Well, good afternoon everyone. We hope you had a good opportunity to have some chats and have some lunch and discuss some of the mornings deliberations. We heard from a really excellent cross-section of speakers representing different parts of the Nigerian government, representing civil society and the activist community, providing us with both analytical scope and perspective, a good deal of insight into the current situation and how it's assessed in various quarters as well as different perspectives on what is occurring now and the challenges looking ahead. And so it's very fitting and appropriate and indeed quite welcome that we're joined by Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Ambassador Linda Thomas Greenfield. We're very pleased and honored to have you, particularly as she reminds me that we're looking toward in just about three weeks time a much larger gathering of official and unofficial African visitors in Washington. And so the fact that she could break away even briefly to speak to us today at this important series of events is very welcome. I won't take up much time with introductions except to note that Secretary Thomas Greenfield has been a member of the Career Foreign Service, an ambassador in Liberia, a principal deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of African Affairs in the mid-2000s, and also she's been a PDAS in the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration. So she has long and deep experience and insight into the challenges of Africa as a continent and Nigeria as a country. She's been posted to Nigeria in the past as well as Gambia, Kenya, Liberia and other countries. And so brings a long legacy or a long train of experience to her remarks and her perspective today. Without any further delay but permitting her a couple of minutes to enjoy her coffee, which I can only concur as essential, we'll invite her to the podium and then we'll have a few minutes for Q&A. Good. Thank you. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. I don't know whether it's a good thing to speak to a group after lunch when you're satisfied and you've had a morning of speeches and so you feel as if you can close your eyes a bit to a boring speaker or to have spoken to you before lunch when you were hungry. But I'll do my best to keep you all interested so that you do stay awake. I'll try to make this as brief as possible so that I leave time for Q&As. Again, let me say how delighted I am to be here today. I think this is an extraordinarily important event. It's a timely event as we approach the election in Nigeria as well as a number of elections across the continent of Africa as we move into 2015. Let me start by thanking CSIS, particularly Jennifer and Richard Downey for inviting me to speak today but more importantly for hosting this event at this time. I would like to also thank our distinguished guests for making a long journey from Nigeria. Your expertise and wisdom are critical as Nigeria prepares for these important elections and I want to thank you for sharing your knowledge with us. I think we can all agree that the impressive turnout for this event is indicative of a strong interest in Nigeria's upcoming election but also is indicative of the importance of these elections, not just for Nigeria but for the entire continent. As the most populous country in Africa and as a continental power, Nigerian politics have a tremendous influence on the continent. The choices Nigerians make in this critical election will have great ramifications for the future of Nigeria and for the future of the continent but more importantly for the people of Nigeria. The United States stands as a partner and a friend to Nigeria and its people. We're ready to do everything within our power to assist in ensuring that the vote is credible and that the vote is peaceful but credibility does not start just on election day. Credibility starts months before the election and I know that's why you are all here today and why we're here today having this discussion. Through the U.S. Agency for International Development, we're working to enhance the capacity of the Independent National Election Commission. We are engaging with a wide spectrum of Nigerian leaders from the political class and civil society. We're communicating the importance that we place on this election and calling for the utmost efforts to ensure transparency and peace in the contest of the election. This includes ensuring that all voters are enfranchised, including those living in the three northeastern states currently under a state of emergency. To complete a successful election, a nation must tackle many challenges. Few of these challenges are more important than security and I'm glad that this session has focused attention on this important topic. Security issues matter during all phases of the election. During the campaign, violent words and deeds can undermine the confidence of ordinary voters in the electoral process, intimidation and thuggery can make candidates and citizens afraid to engage. And campaign violence can tarnish an election's image even before the first vote is ever cast. In the case of Nigeria developing and executing an electoral security strategy will be critical to ensuring that elections can take place in regions of the country facing the Boko Haram attacks and threats. During the vote itself, insecurity can facilitate manipulation and tampering. If a might makes right, the people's will will be overturned and we don't want to see that happen. During the post-election phase, violence can tarnish even the best run election. When results are greeted with riots, the legitimacy of the process can be called into question at home as well as abroad. Last September, I attended the U.S.-Nigeria bilateral commission in Abuja. When I met with the INAC chairman, Professor Jega, at the time, he told me that he sought not just to make the 2015 elections better than 2011, but he also wanted to meet international standards and deliver the election that the Nigerian people deserve. In fact, he indicated that he wanted this to be the best election that Nigerians have had. We hope that his promise will come true, both for the sake of Nigeria's democracy and its stability, but for that to happen Nigerians must be willing to do everything in their power to ensure that the vote proceeds not just credibly but also peacefully. You will notice that I use the word peacefully almost in every sentence here because these elections must be peaceful if they are to happen at all. That imperative places a heavy burden and a responsibility on the Nigerian security services. They will need to undertake a critical task. They have to protect civilians and protect the process. Refaining from any intimidation or tampering to enable citizens to be the decision makers about who governs them. I urge the delegates here as civil society representatives, as former government officials, to impress upon the Nigerian government, writ large, and the security services, particularly the importance of this responsibility. I urge you to hold them accountable for their performance. The United States stands ready to provide training, to provide advice to the security services in fulfilling their responsibilities and to ensure that they fulfill those responsibilities with restraint and impartiality. Mitigating violence is also the responsibility of politicians because politicians are the ones that the violence is for. And no politician should want to win an election because the people who support them fought the hardest or killed the most people or were more violent than the other party. They should want to win an election because they were the candidate of choice. People voted for them, and those who didn't vote for them accepted the choice. In my travels to Nigeria and my meetings with Nigerian leaders, I have urged politicians of all parties to avoid incendiary rhetoric and to reject intimidation and manipulation as campaign tactics. This election is too important for that. No officeholder should use the power of incumbency to intimidate challengers, and no challenger should threaten or incite violence to undermine the democratic process. I urge you to demand that politicians meet the highest standards of patriotic and honorable campaigning based on the issues that matters to citizens. It is not about them, it is about the issues. And that is a point that we have to continue to make, and voters need to understand in the education process. It is not about who is running, it is about where they stand on the issues. And too many times in African politics the issues are put in second place to the candidate, to the personality, to the person. The issues are what should matter to the voters. Being a safe election is also the responsibility of ordinary citizens. Words and signals from the top can trigger violence, but violence can also emerge from the anger that exists among the jobless, the disenfranchised and the marginalized. Many ordinary people in Nigeria have reasons to be frustrated or angry, especially many of those who have experienced the recent violence that Boko Haram has carried out in the