Parables: How We Listen - Tim Mackie (The Bible Project)

[Applause] so we're launching a new series on parables today I'm really excited about it we'll run throughout the remainder of the summer normally I would launch the new series but today we have a guest speakers not really a guest speaker he's been here a few times and hopefully he'll continue coming back and and bless us he's a buddy of mine a friend of mine Tim Mackey Tim and I we backpack together every summer so he's got lots of stories about me that he'll never tell and and then we were on staff together for six and or seven years that opened in church in in Madison Wisconsin so we go way back I love him dearly he's a good buddy but even more than that he's an incredible scholar and he's the creative force behind the Bible project so many of you're familiar with the Bible project if not just go on your phones right now and google it and you know you have my permission and just check it out it they're doing a really really incredible work to make God's Word come alive through the platform of a video so some of you guys say what John why don't you do your job and launch series you know that kind of deal well my job is to get people up here feeding us alright and I've no doubt you're gonna be well-fed I heard the the sermon the first service and Tim's gonna give you a feast so please give a warm New Hope welcome to to our friend dr. Tim Mackey [Applause] hi everybody how are you guys me too me too my job today is to read a story about Jesus out loud and reflect on it was the group of his followers so that's awesome actually my idea of a good time I'm being quite serious about that so anyhow happy Sunday it's good here to be with you guys every time I come and get to be here it's awesome so many wonderful people in this church community so yeah you guys you were gonna spend your Sunday gatherings for the rest of this summer each Sunday reflecting on one of the parables of Jesus in in our 21st century modern Western culture Jesus of Nazareth is still very much at the center of people's attention whether you're religious whether you're not religious whether you're religious or anti-religious people still know that Jesus of Nazareth is somebody that you have to at least recognize and have some category for in your mind he's still 2,000 years later not somebody to be ignored and and especially in light of the fact that it's both his life story and the fact that his teachings 2,000 years later his teachings live on in this very powerful form both that we have in the stories about him in the New Testament and also in the life of in the communities of his followers around the world today Jesus was known as a teacher and specifically he was known as a really skilled communicator I'm how many other ancient teachers from 2,000 years ago do you know of that we're still like quoting their lines today the list is extremely small and Jesus is at the top he was an extremely memorable teacher and foremost among his teaching style was the form of these short fictional stories that he would tell they take no more they usually take no more than one to five minutes to actually say the whole story out loud five is on like the long end for Jesus usually they're much shorter just these short stories that have there have a way of sticking in your mind and in your heart so you find yourself thinking about them two days later after you hurt one or they wake you up in the night bothering you about the decisions you made the previous day or like these stories of Jesus and so one part of the big big tapestry of learning how to follow Jesus cultivating a life in a community that's following Jesus is to learn and immerse ourselves in these parables they're one of the most important ways that he communicated the things that were close to his heart and that he wanted to share here's the thing about these parables however is that they are most often puzzling their meaning is is almost never totally straightforward and clear and this has always been really fascinating to me there's a big part of our culture that values being concise and clear and to the point and Jesus was almost never any of those things and parables make that more clear than any other form of his teachings often these short stories feel more like riddles little puzzles right these almost like detective stories that you have to figure out like okay what's going on in this story and why am I being told this story in the first place so you can have a whole rest of your summer to explore these and what we're gonna do today is look at kind of the crown jewel the the chief among Jesus's parables it's the parable that he told about why he tells parables right it's so if you want to open your Bibles or turn one on whichever one of those things you do turn it on open it to the Gospel of Matthew first book of the New Testament out of chapter 13 and the reason why he gives they'll just spoiler alert Jesus knows that part of the human condition is that we are terrible listeners we're terrible at listening to other people it's very difficult for us to hear the voice of another person over our own voice going on in our own heart and mind listening is actually one of the most difficult things that you and I can do on a daily basis is truly listen and Jesus knows this and and this was apparently part of his motivation for using these short fictional stories to get our attention for Jesus these were not little helpful illustrations to make everything clear they actually seemed to function the opposite way they were puzzling inviting stories that force you to do the work of thinking and listening as you consider Jesus and this is very close to home as I've been thinking about exploring this section of Matthew this morning throughout the last couple of weeks I've like it's just very close to home listening is one of the most difficult things you and I do in a day anybody so here's