We are all so used to hearing people say “Amen” at the end of prayers and saying it ourselves that we seldom think about the word, but the following points may show you that there is a lot about that small word you don’t know.
1) “Amen” doesn’t just mean “may it be so.” Many people think of amen as a kind of spiritual punctuation mark – something we put at the end of prayers to mean “the prayer is over.” Those who understand the word better think of it as meaning “may it be so” and being a way of adding our agreement to what was said, but the word means much more than that and actually has a number of meanings. Amen comes from a Hebrew root which in its various forms can mean: to support, to be loyal, to be certain or sure, and even to place faith in something. At the most basic level, the word can mean simply “yes!” as we see in Paul’s statement: “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the ‘Amen’ is spoken by us to the glory of God” (2 Corinthians 1:20). But the central meaning of the word has to do with truth, as we will see.
2) Amen was not usually used to conclude prayers in the Bible. Although it is found many times in the Bible, its main use was to affirm praise for God (Psalm 41:13; Romans 1:25; etc.) or to confirm a blessing (Romans 15:33; etc.) – either by the speaker or the hearers. The “amen” found at the end of the Lord’s Prayer in some manuscripts of the New Testament affirms the expression of praise that concludes the prayer. Perhaps because of this, over the course of the centuries it became common practice to use “amen” as the conclusion for prayers.
3) Amen is used as a characteristic of God in the Old Testament. Although the English Bible translation you use may not show it, in Isaiah 65:16 the Hebrew text speaks twice of “the God of Amen,” and this clearly uses amen as a characteristic or even a title of God. Because many translators feel this would be confusing in English, they choose to render the text as “the God of truth,” and although that is not a bad translation, it does somewhat obscure the original sense of what was written.
4) Amen is used as a characteristic of Jesus in the New Testament. Just as God is referred to as the God of Amen in the Old Testament, so in the New Testament in Revelation 3:14 “Amen” is used as a title for Jesus Christ “These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God’s creation.” The combination of Amen with “faithful and true witness” clearly show the connection between amen and truth.
5) Amen was used uniquely by Jesus. Jesus usually used the word amen at the beginning of his statements, and in those cases, it was sometimes translated by the Gospel writers into Greek as “truly” (Luke 4:25; 9:27; etc.). The NIV translates this in turn as “I assure you …” But a completely unique use of amen by Jesus in the New Testament is recorded by the apostle John ,whose Gospel shows us that Christ frequently doubled the word at the beginning of particularly important statements. In the King James Bible this is translated “Verily, verily,” in the ESV as “truly, truly,” and in the NIV “Very truly.” The doubling of amen was not only used by Jesus, however. In the early 1960’s part of a Hebrew legal document dating from the time of Jesus was found in which an individual declares “Amen, amen, ani lo ashem” meaning “Very truly, I am innocent.” It is possible, then, that Jesus borrowed this doubled form of amen from legal language of the day. But knowing that Jesus used this expression to signify important things he wanted to stress can help us see their importance in our own study of his words. The full list of occurrences of amen being doubled in John’s Gospel is: 1:51; 3:3, 5, 11; 5:19, 24-25; 6:26, 32, 47, 53; 8:34, 51, 58; 10:1, 7; 12:24; 13:16, 20, 21, 38; 14:12; 16:20, 23; and 21:18.
It is interesting that while the New Testament writers often left untranslated certain Hebrew or Aramaic words such as abba, “father,” but immediately followed the word with a translation into Greek, they invariably left “amen” untranslated in its Hebrew form. This could possibly have been because they felt the word amen was known and understood by all their readers, but it is more likely that they knew that the word represented a range of meanings and they felt it better to simply include the word and let the reader or hearer consider the possibilities. If this is the case, we can draw a lesson from the fact. That small untranslated “amen” we read in our Bibles can mean more than just “may it be so.” We can often profitably think about what it most likely means in a given context or the intended force with which the expression was used. Finally, we should remember that “amen” certainly is not just a spiritual punctuation mark or a simple exclamation – wherever we use it we should think of it as a solemn affirmation that we are giving our personal guarantee that what was said is true!