North in Jaws, as well as in Abuja, and I just heard as I was coming in just now that Boko Haram has taken responsibility for the attack that took place in Lagos. Nigeria's economy has risen to become the largest in Africa, but over 60 percent of Nigerians live at the bottom of the economic ladder, subsisting on less than a dollar each day. And I'm not telling you anything that you don't already know. You see the people begging on the streets in Nigeria. I was in the North recently. I saw the large number of children who were begging on the streets. And as these Nigerians struggle to find work, as they struggle to feed their families, it is understandable that they question why corruption goes unpunished and the power for go unchecked. We should all work to urge Nigerians, particularly youth, to channel their grievances toward making their community and their country better. They should use their power to build, not to destroy. Every time I have been in Nigeria, I have been impressed by the vibrancy of civil society, the vibrancy of journalism, particularly impressed by the religious community, the film community, as well as other modes of expression in Nigeria. Nigerians know better how to express themselves than any group of people I know anywhere in the world. This kind of vibrancy should be used to encourage and support transparent and peaceful elections. Urging these channels, youth can and must make a positive contribution to the country's politics, not a negative one. 2015 is an opportunity for them to do this, and delegates who are here today as leaders within Nigeria's civil society, you can play a strong part in encouraging young people to constructively engage in the electoral process, using it as a window of opportunity to non-violently push for more responsive governance on the issues that matter to them. Along these lines, we are supporting efforts to channel the energies of Nigerian youth in a positive direction, as we do in countries all over the world. In Nigeria, our Conflict and Stabilization Operations Bureau supports the efforts of the Niger Delta Legacy Board, some of whom are here today. Where are you here in the room? Oh, good. I know you. Thank you for being here. So you should work as they have to harness media, engage civil society to promote the message to the communities, and in particular, youth can make nonviolent change. Here in the United States last month, we saw the kickoff of the Washington Fellowship program under President Obama's Young African Leaders Initiative. We have 500 of the most amazing young people I have met from Africa here in the United States, and they are just a drop in the bucket of the amazing. 50,000 applied for the program. Of those 50,000, only 500 were selected. There were 15,000 applications from Nigeria alone, showing how it shows how important youth are, but it shows how much they need and how much they want to be part of the process. I am looking forward to welcoming these young people to Washington from the 28th through the 30th of July when they will be hosted by the President for a town hall meeting. As I mentioned, Nigeria is one of the largest contributors, and these young people are the future leaders of Nigeria. When we are talking about political leadership, and when we are talking about leadership, we are not just talking about political leadership, but we are talking about leadership across the board. We are talking about leadership in the private sector. We are talking about civil society. We are talking about leading in communities, and I hope that these Nigerian alumni will act as catalysts for constructive change and catalysts for peace during the remainder of the election season. They are a small drop in the bucket of the young leaders across the continent, but each one can have impact on dozens of others, and we are hopeful that as we build the Yali network across Africa that we will see the catalytic impact of what these young people can do. But they have to be given space, they have to be supported, to be successful in their endeavors and to create opportunities for them, and we are all responsible for ensuring that they have the opportunities to be the leaders that we know that they are capable of being. In too many places across the globe, we see young people who are not vested in the futures of their country. They are attracted by extremist ideologies because they have no other ideology to focus on. This is what Yali has. Yali is about investing in the next generation of Africans, and it is about us doing the most that we can do to mentor them and support them. It is about finding a way to provide opportunities for these young people so that they are not attracted to organizations like Boko Haram. Instead, they will be vested in the futures of their countries, and when young people can find jobs, when they can find successful businesses, when they get a good education that they can use and have a voice in their governance, they will shun extremism, they will participate in their country's future, they will make a difference. And as we help build the next generation of Nigerians, we recognize that events are moving swiftly right now. So we are talking about the next generation, but things are happening right now. They are happening tomorrow. Election season is already on the way. On June 21st, voters went to the polls in Iqiti State in southwestern Nigeria to choose between their incumbent government or governor and a host of challenges. We engaged strongly to help make Iqiti's election the best they could possibly be. Our embassy and our consulate filled 32 observers who visited over 180 polling stations in the State, and I made calls on June 20th to the leading candidates and to key electoral and security officials. I think some of them were wondering who the heck I was, calling them when they were involved in the throes of the election. But the point was that they needed to know that this was being watched all over the world. This was not just about what was happening in Iqiti State, but it was about how what was happening in Iqiti State would be reviewed all over the world. The elections proceeded relatively peacefully, and when the results were made clear that Governor Fajimi, the incumbent governor, had lost, he graciously conceded. Overall, the security services performed admirably in ensuring that the safety of the voters and INEC administered what was considered a credible election. Yet we are concerned by reports that the military restricted the movements of leading opposition politicians from outside Iqiti. When voters go to the polls in an Osun State on August 9th, the world will be watching again closely to see whether the prerogatives of all parties and all voters are respected. And I am hopeful that this election will turn out even better than the Iqiti election because we will have had the experience of Iqiti learn from any mistakes that were made and ensure that it is a better process. The elections in Iqiti and Osun are the last off-cycle elections before the national and state elections that take place in February. As of today, we are seven months until the national vote. And again, the world will be watching Nigeria as it makes its final preparations. Events like what we are doing here today at CSIS contribute to the tough but fruitful conversations that Nigerians are having about their future. Just as we have benefited from hearing from this panel and experts today, it is my hope that our distinguished guests will leave here with renewed enthusiasm for the vital work of securing Nigeria's democracy, the largest democracy on the continent of Africa and one of the largest in the world. As ever, the United States will work hard to aid that effort and to support those efforts. In less than a month, as you heard earlier, President Obama will host leaders from across Africa, including from Nigeria, for the Historic U.S. Africa Leaders Summit. This is the first time we have had a summit like this in Washington. And certainly the themes that we have discussed here would be part of the conversations as we collectively look at governing for the future and what that means on the continent of Africa. We have been consulting closely with our African partners to ensure that this is a successful and a transformational event. The President and Secretary Kerry are looking forward to the summit as you can well expect that I am as well. Let me thank all of you very much for your attention, for sharing your wisdom with us today at this conference. And again, I want to thank CSIS for hosting this event. I look forward to taking some questions from you. Thank you very much. Okay, we'll take a group of questions and then we'll let Secretary Thomas Greenfield respond. Yeah. Ambassador, you get to ask questions all the time. And I see you every day. It is a question. My dear sister, I'm going to disappoint you. I'm not going to ask a question. I think I had enough answering questions last Thursday at the Hill. It was a thorough three hour grilling, so I'm not inclined to have that. I just want to say on behalf of the Government of Nigeria, how grateful we are to the U.S. government and