here's how that's true for me I this week we'll celebrate sixteen years of being married to the most wonderful woman on the planet Jessica and we have we have two roommates that we live with there for six years old and they are incredible incredibly energetic and rambunctious and they their behavior on any given day here's the thing so when they were when they were infants and tiny incredibly exhausting right physically it's so demanding to live with these two little humans in terms of like sleep deprivation and you have to do everything for them but emotionally they're just very simple little creatures you know they want to eat cry poop play you know that kind of thing they're not that calm and so on the opposite end so I hear at least when they get into like late up adolescence and teenage years they're not as physically exhausting you can actually can't pick them up anymore right and you're not wiping their bottoms every three hours or something but they're incredibly emotionally complex does that is this true I don't know I don't only live with teenagers okay so somehow somehow when you have a four year old in the six year old they're both physically exhausting and very emotionally complex it's like the most it's like the perfect toxic cocktail anyhow so here's my point this is a very demanding all-consuming season of parenting from my wife and I and maybe it's just us but every other friends we have with kids our age feel the same way and the biggest toll that it takes is on my wife of my wife on my ability to listen to my wife sometimes her ability to listen to me but if I'm being honest and I'm trying to be with a large group of people that I don't know most of you that it's mostly the biggest toll on my ability to listen it's a daily occurrence that I'm managing I managed the like post dinner bedtime get ready bath whole process and so I'm managing four-year-old in the bathtub which is the bathtubs a great babysitter by the way but the he constantly wants to have the water be outside of the tub instead of inside the tub so I'm having to manage that I'm managing the playrooms right around the corner it's where all the Legos are which means it's a minefield if you've ever stepped on the Lego you know with the bare feet it's terrible pain and so every day we have to have a lego roundup and so I'm managing that with our six-year-old and I'm doing this and then my dad dear Jessica comes up and she whatever she has a doctor's appointment she had an intense conversation with somebody today she whatever the boy is were really difficult she's trying she's actually just trying to talk to me and what am I not doing as I simultaneously manage this and this but I'm looking at her and well I will even give physical not you know nonverbal communication like nodding uh-huh that's right I'm trying to listen but what am I not doing I'm not listening I'm not listening this happens every day and I shall I get you know two or three minutes into trying to tell me something and I and I have a choice I can just let the show go on as if I'm listening and then I get into the pot water cuz usually I end up having to say like oh sure or something yes yes dear yeah and this like did I just agree to something I don't know what she was saying what did we what am I supposed to do now so obviously the highroad in that moment is to just own it and just be like I'm sorry I'm over stimulated I was not listening I tried to make it seem like I was listening but I'm not listening anybody so some of you are more often on the receiving end of this and almost all of us have been at some point where you're trying to share something and you realize like uh they're not listening either because they're distracted because hearing me isn't their priority and they have some other thing or what they're thinking of as they listen is just thinking of their response to me and what they want to say that's what they're are you with me and so here's here's the basic principle we all experience this in different ways listening to other people really hearing other people is one of the most difficult things you and I do in a day and Jesus dosed this he knows this he knows and and because what Jesus was trying to communicate was so out of anybody's categories in the first place he knew that people had a very difficult time actually hearing him in the first century this will see and in the 21st century it's very difficult especially if you are very familiar with the stories and teachings of Jesus it's very difficult to truly hear him and so that's why he told this first parable that we're gonna explore in Matthew chapter 13 because it's a parable about how we listen Jesus knows were such terrible listeners this was why he chose the form of parables of short fictional stories this is why he chose to do this as one of his main modes of teachings and this that's what the story is about Matthew chapter 13 let's just dive in who let the story unfold it's the first sentence so on that same day Jesus went out of the house and he sat by the lake and such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and he sat in it while all the people stood on the shore and then he spoke to them many things in parables okay so get the scene Matthew's taken a lot of effort to paint the visual picture here and it's really a cool one so our first thing we're doing something you should never do which is just open a book and just open it halfway of a narrative and just dive in without any context it's actually never a very helpful way to read but that's exactly what we're doing so we're twelve chapters into a really involved story Jesus has come on to the scene and as we're gonna consider at least his core message of what he was about and he's already been attracting lots of crowds he's already gotten a whole diverse set of responses some people love him some people hate him some people are gonna plot to kill him already but