. He would not have been allowed to “put her away”. Indeed, it would not have entered his head to do so.

Whence then came Mary’s pregnancy? Can we suppose that some village rascal was responsible for her condition? I hold that the beauty of the peerless story rules this out. Read again the first chapter of St. Luke’s Gospel and imagine a village maiden of sixteen or so, after some mystical experience beyond the power of any pen to describe, saying quietly, “Behold the slave-girl of the Lord; be it unto me according to Thy word!” [Luke 1, verse 38].

One explanation of Mary’s pregnancy has been put forward by Mr. C. A. Wainwright of Oxford. First, he refers to the “sacred marriage” ceremony which was an ancient and widespread custom in the Near and Middle East (including Egypt and India). The high priest played the part of a divine messenger. He was “married” to a virgin with whom he cohabited. The offspring of such a union was regarded as a son of god, or a divine personage.

Now Zacharias was the priest on duty in the temple at the relevant time. He “executed the priest’s office before God in the order of his course” (Luke 1, verse 8). We are told that, though old, Zacharias was not impotent, for he made his wife Elisabeth pregnant though she was past the normal time of child-bearing. John the Baptist was their son.

We are also told that after Mary’s visitation from the angel who told her she was to bear Jesus, Mary replied: “How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?” Mary was then reassured: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee: wherefore also that which is to be born shall be called holy, the Son of God” [Luke 1, verse 35].

We are then told that Mary entered the house of Zacharias [Luke 1, verses 39-40], stayed there three months, and then returned to her own house [Luke 1, verse 56].

In a “sacred marriage” of the sort described by Mr Wainwright, a stay of three months was required in the house of the priest, or in the sacred precincts, to make sure that pregnancy was established*. This would explain why Mary stayed in the home of Zacharias for that length of time before returning to her own home. Indeed, what an otherwise strange reaction to Gabriel’s message was her hurried journey into Zacharias’s house! “Mary arose, and went with haste and entered the house of Zacharias” [Luke 1, verse 39].

Now here’s a man saying that the Virgin Birth was more a lurid tale of an older man sleeping with a younger girl in some weird kind of spiritual-sexual rite. But people will read stuff like that (and sadly, there is a lot of it) and say, “See, that’s where theology will take you. I’d rather just believe it and leave it at that.”

The problem is unbelief in the name of God isn’t all that new. In the days of the New Testament, there were a group of men called the Sadducees. The Sadducees were part of the ruling religious class of the day and they had some peculiar views. They denied any sort of resurrection, didn’t believe in the afterlife or in much of the supernatural. As you can imagine, they just loved Jesus and the Apostles. No, they opposed his message with everything they had – yet they felt themselves to be true to the Law of Moses. Why expect times to change? Didn’t Paul says that the risk of believing another Jesus was always a threat (Galatians 1:6-9, 2 Cor 11:4)? The existence of the counterfeit and false doesn’t rule out the existence of the genuine and authentic. The answer to theological unbelief is not the rejection of theology – it’s the rejection of unbelief! As Christians, we are a believing people – either we believe that God has spoken and we need to listen (which is the natural orientation of Biblical Christianity) or we believe that we have spoken and God needs to listen (every other form of “Christianity”).

Rejecting theology because of aberrant forms of it is like refusing to watch an Arsenal game because Spurs are useless. (UK readers: don’t argue – just smile and accept it.) In all seriousness, it’s more akin to rejecting the use of money because counterfeits are circulating. It’s like refusing to drive because they are drunk drivers or refusing to eat because some folks cannot cook. It sounds absurd, I agree, but that is what we do if we shun all theology because of the “bad apples”.

To be continued…

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Here’s my premise: there isn’t a black church, any more than there is a white, hispanic or Asian church. There IS, however, a set of values which large numbers of black Christians would cherish as part and parcel of Christianity.