to you personally for the interest we have taken in Nigeria, particularly in these and forthcoming elections. In 2011, the U.S. government through several agencies supported INEC and other agencies towards the organization of the most successful election ever in Nigeria. And you've always given support to INEC and other agencies to ensure that the experience of 2011 is not only, it's not only repeated but also improved upon. Just about two, three months ago, you were in Nigeria. We had a meeting of the U.S. Nigeria by national commission. That is the commission through which there are four components of that commission. One of them is focus on transparency, governance and integrity. It is through that component that the U.S. contributes and assists Nigeria in organizing a successful election. We met last in Abuja. Next meeting is being planned. I'm still discussing with my boss here, the head of Nigerian office. And that's another thing is the U.S. government has to create a separate office taking us out of West Africa. We are two months away from West Africa. They're taking us out of West Africa and creating a specific office to deal with Nigeria. That shows the strategic importance with the U.S. attaches to Nigeria. And for that, we are very grateful. So I just want to assure you that on behalf of the Nigerian government, we appreciate what your government is doing. We appreciate what you personally are doing because we call her Omo Wale, a child that has come back home. She has served in Nigeria and she's been in Nigeria so many times that other ambassadors from African countries are asking, why is Linda always going to Nigeria? You can't compare Nigeria to most of these African countries. Anyway. So we are very grateful. I just want to assure you that we know the importance of the elections to Nigeria. We know what elections means to America's urge to see a very peaceful, peaceful world. And we know what it, one importantly, we know what it means to us. We are determined to make it a success because we know the security of our country depends on it. And I want to assure you that in spite of what is happening, in spite of 10,000 bookarounds, we are going to make the 2015 elections a success. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, over here, please. Hi, I'm Brenda Humphrey and I'm a former Ford fellow in city planning. And I lived and worked in Liberia as a, of course, city planner. I'm wondering if there are any instructive parallels from the elections in Liberia that you would share with us that might apply to Nigeria. Okay. You want to take a few? Yeah, I'm going to take a few. Thank you. Good afternoon. Let me also join others to thank, you know, her excellency for this wonderful presentation and for the interest and passion that she has on Nigeria. I met her, I think, when she was in Abuja in one of those streets, you know, at the Ambassador House. I just want to ask, you know, specifically on the Obama meeting with African leaders. I know when the concept, you know, was developed, the embassy circulated it to some people and I was one of the people who commented, you know, I was asked to comment on the concept. But I'm not aware whether civil society are going to be part of that process because so far I have not had any Nigerian civil society being invited to be part of this very historic, you know, meeting. So I want to know whether there's any plan, although it's getting late, you know, whether there's going to be any civil society from Nigeria that will be part of that process. Thank you. Okay, thanks. Did see one over here? Yes. My name is Andrew Chawmumu and I'm an attorney, a practice here. Both Nigerian Constitution and the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Act permit dual citizenship, which means that millions of Nigerians in America can vote. Now, question for you is, is there anything the United States can do to help Nigeria actualize the diaspora votes for Nigeria? Thank you. My name is Sally Booker, Madam Secretary. This question is about security cooperation with Nigeria. Current U.S. laws, specifically the Leahy laws, restrict the U.S. government's ability to provide military or security training in cooperation with individuals or units who there is a credible evidence that they've been engaged in gross violations of human rights. Now, currently this restriction renders ineligible maybe one-fifth of Nigeria's security forces from training in cooperation with the U.S. military and State Department. President Obama has announced his intention to seek to circumvent this law through a waiver in his request for the $5 billion counterterrorism partnership fund that he's requesting of Congress. My question is simply, what's the rationale for seeking that kind of waiver, and particularly in the case of Nigeria, where the United States really wants to improve the human rights performance of the Nigerian security forces? Okay. I think I have enough to keep me going for a while. Thank you, Ambassador Adifuye, for your comments. Again, we are working very, very closely with the government and civil society, security services, and others to ensure that the elections are free, fair, and peaceful. I very much appreciate the dialogue that we had with the Nigerian government back in February that looked at all of these areas across the board. On Liberia, where we were successful in achieving very good election results, both in 2006 and in 2011, I think there are some lessons to be learned. I think there was a strong commitment on the part of the government for the elections to go well, and as well on the part of the opposition. We held a lot of meetings with the opposition and with the government in the lead-up to the election. What was different about Liberia, that won't be the case in Liberia, is that there was the international community, a huge peacekeeping force there to help to ensure security and peace during the election. That was a bit unusual. But also, I think civil society played a huge part in making sure that people were educated and prepared and understood the process of voting. And again, these are all lessons that we can learn. And thank you for that question, because we did have successful elections. On civil society participation in the Head of State Summit, there is a variety of opportunities for civil society to participate. On the 4th of August, there is a large civil society event that will be hosted by the Secretary of State at the National Academy of Sciences. And he will be holding a town hall meeting where they will be taking questions online and Twitter as well. But there are 30-plus side events around Washington, including events that are being hosted by the Congress that will have intense civil society involvement. I don't know who has been invited to all of these various events, but I do know that there are quite a few. And there should be opportunities for participation across the board by civil society. I'm not sure on dual citizens. I think I'm going to throw that question at the ambassador, because I have known in other cases where countries do allow for dual citizens to vote. The votes usually take place at the embassies. And that's what we do in the United States. And I would encourage Ambassador Adi Fulye, the Nigerian government, to look for possibilities of allowing votes at the embassies or at the numerous counselates that exist across the United States for those Nigerian citizens who are registered to vote. I support the idea of dual citizens being allowed to participate in the election. And again, it's not something that we can do, but we certainly support those efforts. On Lehi, the Department of State strongly supports Lehi. It is part of our programs that allow us to provide assistance to the governments that we work with across the board. Those that are involved, that we have credible evidence of their involvement in human rights violations or other gross acts against civilians, are not part of our program. I can't comment on, I think, the law you're referring to provide some opportunities for our colleagues in DOD to continue to support some groups. But I think in the final analysis, there's no question that we don't want to support anyone who might use the training or equipment that we provided to them to commit acts of human rights violations against citizens. So there is no effort on our part to circumvent Lehi. We have embraced Lehi and we are trying to ensure that the implementation of Lehi occurs in a way that respects human rights. So again, this is not an effort to get around or circumvent the law. Again, let me thank all of you again for all of your efforts here. This is going to be a huge contribution to Nigeria's electoral process. Your efforts, your work, whether you're working in civil society or you're working in government or your advocacy groups in the United States will make a huge difference on how successful this election is. So again, I encourage you and support your efforts. And I'll look forward to congratulating Nigeria in February of 2015 for a successful, peaceful, transparent election that reflects the will of the people of Nigeria. Thank you very much.