chapter 13 and some people are just indifferent and think he's weird but they're curious so they come so he's got this really diverse crowd and noticed the scene Jesus he's a big crowd and so he creates this natural amphitheater right imagine there's the shore was some kind of incline or hill and so what does Jesus do it's actually really smart he gets in a boat and he goes out a little ways from shore and you know how your voice can carry over water more than it does over land do you know this dude an expert go on a canoe and do an experiment shout to your friend in a different canoe or something anyway so he goes out you know and all of a sudden his voice can carry and he's created an amphitheater right here on the beach so brilliant and he starts teaching now imagine that you're here in the in the coastal amphitheater and what what do you hear Jesus talking about he's talking teaching what do you hear him saying and what you hear him saying in your imagination will actually tell you a lot about your assumptions about Jesus what you think he would talk about some of us might think of his most famous teachings like love your neighbor as yourself or the golden rule do to others what you want them to do to you and you probably would hear him say those things but there is one key thing that you for sure would hear him talking about the main thing he was always talking about it's the main thing that all of Jesus's parables are about and you don't have to go there I'm just gonna put my thumb here and get back to chapter four of the story where Matthew summarized for us what Jesus talked about everywhere that he went it was in Matthew chapter 4 in verse 17 he says from that time on Jesus began to preach everybody turn around repent hate it when that happens turn around repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near so Jesus Corps announcement was that something has come here and what is the something the kingdom kingdom of heaven just a few sentences later in verse 23 he summarizes what Jesus talked about on any given day he says Jesus went throughout Galilee teaching in their synagogues proclaiming the good news of God's kingdom so the thing that Jesus cared about most he talked about all the time was that the Araya the arrival of God's kingdom of God's reign and God's rule was happening here and now through him so this is really important because this is gonna help us recalibrate what we think these parables are about what what the parables of Jesus are not is little self-contained moral tales that each has a little takeaway about be a good person don't lie Oh tell the truth be nice or generous that's not what's happening in these parables all of the dozens of parables that Jesus told revolve around are revolving in orbit around the core thing the Jesus was all about and that all of his other teachings are about - is that something has happening with his arrival and it's the fact that God's reign and rule over this world has come crashing into Earth Heaven is invading Earth in the person of Jesus and there's Ellis tration that's very helpful to me over over the years and so let me just show it to you real quick and I think this will help us grasp what's going on here as we go on in Matthew chapter 13 there's a very common modern misperception of what Jesus's message was about and therefore what the story of the Bible is about and what Christianity is about and it goes something like this you and I live in this old world that was meant to be really great but it's it's bad now compromised by human sin and rebellion and spiritual evil and so it's the old creation and the Bible that's called this age or this world the kingdom of this world and so the story goes if you were to ask your co-worker what they think the basic message of Jesus or Christianity is about what they'll probably tell you is oh Jesus came here teaching people about heaven and about how if they'll follow him or accept what he did for them that after you die you can go to the good place after you died and so we call that heaven or the new creation or the kingdom of God are you with me it's a very common way of talking about what Christians believe and what Jesus was all about the main problem with this way of saying and thinking about things is the Bible and the actual teachings of Jesus if you listen to them because if you actually listen to the teachings of Jesus what he doesn't talk about is people going to heaven what does Jesus talk about repent for the kingdom of heaven is where has come here it's a very different story that you could depict visually in a very simple different way which would be something like this that heaven and earth the old creation and the new creation are not separate and in fact they were never meant to be separate and the story of what God is doing in this world is not trying to get people out it's trying to invade and take back over what we have hijacked from the Creator the story the Bible begins with God establishing these image bearing human beings to rule and be responsible and to steward his creation and how have we have we done with a child right exhibit a human history we haven't done that good of a job and so the whole story of Jesus and what he's announcing is everybody there are there's a way of being humans that we have that you've all been born into and it's destroying you and it's destroying God's good world repent turn around God's taking his world back and in how in and through Jesus that's what the four gospel accounts are about about how heaven is invading earth in and through the person of Jesus and when people discover discover the truth about themselves and the truth about Jesus they find themselves inhabited two world simultaneously they find that Jesus is bringing about a whole new way of being human a way of salvation a way of healing and restoration and forgiveness and new life and it's being birthed right here in the midst