- Why Rise Above?
- Rising Above by Stooping Low, and How That Makes Sense After All
- Rising Toward Reality
- Rising Above In Trust and Love
The question we’ve been asking in the latter part of this series is whether Christian ethics isn’t just a matter of getting what’s best for ourselves, a thinly disguised game of seeking our own self-interest. After all, the Bible promises rewards for doing good and warns of punishment for doing evil. Maybe Christians who claim to be “doing good” are just as darkly self-serving as anyone.
I’m going to try to finish answering the question now. I fear it will be an incomplete and in some ways superficial stab at it, but it will at least keep the discussion moving forward.
I set the stage for this concluding post last time by focusing on God’s goodness: the glorious goodness that totally suffuses and gives light to all of reality. The universe is really, really good: for it is the moment-by-moment handiwork of a totally, completely good God.
Now then, how does that relate to Christian ethics in real life? Let’s look at some of that real life.
One of my darkest moments as a husband and father was when my now-teenaged children were quite young. Our family was traveling together, we had just checked into a motel room, and I was under considerable pressure to send a report to my boss. There was no such thing as email then, but my laptop computer was set up for sending faxes—or so I thought. I tried and tried, and every time I tried to connect to send that report, the computer would throw up a different error and it would fail. Well, in response to that, I failed even worse. In my frustration, under that pressure, I got hot. I was really, really angry; angry enough to scare my wife and kids badly. She didn’t know what I was going to throw, or in which direction. No one got hurt—physically. But it was awful. It took days, maybe even longer, for everyone to recover.
Right there in that moment, for me and for my family, reality was still good. Good in every way, including moral goodness.
What could that mean? Before answering that I want to stretch the question to its limit. I’m reading a book, After the Ball, written by two homosexual men some twenty years ago to lay out strategy for the gay rights movement. Part of the book is a description of what it was like to be gay in America then. The picture for them was bleak. They describe all the loneliness and anger, they experienced, living in a world they could only see as misunderstanding them badly. For homosexuals, though, reality was (and is) really good. Reality is good even in the midst of however one person, straight or gay, might be behaving sexually with another outside God’s intended purposes. Reality was (and is) good for both the perpetrators and the victims of the notorious priestly sexual scandals. Good in every way, including morally.
I have a friend in jail. For him, reality is really good. I have friends in war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq. For them, reality is really good.
How is reality good in those circumstances? Reality is really good everywhere and at all times, because God is good everywhere and at all times. But I have been saying that “for them” reality is really good. This draws attention to the way we experience reality, and our experience most certainly is not always good. Sometimes it is. When my wife and I hold each other close, when we walk through the woods together, when we celebrate things like our son’s upcoming graduation, reality is really good and it feels good. When someone cares for a hurting neighbor, or travels across town or across the world to share with the needy, reality’s goodness is really expressing itself in that.
So what does it mean in all these different experiences that reality is really good? I don’t mean that we feel or experience it as good, or that it seems good to us. I mean that God in his goodness is actually there. His goodness is brighter than any good we do, and stronger than any evil we might commit or experience. With respect to the good that we do, it is God who lights the way and supports the good by returning good back again. With evil, he also shines the light, but he does so to oppose it and to return punishment. Goodness supports goodness and stands against evil. How could it be otherwise?
God’s goodness was there with me that day in my anger—and stood against it: to correct me, restore me, and to bring healing to our family’s relationships. God’s goodness is there with the gay man, to bring healing to hurts and pains, while yet working to correct sin and restore righteousness. The same in jail and in war zones: God’s goodness is at work to support the good and correct the evil.
The picture as we see it is not so simple, though. We need to look into that more deeply. A humanities professor of mine said that one message of the biblical book of Job is, “God doesn’t practice double-entry bookkeeping.” There is no simple one-to-one connection between the good or evil we do, and the results we see coming back upon us. My professor was not a believer, so he didn’t have any further explanation to offer for that, but I can think of two reasons.
One is that God is working in the very long term. There can be a considerable space of distance and time between moral action and moral effect. Christians believe we will be rewarded for the good we do, but we expect the greatest proportion by far to come after we move on from earth into eternity. This introduces another value into the ethical picture that non-believers do not recognize or participate in: faith. When asked what it meant to do the work of God, Jesus answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (John 6:27-29). Faith involves looking beyond any obvious or non-obvious return to our moral efforts, and trusting personally in the good God: that he will reward eventually what today seems just to be sacrifice and cost.