Hi everyone! My name is Sumner and I'm a library assistant with the Long Beach Public Library. Today I'm going to show you how to create your own fossils. If you haven't signed up for summer reading yet, visit longbeach.beanstack.org to get started so you can earn prizes for all the reading that I know you're already doing this summer. If you are signed up, make sure to get credit for watching this video today by entering the code dinosaur into the activities tab. I think dinosaurs are super cool but they've all been dead for millions of years so most of what we know about them we learned from fossils. Fossils are the preserved remains or other evidence of plants and animals that once lived on earth. Most fossils are made of the hard parts of a living thing so their bones, claws, teeth or shells that become buried in the earth and over millions of years become rock. That's what happened to this ammonite here. Once upon a time it was a sea creature with little tentacles but the soft tissue of the tentacles was not preserved so all we have left is this shell that is now rock and it's pretty heavy. Other fossils are indirect evidence of living things so sometimes that is the impression of their skin texture or maybe a trail of footprints. Sometimes that's the outline of an entire plant or animal that gets pressed into some soft mud or it's the nest or burrow that an animal lived in. Paleontologists find and study fossils to learn about the animals and plants that lived in millions of years ago. Now we don't have millions of years to wait for our fossils so I'm going to teach you how to make a salt dough from just three ingredients and we will use a toy dinosaur. I have my little toy dinosaur here to create fossils of our own. The three ingredients that we're using for our salt dough today are flour, salt and water. In a medium-sized bowl you're going to take one cup of flour and one half cup of salt and you're going to mix these two together. I'm using my hands because I think it's more fun that way but if you want to use a spoon you can once it is evenly mixed together we're going to add half a cup of water but not all at once. I like to start with quarter cups so half of what you started with and if it is still too crumbly after that you can add more a little at a time. You probably won't use the entire half cup but it's nice to have it there so here you can see it's still pretty crumbly. I've got lots of loose flour so I'm going to go ahead and add some more water and just mix it all up and knead it together until it comes together into a uniform dough. There I need to add a little more water again, mush it all around in your bowl, all come together into a nice clump. We can turn it out onto the table and start making our bubbles.  You don't want to smush it too thin because you need to have enough height to press your dinosaur toy in to make your fossil. Now I have my little baby Parasaurolophus and you can turn it on its side to take an impression of the whole animal, maybe rock it back and forth. I might have used a little too much water or you can make a trail of footprints. If you don't have a dinosaur toy you want to use you can do this with a leaf or a seashell or any other kind of toy you want. You can take a little bit of dough and make an impression of your own hands, make a fossil of yourself. If you want to make your dough extra special you can mix in some food coloring or glitter. If you want to get extra extra fancy you could even sculpt some bones or a little dinosaur nest. Be as creative as you want. After you're happy with your fossils they need to dry out so you can put your fossil onto a cooking sheet and with a grown-ups help bake them in a 200 degree oven for about two hours. If your dough is extra thick it might take longer than that. If you don't want to use the oven you can let your fossils air dry. Put them out in the sun and you have to be patient for this part because it'll take a few days for them to dry out completely. Once your fossils dry you can decorate it. Acrylic paints, watercolor paints or markers are all good choices. You can be as realistic or as creative as you like. You can show us your fossils by tagging the library on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook. Thanks for joining us!


So we've been podcasting for about five years now. We've released over 250 episodes. And over all the years, we're always asked to do remote recordings. We've yet to find any type of solution that works for us, because you can't control the audio, the video, and obviously, sometimes the Wi-Fi isn't good. And so we just found this new tool. It's called Riverside. One thing I love about Riverside is how it records your conversation locally. It makes my producer's life a lot easier. This means even if your internet connection acts up during the pod, you'll still get a clean video without any lag or pixelation. Riverside also has a built-in clip generator that makes creating social media clips super easy. And so for you guys posting a lot of your content on TikTok or Instagram, you can do that right now through Riverside. And before using Riverside, we'd spend so many hours generating clips of our own. We had to hire an editor and a tremendous amount of work, time, money, and now we can just do everything in one spot. Riverside has made a tremendous amount of difference for us and our podcast. We finally have something we can believe in. If you're looking to try it, head over to riverside.fm, use promo code start to storefront.  And now on to the episode. All right, welcome to the podcast on today's show. We're talking to Cindy, founder of WADFREE. Thanks for joining, for people who don't know and haven't seen it yet on air. What does your company do? So I invented WADFREE, which is the first product ever anywhere that solves a problem so many people have when they wash and especially dry their sheets.  And then if you don't have that problem, I think a lot of people are familiar with what I call the sheet burrito.  So WADFREE solves that problem at last, yes. Well, first of all, it's definitely a problem we all have, but what year did you decide to go down the road of, okay, I think I have a solution or at least I wanna start something, I wanna build something that could solve it. Right, so sort of the backstory is I did a little remodeling in my house and I ended up getting a new washer-dryer set, these right here. And while I had always had a problem with my sheets occasionally balling up or saggy items getting trapped inside the sheets, I'll tell you what, when I got this set right here, they wadded up like nobody's business. And I talked to my friends and my family and they were like, yeah, well, of course, wadded up sheets are just a fact of laundry. And I was not accepting that because I had two kids, have two kids and at the time they were younger.  Yeah, that's right. When I would come, the kind of person I'd take my sheets off the bed, I'd wash them, dry them, put them right back on the bed, but approaching bedtime when I'd come back to the dryer and the sheets were in a wet wad and I had to keep my kids up past their bedtime. It was not my finest parenting moments. That's a fascinating story. Yeah, and I guess at that point, the pain is the highest because here you are, you have a schedule, you're trying to get the kids to bed and now you have another 45 minutes of drawing time before, I get it, that's amazing. Wow, okay. It was maddening, yes. And so, like I said, there's never been a solution to this problem. So I would sit and watch through the glass of these appliances as my sheets would twist and tangle in front of my eyes until I figured out the physics behind why that was happening. And then I taught myself solid works which is a professional engineering CAD program in order to design a product that would solve this problem at last. I don't have a background in engineering or manufacturing or product development, none of it, but I taught myself everything in order to develop and launch this product all by myself. So to answer your question, I got the new washer dryer set in about 2016 and then I became really obsessed with solving this problem. I think I came up with a solution in 2019 and then it was about 14 months from the time I came up with a solution till when I launched in June of 2020, pandemic launch. Yeah, this is so fascinating. So for people listening, I mean, you're mentioning solid work. So it's like for the nerds out there, the people like me, we got CAD, we had Rhino, we had, I guess SketchUp would be considered an interesting new modeling sort of lighter weight now, but solid works is a deep one.  