of the old one and this was so surprising for people to hear this was so not how people talked and thought about things it's continued to be that way that's why we need to continually make sure that we're actually listening to Jesus not just our traditional interpretations of Jesus that we heard from when we were growing up but never actually read for ourselves are you with me we need to constantly be going back to the actual stories of the Bible and the actual teachings of Jesus and paying attention to how we listen and when we do will usually be usually we will always be surprised and here's things we've never heard before and it takes a lot of hard work so picture the scene Jesus is now announcing right the heavens invading earth in and through himself he's got a whole crowd of people some of these people you just read about if you read chapter 12 right before this chapter 12 comes before chapter 13 which is the one that we're reading simple math so you read chapter 12 and there's a whole bunch of people that are so angry with Jesus and what he's claiming about himself they're ready to kill him there's people who have had their lives changed by Jesus they love him they want to follow him there's people who are indifferent to him they think he's irrelevant or they think he's a curiosity and Jesus has a whole crowd he's got a wonderful natural amphitheater are you with me this is a great opportunity to just be clear into the point and what does Jesus do you know there was a farmer and he went out sowing his seed as he was scattering the seed some of it imagines farm filled farmers got his bag of seed those are he's throwing it here in two rows or doing a broadcasting thing right so some of the seed what out of the row off the off the farm plot and some of it went where well it went on to the past and some birds came and ate it up some of the seed actually rolled off and went beyond the path and it fell down into some rocks and it didn't have very much soil there and so it sprang up quickly because the soil was shallow but then the Sun came up and the plants got scorched because they withered and had no root you know there was some other seed and it actually didn't end up in the good soil it didn't end up on the past it didn't end up in the rocks it actually rolled down into some thorns and so they grew up but the thorns choked the plants but there was some other seed fell right in the good soil and it produced a crop some of it produced a hundred times sixty times some 30 times what was sown you guys who has ears do you have ears we should listen that's the story yes that's how Jesus capitalizes on a prime moment to be crystal clear to a diverse crowd of people are you with me so puzzling we value clear to the point Jesus values something else what is that something else well here here's that's exactly where he's gonna go Jesus values something other than just being crystal clear what he wants to do is draw people in and force you to think for yourself to force you to do some reflecting and soul-searching that you wouldn't otherwise have done when you woke up this morning he's forcing you there are people in the crowd who hate him and so they and they reason they hate him is because they hear that there's this guy claiming he's the king of Israel in the world right going out roaming the hills he can't do that so you show up you already are disposed not to like Jesus and you go okay let's hear what this claim so-called Messiah has to say and you start talking about birds and seed and a farmer and what are you gonna think about this guy he's crazy it's stupid why did I waste my time coming out of here but then there's gonna be other people and they watch their friends get healed by this Jesus and they know that he has profound things to say and so they hear this puzzling unexplained story totally differently they hear this story as an invitation to ponder and to think about themselves about these soils different responses to the seed and Oh oh my gosh Wow are you with me Jesus uses the same form of communication to do lots of different things it's brilliant it's brilliant and specifically what he's aiming at for people who already think that he's stupid the parables will only convince them more that he's stupid for people who have already rejected him but for people who are open-minded and are willing to hear a voice other than their own voice in their life these will be an invitation to something deeper into something more and this is the function of parables they're not neat little stories that make things clear they're actually puzzling stories that invite you in one of my favorite introductions to the parables of Jesus it's in by a scholar named Robert Farrar Capone a wonderful name let me he he puts this in better words than I could he says for Jesus the meaning of God's kingdom is a radical mystery even as he tells people about it it remains permanently intractable difficult to all our attempts to fully grasp it Jesus did not use the parables to explain everything to people satisfaction but rather to call into question people's previous understandings in other words the parables are trying to upset people's existing ideas as well as provide them with new ones and those grids final bit here it's good the parables are meant to pop every circuit breaker in people's minds after all of our Yammer and opinions about how God should or shouldn't run the world getting people to just stand there with their eyes wide open and their mouths shut would be a giant step forward this is what the parables of Jesus are designed to do isn't that great in other words it's precisely that Jesus doesn't say what you expect him to say that forces you to be like oh oh I didn't see that coming I thought he was gonna tell me to be moral or be a good person or pray after whatever good dinner or something like that but he starts talking about birds and what is this that's the