I dismiss the former because the Bible is clear – Gal 3:28. As far as the Government of Heaven is concerned, the black church is non-existent. There isn’t a black church, any more than there is a white church or Asian church. Ephesians 2 makes it as clear – God has torn down the wall of hostility between Jew and Gentile to create one new humanity. Racial differences still exist – Paul still speaks of Jew and Gentile, Greek or barbarian – but differences ought not to lead to division. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t a distinct sub-culture in the visible church, united by racial origin and several other distinctives. As I tried to figure out what those distinctives were, I wrestled between being stereotypical and being honest to my own experience. And so, I offer some distinctives – conscious that these are from one vantage-point and open to critique.

• Predominantly Pentecostal/Charismatic: Chances are, if you met a black Christian, they are mostly Pentecostal or Charismatic (and yes, I do believe that there is a clear distinction to be made between the two). Even those who wouldn’t call themselves Pentecostal or Charismatic often find themselves inadvertently affected by the ideas of these movements.

• Deeply experiential: The stereotypical depiction of the black church service tend to go something like this. While an extreme case, we do tend to view Christianity in a primarily subjective fashion. It would be fair to say that we tend to think the broad outline is more important than the details.:

Click here to view the embedded video.

(May I say briefly that I am not opposed to an experiential faith. In the Reformed  tradition, we have long emphasized the importance of “heart religion”. The teaching of such modern reformed preachers as Dr Joel Beeke has re-emphasized this facet of our faith.

• A distrust of intellectual rigour: This isn’t true of all, but in many circles, there is a clear distrust of the intellectual. We don’t think much of theology, we don’t rate ministers based on their theological accuracy and we’re more likely to look down on the person who thinks ‘that stuff’ matters than we are to listen to them.

• Strong emphasis on social position: Now I don’t want to speak bad of this trait. It has made us more conscious of social equality and thus desirous of worthy causes of advancement. There is a reason that (despite any theological differences) the civil rights movement was primarily headed by ‘clergy’ and churches. That being said, by focusing on their social position, black churches have become fodder for the prosperity gospel with its belief that poverty is never God’s will and that believers should actively seek to prosper as their covenant right. Even among those who do not accept the prosperity gospel, a social gospel remains an ever-lurking threat with its belief in social equality and the betterment of all in society.

These are the things I could find across the board and dealing with them may advance the discussion on being black and Reformed.

To be continued…

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Often I get asked how does being black and being Reformed work out. After all, the world I grew up was dominated by the theological superstructure of Pentecostalism. Until I was 18, I knew personally of two types of African Christian – Pentecostal and Catholic. There was a Baptist church behind my house – but they were (and are still) for all intents, Pentecostal. When I came under the teaching of Reformed theology, I knew I’d encountered a worldview shift of epic proportions. I also knew that a lot of reformed teaching clashed not just because of the theology I grew up with, but also because of things considered fundamental to being a ‘black Christian’. In short, I had – or thought I had – to make a choice: either I was going down the Reformed road or going down the ‘black’ road?

Fast forward the next few years to today and I am not so convinced I needed to choose. I am convinced however that there are some issues that need to be addressed. This series isn’t 100% planned out in my mind, but here are some of the issues I want to hit:

• Is there such a thing as the black church?
• Does it need reforming?
• Does being reformed entail an identity change?
• Do I need to be ‘white’ to be reformed?
• Is there a black theology?

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It’s 10:20pm on Reformation Day. October 31, 2011. 494 years after Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to a church door and sparked off the greatest revival of truth since the days of the early church. I struggled to think what to write for Reformation Day, even though today was my day off.

Then it hit me – times haven’t changed all that much since 1517. Luther had indulgences, promising blessing from God in return for cash and we have…well, we have this:

Click here to view the embedded video.

What was the answer in 1517? A rediscovery of the Gospel of God’s glorious grace. And in 2011, well, the answer is still the Gospel of God’s grace. Take some time and rediscover the glorious truth of salvation by the free grace of God in Christ Jesus:

Click here to view the embedded video.

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The Reformer Reader explains what the three uses are:

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James MacDonald, founding pastor of Harvest Bible Chapel, has invited T.D. Jakes, pastor of The Potter’s House and charismatic superstar, as a guest for the second round of his Elephant Room round-table discussions.

The response has been either supportive (as of James MacDonald’s set of responses), “let’s wait for it to happen” (as per Mark Driscoll) or “this is bad” (like Carl Trueman of Ref21).