Just to get there, kudos to you, that is not an easy program to learn. Thank you, definitely not a beginner's program. I lost a lot of hair in that process. All right, so then you have the product and now you have to enter this new game where, okay, e-commerce, website, marketing, digital advertising, whatever it may be. And so what was that like? Well, taking a couple of steps back. First, there was the manufacturing process. I had to figure out, I had no idea how a product was made. I sort of did all of that research before I even developed the product because while you can make a product that doesn't mean that you can manufacture a product or that you can manufacture it at a price that consumers are willing to pay. So I had to do a lot of back research before I even started the design process so that I could figure out, okay, what is plastic injection mold? I had no idea. I thought plastic was plastic. Well, there's lots of different ways to make products as it turns out. And I also had to learn all about the different materials because plastic isn't just plastic. That's right, there's so many different things, yeah. In fact, I had to have one of the materials that goes into the product custom compounded just for me, just for WADFRI because there was nothing on the market that meant all of my needs. It had to tolerate the entire laundry process. Be safe for the appliances, be safe for your sheets. Be safe for humans and the environment. And since there was nothing on the market, I actually have a plastic that is made just for me. And then I found a U.S. manufacturer just a few miles from my house. Whoa, lot of nice. Dirted working front, yes. Yes, WADFRI is completely made in the United States. Still is, printed, sourced, everything. And so I have to ask this question. How many iterations did you go through and then how many did you order at the beginning? Like what was the commitment number you had to get? So I think you're asking how many prototypes did I go through? Yeah. Probably a dozen different prototypes. And I kept in the very beginning, I would take my SOLIDWORKS files over to my local library and I'd have 3D prototypes made. And I'd test them on my friends and family and on strangers, which is where you give your most honest feedback. But of course they're 3D printed so they're not made for the laundry process. But I finally settled on a design that everybody liked, although it was difficult to sort of envision what the final product would be, because like I said, there's a custom compounded plastic just for this product. But it was probably around a dozen different prototypes. I love that. Okay. And then once you had the one that you knew worked or that you got feedback on that people were comfortable with, let's say, how many did you have to order just to get started or like the minimum's high or could you do a smaller batch? I think my first production run was 5,000 units. When those units show up to your house, what are you thinking? Are you thinking, okay, I have a lot, I have 5,000 Christmas presents for the next 10 years. They're like, what's going through your head? So like I said, I launched in June of 2020. Unfortunately, I ran out during the Christmas rush because they started flying off the shelves. As soon as people got wind of it, they didn't make it through the holiday season. And that was my first sort of... That's incredible. Yeah, that was my first learning experience in, well, it was COVID too. So there was a lot of supply chain problems, but now I stock hold my raw materials because that was the biggest problem was the material that is custom compounded just for me. It took a while. It's made in Massachusetts. I'm in Colorado. It was, you know, COVID delays and it took them a while to make that plastic. And so I went out of stock and that was really painful just as I was getting great traction because they do make excellent gifts. Holiday gifts, they're in a lot of stockings, yeah. What do you think led to all the good sales? Like, what was it? Obviously, Shark Tank plays a role a little bit later, but what was it? For my product. So people aren't searching for a solution for this problem because it has never existed before. People have just dealt with it. So for me and my product, especially in the early stages, it was word of mouth and being endorsed. So I got picked up by the Good Housekeeping Institute, Tested Wadfrey in their cleaning lab. They wrote about it in the Good Housekeeping Magazine and they called it genius. Yeah, that was a really proud moment. That's unbelievable. Well, congratulations. I mean, that is not easy, but it sounds like, I mean, it's amazing. It's amazing to think about that it works that fast. And then when it came to deciding to go on or into the tank, I guess, did they reach out to you? Were you interested in maybe making a splash on TV or how did that happen? Well, that happened, I even said in my pitch, I had been watching Shark Tank since it premiered in 2009. So I was a long time fan of that show. And I've sort of felt like they were almost my mentors. I have a lot of years of watching inventors bring their products to market and bring them here to you on this carpet. You have all inspired me and given me the courage to launch Wadfrey. So as soon as I had the idea to launch my product, it was just natural for me. And I reached out to them, I think even before I launched my product and got a call back like instantly. That's amazing. And then before you get on the show, and so once you get accepted, you go through the rigorous process of getting onto the show, which is challenging onto itself. Did you have a Shark you wanted to align with prior? Were you like, this is the person I'm going for or I'm hoping to get? Honestly, no. I thought it would be a good fit with pretty much all of the Sharks. Although I will say, I did not see myself taking a deal with Kevin O'Leary. I didn't go into the tank thinking, oh, this is a Kevin product, but it makes perfect sense because, well, for anyone that hasn't seen the show, there were a couple of Sharks, Laurie Grenier and Kevin O'Leary were fighting over me. They were just beating each other down. Epic Shark fight.  I ended up going with Kevin O'Leary and it does make perfect sense because he's all about sustainability and saving money, which my product saves a whole lot of resources, time, money and energy. So it's now part of Mr. Wonderful's sustainability portfolio. I'll tell you this. So from my perspective, when I started watching the episode, I said, okay, in my head, I'm probably going after Laurie. This feels like a good product in terms of maybe QVC and that audience. I think that's a slam dunk. And then I was like, in some way, I basically just thought Laurie. I was like, Laurie's probably the one person I'm going after. And then immediately what happens is Mark is out, right? He's like, I don't really know anything about this. Same thing with Laurie. I went to Laundrie, yeah. Yeah, I haven't done Laundrie since I was 12. Okay, Mark, thanks for that. Yeah, I don't even know what a washing machine is. I don't even know what it does. When you're a billionaire, I guess you've got someone else doing your sheets, but somebody's doing his sheets, so. Yeah, somebody. I mean, that's the other part about this particular segment is it's also extremely comical. And then Laurie and Kevin just start fighting over you. I mean, really, I've never seen, I don't think anybody's ever seen anything like that in the history of Shark Tank. It was quite impressive to watch where you're not doing anything. You're just watching them. Obviously, when you watch the clip, it feels like minutes, but was it like 10 minutes? Was it 15 minutes in real life? How long was that time where they're just attacking each other?  It certainly looked like that. And then, and so when this is happening in real time, are you thinking like, okay, I'm gonna go with Kevin?  Like, what was the analysis you're doing in your own head as you're watching them fight? Because in some way, you can choose either one. Oh, oh, absolutely.  