Beeson Podcast, Episode # Martin Luther King Jr. Date >>Announcer: Welcome to the Beeson podcast, coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. Now your host, Timothy George. >>Timothy George: Well, it’s time for another Beeson Podcast that features a classic sermon. This one by the great Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This sermon was preached on December 9, 1962 at the 6th Avenue Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. On the occasion of the installation of a new young pastor, Dr. John T. Porter. He had been away in Detroit. He’s from Alabama originally. He had gone to Detroit to be a pastor. He had originally served with Dr. King at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery. So, they had a long association. He had gone to Detroit and now the church has called him back. There’s great excitement about the beginning of the new ministry. And Dr. King has been invited to come and preach the installation sermon. Dr. Smith, tell us about his text and how he develops it? >>Dr. Smith: Dean George, he selects for this occasion a text out of Luke 11, a parable. And it’s the parable of a man who was awakened at midnight because his neighbor had a friend who unexpectedly visited him and wanted to borrow loaves of bread to provide hospitality for his friend. This is a special occasion. It is the installation of John T. Porter. And he preaches this sermon from the thought, or the title, “Knock at Midnight.” This is the all encompassing metaphor. And he uses midnight as a time of warning and a time of great decision making and as a time in the life of the church when some great decision has to be made. He really is dealing with the role of the minister in grappling with societal ills. So, he’ll take this metaphor of midnight and say it’s midnight in three orders – the social order – and he’ll deal with what’s going on in society internationally/nationally/locally. It’s midnight in the psychological order – what’s taking place there. And then finally it’s midnight in the moral/ethical order – and that the church needs to be aware of that. What I really like about this sermon is that he weaves the text with application throughout the sermon so that it is not delayed and suspended until the end. And everyone stays with him. I know that you noticed how the crowd response rolls and the passion was felt and lifted even more when King began to challenge the Black Church, as you said, he’s even handed, he’s balanced. >>Timothy George: He speaks to the White Church, he speaks to the African American Church. >>Dr. Smith: Exactly. And deals with the fact that the Black Church exists in two forms: those churches that are freezers and are cold in their worship and those churches who burn up, who are hot in their worship but are unyielding when it comes to any kind of ministry outside of those four walls. I like how he slices off pieces from this parable and injects it actually into the atmosphere of what’s going on in the African American community. He says in dealing with this idea of bread, that the neighbor knocked on the door for bread, that people are going to be coming to the church looking for bread and the bread has to be kept fresh. The bread of faith, people are losing faith. Nihilism is running rampant. The bread of hope, people are losing hope and have come to a place of giving up. And then the bread of love. He takes this from 1 Corinthians 13:13 and contemporizes it and says this must be the position of the Church. As he closes the sermon he reaches to the spirituals. And there’s this litany of spirituals that he links up with the African American experience, this whole idea of faith, hope, and love. And says in recalling the experience of Black people, “You know what it was like to be able to not have shoes and not to have robes and all of that, but there will come a time, eschatologically speaking, where all of God’s people will be able to say, ‘I got shoes, you got shoes, all of God’s people got shoes.’ And when we get to heaven we’re going to put on all our shoes and walk around God’s heaven.” He accentuates the positive and he closes the sermon in an affirmative note. It’s testimony. I’ve seen the lightning flashing. I’ve heard the thunder roll. I’ve felt [inaudible 00:04:55] trying to conquer my soul. But I’ve heard the voice of Jesus telling me to still fight on. He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone. So, as he said, midnight signals that it won’t last always. It’s night now, but the morning is coming. >>Timothy George: Now, keep in mind, this sermon was preached in December 1962. On the eve of that momentous year of 1963 that witnessed not only the march on Washington but also the bombing of 16th Street Baptist Church right here in Birmingham. There’s a lot of tension in the air when this is beginning to unfold not only in the life of this church and the culture, but all around. Dr. King speaks into that tremendous moment, historic moment, in the words of Jesus from Luke 11. Let’s join that great congregation at 6th Avenue Baptist Church, December 9th, 1962, the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his sermon, “The Knock at Midnight.” >>Dr King: I would like to use as a subject from which to preach as I think of this installation occasion A