Even great writers occasionally experience “writer’s block” – the seeming inability to write a few meaningful sentences – despite the fact that they may regularly write thousands of words in a day. In a similar way, even the most faithful of prayer warriors can experience times when praying seems to be difficult. There may be different reasons for this – prayer may become difficult because of feelings of guilt, exhaustion, discouragement, defeat, sadness, anger, or other reasons. But whatever the cause, if we are finding it hard to pray, there are several simple strategies we can employ to help us get back to God – back to wanting to pray. Next time you feel it is difficult to talk to God, consider trying one or all of these techniques:
Get Some Rest
One of the most frequent causes of difficulty in prayer is simple tiredness. Whether it is because we are trying to pray at the end of the day when we are already tired or because of exhaustion resulting from illness or other factors, tiredness greatly impairs our ability to think clearly and to pray effectively. The answer in these situations is often simply to get some rest and try again. As Psalm 127 tells us: “In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat— for he grants sleep to those he loves” (Psalm 127:2). The God who planned for sleep in our lives knows that sometimes we need rest before we can proceed. Difficulty in prayer at night can often disappear by morning.
Give Yourself a Spiritual Check Up
If difficulty in prayer continues, we may need to take the time to examine our lives and determine that we are not compromising our beliefs in some area. When we settle into a habit of making allowances for thoughts, words, or deeds that we know are not good, we set up dissonance in our minds and our prayer is usually the first thing to be affected. The book of Genesis shows that the first sin led immediately to a reluctance to talk with God (Genesis 3:8) and, as is often said, prayer can stop us sinning, but sin can stop us praying. In these situations, as we determine to change we find it easier to pray again – and to get the help that true change requires.
Pray for Others
Sometimes it is our own feelings or problems that, for whatever reason, are pulling back on our ability to pray. In situations like these it is often helpful to simply try to concentrate on the problems and needs of others (so often so much worse than our own!). There is something about doing this that makes our own efforts to pray more effective. The book of Job tells us that “After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord restored his fortunes …” (Job 42:10) and this story perfectly illustrates the way active concern for others pulls us closer to God despite our own situation.
Use a Prayer from the Bible
On occasion, our difficulty with prayer can be that we simply do not know what to say. Perhaps we feel ashamed for something we have done, or possibly we admit we feel angry with God for something that has happened in our lives. In these situations, when we just do not know quite how to put our thoughts into words, it can help to simply pray out loud one of the prayers recorded in the Bible. The prayer outline we call “The Lord’s Prayer” (Matthew 6:9-13) can work well as can Psalm 23, Psalm 51 or one of the other psalms, depending on the circumstances. Praying these prayers out loud can often help us feel like adding our own words and thoughts as we go along – and that is getting back to where we should be.
Just Pray it!
We began this article talking about “writer’s block.” Professional writers know they cannot afford to allow themselves the luxury of continuously not writing, and most know that the best way to overcome such a block is to “Just say it!” – simply to make themselves write something. Just putting the words down somehow gets the creative juices flowing again and while it may not be great literature, it’s usually better than nothing!
Prayer is like that, too. When we feel unable to pray we often need to “Just pray it!” Pray something – anything – just to get the process started again. Using one of the techniques we have looked at can often help us accomplish this. But we should always remember that no matter how awkward or even artificial our prayers may seem at these times, God is more than happy to accept our efforts and even to help us in ways that we may not even imagine (Romans 8:26-27). That’s one of the great things about prayer itself – when it gets hard we can pray for help in praying. And that’s a prayer that God will always answer.
* For more information on prayer, download our free e-book Your Call: Using the Direct Private Line of Prayer. You can download a copy to read on any computer or e-book reader here.
The apostle Paul begins and ends his letter to the Colossians on the subject of prayer. He begins his epistle speaking about how he prayed for the Colossian believers (Colossians 1:3, 9) and ends, directly before the personal greetings that appear at the close of his letter, with a final counsel to his readers on how they themselves should pray: “Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful” (Colossians 4: 2).