Now I’ll tell you upfront – this is in the “this is real” category. I am shocked that James MacDonald, a man I once thoroughly respected and even featured on my blog in its early days, has opened the door to a man who, in my rather frank assessment, should have the door slammed firmly in his face. Harsh assessment? Observe the following:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Yeah, that’s his game – ripping people off for their God-given, hard-earned money in the name of God – and yet he’s going to be on the show, come the 25th of January.

Enough ink has been spilled on Jakes’ vagueness on the Trinity – although this has inspired to do a Reformation II Radio show on the Trinity at some point in the next month. I want to consider the following comment MacDonald in this blog post regarding his invite of Jakes:

I am also excited to hear him state his views on money, which may be closer to Scripture than the monasticism currently touring reformed world.

This comment epitomizes an ignorance in the prosperity gospel which is actually more widespread than most would care to realize. For the record, I think MacDonald’s comment is ignorant and devoid of any Biblical basis. Jakes’ view of money is firmly rooted in the prosperity gospel. The prosperity gospel hinges on a number of factors:

1. A warped view of God

In their world, God is so good to His children, He’ll never allow them to be sick, allow them to be poor or allow them to suffer. God always blesses, provided you follow the right formula and ‘live right’. Essentially God turns into a sugar daddy. Further, God is a being who has faith – the kind of faith we ought to had. He created the world using His faith and when we become believers, He gives us the same kind of faith so we can create things (more on this later).

My Bible tells me that God has need of no-one. Read passages like Isaiah 40-55, where the Almighty basically says, “I’m God – all pretenders fall back and know your place”. Faith is dependent on something bigger than itself – if God has faith, He’s no longer God. Further, God does indeed makes “all things [to] work together for good” (Romans 8:28), but making all things work together for good and making you wildly rich, wildly healthy and super-influential are two different things. It’s not even realistic – the only ones who get rich off that scheme are the ones who teach it.

2. A warped view of salvation

Now follow me here because this can get a little confusing. To understand the prosperity Gospel – much like the Biblical Gospel – requires a proper understanding of the beginning of salvation history. In their view, God, in creating Adam, didn’t just create an image-bearer but He created a miniature of himself – a little god. This little god had all the dominion and then he gave it all to the Devil. In salvation, the born-again man regains his dominion and all its accrued benefits, including access to the blessing of Abraham, which is interpreted to mean all the blessings promised in the Old Covenant including freedom from poverty, health and unlimited blessing. By the way, he is now a little god, capable of speaking things into existence like his Father.

Again the Bible nowhere teaches that God created Adam as a little god, that Abraham’s blessing equals financial blessing in this life (if anything the Bible teaches the blessing of Abraham is salvation from sin through Christ – Galatians 3:13-14 for proof). This is foreign to the NT – and Jakes has been caught teaching this stuff over and over.

No idea lives in blissful isolation, including one’s idea of money. I’m sorry, Pastor MacDonald, but Jakes’ view is nowhere near close to Scripture – it is a view borne out of a sub-Christian reading of the Bible. Further, it is the outgrowth of a system which doesn’t have in Biblical Christianity, but out of New Thought and metaphysics.

I’m amazed that MacDonald could make just such a statement as though no-one has done the spadework to show that, in actuality, the prosperity gospel view of money is in fact a different Gospel. Then again, what does that tell you about the attachment to money and pleasure in many evangelical hearts? God help us (literally) for Christ’s sake!

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• MacDonald, Jakes & the Elephant in the Room (challies.com)
• The Elephant Room, T.D. Jakes, and our reaction (theexpositor.wordpress.com)
• The Elephant Room and T.D. Jakes (theexpositor.wordpress.com)
• Pyromaniacs: Playing nice with heretics (theexpositor.wordpress.com)

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The Grace of Law by Ernest F Kevan

Well, on Friday, I fulfilled something of a personal mission and bought a book. To understand why this was a personal mission, allow me to take you back to December 2008. Me and my mentor, Rev Nathaniel Ramshire, were talking about the Law and he made the following statement:

Have you considered what a gracious act it was for God to give the Law?

