The Ministry of the Church — R. Edward Miller

The Temple as a Picture of the Church

Ezekiel was a prophet of end times, much in Ezekiel, in different ways. The Lord caused him to speak of things he surely knew not. Looking down through the millenniums, the times of the end. And we're going to look at chapter 44, which is one of the chapters that has to do with the temple.

The temple of Ezekiel, very, very specific directions and measurements and materials and so on. And yet that temple was never built. No one ever built Ezekiel's temple with all of its directions and measurements and so on.

Because that temple is a symbol, that temple is symbolic and typifies the church of Jesus Christ. And when you look at it in that way, you'll find, the more you can search out, the more you'll find how the different materials and measurements and so on typify the different aspects of the church of Christ.

It's a long study, and we're not going into it. But we are going into chapter 44. And that has to do with the ministry of that temple. As I say, the temple was never built. But it does speak of the church of Jesus Christ.

The Three Classes of Ministry

So we're going to look at the ministry of the church. There are three classes of ministry. The first is rejected. The second is restricted. And the third is the accepted, or the blessed. Now in the New Testament, in fact, even in the Old Testament, way back before Moses' time and in the first part of Moses' time, the people were priests unto God.

But then that changed. And God put in a restricted ministry with the priests and the Levites and the high priests. And so it was a substitute. But in the New Testament, He has made us kings or a priesthood, a kingly, a royal priesthood.

God would have all of His people to be priests. However, we'll look back into the prophet Ezekiel to see a picture of what God wants and how He will work with the priests of this day, with the ministry of this day.

And as I say, priests, because God would have us all to be ministers in one form or another, in one category or another. So we'll go to the 44th chapter. I think about the, let's see, the 9th verse, is it?

Yes. Thus saith the Lord God, No stranger, uncircumcised in heart, nor uncircumcised in flesh, shall enter into My sanctuary, or any stranger that is among the children of Israel. That's what God says.

We'll go back two verses. Verse 7, In that you have brought into My sanctuary strangers, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in My sanctuary, to pollute it, even My house, when you offer My bread and fat and blood.

And they have broken My covenant because of all your abominations. You've not kept the charge of My holy things, but you have set keepers of My charge and My sanctuary for yourselves. About 200 years ago, there was a very serious controversy in the church, both in the colonies of this land and in Europe, and in England especially, and that controversy was, was it necessary for a minister of the gospel to be converted?

Did he have to be a believer, did he have to believe what he said, or just teach what was written? That was all. That was in the days of John Wesley, in the days of George Whitefield, in the days of Jonathan Edwards, and men like that.

They claimed, yes, a minister had to be converted. But believe it or not, most of the ministers said, no, it wasn't necessary. I don't know what you think about that. I know what I think about that, and I know what God thinks about that.

I hope we're all thinking the same. God says, I have a controversy with that. He said, you have set up ministry. God hadn't. You have done it. We prepare them. We have our institutions of learning where we grind them out like sausages, so many per year.

Now they come knowing everything and having received much of nothing. God says, that's not what I'm wanting, because that's what you have done. But saith the Lord God, no stranger uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh shall enter into my sanctuary, of any stranger that is among the children of Israel.

In other words, they had to be those who were born to serve God, born again, and have the work of God in their hearts. There had to be a circumcision in both their heart and their flesh. In other words, they were sanctified, that's what the word really typifies, circumcision, sanctified inside and sanctified outside, inside and outside, outside and inside, both.

Because the outer holiness isn't enough. Paul makes that very plain, he says, they're not even true Jews if they're only circumcised outside. If it's only an outer sanctification, then they are not a part of the true family of God.

They're not. There has to be the inward. So now we're going over, going on to verse 10. And the Levites that are gone away far from me, when Israel went astray, which went astray away from me after their idols, they shall even bear their iniquities.

Yet they shall be ministers in my sanctuary, having charge of my gates, ministering to the house, and so on. Before we go any further, I would like to go back to Ezekiel 14, 3. In the same book, the same writer, we read, Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts.

I want you to notice that. Ezekiel's not necessarily talking about outside idols, whether they're sitting on a pedestal in a church or in a temple or in a home. He's talking about the inside ones, isn't he?