Military Expressions
To see Paul’s full meaning in this exhortation it helps to understand that here, as in several other places in his letter to the Colossians, he uses military expressions. In the second chapter of the epistle, for example, Paul says that he is delighted to see “how disciplined you are and how firm your faith in Christ is” (Colossians 2:5). Here, the word translated “disciplined” is a military term meaning literally to stand “shoulder to shoulder” as in a battle grouping, and the word “firm” means having a solid, immovable front, like a tight battle formation.
In the same way, when Paul writes that we should be “watchful and thankful” in prayer, he returns to this underlying military motif. The idea of being “watchful” connotes the alertness and vigilance of a sentry on duty, a soldier standing guard at his post, or a watchman on a city’s walls or guarding a city gate.
There is a lesson for us in Paul’s use of this term. It brings to mind words of Isaiah from the Old Testament: “I have posted watchmen on your walls, Jerusalem; they will never be silent day or night. You who call on the Lord, give yourselves no rest, and give him no rest …” (Isaiah 62:6-7).
We do not know if Paul had these words in mind when he instructed the Colossians to devote themselves to being “watchful” in prayer, but the intent of both writers is identical. Isaiah and Paul both make it clear that our prayer is to be continually active and that we should be constantly alert to our own needs and the needs of others. This is the opposite of unfocused, ritual, or occasional prayer – it is specific, situational, and constant. Isaiah makes this last aspect particularly clear in telling us that we should give ourselves no rest (just like a guard on duty) and even that we should give God no rest! Paul makes the same point in Colossians 4:2 less poetically, but just as clearly, in stressing that we should “devote” ourselves – a word meaning “to continue without stopping” – to this kind of watchful prayer.
The Two Halves of Prayer
The apostle then proceeds to say that we should show that we are thankful. For Paul the activities of being watchful and thankful cannot be separated – they are two parts of the same activity of prayer just as inhaling and exhaling are two parts of breathing. We already saw that Paul continually thanked God for the Colossians in his own prayers (Colossians 1:3) and now he shows that they too should give thanks. The implication is that we should be no less alert to the things for which we should give thanks – whether they are blessings we or others have received. Nevertheless, Pauls’ stress in this verse is primarily on our own needs and thanks, as he adds, in the very next verse, “And pray for us, too … (Colossians 4:3).
Colossians 4:2 also indicates that our thanksgiving should be constant. Just as Paul wrote that he and those with him “always thank God … when we pray for you” (Colossians 1:3), so now he implies the same continuity of giving thanks that we saw in his command to “devote” ourselves to asking for our needs.
Although our prayer should be set within praise and other aspects of interaction with God (see our free e-book on prayer), Paul shows in Colossians 4:2 that the two central aspects of prayer are in fact simply asking and thanking. The two cannot be separated and they form, together, the core of our relationship with God himself. Asking and thanking are not only the two aspects of prayer that Paul shows we must do, but also – and equally important – the two things we must do continually.
* You can download our free e-book on prayer here.
In the apostle Paul’s famous analogy of Christian qualities that he compares to the armor of the Roman foot soldier (Ephesians 6:10-18),* he lists only one offensive weapon – the “sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (vs. 17). Although the short sword was the main offensive weapon of the lightly armed Roman legionary – such as the one assigned to guard the captive Paul (Acts 28:16) – it was not the Roman soldier’s only weapon. Fully armed combat troops were also armed with a spear, as we read in Acts 23:23 where 200 spearmen were assigned as part of the escort to take Paul from Jerusalem to Caesarea.
If Paul had based his analogy of the “armor of God” on the more fully armed infantryman, rather than the lightly armed soldier who guarded him in Rome, he would certainly have had to expand the analogy to include the spear. We cannot know for sure what Paul might have chosen as a spiritual counterpart to the spear had he incorporated one in his arms and armor imagery, but by reading Ephesians 6 carefully we can see a distinct possibility. Paul concludes this passage with a mention of the power of prayer. Had the soldier guarding him held a spear, Paul could well have ended his discussion not simply with “prayer” but with “the spear of prayer.”