whole point the parables are Jesus putting the ball in your court and depending on your response you will get out of it what you come to it with and did everybody get Jesus on the first go-round no look at the response even people close to Jesus didn't quite get it verse 10 the disciples came to him and said um Jesus what why are you speaking to everybody in parables jesus replied because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven they've been given to you but not to them whoever has will be given more and they'll have an abundance whoever doesn't have even what they do have will be taken from them ah Jesus always so clear so what was he saying so the King Jesus has been with a group of disciples all along he's giving them the message of the kingdom but the parables have this dual purpose when it comes to who's the them.these crowd and who's in these crowds well there's all kinds of different people for all car there for all kinds of different reasons and with different motives so there are some people who have they for them they're open to Jesus and there were lots of people who fill the stories of Matthew up to this point people who are open to Jesus people who know there's something going on with him and they're intrigued by the strange story and message that he's announcing and so for those who have the parables give more they invite you in you begin to ponder and think but for those who do not have for those who have already rejected Jesus will even what they do have will be taken the parables will only reinforce what they already think with just Jesus is irrelevant or stupid that best or dangerous at worst and then Jesus says listen this is nothing new Israel's profits have been doing this all along this is why I speak to them in parables quote though seeing they don't see though hearing they don't hear or understand in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah just quotes from the book of Isaiah you'll be ever hearing but never understanding you'll be ever seeing but never perceiving for this people's heart has become calloused so they hardly hear with their ears they've closed their eyes otherwise they would see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand and turn and I would heal them so what Jesus won't do is play in to the role that people think he ought to play woody constantly is just gonna put the ball in people's court other people's court he won't leave you alone and he won't allow you to remain comfortable he's gonna tell stories that force you to rethink how you think about yourself in the world and then make you do the work welcome to the parables of Jesus so amazing and look what he says to these guys but blessed are your eyes because you're seeing right you're following me and you're trying to hear me and you're beginning to get it blessed are your ears because they hear I'm telling you many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but didn't see it and to hear what you hear and didn't hear it and so here's here's the point and then we're gonna move into this last movement that'll land land land the plane here apparently Jesus he knows the human heart and mind he knows how difficult it is for us to listen and that even when we are listening to someone other than ourselves it's usually what we're hearing is even some mixture of our own voice mixed with what the other person is trying to tell to us listening true listening is one of the most difficult things you and I do and so part of following Jesus is this cultivating habit what the parables force us to do is cultivate the habit of open mindedness and open ears and never thinking that I fully actually know what's going on here never being comfortable with where I'm at in my grasp of Jesus in his kingdom the moment I'm comfortable was following Jesus is the moment I'm not listening apparently and that's what the parables are designed to do and this parable is about all these different ways of responding to Jesus and he meant everybody's sitting on in that crowd to find themselves in one of these kinds of soil right because this soil this is all about being open and receptive in responding in different ways and so Jesus is gonna explain what each of these four soils means I'm gonna read through them and just comment on each one briefly but I want this explanation to do in the 21st century what he was doing in the first century which is we're supposed to find ourselves in one of these four categories and if you if you find yourself in the category it doesn't mean you're trapped there the whole point is trying to get you to think about how you listen so that you move to a different category one that's listening well and positively positively responding but this is serious and the stakes are high and Jesus is in challenge mode not comfort mode right now and so let's read and let's consider our own wives honestly as we hear his description verse eighteen listen to what the parable of the sower means then you know when somebody hears the message about the kingdom and doesn't understand it so let's pause right there so what understand means in the Bible isn't primarily or only a mental perception cognition or in or intellect did you know there's no word for brain in the Bible this is biblical authors didn't have any concept of the brain everything you think and feel and desire in your heart and so this idea of understanding in the Bible is never just I can grasp it conceptually well if I understand something it's because I know and live by something that's a whole life type of understanding and so we're talking about someone who doesn't receive and respond appropriately to the message about Jesus they don't they say I'm just fine I don't need heaven to invade earth and I certainly don't need Jesus to invade my life I'm just fine thank you very much and if I'm in that position then of course Jesus will be completely irrelevant to me because I