Well, they would both have made great partners. I mean, it does, on the surface, seem like a great fit for Laurie, and it is. But as I was thinking about it, she wanted too much equity. For where I was as much as I had done, the appeal of the product, it was too much. So I was never going to entertain her 25%. Yeah, it's pretty massive. And the fact that Kevin brought himself down without me even asking it just said to me, he really wants this, he really believes in it. That was the most bizarre thing, honestly, because if you, Mr. Wonderful is known for being probably like the shark in terms of really trying to strike a good deal for himself, and then he'll convince you that having him on your side is why you're gonna give him your whole company, essentially. Like, he's really good at hitting that tune. And he just kept talking himself down. It was amazing. It was like next level. Down to 5%, right, which is what I went in asking for. So it was sort of an old brainer to me, right? After the show, what happens? What happens in terms of your company? Did you run out of stock? Did you prepare beforehand? Oh, I did prepare beforehand, yes. So no, we were well stocked. We did go out of stock within minutes on Amazon, but that was okay because it just drove people to the website. Yeah, to my Shopify site. So yeah, that did work out quite well. And when it comes to having Mr. Wonderful, what is it like working with him? What have you learned from him? How has it been? Wonderful. No, he's a phenomenal businessman, and he has great ideas, and he's very down to earth. His TV persona is his TV persona, but he and his team, his team is fantastic. So it has been a great experience working with them. And as it relates to the company, I obviously, so many companies at some point feel a pressure to start something else or have a new line or do some other product. Tell me. Here's the original one. This is Wad Free for Bedsheets. That's the one that I pitched on Shark Tank. Last year, so in 2023, I launched the heavy duty one for blankets and duvet covers. So I now have two products in the Wad Free line to handle all your bedding needs. And what does the second one do? Walk us through what the second one does and how much it is and all that good stuff. So the first one is the Wad Free for Bedsheets, and there's two in this package. So it goes on both the flat sheet and the fitted sheet. You might recognize these sheets. These are the actual whole sheets that I used on the Shark Tank set. But it attaches to the four corners of the sheet. One on the flat sheet, one on the fitted sheet, and then you put it in the washing machine. It stops it from doing the twist and tangle or rocking the machine off balance. And then you transfer them to the dryer. They stay separate and dry up to 75% faster and have fewer wrinkles, if that matters to you. And then the new one is the Wad Free for Blankets and duvet covers. It's larger, it's got more attachment points. It's heavy duty, so it handles those heavy duty wads. From like a personal perspective from your own story, you know, how has this whole thing changed your life? Obviously you go from viewer to fan to entrepreneur in the tank. And now in some way, now they're colleagues of yours. They're peers, you're with peers. And so what do you think the future holds for you? How big do you wanna take this? What has it been like, this journey? Oh, well, incredible. The entire experience has been incredible. As I said in my pitch, I spent about a dozen years being a mom and only living parent to my two kids who are now older. And so they've witnessed me, you know, I think growing up, they didn't see me as very ambitious because I was their mom. I took care of them. They didn't know I had this in me. So I will tell you one of the greatest rewards of this whole journey is that I now make my kids proud. That's amazing. I mean, that's really special. Yeah. They get to see you in action and live out your dream. And that's amazing too. There's, yeah, wow, that's incredible. But now they're older and they see me working like crazy.  It is, but it seems like you're at least enjoying it, which is fun. Yes. Anything else that's next on the horizon for the company that you can share? Obviously, you got this other product that's great.  Are you gonna patent some of the, I assume this is a patent technology that you've created. Yeah. Yeah, this is your own creation and solid works. You have all the documents, all the drawings, yeah. Yes, yes, I have multiple utility patents. I have more patents on the way, trademark, copyrights, all of it, yeah. But to answer your other question, I do have more innovative laundry game changers in the works, but not a word until those patents issue, yeah. What about t-shirts that say like sheet burrito with like a picture of a sheet burrito or something like that? Fantastic idea. Oh. I feel like you should trademark that to be honest because there was a part of me that was like, she's saying a lot of things right now that, I think we've all thought in our heads, but never said. And when I've watched the beginning of your pitch is basically like, oh, you could coin that term. Oh, in that term. I mean, you have in some way, right? You literally have. I'm gonna do that in a second we get off this call. Well, that's awesome. I appreciate it. Well, great. Well, listen, for people listening, where can they get your product? Where can they follow you, follow your business? Tell them everything. The best place for my small business is of course my own website, a Shopify website, wadfree.com. It is also on Amazon. It's all e-commerce. You can also find it on the Walmart marketplace but shopping direct. Cindy, thank you for sharing your amazing story. We're proud of you. It's amazing to hear. Thank you. We're excited for other things to come. Thank you for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, share with your friends, your family, or anyone you might think might benefit from the conversation we've had today. And if you haven't already, please take a moment to leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. We'd greatly appreciate it. Your feedback helps us improve and reach more people who can benefit from our discussions. The best way to stay connected with us and get the latest updates on future episodes is through our social media channels. You can find us at Startup and Storefront. We'll be back next Tuesday with another great episode. See you then.


Hello and welcome to the session. Let us discuss the following question. It says, A right circular cylinder just encloses a sphere of radius r. Find 1 surface area of the sphere, curved surface area of the cylinder and the ratio of the areas obtained in part 1 and part 2. To solve this question, we need to know the formula for surface area of sphere which is 4 pi r square and the curved surface area of cylinder. Curved surface area of cylinder is 2 pi r h where h is the height of the cylinder and r is the radius of the cylinder and here r is the radius of the sphere. So this knowledge will work as the idea. Let us now move on to the solution. In the first part, we have to find the surface area of the sphere. Now radius of the sphere given to us is r. So the surface area of sphere equal to 4 pi r square because the radius is r. In the second part of the question, we have to find the curved surface area of the cylinder and its formula is 2 pi r h. So we need to know the radius of the cylinder and height of the cylinder. Now we are given that the cylinder encloses the sphere. That is the radius of the sphere is same as the radius of the cylinder right. It is also the radius of the sphere. It is also the radius. This much is the radius and the total is the height of the cylinder. That means 2 r is the height of the cylinder. That is the diameter of the sphere is the height of the cylinder and the diameter of the sphere is 2 r because radius is r and we know that diameter is twice of the radius. So here radius of cylinder is r and the height of the cylinder is 2 r. So the curved surface area of cylinder 2 pi r h radius is r and h is 2 r. So the curved surface area is 4 pi r square. Now in the third part we have to find the ratio of the areas obtained in 1 and 2. So the ratio of the areas of the sphere and the curved surface area of the cylinder 4 pi r square is 2 4 pi r square which is equal to 4 pi r square upon 4 pi r square which is equal to 1 by 1. So the ratio is 1 is to 1. Hence the surface area of the sphere is 4 pi r square and curved surface area of cylinder is 4 pi r square and the ratio of the areas is 1 is to 1. So this completes the question, why for now take care and have a good day.