Knock at Midnight. I like to read as a basis for our [inaudible 00:06:14] together a few verses from the 11th chapter of the Gospel as recorded by St. Luke. And he said unto them, “Which of you shall have a friend? And so go unto him at midnight and say unto him, “Friend, lend me three loaves,” for a friend of mine and his journey is come to me. And I have nothing to set before him. And he from within shall answer and say, “Trouble me not. The door is now shut. And my children are with me in bed. I cannot rise and give thee.” I say unto you though he will not rise and give him because he is his friend, because of his importunity. You will rise and give him as many as he needs.” Now this is a parable dealing with the power of persistent prayer. But there is much in it that we can use as a basis for analyzing many of the problems of the world today. And the role of the minister and the church in grappling with these problems. The first thing we noticed in the parable is that it is midnight. It is also midnight in our world today. We are experiencing a darkness so deep that we hardly know which way to turn. It is midnight. It is midnight in the international order. Or to put it another way, it is midnight in the social order. When we look out on the international horizon we see the nations of the world engaged in a dangerous and bitter contest for supremacy. A [inaudible 00:09:50] warfare has just begun and bacteriological warfare is [inaudible 00:09:57]. Guided ballistic missiles are carving highways through the stratosphere. And nuclear tests are still taking place with the ominous possibility of poisoning the very air we breathe with radioactive fallout. And that is the danger that all of these things will conspire to bring an untimely death to the human family on this globe. It’s midnight. And the midnight-ness of the social order is seen in our own nation. Let nobody fool you. In any nation where it is necessary to have more than 12,000 troops on hand to see that one negro young man is able to go to an institution supported by tax money - [it’s 00:11:12] midnight. This is one of the strange ironies of history that in a nation founded on the principle that all men are created equal, men are still arguing over whether the color of a man’s skin determines the content of his character. It’s midnight. On a day when the Governor of a state like Alabama will stand up before the nation and his lips dripping with words of [imposition 00:11:57] and nullification. And say that he will defy the very law of the land. Then it is midnight. When man will burn down houses, it’s a dark night. But when they would burn down the house of God it is about midnight. Everywhere we turn we find ourselves wandering through dark and desolate midnight. It is midnight in the social order. But not only is it midnight in man’s collective life. Not only is it midnight out there. But it is midnight in here. Men and women by thousands and millions are [inaudible 00:13:12] by day and haunted by night with paralyzing fear. Clouds of anxiety are floating in so many of our mental skies. People are more frustrated and worried and bewildered today than in any period of human history. The psychiatric wards of our hospitals are filled today. The most popular books in psychology are books with titles, “Man Against Himself.” “The Neurotic Personality of Our Time.” “Modern Man in Search of a Soul.” The bestsellers in religion are books like, “Peace of Mind,” “Peace of Soul.” And the popular preachers are those who can preach soothing liberal sermons on how to relax and how to [inaudible 00:14:29]. And so [inaudible 00:14:34] the gospel to read, “Go ye into all the world and keep your blood pressure down and I will make you [inaudible 00:14:41].” [crosstalk 00:14:47] This is indicative of the fact that it is midnight in the psychological order. But not only that it is midnight in the social order. I mean in the moral order midnight is a time when all colors lose their distinctiveness. And everything becomes merely a dirty shade of gray. In the modern world all moral principles have lost their distinctiveness. The modern man has nothing absolutely right and nothing absolutely wrong. It’s just a matter of what the majority of people are doing. Everybody is doing it so it must be all right. This is the idea that pervades our nation and our world. Nothing absolutely right or nothing absolutely wrong. To put it in sociological lingo, morality becomes a matter of group consensus and the [inaudible 00:16:15] are right ways. So, we go on down this dangerous [inaudible 00:16:24] midnight believing that there is nothing absolutely right and absolutely wrong. It’s just a matter of what the vast majority of people are engaging in. And we have come to believe that to discover what is right by taking a sort of Gallup poll of the majority opinion. And then midnight is a time when everybody is seeking to get by. The epic of midnight is an epic of not getting caught. This is a dangerous ethic that’s availed today. The idea of getting by and so nobody is too concerned about obeying the ten commandments. They are not a part of midnight. Everybody is concerned about obeying the 11th commandment, “Thou shall not get caught.” [crosstalk 00:17:28] according to the ethic of midnight. It’s [inaudible 