don't know I don't need him what do I need him for I'm fine we're all just fine here and so I lack of reception it's a lack of understanding and so when someone doesn't receive and understand what Jesus says that's a precarious position because that person is in a place to let all sorts of other influences begin to take the place the Jesus Kingdom would take in their lives he calls this the evil one coming and snatching away what was sown in their heart this is the seed sown along the path remember the path that's out there it couldn't go into the soil and so the birds come and take it away that might be some of us it's hard to know if you were in this position you probably wouldn't care but some of us might be in this position and you do care in which case do you have ears you should listen you know their seed that rolled off the path and down into the rocks remember that seed that refers to somebody who hears the word and at once receives it with joy remember it took root it didn't have much of dirt but it got the little bit of dirt and so it took root there among the rocks and sprouted up but then you remember what happened or what happened the Sun came up and he says since they have no root they last just a moment because when trouble or persecution comes because of the word because of their association with Jesus they quickly they quickly fall away so Jesus is envisioning a situation where somebody if their Facebook friend with Jesus they associate publicly they would identify even as associated with Jesus but if you actually look at their at their life choices right and notice what he talks about when trouble when difficulty comes or persecution when people are alike really you're associated with those backwards head-in-the-sand religious people look like the Jesus people really that's you right and right these are people who are embarrassed about their association with Jesus there's no route there's no commitment and so they don't last and maybe that's some of us do you have years you know there was some seed that fell among the thorns and Jesus says that refers to someone who hears the message of the kingdom but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke out the word making it unfruitful so in this case it's not about shallowness it's that here in this plot of soil the message about the kingdom isn't the main thing growing there's competition for sunlight and for water and space right in the dirt and so here we're talking about a competition of values competing values and competing stories in our lives that Jesus is one thing in my life but if you actually look at my life choices don't look at my facebook status all right whether or not I'm a Jesus fan look at the actual choices that I make and my bank account and what I do with that and my life choices my time and my energy and what you'll find is there way other different types of priorities driving the course of my life and Jesus says yes like thorns and the one last chokes it out maybe that's some of us but then there's seed that falls on good soil and it refers to someone who hears and receives and understands and inevitably when Jesus when you let Jesus in and when you let him start to mess with you and if you actually devote yourself to try by His grace to follow his teachings you get a life that begins to produce fruit and it yields all different types of fruit 160 30 it's not about the amount it's the it's about people rediscovering their humanity through the love and the grace of Jesus hey guys done do we have ears I mean I do I need I don't I hesitate to say anything as I conclude cuz this story tells itself the Jesus who speaks to us here is the Jesus who knows that were terrible listeners and he knows that we're that were bad at being humans and he came pronouncing God's kingdom and he lived as the kind of human that you and I are made to be but every day failed to be and he died for the consequences of our failures and he overcame them with his love and life in his resurrection from the grave and by His grace and by his presence in the spirit you and I are invited every day to open our ears and to listen and to be invited into something mysterious and powerful it's the new creation that Jesus wants to birth right here in our world and wants to birth inside of you and me and the ball is in our court about how we will listen and so how are you and I going to listen that's that's the question before us I'm gonna pray and as we come to take the bread in the cup and retell the story of his death and resurrection for us some of us might need to have a moment of confession and repentance others might need to have a moment of crying for help others of us might need to have a moment of celebration for the good things Jesus is growing inside of our lives I don't I can't tell you what your response is supposed to be because Jesus's whole point is to put the ball in your court so let me pray and let's respond Jesus we are so grateful for your savvy and your wisdom that you never you never leave us comfortable and you never say and do what we expected you to that's both uncomfortable Jesus but it's so reassuring because we know that above all you are committed to us despite our flaws and failures the loved us that you lived for us and died for us and so we hear the voice of the one who loved us and gave himself for us this morning and we want to respond we want to be open receptive soil that you can grow the fruit of love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and faithfulness and self-control we want to be people in whom your new creation is coming into existence Jesus by your grace we celebrate your kingdom and we come and take the bread in the cup and worship you we pray in your name Jesus amen yea

Channel: Tim Mackie Archives

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Length: 42min 24sec (2544 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 23 2017