Sorry about that. I was strange that never happened before Well again, this is brother Mike. I'm back on my live Sunday morning a podcast at 9 a.m. Mountain time if you need to get hold of me you send me an email at Mike at hardcore Christianity comm and I Answer all my emails and answer them quickly please remember that we have two Live delivered services every week on Zoom Send me an email. I'll send you the idea code and the password. We also have two live services every week Thursday and Friday nights at the Arizona Deliverance Center They have broadcast live on our YouTube channel on and on four other platforms Go to YouTube comm House of healing a z and you'll be able to watch both of our live services Every week Thursday and Friday nights that starts at 7 o'clock mountain time 7 p.m. Mountain time so We thank you for tuning into the programs. We've had very good responses We have healing and deliverance and teaching at both of those services. I Usually teach on Friday nights. I leave my mic on so you can hear what goes on during the deliverance and I Make mistakes on Friday night. You get to hear those. I also do some things that are helpful You'll also be able to heal and hear those And so I leave all that stuff open for everybody to learn from Because my goal here is not just to have a deliverance ministry for brother Mike And my goal is to trigger this thing and crank it So that all around the country people are opening up terror cells in their own church And they are getting together two or three the Bible says we're two or three gathered together there am I in the midst?  That is a good thing that has got promoting you from from your the church you're in to your new ministry and Stay strong and go for that happened to me years ago at the dream center in Scottsdale Arizona I was a I Had my own terror cell I opened up a terror cell in the church and initially the terror cell was me and After that it started growing and then it got too big And if he gets too big you're in trouble. I got a Bible study for you today There's a story for the ages There's nothing quite like it anywhere in the New Testament. It's this thing's off the chain powerful And that's exactly what you're looking for for 2023. That's exactly What you are looking for something unbelievably powerful You need to look no further than this podcast. I have it for you today. Let's go to it Luke chapter 7 verse 36 Here we go. It's utterly amazing One of the Pharisees this was a guy named Simon Simon was a very common name back then It was kind of like my name Mike, you know For for many years here in the United States the most popular name to name a child used to be Mike For some reason it was tremendously popular 50 60 70s like his name Mike Well, they had that back then to they had Simon was one of them Simon was a very popular name. John was a very popular name Ionis is John in the Greek and Here we have Simon This is one of the Pharisees Simon desire that Jesus would come eat lunch with him So Jesus went to the Pharisees house and he sat down to meet now here Whatever I read the word of God what I try to do in my mind. I've tried to pretend I am standing there watching what's going on Literally watching it. I'm looking at it And I'm watching what's happening in the scripture and here I'm watching and I see on the clean oh It says he sat down to meet. This is the King Jane version on a clean. Oh means to lay down to lean back and Lay down to eat you see back down not everybody had had chairs And so everybody sat around the dinner table so to speak it was a centerpiece circular and The bowls were all put down there and then the guests would lay down around The centerpiece where the food was and everybody would dip, you know, the King Jane version was a sock They would dip the avocado. They would take off a piece of bread Roll the bowl to the next guy push it over there then everybody ate in the circular area and then the the servants in the house would stand back to the sides of the room and replenish the bowls and refill the the water cups The water bowls.  They were very expensive and inside these containers Some very expensive murks kept and there were all kinds of different kinds of murk But this murk usually came from was imported from Italy and was very expensive extremely expensive and She had an ointment in their Muran is the Greek word. It means murk It was one of the gifts that the wise men gave to Jesus when he was a toddler He was two or three years old when they found him at Nazareth in the house and they gave Joseph and Mary Muran to so that they would have Enough money to raise Jesus remember remember that God always Always meets your needs and if God is not meeting your needs the demons are blocking it All you have to do is remove that block and your needs will be met I've been a counselor for 40 years now over 40 and what I noticed is and this has always come true When I'm counseling Christians if their basic needs are not being met their basic needs That's demonic Some things blocking those Needs from being met because God never Doesn't meet the needs of his children. He doesn't give you all your wants. That's for sure. I'm a living testament to it Man, I didn't get everything. I wanted that's for sure But I always got everything I needed if someone doesn't have their needs met the demons are blocking it in some way in some way and Jesus always had his needs met and Was always provided for by the Holy Ghost and that is true of you You will always have your needs met period It will never the devil can never stop that if it's being blocked Someone's doing something could be a witchcraft curse could be a word curse could be hidden sin could be unbelief could be doubt Could be something on your end Blocking your needs from being met But you're having a father never doesn't meet his children's needs your wants. No, that's a different Bible study And it says here she stood at his feet poos is the Greek word for feet Okay, now that means once again Jesus is laying down He's laying down Eating and that's what they did back then because as you know, nobody ubered anything The common people all walked everywhere. They wanted to go, you know, nobody could afford horses Nobody could get a ride in a carriage so to speak on a human carriage where you know For men would carry someone on poles where you're up in the carriage now and never happened You had to walk everybody aware so everybody was exhausted all the time From walking and when they ate they laid down to eat they reclined So what that Greek word means and it says she said behind his feet poos and began to wash his feet with tears Okay, the Greek word for wash there. It doesn't mean scrub It is the Greek word is break. Oh, and it means to moisten. So what she was doing there This prostitute was leaning over his feet She knelt down and leaned over his feet and the tears were coming out and Dropping on his feet is what it means and it says she anointed them with Wait a minute From the alabaster boxy alabaster The mooran the murk she put the murk on his feet along with the tears and It says she was washing them break. Oh She was moistening them and the Bible says she was wiping wiping down the tears and Wiping on the more on the murk on his feet Now remember Jesus got anointed three times before he was murdered by the Jews in the Romans three times Simon the Pharisee Simon the leper and at Lazarus house with Martha and Mary if you remember that so you get the scenario here, but it gets a deeper It says she was weeping And The Greek word there for weeping is not the normal Greek word that cruel That cruel means to shed a few tears and weep a little bit kind like you would at a funeral Swipe away a couple of tears there This Greek word is not that one. This is Clio She was wailing So what had happened here, you're having a quiet afternoon lunch at a Pharisee's house a very important man and The prostitute comes staggering down the street Consumed with clinical depression Loaded with demons and loaded with guilt and shame This woman was shot.  They do it the secret they make appointments that kind of thing This woman had been shunned by society. She was suffering from clinical depression. She was loaded with spirits She had to earn a living Horing herself out. It could have been a worse life and here's she hears about Yeshua Yeshua Jesus at Simon the Pharisee's house She would have never gone down to the Pharisees house normally because she would have been Condemned to the gates of hell because of who she was and what she did But now she's she comes in and disrupts the lunch goes around behind Jesus kneels down behind his feet and starts wailing Weeping and crying out loud wailing Can you imagine what's going on in this? Pharisees home right now. Everybody's in a state of shock She's making this huge clamor behind him. She's wailing crying heaving tears Everybody's watching this and then the Muron the Mur fills the whole house Because she's pouring it on his feet and anointing his feet This stuff was very expensive and had a powerful odor to it. It was really fantastic and prostitutes had these these A lab of strong boxes The containers for the mirror the high class whores had them because these things cost a lot of money the container cost a lot of money and the Mur cost even more money and they broke that stuff out for their high paying jobs So the scenario here right now is one of enormous disruption The second thing you might want to notice here as you're watching this scenario Pass through you in your mind's eye there is the guts and the desperation of this poor woman Having to expose herself in front of all these self-righteous religious people Jews and Christians Can you imagine the nerve and The courage and the