They set up their idols in their hearts. And so when we're speaking of this idolatry, that's what God is looking at. He's looking on the inside. Now, I want us to take a few moments to go back and look at the idols of the Old Testament and what they signify.

Idols of the Heart

First we have Baal, who's connected with Ashtoreth, incidentally. That is the ruler of both the political system, but he's the god of agriculture and of fertility and the rites, the ceremonies, the rituals were very orgiastic and very immoral.

He's the lord of joy and pleasure. And then we have another, Baal-Berith. He's the lord of covenants and pacts and promises. And then there's Baal-God, the lord of fortune, the lord of riches, the lord of greed.

You see how these idols can get into your heart? You begin to look and see that you can have worship Baal and not have any outward idol at all, but the worship of riches, the love of money is the root of all evil, isn't it?

And incidentally, it doesn't say money. It says the love of it. You can have very little of it and love it much. Do everything in your power, sell everything you can sell to get hold of it and still be poor.

Those are idols in the heart. There's the, we'll go to another one. There's several, but I'm skipping some of them, not to take the time for them. There's Baal-Haman, lord of the multitudes. That fits nicely into our democratic system.

People power. You ever hear of people power? The multitude rules. Everybody does it, so that makes it okay to do. We follow the crowd, but I think Jesus said something about where the crowd went was the way to destruction, wasn't it?

The way was narrow, few there be that find it. Then there's Baal-Haman. That is, God is good, but it becomes a good godism. There's no such thing as responsibility, no such thing as holiness. God is good.

God is gracious. He just wants to do all his good things for you and never any responsibility. That's good godism. Baal-Haman. There's Baal-Hazor. He's the lord of enclosure. He's the lord of security, of natural security.

There's no dependence upon God. We put our dependence on our armies. We put our dependence on our defenses, and so on. And then there is the lord of architecture, Baal-Qurja, the lord of architecture.

Some people worship that. Oh, everything, their lives just fits into that. Then there's Baal-Is, the lord of pleasure, hedonism, one of the Ammonite gods. And then there's a house god. People worship their houses.

I know some, I've been in some homes, I know some women, I remember one especially that was delivered. She just couldn't leave her house. She just had to be always keeping everything so spotless and just, she was a workaholic in her own house, keeping everything so nice.

Then there's the lord of the open doors, and of the immorality, that everything's all right. Do anything you want to. Then there's a worship of nature, in the sense of all the flowers and gardens and trees and all that part of nature.

That's Baal-Temar. And then there's another god, I don't think we have this god in our hearts, Baal-Zebub, or you've heard it probably pronounced together Baal-Zebub. That's the lord of flies. I don't think anyone here is worshiping that area, so we'll pass it by.

We should let her swat him, wouldn't we? And then there is the god of war, and then there is Dagon. He's the god that represents the ego. Not going into a long explanation of it, just to leave it at that, I can tell you more about it if you ever want to know, but he represents the ego, the worship of self.

He was one of the big gods that only the ark, only the presence of God could overcome Dagon. David overcame the Philistines, but he never overcame Dagon. Samson, he lost his life there when they were having a big party celebrating the capture of Samson, and that was the worship of Dagon.

But when they brought the ark into the presence of Dagon, what had happened, do you remember? It fell down, and they put it up again, and it fell the second time and broke it so completely they couldn't raise it up again.

That is Dagon. That's a symbol of self. It's a mixture of fish and man, and that's the worship of self. The only thing that can overcome self is not strength, but the presence. That can melt us down inside, can't it?

That can make everything fall, can't it? That presence comes, and suddenly all that resistance and all that strength begins to fade away. Knees get weak, hearts get soft. He alone can overcome Dagon. And there's the Neushtan, which is the worship of religion, the worship of church, the worship of ceremonies.

It's very interesting that many fights in churches, especially in moral line churches, have developed because they would change just one symbol in their ritual. I remember a church in England that they moved from the goblet in the service of communion to the little glasses.

What did they do that for? They had a major battle on their hands. Just that little thing, no way, no way, no way, and they had a real royal battle. That was because they were worshiping their rituals.

Neushtan is the brazen serpent that one time God used, and then they made it an idol, and it had to be destroyed years later. And that's what happens. God uses something, but then we make a fetish of it, it becomes an idol to us.