Rewards for a Christian are no Skinnerian motivator, where we do what we do because we see what we get from it. We do what we do because we see God before us, whom we love and trust, and whom we expect will do for our good works according to what good works deserve. Looking to God in faith is itself a very good thing. This relationship of trust is so basic that it is fundamentally what God looks for in his people.
(It’s important to note that I am speaking from the perspective of human motivational experience. I’m not painting a complete picture, and I do not have space to do so. If I did, I would also spend time on where that faith comes from. It is a gift freely given by God, not the product of our own merit or worthiness.)
But there is an even deeper reason God doesn’t work by double-entry bookkeeping. Ask any accountant: how do you balance a ledger when one side has infinity entered on it? It can’t be done.
There is a cost to be paid in return for our evil; but by his infinite love God chose to go to the ultimate degree. In Jesus Christ he himself paid that price infinitely, through his death on the cross. This opens the door for a second outcome for evil. I said a moment ago that “goodness stands against evil. How could it be otherwise?” and I spoke of punishment as the natural return for evil in a good universe. But God in his infinite creativity and love found a way to stand against evil without punishing each of us as goodness would otherwise demand. He paid the cost; he took the punishment himself. Punishment has been accomplished on our behalf. Now it is not absolutely required of God’s goodness that he punish evil; he can express his goodness by redeeming evil.
First he redeems the evil one. That would be me. I am the evil one, screaming in the presence of my family, scaring them half to death. He has rescued me from punishment by taking it upon himself. He has freed me from the ultimate penalty for sin, opening the way for me to join in his kingdom of goodness and to experience his love without punishment. The Christian doctrines of justification and identification go even further than this, though. God has not only freed me from the penalty of sin, he forgives my sin so completely that he no longer views me as “the evil one.” I have become the redeemed one instead. I am adopted into his family, a welcomed son, like the prodigal. This is available for all who will receive it as a gift from God.
God also redeems evil. He does not make evil good; he overcomes it instead, and causes good to come from it. Here too we must tread respectfully, recognizing that this is often far from easy to see from our temporal perspective. Sometimes we can figure it out. I was badly mistreated in a significant working relationship for two years, from about 2001 to 2003. It was painful every day for two years, and it was wrong. I look back on that now, though, and I can see how God used that experience to grow me up into a much stronger person than I could ever have been without that training. I couldn’t see the good in it at the time, but it’s clear enough now. Because I understand God’s character and how he works, I believe someday I’ll be able to say the same for all the other evils I have experienced.
How then does this have anything to do the question we started with? Here’s the connection. God has redeemed me from my own evil ways. He overcomes evil. For that, I am eternally grateful and filled with love toward God. I look back at that day in the motel and I say, “because God loves me and has lifted me out of that, never again!” Whether there is punishment for it or not, “never again!” For God has called me in love to something higher, and in love I respond to that call. This is a major factor in Christian ethical motivation. The closer we draw to God, the greater a factor it becomes, for the love of God becomes more real and more motivationally powerful in our ways.
When God redeems us, by the way, he also empowers and leads us through his Spirit to do good beyond our un-redeemed capacity. This is another topic I lack space to explore as much as it deserves, though I did touch on it earlier in this series.
To summarize, then, here is the answer to our question.
1. Yes, Christians may be motivated by rewards and punishments. The Bible does not hesitate to hold incentives out before us. It is in the nature of a good universe, ruled by a good God, that good would be answered by good, and that evil would be answered by correction. This is common to all humanity and there is nothing inherently wrong with it.
2. Christians’ very attitude toward rewards can be an expression of trust in the personal God who assures these rewards over the very long haul. We place our good works in deposit with him, as it were, expecting that deposit to be repaid; and that expectation is an expression of our attitude toward the One who holds that deposit. God values that attitude of trust. It is itself a good, one standing near the peak of all virtues.
3. Rewards and punishments are not the whole story for Christians’ ethical motivation. We also live and act according to love for God and a desire to live his ways in love, regardless of any rewards.