00:17:33] than this. It’s all right to explore but be a dignified explorer. Don’t be a [inaudible 00:17:48]. [inaudible 00:17:53] of love and make it appear that you are loving when you actually hate [inaudible 00:18:00]. This is the tragedy of this dark midnight. Midnight in the moral order and so we find ourselves surrounded by this threefold midnight experience. Midnight in the social order. Midnight in the psychological order. Midnight in the moral order. [inaudible 00:18:32] in our world today. The deep silence and darkness of the midnight happen to be interrupted by a knock. And in our world today it is the knock of the [world 00:18:54] on the door of the church. No one understands that knock better than God’s preacher. If anybody in this church understands the knock it is Reverend Porter. The world is knocking on the door of the church. Today you have more than a 100 million people names on the rolls of some church or synagogue. Now back in 1929 there were only 50 million. This is an increase of about 100% and within that same time the population has only increased 31%. It reveals that even though there are still a number of people outside of the doors of the church that they are still knocking. Even in a country like Russia, whose official policy is atheistic, the tell us that the churches are bulging over on Sunday morning. And their government is getting a little bit [inaudible 00:20:21]. But it does reveal to us that man are still living with the idea that the church has an answer to their individual and collective problems. And they are knocking. In the parable that man wanted three loaves of bread. In our world today those who are knocking are requesting three loaves. They are longing for the bread of faith. Living in a day of colossal disappointment with one harrowing frustration piled on top of another. Men have lost faith in themselves, faith in their neighbors and faith in God. And in the midst of this they are crying out for the bread of faith. And then they are seeking the bread of hope. In the modern world the light of hope has gone out to a great extent. And millions of people are roaming in the dark chambers of pessimism. And so many have come to believe that life has no meaning. Young men, old men are [unconsciously 00:22:09] themselves, crying out with Philosopher Schopenhauer that life is and endless pain and a pain from within. That life is a tragic comedy playing over and over again with merely slight changes in costume and scenery. Millions of people today are crying out with Shakespeare’s MacBeth that life is a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing. Millions of people today are crying out with Paul Laurence Dunbar – a crust of bread and a corner to sleep in. A minute to smile and an hour to weep in, A pint of joy to a peck of trouble, And never a laugh but the moans come double; And that is life! And in the midst of this agonizing midnight. Men are crying for the bread of hope. Then they are crying for the bread of love. Everybody wants this love. So many things are happening in the world today to make people feel that they are nobody. To make them feel that they do not count. Caught in the shackles of discrimination and the manacles of oppression. So many people feel that they are things rather than persons. Covered up in big cities and mass population. Courting the modern tendency of depersonalization so to speak. So many people feel that they’re little more than numbers. This is the gist of life. A little baby is born into the world and his mother is maternity case #504. And as soon as he is fingerprinted and foot printed he becomes #1008. Then he begins to go off and finally gets a job in a factory. And soon discovers that he’s #1219. Pretty soon he’s called to [inaudible 00:24:50] and he discovers now that he’s #706 in regiment #503. He may make a mistake in life and finds himself in a prison and he becomes #1824 in cell B. And then comes the day when he comes to the end of life. And he has a funeral in a modern situation and so gets in parlor #206. Preach number #14 giving the eulogy. Choir director #10 taking care of the music. Flowers #1 or #2 decoration Class D. And so he goes through the whole of his life caught in the shackles of numbers, feeling that he’s really a card in an index and in the midst of all of this he cries out saying, “I want to be loved. I want to feel like somebody. I want to feel that I’m more than a number on an index card.” In the midst of midnight modern man cries out for bread. The bread of faith, the bread of hope, the bread of love. Come if you will back to that parable with me. Watch that man as he knocks on the door. See him standing there, knocking. And then you hear a real terrible disappointing retort. I’m asleep. Tired. My children are in bed, don’t disturb them now. Don’t bother them now. As if to say I don’t have time to be bothered with you. So, at that dark agonizing midnight the man on the outside was left disappointed. I will say to you this afternoon that this is so often been true of the church ... men have knocked on the door and so often been left disappointed. Look at South Africa today. There you will find more than 12 million Black men and Black women segregated on 2% of their own land. [inaudible 00:27:44] as he knocks on the door of