That's why God wants to keep changing so we don't lock in and say, this is it, now we've got the formula. Finally we've got it. Now we know what to do all the time. And that isn't what God is wanting.

Then there's a God of education and a God of commerce that's called Moloch. And there is the God of fashion, there's a great deal of worship of fashion. I mean, some people wouldn't be seen outside the house with anything that was unfashionable.

That's the God of fashion. And believe it or not, how much they are worshipped. How difficult for someone to break fashion. There are more in our hearts than we think we are, than they think we are. And so, without going any more into that side of it, just the fact that when we talk about idols in the heart, it's not necessarily talking about a few idols on a God's shelf, or a few virgins raised up, or religious symbols raised up in church.

No, it's not talking about that. He's talking about idols in the heart. As I mentioned the other day, our first love, the things we love more than anything else, those become the idols to us. Those become what we mostly worship.

And I think, really, Dagan is very strong. Very strong. He's one of the hardest ones to get out. And so, that's why now God says, the Levites that have gone away from me when Israel went astray, which went astray away from me after their idols, they shall bear their iniquity.

But verse 11, yet they shall be ministers in my sanctuary. And only to look at these ministries, there are seven of them, and these are the restricted ministries. There are seven. They shall be ministers in my sanctuary.

That's like taking care of everything, we might call them janitors. And they will have charge at the gates of the house. The gates is a place of entry, isn't it? It's a place where people come in, and people go out.

They shall have charge of the gates. That speaks of evangelism. God will use them for winning souls, He will use them as evangelists, official evangelists, or just private evangelism, or one-to-one, soul winning.

That will be one of their ministries. They will minister to the house. That's speaking of deacons, who take care of all the things that are in the house of God. And the house of God is the church of God, the people of God, taking care of the people of God, the different material needs that they will have.

Then they shall slay the burnt offering and the sacrifice for the people. I want you to notice, they do not minister the blood. We'll find that out later. Putting it in crude terms, they were the butchers.

They had to do the hard work. It is a lot of hard work to take a large animal, especially like a bullock, and slay it, and prepare it for the offering. They did all the preparatory work. They did not minister the blood.

We'll find that out later. They did not have anything to do with that, but they did have to do with the sacrifices and the offerings. They did the hard work. They did the preparatory work, and all that was necessary, but they did not offer the blood.

Also, they shall stand before them, my people, to minister unto them. We have Sunday school teachers, or cell leaders, or however you want to put it, in whatever form it takes, whatever ministry is given to them, they are the ones who will be ministering to the people in that level.

And it says, verse 12, because, here's why they can only do these things, because they ministered unto them before their idols, because they were sanctified, they were circumcised, outside, but not inside.

And so they joined them in their idolatries, their inner idolatries, and they caused the house of Israel to fall into iniquity. If they do it, we can do it. And so away they went. And so now God speaks, and this is why they're restricted, therefore have I lifted up mine hand against them, saith the Lord God.

Now there's two other versions, Goodspeed's and the revised version, says, he has sworn by lifting up his hand, that's a form of making an oath. I have lifted up my hand against them, saith the Lord God.

They shall bear their iniquity, or their guilt, or their consequences, or their punishment. They shall bear it, and yet they shall minister. But here's what their punishment is. They shall not come near unto me.

They shall not come near unto me. They will never come into the presence of God. They will never be able to minister there, to do the office of a priest unto me, nor to come near any of my holy things in the most holy place.

They shall bear their shame and their abominations which they have committed. That's why you can enter into many, many, many churches, but you'll not find the presence there at all. You'll not find the holy places.

You'll not find the holy things of God. There won't be the anointing, because the anointing that sanctified and that made those things holy, the different furniture in the sanctuary. And so, there won't be that touch, there won't be that anointing, there won't be that work.

God says, I've lifted up my hand against them, I swear, I take an oath, they shall not come near to my holy things. They shall not minister in my holy things, and they shall not minister to me. They shall bear their shame and their abominations which they have committed, but I will make them keepers of the charge of the house, and to take care of the house itself, all the repairing, or carpentry work, or plumbing work, or whatever it happens to be, for all the services thereof.

And also, one more that makes a self-administration, for all that shall be done therein. Any odd job, anything whatsoever that needs to be done in the house of the Lord, and in the service of the Lord, all right, they can do that.