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Possibly related posts (automatically generated):
Nothing in this post refutes the claim that your Christian ethical motivation is just hedonistic egoist self-interest.
If you believe in this type of god and so the promise of reward in heaven and threat of punishment in hell, what else is the motivation but egoistic hedonism?
Well you try and answer this with the idea that such a god might forgive your “sins” and so not punish you, if you love it, but this is just another carrot – another type of promise of a reward, in this case not to be punished for your “sins”.
Further it is not up to such a god to forgive your “sins”, if you erred against others, then it is those from whom you should seek forgiveness and make amends.
The forgiveness of your god and the love for it are are irrelevant to this issue. Your argument is just a “get out of jail free” card and that is itself unjust and immoral in many ways.
Surely no God that is really good would promote such an immoral solution? So your assumption over the goodness of your god that pervades this post is refuted by how you argue this god deals with some “evil”.
Martin:
One of the most respected of Christian teachers in the world today, John Piper, would almost agree with you: Christian Hedonism is a very good thing. But there is a difference between worldly and Christian hedonism.
I would agree there is a strong factor of pleasure and reward, but I would disagree with your insertion of “just” into the equation: “Christian ethical motivation is just hedonistic…”
What else is the motivation but egoistic hedonism? Apparently you think that if one is motivated by a, then all of one’s motivation is fully subsumed by a. If you were interested in some woman and wanted to marry her, and her looks were part of your motivation for being with her, then her looks were the only reason you wanted to be with her.
But no, I don’t really think you think that. And I don’t think you would think that if there is a reward component to Christians’ motivation, that it could be the only thing that is true to Christian motivation.
Is it up to God to forgive me, or is it up to others to do so? Well, forgiveness is up to the one who is sinned against. If I sinned against others, then it is up to them to forgive me if they choose to do so. If they don’t, then I pay a penalty of lost relationship with them, that is certain. And it is most assuredly up to me to make amends and seek forgiveness. That wasn’t the topic of my post, but it’s absolutely central to Christian life and practice. Where I have sinned against God, it is up to him to forgive me; and if I don’t accept the forgiveness he offers, then I pay the price of lost relationship with him. This is not an either-or. Forgiveness is the prerogative of the sinned-against.
You pronounce on my motivation, “The forgiveness of your god and the love for it are are irrelevant to this issue.” How on earth could you possibly know that about me? How could you know that it is not a factor in my motivation?
My God is a person, by the way, not an impersonal “it.”
Tom
I was not referring to your god as what you regard as the person called God, I was referring it to as… your god. Others also call it God, but they mean something different by this and often not as a person at all. Others have different names Zeus, Allah, Jupiter, Yahweh and so on. I do not see the issue here. This is the same as if I refer to your spouse as your spouse. I do not know her name but say, her was Anne, then I could refer to Anne and I would not say anne but I could still refer to your spouse. If your spouse was named Spouse that would be confusing! But it you who refer to your god as God and not me. If I refer to god then I am specifically not referring to your god. If I am I could either say your god or God as grammatically required. I prefer your god to avoid some confusion and equivocation that you were talking for theism when you are not, the category error I pointed out in the other thread, you are talking over a particular instance or version of theism.
I see your point with regards Hedonism. Now on the surface “a love of God” is an other-regarding desire and being motivated on the basis of that is not egoism.
Egoists try to reduce all other-regarding desires to self-regarding desires, which is an unfalsifiable thesis and they need sometimes ad hoc arguments to do such a reduction. I say sometimes because in other cases they are correct and the argument is not ad hoc. Anyway I call this the Egoist Fallacy.
Now this egoist fallacy is not what I am doing here. You yourself have only given reasons to reduce your other-regarding desires “the love of God” to a self-regarding desire, in terms of obtaining God’s forgiveness and lack of punishment for your sins. By so doing you have reduced your other-regarding desire to a means to the end of a self-regarding desire – to be forgiven and not punished.
Further your post completely missed that ethical motivation is about what one’s behaviours have on others and vice versa. In your comment, you have now made this a different category. As you said:
“Well, forgiveness is up to the one who is sinned against. If I sinned against others, then it is up to them to forgive me if they choose to do so. If they don’t, then I pay a penalty of lost relationship with them, that is certain. And it is most assuredly up to me to make amends and seek forgiveness. That wasn’t the topic of my post,…”
Well this is the only category of ethical motivation people are concerned abut when they talk about morality and the only reason I am here.