the protestant church. When they answer, “Get away from here. We are busy in the comfortable isolation of our stained glass windows. Get away from here. We know that segregation is a part of the will God, God was the first segregationist. This is the answer.” So, [inaudible 00:28:19] and 12 million Black men and women have been left standing outside [inaudible 00:28:24] the bread of social justice. They have been left disappointed. Look at America today. Think about the fact that this morning at 11:00 millions of Christians stood to sing that in Christ there is no east or west. When the millions of Christians stood to sing that, they stood in the most segregation hour of Christian America, and the most segregated school of the week was the Sunday School. Think about it. Millions of dollars a year going over to Africa for the missionaries – a great thing to do. Southern Baptist Convention gives as much for missions as any convention you want to see, that’s a wonderful thing. But if one of those Africans those missionary funds go to help would come to the United States and visit the church and sit in the front they would be kicked out of that church. You know I can hear God speaking. I can hear him saying, “Get out of my face.” I don’t hear all the [inaudible 00:29:52]anthems. I don’t hear the cosmic outpouring of the beautiful hymn. Get out of my face, your hands are full of blood. I can hear [inaudible 00:30:08] concerned about your long prayer. I’m not merely concerned about your sermons, let justice roll down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream. I can hear him saying I’m not concerned about the fact that you’re building a lot of billion dollar churches. I’m not concerned about the impressive [inaudible 00:30:33] religious education buildings. I am concerned about that you would do justly, you would love mercy, and you would walk humbly with God. That’s what I’m concerned about. This is what God is saying even to the Southern Baptist Convention. And every White church in the United States of America. He is saying you have left my children disappointed at midnight. And you have been slumbering and sleuthing in the chamber of pious irrelevancy. And now if the gospel is going to have meaning you’re going to have to open the doors of your churches, your hospitals, your church related schools, and make it clear that out of one blood God mad all men. [crosstalk 00:31:27] This is what he’s saying. I don’t want you to accuse me of being chauvinistic and I don’t want you to accuse me of just getting onto White Christians. The Negro Church ... has often left men disappointed at midnight. You see there are two types of Negro churches that have left men disappointed at midnight. One freezes up and the other one burns up. Now the one that freezes up is the church that goes out an boasts that it is a dignified church. And it talks and boasts about how many professional people it has in the membership. And it goes on and really gains a great deal of satisfaction from its exclusiveness. We have so many doctors and we have so many school teachers and we have so many lawyers – as if the other people don’t count. [crosstalk 00:33:01] It becomes [inaudible 00:33:14] the preacher preaches nice little essays on current events. And the choir sings nice little songs that they don’t get in too much. One Sunday they decide to sing a Negro spiritual, the members bow down and shame because this reminds them of something they don’t want to think about. It’s not in line with that [crosstalk 00:33:48]. Now you can see the danger of this church. It ends up little more than a social club with a thin veneer of religiosity. Fails to see the power and meaning of the gospel. Loses the power of the whosoever let him come doctrine. And so this church ends up freezing up. Men come by and they’re turned away because they don’t have that certain level of education. They’ll even give them a little stale bread that has been hardened by the long [inaudible 00:34:39] class consciousness. Oh these churches have left me hungry, [inaudible 00:34:49] at midnight. Now there’s another church that burns up. It is a church that reduces worship to entertainment. It is a church where the minister is more concerned about the volume of his voice than the content of his message. It is the church where people have more religion in their hands and feet than they have in their hearts and souls. It is the church where people confuse [inaudible 00:35:33] with spirituality. This church has also left men hungry at midnight. They came, “Can I get a little bread?” And they found people playing with religion. They came, “Can I get a little bread?” And they found people entertaining some [inaudible 00:35:56] in the church a little more than ecclesiastical gymnastics. They came by to get a little bread and they discovered that they didn’t get it there. Because the bread that they needed to be emotionally satisfying, yes, but also intellectually respectable. So, they were left standing there hungry at midnight. God is speaking even this day to the Negro Church. We have a marvelous opportunity to make God’s Kingdom a reality and to be the true church to inject within the veins of religion. New and powerful meaning. And he is speaking to us today. Come again with me to this parable. Even