But they shall not come near to me. They shall not do the office of priest to me. They shall not come near to any of my holy things. They shall not, even in the most holy place, they shall bear their shame.

The Accepted Ministry and Ministry Unto God

Now, God is doing this thing, this is a picture of the church of Jesus Christ, and this is effective. It's effective now, whether people realize it or not, whether they know it or not, whether they want it or not, it is still effective now.

But let's go on now. Now we come to Zadok, the sons of Zadok, the priests, the Levites, the sons of Zadok that kept the charge of my sanctuary when the children of Israel went astray from me. They shall come near to me to minister unto me.

They shall stand before me to offer unto me the fat and the blood, saith the Lord God. Over in Acts 13, 1 and 2. Now there were in the church that was Antioch certain prophets and teachers, as Barnabas and Simeon, that was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manian, which had been brought up with Herod, the Tetrarch, and Saul.

Now look, as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me, Barnabas and Saul, for the workmen I have called them. There is a ministry unto God, not unto men. They ministered unto the Lord.

They were just gathered together, just those seven people, prophets and teachers they were called, and they were not ministering to man. If you remember in the Old Testament, in the tabernacle, when the priests went in to minister to God, first they had to dress in special clothes, and the curtains were dropped down, they were inside a closed, an enclosure, a tent, or a building, which is a temple later.

The people were not in there. They ministered, they offered the incense at the golden altar, the light was burning, which was the symbol of the Holy Spirit illuminating, and everything was done, they ministered unto God.

Although it was ceremonial, now in the New Testament we find it's not ceremonial. They were not ministering to men. We have the idea that the only way to minister is to man. But by far, as we see as we go through here, the far greatest ministry is not to man, it's to God.

In England there are certain places that will have certain shops, catering businesses, things like that, restaurants, they'll have a little plaque or a shield over their business. The queen ate here. Tailors to the king, oh that was a great thing, that was a great thing.

That put them above all the other tailors. They ministered to the king, you see what I mean? For instance, if a catering shop had a contract going with a miner's union to cater to 5 ,000 miners in a big union meeting, and then the chamberlain of the king came by and said the queen and a few of her nobles would like for you to cater their home in Buckingham Palace, and they want it on this night, in this hour, the same hour as the union had planned.

Now in one they might get almost a fortune, in the other they wouldn't have nearly as much money involved. But who do you think they cater to? The king, wouldn't they? Oh, that gives them a prestige, a position.

No one else could say we have catered to the king in Buckingham Palace. You see, it's so much greater to minister to the king than it is to minister to subjects. It's so much greater to minister to God than it is to minister to man.

And we have the idea that the only ministry that's valuable and the only ministry we could do is minister to people. Am I right or wrong? As soon as people think of ministry, what do they think of? As soon as people think of entering the ministry, what do they think of?

Standing up here behind a pulpit. Is that right or wrong? You see, we've got the wrong idea about it. These that were under restriction with an oath of God, they could not minister to God. They were free to minister to the people, but what they couldn't do was minister to God.

He said, they can't even come near to me. Let them go on worshipping their idols. Let them bear their iniquity. Let them have their shame. He called it a shame, didn't he? Let them bear it. They'll minister.

Go ahead, minister to people. Minister to the house. Do all those wonderful things. Get a lot of souls in. Stand there at the gates. Entice everybody you can. But he said, they won't come near to me. They won't minister to me.

They'll bear their own ministry. They can't come near to me. I won't let them. You know, in the tabernacle, you remember there were embroidered cherubims all around, especially on the curtains. And over the ark, there were two cherubim worth there, bowed down, watching.

What does that signify? What does that symbolize? They, the cherubim, are the guardians of the holiness of God. Who was it that stood at the gate of the Garden of Eden with a flaming sword and would not let Adam come near that tree of life?

Cherubim, wasn't it? They are the guardians of God's holiness. I tell you, they stand at the door, and no unholy person will draw near at the pain of death. And in His grace and love, He just won't let you draw near, because if you did, you'd die, like Adonai and Sapphira.

So He keeps it away. He keeps you away. The great ministry is ministry unto God. Who was Paul and Silas ministering to in the jail at Philippi when they sang praises? Now this took place, their scourging, their punishment, their locked in the jail took place in the afternoon.