You, as others too, might have a relationship with a god, and whether that is over reward and punishment, egoism or not, is a separate issue and not my concern. That is between you and your god. You can call that ethics or morality too but do not confuse them, that is equivocation.
The other issue here, apart from motivation, is based on what was discussed in two other threads. From those we have:
Generic good is conformance with God’s nature.
Moral good is conformance with God’s character.
Again in your first comment you explained that “If I sinned against others, then it is up to them to forgive me if they choose to do so. If they don’t, then I pay a penalty of lost relationship with them, that is certain. And it is most assuredly up to me to make amends and seek forgiveness.”
The other issue is that where there is a clash between conforming to God’s character and harming or sinning against others. In Judaism it is the others that take precedence, it better to sin against God – and ask his forgiveness – than to sin against others. I am under the impression that in Christianity it is the other way around.
What else can explain the Christian bias against in the past against Jews and at present with respect to homosexuals and generally adversely and detrimentally interfering in the lives of others such as indicated in The Manhattan and Westminster Declarations?
You said the other thread on “what is really good” was uninteresting. Here you refer to “detrimentally interfering in the lives of others such as indicated in The Manhattan and Westminster Declarations.” Do you not see the connection? I think the Manhattan Declaration (of which I am one of the handful of original signers) is good. You think that it is detrimental. How will we know which is which?
Remember the chain of reasoning regarding good I included in that other post? If you can’t show how your conception of good is supportable on the basis of other actually supportable conceptions of good, then I have no reason—and neither do you—to suppose that your conception of good really is good. Your description of these Declarations as “detrimental” calls for the question, “detrimental to what?”
I agree with you that they are detrimental: detrimental to harmful attempts to undermine society, undermine marriage, undermine religious liberty, undermine personal health, undermine spiritual development. I’m glad I signed something that’s detrimental to attempts to undermine those things. Because those things are actually good.
We can’t really proceed here until we settle the issue over there.
“If you believe in this type of god and so the promise of reward in heaven and threat of punishment in hell, what else is the motivation but egoistic hedonism?”
To believe that this is the only or even remotely the central motivation for Christian ethics is to have missed one of the purest expressions of the motivating joy for Christians outside the egoistic hedonism you describe. It’s expressed in the dénouement one of the finest pieces of American literature ever written. It goes like this:
“That’s a noise,” grinned the Grinch, “That I simply MUST hear!”
So he paused. And the Grinch put his hand to his ear.
And he did hear a sound rising over the snow.
It started in low. Then it started to grow.
But the sound wasn’t sad! Why, this sound sounded merry!
It couldn’t be so! But it WAS merry! VERY!
He stared down at Whoville! The Grinch popped his eyes!
Then he shook! What he saw was a shocking surprise!
Every Who down in Whoville, the tall and the small,
Was singing! Without any presents at all!
He HADN’T stopped Christmas from coming! IT CAME!
Somehow or other, it came just the same!
And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?”
“It came with out ribbons! It came without tags!”
“It came without packages, boxes or bags!”
And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store.”
“Maybe Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”
And what happened then? Well…in Whoville they say,
That the Grinch’s small heart Grew three sizes that day!
And the minute his heart didn’t feel quite so tight,
He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light,
And he brought back the toys! And the food for the feast!
And he, HE HIMSELF! The Grinch carved the roast beast!”
It isn’t the offer of rewards that motivates Christians. Our motivation is the outward expression of a transformed heart just like the Grinch experienced that day.
Tom
AFAIK to the small steps we have taken in the other thread, I have provided a conception of value that is supported by other features of reality whereas you have not yet done so.
BillT
That is a nice quote but does not refute the hedonistic egoism charge, indeed can support it. And hedonistic (or eudaemonic) egoism, Christian or otherwise, is a failed basis for legitimate moral motivation, as hedonism needs to taken account of in any moral theory, but due to the possible conflicts between hedonism and moral obligations and prohibitions.