There is another reason to presume that Paul might have equated prayer with the ancient soldier’s spear. In the book of Joshua we are told:
Then the Lord said to Joshua, “Stretch out the spear that is in your hand toward Ai, for I will give it into your hand.” And Joshua stretched out the spear that was in his hand toward the city. So those in ambush arose quickly out of their place; they ran as soon as he had stretched out his hand, and they entered the city and took it … For Joshua did not draw back his hand, with which he stretched out the spear, until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai (Joshua 8:18, 26 NKJV).
This story is recorded as a direct parallel to that in Exodus in which the prophet Moses held out a staff in his hands in prayer and continued to hold them out while Israel was fighting against the Amalekites who had attacked the Israelites:
The Amalekites came and attacked the Israelites at Rephidim. Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.” So Joshua fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered, and Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the top of the hill. As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up—one on one side, one on the other—so that his hands remained steady till sunset (Exodus 17:8-12).
The story of the prophet Moses continuing to pray with the “staff of God” in his hands clearly shows the same lesson as that of the warrior Joshua continuing to hold his outstretched spear till the battle was won – that God helps those who seek his help as long as we continue to seek it.
How does this tie together with what Paul tells us about prayer at the close of his description of spiritual armor and arms? The message is the same. Notice what Paul’s exact words are at the end of his description of the armor of God: “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people” (Ephesians 6:18, emphasis added).
So if the legionary guarding Paul had been a little more heavily armed, we might well read today of the “spear of prayer” as well as the “sword of the spirit.” But whatever the case, we can draw the same lesson from what Paul does say at the close of his “armor of God” analogy as we can from the stories of Moses with his staff and Joshua with his spear: If we are to be victorious against the spiritual enemies and problems that we fight, we must continue in prayer as long as the problem persists.
God does not call us to pray, then hope things work out for the best, or to stop praying if things don’t get better (Luke 18:1). He calls us to continue to pray as long as we continue the fight or the work we are given to do. Prayer, like any military offensive, must not let up until victory is accomplished. It’s an attitude that we could say is aptly summarized in a comment about men with spears in the book of Nehemiah:
“So we continued the work with half the men holding spears, from the first light of dawn till the stars came out” (Nehemiah 4:21).
* Read our blog post on Paul’s analogy of the Armor of God here.
Apart from telling us WHAT to Pray, the “Lord’s Prayer” shows us in at least three ways HOW to pray!
The “Lord’s Prayer” is a profound outline or guide for prayer. It is profound in that although it is so short it provides a framework for every necessary topic of prayer, and also in that it teaches us important things about the way we should pray about the things for which we ask.
The prayer is found in two places in the Gospels – in Matthew 6: 9-13 in its fuller form, and in Luke 11: 2-4 in an abbreviated form. This fact alone seems to prove that the prayer is a guide on essential topics to pray about, rather than a prayer with specific words to be learned and repeated by rote as some believe.
Looking at the longer form of the prayer in Matthew, there are seven specific petitions or requests directed to God; but in this article, rather than looking at those petitions individually, as is often done, let’s look at some of the overall aspects of the guide which can be helpful in teaching us how to pray.
• The Prayer and the Commandments
First, when we compare the overall structure of the prayer, we see that it is actually similar to the structure of the Ten Commandments: the first group of points relating more directly to our relationship with God, the second group of points to our relationship with others. There are even some basic but noticeable touch-points: “I am the Lord Your God …” – “Father in Heaven”; “You shall not take my name in vain” – “Hallowed be your name”; etc. This is not surprising, of course, because in both the Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer we are looking at the same things – our relationship with God and with others.
The dual stresses of the commandments and the model prayer are even clearer if we compare the words of Christ when he was asked which were the most important of all the commandments. Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40). When we understand this we see the Lord’s Prayer is not about asking for the things that we think will make us happy or that we want, but things that show our love for God and others. If the Ten Commandments show us how to love God and others, the Lord’s Prayer teaches us how to ask for help to do that properly.