though this man was disappointed he [kept knocking 00:37:07] the man had cursed him out and told him to get away and disappointed him. But he kept knocking. Now the big word that I read is the word importunity. Do you know what that word means? It means persistence. It means sticking to something. It means staying with it. It means keeping on keeping on. It means going on and going on and going on in spite of. Not giving up. Because of his willingness to keep on keeping on something happened. As I use my imagination here I want to tell you why I believe he kept knocking. That man had no illusions. He was not having a good time at midnight. Midnight is a time when men are desperate [inaudible 00:38:12] somebody is coming by here. Perplexed by the uncertainties of life. Agonizing because the contradictions of history. They’re going to want the bread of hope. You must keep your bread fresh enough so that you will be able to imbue them with the conviction that God has not left this world alone. That he is still working through history for the salvation of his children. Somebody will come by here and maybe some young person who has committed some great sin. And they will come with regrets and guilt. Trying to find the bread of forgiveness. They tried the night club and couldn’t find their way out there. They tried to drink and couldn’t find it there. They discovered that the more they tried to drown the guilt feeling the more they engaged in the guilt of [inaudible 00:39:28]. So, in the midst of their agony they will run to the church of God. You’ve got to be able to give them that something that will turn them to Christ. The Christ who can provide the bread of forgiveness. The Christ who can change ... the Christ who can change the Simon of Sin to the Peter of Rock. The Christ who can change the persecuting Saul to an Apostle Paul. The Christ who can change the [inaudible 00:40:03] Augustine into a St. Augustine. They will come wanting that. There will be some persons who have been through the morning of childhood, the moved on through the noon of adulthood, and now they’re coming to the evening of life. Death is not too far from them. And they are caught in the fear of death. [inaudible 00:40:33] A little bread to tide them over [inaudible 00:40:40] somehow your bread won’t be fresh enough. Let them know that death is not a blind alley that leads the human race into a state of nothingness, but an open door that leads men into life eternal. Your bread must be fresh. Let them know that this earthly life is merely an embryonic prelude to a new awakening. Your bread must be fresh enough to let men know that death is not a period which ends this great sentence of life but a comma that punctuates it to a loftier significance. You must be able to give them the bread of hope and the bread of faith. Keep the bread fresh. And finally, this man just really wanted enough bread to tide him over until the dawn. His cry for a little bread was really a cry for the dawn. He knew that midnight was not here to stay. He realized that midnight was merely a temporary phenomenon in the universe. Probably he had read that magnificent passage in the Psalms, “Weeping may tarry for the night, joy cometh in the morning.” To go back to the Hebrew word [inaudible 00:42:18] really means to dwell for the night as the larger, weeping may dwell as a larger for the night but joy cometh in the morning. Our Negro fore-parents, our slave fore-parents rather, realized it. They knew about midnight. They didn’t have anything to look forward to but long, drawn out rows of cotton. Sizzling in sweltering heat. The raw hide whip of their overseer. They were taken away from their homes, taken away from their backgrounds, taken away from their heritage, taken away from their language. And often children were taken from their parents. So many of the women were forced to satisfy the biological urges of the old mean boss. And as soon as the children were born they would be snatched from their hands like a hungry dog snatches a bone from a human hand. They knew about midnight. And so when they thought about midnight they would sing nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. They knew about that. But then before they could get through singing that, they knew that morning would come. And so they would start out singing something else. I’m so glad that the trouble don’t last always. They had lived with the darkness of slavery. And they had experienced it’s shackles and it’s chains. But they knew about God and they knew morning would come. So, they could look out and begin to say by and by, by and by I’m going to lay down my heavy load, I know my robe's going to fit me well I'm gonna lay down my heavy load I tried it on at the gates of hell. [inaudible 00:44:46] at midnight. It’s a terrible midnight when you have to walk down the long road in bare feet. No shoes on your feet and you’re just walking down the road endlessly. Day after day and evening after evening, getting up when you can’t see and getting off of work when you can’t see. Day after day they went shoeless without shoes as they marched up those row of cotton. It was midnight then. Then something told them, “Morning would come.” They started singing, “I got shoes, you got shoes, all of God’s children got shoes. When