It was midnight. And who in the world were they worshiping and praising at midnight? People? Who was there? Who were they ministering to? Who were they singing hymns for? God. And the angels drew near.

You see, it's a different thing. We have to understand that this ministry to God is so much higher and so much more wonderful, but people don't realize what they're missing. They don't realize what they're locked out of.

They don't understand. Just to come near, just to cry out your heart and say, oh Lord, I love you, is worth 10 ,000 sermons. Do you know that? Because it's ministry unto Him. It's ministry unto Him. Madam Guyon, seven years in isolation in prison, read some of the poems.

Read some of her writings that come out of that prison. She had a gorgeous time. She was ministering to the Lord daily. And there wasn't anybody else to minister to, was there? But she was still ministering.

That's the ministry. What were the apostles doing when the Lord sent them on missions and launched the first missionary enterprise? What were they doing? Were they gathering together committees and saying, look, the world is lost.

We've got to go out and save this world now. And we'll get some mission committees and we'll get some financial committees and we'll work this all out. Was that what they were doing? They had the call because when God spoke on that day, He said to the ministry, which I have called them, so they knew what was to be done.

That was already in their hearts. But it wasn't launched yet. But what were they doing? When it was launched, they were ministering to God. Then God spoke and gave them a commission, a charge, and they fulfilled it wonderfully.

We'll get to that later, the charge. But you see, we have to understand there is a ministry that all of us are priests to offer sacrifices unto who? What does it say there in 1 Peter? Sacrifices unto God.

And what are the sacrifices? It's a sacrifice of joy. No, there's a sacrifice of praise. Those are written as sacrifices of joy, as in the Psalms. No, there's a sacrifice of offerings, a sweet smelling savor, God calls it.

There's all kinds of sacrifices. We're a priesthood to offer unto God. That's what we're called to be. That's what God wants. That's why He wants not only to clean out the outside, He wants to clean out the inside.

Until they're sanctified inside and outside, circumcised inside and outside of the heart and out of the flesh, until they're turned away from that and they're ministers and ministers unto God. Now let's go on.

They shall enter into my sanctuary. That means, first of all, they can come into my presence. They can come into my presence. They can come on in to my sanctuary. He doesn't say yours. They can come in to my sanctuary.

Furthermore, they shall come near, let's see, yes, they shall come near to my table to minister unto me. They shall come near to minister unto me, unto God. God will accept that. He'll receive it. He says, that's a sweet smelling savor, my doctor.

Minister unto God. They can come in and minister unto me. Not only that, they shall keep my charge. Wait, missed one. They shall come near to my table to minister unto me. In other words, they come into the sanctuary, they come into the table of the Lord, and they can stand before God like Elijah.

They come in and stand at his table. He prepares the table before us in the presence of his enemies, those that that's a food, the wonderful things that God will prepare for us. But we'll go on. To keep my charge.

God's Commission and Charge for Ministry

There is a commissioning of God. There are the things that God gives you to do. When God spoke to Paul and Silas in chapter, in Acts 13, 2, he gave them a charge. He gave them a commission. He told them what to do.

I remember when I was a young man, at a time of God moving very greatly, I was a minister already in a common sense, ministering to churches and people. But I felt I needed to go to the mission field, and I knew I could not go without an order.

And I sought the Lord for about six months, and very intensely the last few weeks, until one day he gave me the order. He told me he would send me. He told me that he had a place chosen for me. I didn't know it was Argentina.

He told me he would prepare it, and so on. That was a charge. That was a commission. That was an order. That's not, here I want you to do this for me. Do you understand? They will keep my charge. They will do the things that I have given them to do.

They will do what I have told them to do. We need to have orders. We need to have a charge. We need to have a charge for God if we're ever going to be effective and minister in approval, in God's approval.

We can't just go out and do our own thing. They will keep my charge. Now let's go on. They shall minister to me. And then, I skipped a verse. I skipped part of the verse. They shall stand before me to offer unto me.

That's verse 15. I skipped a part of this. Verse 15. Stand before me to offer unto me. Now, if you remember, it speaks of Elijah. The one thing it says of Elijah, that he, before, the God before whom I stand.

He was in the presence of God. He stood there in the sight of God and he said, that's all it says of Elijah. That's all we know about him. He said, I stand before God. That's it. He said, you shall stand before me.