Remembering this dual stress of the commandments and the prayer is truly important in helping us focus our approach to the Lord’s Prayer. Rather than seeing the prayer as an unrelated list of requests, we begin to see it as a prayerful “walk through” of key areas of our relationship with God and with others. That fact in itself gives us an important clue as to how Jesus’ prayer outline can be expanded, as we use it, to include all kinds of things relating to our spiritual relationship with God and the rest of His family. And we need to remember that dual aspect of the prayer’s focus. Humanly it may be easy to expand “Give us today our daily bread” by mentioning our many physical needs, but how much do we expand on requests such as “hallowed be your name”? Realizing the dual stress of the prayer helps us to better equally balance the things for which we pray.
• First Person Plural
Another basic thing to remember as we look at the model we are given is that there isn’t a single “I” or “my” in this prayer – only “you” and “us”, “your” and “our”. Considering how obvious this fact is, there seems to be a clear lesson – once again to focus our prayers on our relationship with God and with others.
Seen this way, the Lord’s Prayer is very different from the individual list of personal wants and needs we are all tempted to offer at most times given the problems of everyday life that we all face. There is certainly no problem in praying for ourselves, and the prayer outline does not deny us the ability to ask for the needs we have – it just puts our requests in the context of “our” needs, helping us to keep our minds on the fact that the problems of others are just as real – and sometimes much more serious – than those we face.
The Book of Psalms gives some great examples of this fact. Remember there are more prayers there than in any other book of the scriptures, and if you look at many of David’s heartfelt personal requests for help, they end with requests for others – for his people, for all of Israel (see Psalms 25:18, 22; 28:2, 9 for just two examples).
• Prayer Triage
When we kneel before God don’t dozens of things come into our minds – the many needs and concerns of our own lives and of those of family, friends and others we know. These many individual-level needs are in addition to things God shows us are even bigger needs – of worldwide scale. Sometimes it’s hard to know where to start and where to end. That fact underscores one of the great purposes of the model we have been given – putting things in the right context and priority. Think of the Lord’s Prayer as prayer triage. Jesus’ guide to communication with our Father sorts through all those clamoring thoughts and needs and puts our concerns and requests in the right order. Matthew 6:7-8 shows us that “… your Father knows what you need before you ask him”; but even though God already knows what our most urgent needs are, the prayer outline puts things in perspective.
Putting it all Together
As we saw at the outset of this article, the Lord’s Prayer is a guide to prayer. None of the recorded prayers of Jesus or the disciples after the time the outline was given follow the wording of the prayer (showing again that it is not a prescribed set of specific words to be prayed), although each recorded prayer in the New Testament stresses some aspect found within the guide. Perhaps we could say that while spontaneous – and especially urgent – prayers will often take their own form, the “Lord’s Prayer” provides a guide for those occasions when we wish to seek God in regular and complete prayer. Although God is doubtless more concerned with the content rather than the form of our prayers, the guide Jesus gave us covers all the main aspects of our relationship with God and with others; it constantly directs our focus outward to include the needs of others; and it helps us to bring order and priority to the requests we make. These three areas of guidance help us to keep in mind what regular prayer is all about.
Every Christian experiences answered prayer. Every Christian experiences unanswered prayer. It’s easy to appreciate the former and then to move on, but unanswered prayer sticks with us: the illness that persists, the job opening that doesn’t come, the ongoing difficulties we all face and may, in many cases, have prayed about fervently. We see this situation in the apostle Paul’s admission regarding a problem he prayed about unsuccessfully: “Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me” (2 Cor. 12:8). Apparently Paul’s prayers were unanswered in this case.
So why unanswered prayer? Only God knows the answer to this question for specific cases, but the Bible gives us at least three reasons, and it’s possible to think of at least one more that we should keep in mind. First, as the Bible often states, the prayers of the unrighteous go unheard (John 9:31); but this was clearly not the situation in Paul’s case, any more than it is for many who are sincerely trying to walk according to God’s commandments.