I get to heaven I’m going to put on my shoes and just gonna walk all over God’s heaven.” I got a robe, you got a robe, all of God’s children got a robe. When I get to heaven I’ll put on my robe and I’m going to shout all over God’s heaven. This [inaudible 00:45:46] my friends, at midnight. It’s not here to stay. Dawn will come. Morning will come. I want to close by mentioning an experience that came to me. Thousands of people working together in a community not far from here. An experience which revealed to me that sometimes the most starless night may be just that darkest morning, just before the dawn of some great fulfillment. For more than 11 months we have worked together in Montgomery, Alabama to try to integrate the buses. You know the story. Then the mayor of the city came out saying we’re tired of this mess. We are tired of this [inaudible 00:46:54] and this car pool. We’re going to get rid of it. We’re going to the court to seek an injunction on the basis of the fact that this car pool is a public nuisance. You remember car pool was the way we got people around the city. When I read that the mayor was going to do this I knew that he would win that easily in an Alabama court. And then came that day. I got my subpoena to be in court. It was on Monday. We would go on trial that Tuesday. And all day long I was bewildered and frustrated. I said how in the world can I face these people in the mass meeting tonight? All of these months we’ve been struggling. A lot of these months we stayed together and stayed off of the buses and now they would begin to think that we’ve led them down a blind alley. You can never know the frustrating moments that come when you find yourself in leadership positions. Moments when you find yourself wondering whether you’re going forward or backward. Moments when you begin to wander whether the very people that you’re seeking to lead out are sympathetic and concerned about what you’re trying to do for yourself and them. I can remember that day, all day long, I said that all of our struggle has been in vain. See that we are going to end up here losing out without any kind of victory. But then I finally got up enough courage to go to that mass meeting at the Bethel Baptist Church that night and I made my speech that night, not hardly knew what to say but I said to the people, I must honestly say and admit to you, that our carpool would probably be [inaudible 00:49:02]. I don’t want to mislead you. But we’ve had a faith that has led us on for all of these months. We’ve had our faith in God that he has led us through. And I believe that even in this he is going to make a way for us out of nowhere. I don’t know what it will be and what will happen. But I believe this and I go on with this faith and I call on you to have this faith. Even after I said these words I could still see the people were down and out. Cool breezes of pessimism were blowing all around that audience. We went on that night and it was a dark night. Darker than a thousand midnights. We got up that Tuesday morning [inaudible 00:49:57] came by the house and we started our trek for the courthouse. We got there [inaudible 00:50:05] court and they started arguing the case. Our lawyers argued brilliantly [inaudible 00:50:14] and our carpool, voluntary pool, and not [inaudible 00:50:22] of profit, it was nonprofit. But even in spite of this I saw the judge Carter was leaning towards the position of the city. But then the clock started moving around toward noon. I saw Mayor [Gale 00:50:37] get up and move back in the back room. I looked over at Commissioner Sellers and I saw him moving over in the same room. I looked at Judge Carter and he was getting a little jittery on the bench. And he said the court would be recessed for ten minutes. Then by that time a man by the name of [Rex Thomas 00:50:56] from Associated Press came over to me. I was sitting at the table with the lawyers and the chief defender. He said, “Dr. King, here is a statement that has just come across the wire. And I believe you would be interested in it. I would like your comment.” I looked at it and it said, “This morning, the United States Supreme Court unanimously ruled that bus segregation is unconstitutional in Montgomery, Alabama.” [crosstalk 00:51:35] I heard a sister jump up on the balcony and said, “[inaudible 00:51:46]” I said to myself that [crosstalk 00:51:52] midnight. A thousand midnights. The morning has come. [inaudible 00:52:06] I just want to change his question mark into an exclamation point. Cry out with the slaves of old, there is [inaudible 00:52:25] sometimes I feel discouraged and feel my work is in vain. But then the Holy Spirit revives my soul again. [inaudible 00:52:43] I don’t mind saying to you I seen the lightning flash, I [inaudible 00:52:53] dancing [inaudible 00:52:58] but I heard the voice of Jesus [inaudible 00:53:03] >>Announcer: You’ve been listening to the Beeson podcast with host Timothy George. You can subscribe to the Beeson Podcast at our website: www.beesondivinity.com. Beeson Divinity School is an interdenominational evangelical divinity school, training men and women in the service of Jesus Christ. We pray that this podcast will aide and encourage your work and we hope you will listen to each upcoming edition of the Beeson Podcast.