Martin,
I would disagree. Christian motivation relies on a transformed heart and the desire to obey as an act of thanksgiving for what has been done for us. There is a marked contrast between what works-based religions require and what the Christian Gospel teaches. Here’s a listing culled from the teachings of Tim Keller that illustrates this. The Christian Gospel rejects hedonistic egoism as a basis for transformation or motivation. Only by mischaracterizing or misunderstanding the Gospel can it be made to support hedonistic egoism as a basis for personal motivation.
RELIGION: I obey-therefore I’m accepted.
THE GOSPEL: I’m accepted-therefore I obey.
RELIGION: Motivation is based on fear and insecurity.
THE GOSPEL: Motivation is based on grateful joy
.
RELIGION: I obey God in order to get things from God.
THE GOSPEL: I obey God to get to God-to delight and resemble Him.
RELIGION: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I am angry at God or myself, since I believe, like Job’s friends that anyone who is good deserves a comfortable life.
THE GOSPEL: When circumstances in my life go wrong, I struggle but I know all my punishment fell on Jesus and that while he may allow this for my training, he will exercise his Fatherly love within my trial.
RELIGION: When I am criticized I am furious or devastated because it is critical that I think of myself as a ‘good person’. Threats to that self-image must be destroyed at all costs.
THE GOSPEL: When I am criticized I struggle, but it is not critical for me to think of myself as a ‘good person.’ My identity is not built on my record or my performance but on God’s love for me in Christ. I can take criticism.
RELIGION: My prayer life consists largely of petition and it only heats up when I am in a time of need. My main purpose in prayer is control of the environment.
THE GOSPEL: My prayer life consists of generous stretches of praise and adoration. My main purpose is fellowship with Him.
RELIGION: My self-view swings between two poles. If and when I am living up to my standards, I feel confident, but then I am prone to be proud and unsympathetic to failing people. If and when I am not living up to standards, I feel insecure and inadequate. I’m not confident. I feel like a failure.
THE GOSPEL: My self-view is not based on a view of myself as a moral achiever. In Christ I am “simul iustus et peccator”—simultaneously sinful and yet accepted in Christ. I am so bad he had to die for me and I am so loved he was glad to die for me. This leads me to deeper and deeper humility and confidence at the same time. Neither swaggering nor sniveling.
RELIGION: My identity and self-worth are based mainly on how hard I work. Or how moral I am, and so I must look down on those I perceive as lazy or immoral. I disdain and feel superior to ‘the other.’
THE GOSPEL: My identity and self-worth are centered on the one who died for His enemies, who was excluded from the city for me. I am saved by sheer grace. So I can’t look down on those who believe or practice something different from me. Only by grace I am what I am. I’ve no inner need to win arguments.
RELIGION: Since I look to my own pedigree or performance for my spiritual acceptability, my heart manufactures idols. It may be my talents, my moral record, my personal discipline, my social status, etc. I absolutely have to have them so they serve as my main hope, meaning, happiness, security, and significance, whatever I may say I believe about God.
THE GOSPEL: I have many good things in my life—family, work, spiritual disciplines, etc. But none of these good things are ultimate things to me. None of them are things I absolutely have to have, so there is a limit to how much anxiety, bitterness, and despondency they can inflict on me when they are threatened and lost.
Martin,
No, you haven’t.
Tom
“No, you haven’t.”
Yes I have!
So far you have not answered my framework and each time you try and develop your own framework more questions are generated than answered!
BTW – for your son -the theme issue is occurring as I am running Chrome/XP on a netbook 1024×600 and the right hand margin overlaps with comments but not posts and the right hand column is much narrower than the margin and overwrites itself. (Add Firebug Light as a Chrome extension to help identify the cause?)
BillT
I am quite unclear on the point you are trying to make. Being of myself aware of applying what I pejoratively call the Egoist Fallacy, I still cannot see how this resolves the hedonism issue. Regardless as you say, if you are following the Gospels not “religion” – ” I’ve no inner need to win arguments.”
Can we leave it at that?
Martin,
You posted this “If you believe in this type of god and so the promise of reward in heaven and threat of punishment in hell, what else is the motivation but egotistic hedonism?” And then claim you have no need to “win arguments”? What were you doing, practicing your typing skills?
You claim that “this type of god” makes the works/reward paradigm of “egoistic hedonism” a necessity of religious belief. You’re right. However, the Christian Gospel rejects that paradigm. Our reward comes unmerited by grace. Our works are offered in thanks not as payment.