I didn’t know much in the way of theology, then – I had only recently turned 18 and didn’t have all that much in the way of a library (that would change dramatically in three month’s time) – but I just couldn’t reconcile the idea of the Law being gracious in any sense.

Now I’m the kind of human being who, when perplexed, looks perplexed. My 92-year-old Presbyterian preacher friend got up, walked over to the West Wing (his study had four large shelves with 700-800 books each. The one right in front of you when you walked into was affectionately known as the West Wing) and pulled off a slender, blue, hardback volume. The book was called The Grace of Law by Dr Ernest Kevan. “Get some of that in ya!” was the accompanying cry – so I took it home and started to read it. By the time it was done, it was safe to say I agreed with my mentor.

Fast-forward to the present day – in the Christian blogosphere, it’s popular to view the Law in an inherently negative manner. Even if that is not the intention, that is certainly how it comes across. The entire project of sanctification is defined away from the classic sense of the Law being insufficient for justification, but a worthy, God-given guide for sanctification – for fear of legalism. The strength of Kevan’s book is that it is kind of like the dude in the meeting of mind saying, “Guys, I think you’ve missed the point”

Using the Puritans as a worthy picture, Kevan deals with the reality that when it comes to sanctification, the Law of God and the Gospel are not competing for position but actually that God uses the Law in the life of the Christian to bring about His gracious purpose.

I won’t spoil the book for you – if you’d like a copy, I’m sure my friends at Tabernacle Bookshop can make that happen. It’s a worthy investment for what is a vital (and very misunderstood) issue. This book introduced a paradigm shift in my life – so much so, I spent years trying to chase up a used copy. Now I have one – and I’m glad it’s back in circulation.

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Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. (Hebrews 1:1-2 ESV)

The writer to the Hebrews starts this discourse with the reality that God has spoken in two distinct phases: (1) in the past, He spoke through the prophets and (2) in the present, He speaks via His Son. Picking up on this theme, I was simply blown away by what Warren Wiersbe notes in his excellent little book Let’s Go!: The Epistle to the Hebrews for Twenty-First Century Christians:

We don’t hear an audible voice as prophets did in the Old Testament and apostles in the New Testament. But through the Scriptures God is still speaking to His people through His Son. The author to the Hebrews admonishes us in the present tense, ” See to it that you do not refuse Him who speaks” (Heb 12:25). If our hearts are truly prepared, each time we open the Bible and pray, God will open His mouth and speak to our hearts (see 1 Sam 3:10). The way we treat the written Word of God is the way we treat the living Word of God, Jesus Christ. We cannot ignore the Bible and at the same time honor Jesus Christ. (pg.15)

While we’re on the subject, consider Paul’s words:

[20] But that is not the way you learned Christ!—[21] assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, (Ephesians 4:20-21 ESV)

Note v.21 and take out the word ‘about’ there (it’s warranted in the original) – “…assuming you have heard him…”

They hadn’t heard the Lord Jesus in person – but they had sat under the ministry of the Gospel through the Apostles. They heard Jesus as they heard Him preached. One more text (as you may gather, I’m a little fired up as I write):

O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. (Galatians 3:1 ESV)

Jesus was portrayed vividly as crucified to the Galatians. Conservative commentators say this epistle was written in AD 48 or sometime in the 50s. That’s about 15-20 years about the crucifixion – they weren’t there but they heard the message – WORDS(!!!!!) – believed it and had receive full and free salvation.

In our day, folks go on and on about hearing from God audibly – books get written about hearing the voice of God, whole conferences are devoted to it and in many sectors of the professing church, a worship service is incomplete without some word of ‘prophecy’. While I am a cessationist, I do believe He still speaks today – I really do. Every time I read His Word, He speaks to me. Every time I hear the preaching and teaching of His Word, devoid of how it sounds or how it makes me feel, as long as it is His Word proclaimed faithfully, He’s talking. The living Christ still speaks today!!! That’s why we ought NEVER to downplay the centrality of Scriptural revelation – because in the Book, the Lord communicates with us on a level which we can understand! The Word is exactly that – a word, a message to us!

So…Christ is speaking to us today? The question isn’t whether it’s enough (yes it is) or whether we need to hear it (yes you do) – the question is will you listen? (Yes you should!)

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