You won't have to run out or anything of that nature. You'll stand before me and to offer unto me the fat and the blood. Now, that's why he said that was not given to the priests, the butchers that took care and prepared it all.

They were not able to offer the blood. That was not accepted by them. You will offer to me the blood. You will offer to me the fat. The fat speaks of the anointing, the anointing oil, that the anointing praises, the fat speaks of the praises.

And you will offer to me the praises that are acceptable. You will offer to me the blood. In fact, there is this very interesting scripture in John, the 20th chapter, verse 23, it says, Whosoever sins you remit, they shall be remitted.

And whosoever sins you retain, they shall be retained. Very interesting scripture, isn't it? That was spoken after the resurrection. Now, that's something only the Holy Spirit can do. That's something only those that stand before God, only those that have that commission and charge and is given that charge to do for the Lord.

They shall offer to me the blood. Many times, and you find it in scripture, Nehemiah, for instance, and Daniel, Jeremiah, you'll find where they, in intercession, they brought forth the release of a people and brought them into revival and brought them into releases.

That's ministering the blood until there is a release and joining in with the Holy Spirit, joining in with Jesus Christ and the ministry of cleansing that comes to the people because of that move of the Holy Spirit, because of that revival.

Coming to the Lord's Table

Just to give you an illustration, I remember one time I was in a healing campaign in the city of Barrio Plata, and there came before me a very dilapidated, debauched-looking person. I estimate his age about 50, 55 at least.

And he was so debauched, and he wanted prayer for his liver, which drink had ruined. And as I started to pray for him, the Lord said to me these words, can these bones live? And I answered, in the words of Ezekiel, only you know, God, I don't know.

And then he spoke to me. He said, whosoever's sins you remit, they shall be remitted. So I switched over into English so he wouldn't know what I was saying, and I remitted his sins. And strange enough, that man never took another drink.

He cleaned up his whole life. Up to that time, he had never brought one wage home, but then he brought them all home, cleaned up his home, cleaned up his family, his whole family, joined the church, and served the Lord.

You can minister the blood, you can stand before me and minister the blood, saith the Lord God. They shall come near to my table, minister the Lord. And where did that table come from? He prepares the table before me amidst my enemies, at the table of the Lord.

There are so many good things to eat, the bread, the wine, all the riches of his word. As he gives it, as he gives it to you, as he nourishes you, that's where we get our nourishment, that's where we get our source of energy.

We eat. He says, I'll feed you. You can come to my table. Oh, when he opens that book, it's open. When he begins to show you things you never saw before, you can come in and I'll feed you. You can come to my table.

What a place to come. What an invitation. What a glorious honor and privilege is given to eat at the table, be divinely nourished. And he said, now he talks about, further, verse 17. It shall come to pass that when they enter at the gates of the inner court, they shall be clothed with linen garments.

Now I want to stop there again. I want to first notice this shall. They shall be clothed. It shall come to pass. It doesn't say it must. It's not something we do. It's something he is going to do. When they enter in at the gates of the inner court, come into the presence of God, they shall be clothed, that is, you don't clothe yourself, he's going to do it, with linen garments.

And linen speaks of the righteousness of Christ, doesn't it? They shall be clothed. Remember when Joshua, the high priest, stood before the Lord and his garments weren't clean? He had filthy garments, and the divine word came, strip it off, and clothe him anew, remember?

Zechariah, he didn't clothe himself. That filthy thing was taken away, and he was clothed. You shall be clothed in the story of the prodigal son. When he reached his father, the son reached the father, the father said, now bring those robes and put on him, didn't they?

We don't clothe ourselves. Because the linen garments, we're told in Revelation 19, speaks of the righteousness of Satan, the outer actions. Our garments in Scripture speak of our outer actions, what we do.

Linen speaks of the righteousness. They're going to be doing righteous works. They're going to be doing the things that please God. They're going to be clothed with that linen, that righteousness of Christ.

And while they minister in the gates of the inner court, and with, well, let's go back a little bit further. They shall be clothed with linen garments, and no wool shall come upon them while they minister in the gates of the inner court.

Um, incidentally, where does, um, where does wool come from? Sheep. Hmm. Does that mean there'll be no sheep fleecing? Does that mean we won't be taking advantage and taking benefit from the sheep? Does that mean that?