I said before, if you believe that egoistic hedonism is a part of any religious orientation you are either misunderstanding or misrepresenting the Gospel. I guess I should have added ignoring to that list.
BillT
So you would follow Jesus etc. if when you died that was it, you were annihilated – you ceased to exist? And never further experienced God nor avoided going to hell etc?
I wouldn’t.
This is not a uni-dimensional either-it’s-hedonism-or-it’s-not matter. It’s a matter of following the Jesus who is, he who is true, he who is love, he who is justice, he who is mercy, he who is eternal.
To “follow Jesus etc.” apart from all that is true of him—including the purpose for which he came, which was to bring us opportunity for eternal relationship with him—would be to follow some fiction. I don’t follow fictions.
Martin,
Tom answered that better than I could.
Further though, aren’t you arguing from your conclusion. Sort of cheating isn’t it? Yes, if everything was different than it is, then everthing would be different than it is. But then that’s something the validity of which you have failed to demonstrate.
BillT
That was not my point.
It was over your claims regarding general religion versus your specific religion (The Gospels) with respect to the question that if your are following Jesus for the promise of eternal life then that is hedonism surely?
Now if you were prepared to follow Jesus without their being such an afterlife then that might not be egoistic hedonism, however since you (and Tom) both agree you would not, it appears you have failed to make your case that over the distinction of the Gospels compared t other religions – which is a red herring by the way since I have not made and do not make an argument regarding hedonism and other religions, my argument was specific to yours.
Martin,
We follow the Gospel to it’s logical conclusion because we understand it reflects the reality of the universe. You don’t seem to like the reality of the universe the way it’s been established. However, there is nothing you or I can do about that.
If there is a life after death then there is. Accepting that truth and living a life that accepts the Gospel because it is the truth isn’t hedonistic egoism, it’s living a life that comports with reality. Remember, there is a life after death of all of us, you included. If we accept your logic, you too are living a life that will create a specific result. After all, your “heaven” and mine don’t have to be the same.
Even if you reject my view of reality, as I’m sure you do, you are living a life in light of that vue of that reality. Your understanding is that there is no life after death. You are looking for a payoff in the present with nothing to come later. Doesn’t that make you guilty of hedonistic egoism? That’s sort of a silly way to look at it, isn’t it.
Martin,
Tom answered that better than I could.
Further though, aren’t you arguing from your conclusion. Sort of cheating isn’t it? Yes, if everything was different than it is, then everthing would be different than it is. But then that’s something the validity of which you have failed to demonstrate.
BillT
One the one hand I reject your Gospel-based conception of reality because it negates any meaning in this world, the real world that is. However if the Gospels were true and made this universe meaningless that is not a reason to reject it, since one should not sacrifice truth on the altar of comfort.
However, and on the other hand, on the same principle, you should accept the Gospels because it is true not because it provides comfort. But AFAICS when one removes the comfort it supposedly and perversely provides there is nothing left, logically or otherwise.
Anyway as for where the Gospels logically leads well it is so full of contradictions and incoherences that it logically leads nowhere. Is that what you mean by heaven?
Living a life that comports with reality requires rejecting comforting falsehoods such as the Gospels surely?
“You are looking for a payoff in the present with nothing to come later. Doesn’t that make you guilty of hedonistic egoism?”
And so you are implicitly admitting that you are a hedonistic egoist if you think that, this indicates a severe lack of imagining alternatives to this! Confirming my point about the Gospels misleadingly rendering this world meaningless.
FYI hedonistic egoism is pursuing as the only end one’s own comfort above all else. That is not morality. And if the Gospels has taught you to believe that, then I you have my pity. There is a whole world out there still for you to discover.
Tom, you have the most brilliant CAPTCHA program, it must be primed off some text analysis: “Heaven others”!
Tom
“I think the Manhattan Declaration (of which I am one of the handful of original signers) is good.”
In which case, surely, either your God is not good or your notion of good is subjective and relative (or both)?
A longer string of unsupported assertions I have rarely seen.
And a more compact way of making multiple unsupported assertions I have rarely seen either.
Aah, so compact unsupported assertions have some special virtue.
At last you indicate some sense of humour.
At last you said something humorous!