The apostle James gives an additional warning: “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:3). Remember James was writing to believers, not to unbelievers, so perhaps we should examine our motivation whenever our prayer does goes unanswered. There are also doubtless times when God knows that it would not be good for us to answer a prayer affirmatively. Have you ever prayed something, then – because of new information or whatever – realized that what you asked for is not what you need or want? This has certainly happened to me, and as a result I try to remember that asking “Your will be done” is ultimately in our best interests!
But sometimes the problem is not with unrighteousness, or selfish motivation, or asking contrary to God’s will. There is also another situation which I believe may apply to Christians just as often as any of these last three reasons for unanswered prayer. Although it is not one for which we can cite a chapter and verse, the principle is nevertheless to be found in the Bible. But let’s illustrate it with a real-life example. Those of us who are parents know that when children have problems or needs they will often unabashedly ask for help as they think it is needed. When one of our sons was in grade school he came home complaining of being bullied by a bigger kid at his bus stop. He had every confidence that his parent would fix the situation, but thought the answer would be for dad to punish the bully and thus solve the problem. Needless to say, dad explained that that would not be the right way to fix this particular problem and simply talked to the offending child the next day. A simple request to stop the bullying was all that was needed.
Like sincere children, sometimes we just don’t understand what to ask for and may well be asking for something that is not going to be given in the way we ask. God knows our need before we ask it (Matthew 6:8); and Paul says “We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit itself intercedes for us…” (Romans 8:26). But that doesn’t mean God will answer exactly according to our request if we are asking for the wrong solution to the problem. Even as adults, we can be a lot like the child who asks for his or her solution to a problem and, as a result, we may not realize it when God works out the situation in a different manner from what we ask. No matter how sincere we may be, if we try to tell God how to do His job, we may find that’s the one way it won’t happen!
This is also true in the matter of timing. When we pray urgently for help that doesn’t arrive just when we think we need it, it’s easy enough to feel that the prayer was unanswered, but that’s not necessarily the case at all. We have to remind ourselves that we pray on our schedules and God answers on His. He doubtless knows when it will be best to answer our requests, but that doesn’t mean our prayers will never be answered.
You may not have noticed it, but there is a great biblical example of asking in a way that doesn’t stipulate what or when we think help needs to be given. In 2 Chronicles 20: 1-12 Jehoshaphat, one of ancient Israel’s few good kings, was told that a vast enemy army was heading toward Jerusalem. “Alarmed, Jehoshaphat resolved to inquire of the Lord, and he proclaimed a fast for all Judah … Then Jehoshaphat stood up in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem at the temple of the LORD and said: ‘Lord, the God of our ancestors, are you not the God who is in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations … here are men from Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir … coming to drive us out of the possession you gave us as an inheritance. Our God, will you not judge them? For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.’”
Notice that Jehoshaphat doesn’t ask for angelic armies to come to Israel’s aid; he doesn’t ask for plagues or whirlwinds to strike the enemy or any of the many ways we might imagine God could take care of the situation; and he doesn’t even ask for help now! His prayer ended with a simple “We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.” What kind of a prayer is that? you might ask. Jehoshaphat just mentions the situation and doesn’t even seem to ask for any specific help. Indeed, he does not. Nevertheless, Jehoshaphat ‘s prayer was answered. We are told that “The Lord set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir who were invading Judah, and they were defeated” (2 Chron. 20:22).
Think about this. If Jehoshaphat had earnestly asked God for firestorms or floods or whatever to be unleashed upon his enemy, he might well have thought his prayer was unanswered. In this case his prayer obviously was answered, and quickly, but the point is that Jehoshaphat simply showed his faith and asked God’s help, leaving the details up to God.
Perhaps there is a lesson in this for us all. If we are living as we know we should, being right in the motivation for our requests, and letting God choose the best way to answer our needs, we can be sure that our prayers will be answered according to God’s will. We still have to accept God’s will in the matter, but we can pray “Your will be done” with confidence when we understand that God does have our ultimate happiness foremost in mind. When we remember that, and that God will answer as He knows best, we will also realize that we may actually have fewer unanswered prayers than we often think.
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