desperation it took For this woman to have done this that day It was astra Nomical verse 39 now when the Pharisee which asked Jesus To come for lunch Saw what was going on it says he spoke He spoke within himself saying Greek word is Lego now that Greek word Lego is exactly the Greek word that you use when you say something to somebody It means to speak to someone Lego. I am talking to you right now Lego but it Qualifies it here in the text saying that he was talking to himself in his head He was having a meeting in his mind and he told himself He's talking to himself and he's got Jesus figured out now What's going on right now has revealed the secrets and he's now he's got it. Jesus is a fake He says to himself quote this man if he were a prophet The Greek word is profites a profites was a person who Spoke in the presence in the absence of God a Profites a prophet speaks in God's place They're very very few probably just a handful of prophets in the United States There are Thousands and thousands of people who claim to be prophets and they are not trust me if somebody says they're Prophet this and prophet does man run for the hills You can be sure that person is they're fake they were looking for a real prophet and Simon supposedly had heard that Jesus was a prophet, but now He tricked him and caught him and now he's a false prophet Because he said he would have known what manner of woman that is touching him for she is a what? Sinner her Matalos. She is a woman who practices living in sin verse 40 and Jesus answering him now Jesus is answering somebody talking to himself in their head. Of course. He did because he had the gift of Knowledge running at maximum capacity So Jesus heard what the guy was saying to himself then Jesus said Simon I have something to ask him and Simon says quote master Go ahead speak it out The Greek word for master there is didosculus. It means teacher So when Jesus came there Simon did not do anything special for him because number one he had heard he was a prophet But he wanted to see if he was a false prophet He didn't want to risk it because of the other Pharisees. We're gonna hear about this Then he didn't call him a prophet He called him a teacher because he knew he was a teacher the question was was he a false teacher? That's what Simon had done that day. He asked Jesus to come have lunch with him because he wanted to check him out He wanted to see in his mind. Is this guy a fake? Is he a fraud?  Are you faking? Somebody's gonna come check you out I've been checked out thousands of times over the years and enjoyed it every second Jesus says to him now Simon. I want to ask you a question now. There was a certain creditor which had two debtors It's one old them 500 Denarion what is a denarion? Well, it was a small coin. It wasn't worth very much You know kind of like it would be kind of similar to us if we had a quarter a denarion and he said the other guy Odin 50 denarion and Neither of them had any money. They were broke They couldn't pay any of it back Okay, they borrowed the money They spent it and then we're not able to replenish it. They they welched, right? That's the old term that we used to use I'm dating myself now. Are they they welched on the on on the on the loan Welched on the bet so to speak and he says the the creditor Frankly forgave them now. This is the Greek word Karidzami Karidzami means to show favor on a person or show Mercy on the person to show kindness to a person To you know show gratuity to a person. It doesn't mean the Greek word forgive Which is a family where we come to Christ and he forgives our sins. That's not the Greek word That's a different Greek word. It says here the the creditor showed him a favor Did a favor to them both of them He just forgave them they didn't know him they owed him zero denarion and then Jesus said tell me which of them Will love him the most Now here's an interesting word It says will love him will love Agapa is a Greek verb for the Greek noun agape And it means to show love to a person Agapa he say which of these two creditors will show love to the Excuse me, which of those two debtors will show love to the creditor The guy that loaned the money What do you think Simon think about it and Simon then says verse 43 Simon says I suppose I'm I'm getting some amens on this teaching from my dog Lexi and Simon says I Suppose he whom he forgave most and Jesus said to him you judged Correctly, and then something amazing happens It says he turned to the woman the Greek word strefo means to twist He's on his on his elbows here talking to Simon or he's on this elbow and he's like laying down on the side or he's laying on his tummy with both elbows talking to Simon and Then he then he twists back We twist back and he Looks at her and he says to Simon while he's looking at her He says you see this woman I entered into your house And you did not give me any water for my feet now understand Simon invited him there there for nefarious reasons Whenever you had a stranger come to your home, it was a common custom in Israel Throughout the whole country. It was just a common custom like let's say we would have a handshake You know hi, how are you? That's just like just like another thing you always watch somebody's feet obviously because number one everybody wore sandals number two everybody had dirty feet and it was a common gesture of friendship and Common simple courtesy to watch somebody he didn't do it He didn't do it because he had a nefarious reasons. He was he thought Jesus was a fraud And he brought him there to try and prove his bias And that's what we have in our society now everybody is biased Nobody cares about the truth anymore. They just want you to affirm their personal bias He said he twists around You see this woman when I came to your house, you didn't give me any water for my feet poos But she she has washed my feet break out She moistened my feet and then she washed my feet with her tears And I said she wiped them with her hair. You didn't give me a Kiss when I came in. What does that mean? What sounds word what again? It was just a common custom eastern custom it was true of Israelites and Arabs and you know just like another thing everybody just had you know your move peck on the cheek It was hi, you're welcome in my home. Let me wash your feet. Please have lunch. Thank you for visiting my home Common courtesy is what it was Jesus told him a parable involving common courtesy and involving exceptional courtesy Simon didn't even have common courtesy And he wasn't even close to the creditor in that parable that Jesus shared with you didn't even have common courtesy Never gave him a kiss never washed him washed his feet What was he doing?  Trust me You are going to smash records in 2023.  She's washing my feet.  Hi, sweetheart I'll pretend my hands my wife Nice morning Hi, sweetheart I gave her a kiss I did not do what this woman was doing. Okay.    You're not just going to casually come in and say hi How you doing? What's up? That's not going to happen this year You're going to come in aggressively.  You didn't anoint my head with oil but this woman has anointed my feet with ointment Amazing She ordered What is going on here? See the difference The disciples that were standing around they represent the church In fact Simon the Pharisee they represent the nitpickers in the church The people who stand by righteously criticizing you and pointing out your faults This woman represents somebody the holy ghost can use For a miracle ministry of deliverance and healing this woman represents what you Have to do in 2023 Verse 47 therefore Jesus said I say to you her sins which are many Are forgiven now Jesus uses the regular greek word here The regular greek word is used here for forgiven at family. It means to release When you got forgiven of your sins the blood of Christ Christ released you From your sins and they no longer exist you no longer have them And she said she has been forgiven for she Loved much same greek word agapao It's a greek verb And it means she showed love Much Greatly The greek word is palouse Much. It means greatly She showed love greatly But he said to whom little is forgiven a family released of The same shows little love And he says to the woman Your sins are forgiven And then everybody starts to talk to themselves and their mind again verse 49 And they that sat at meet with him Began to say within themselves Who is this man that forgives? sins Also And jesus ignored what they were saying to themselves.  Can you imagine that?  No, that's not going to happen man, you're going to become a as as as mickey said to rocky In rocky one. You remember that he says uh Now this string cured it And he says if you learned to move you learned to hit and you learned to Fight with this Using this string He said you become a very dangerous poison You become a very dangerous poison That's you In 2023 you're going to become a very dangerous poison. You know what? you're not going to Come to jesus casually anymore You know You're not going to be like this Pharisee or the or the Disciples standing around Staring and watching and when it was going on now. You know what you're going to do You're going to be bold You're going to be courageous Like this one She was bold She was courageous She was desperate Yep, then notice that going through the word of god New testament Not one person who was desperate for a miracle from god ever left without that miracle Do you happen to notice that the people who were not desperate for god? Did not leave with a miracle Yeah, you know if you go to church too much and you've been a christian for a really long time That's very bad for you Because Psychology kicks in right The psychiatric concept of systematic desensitization kicks in That's what's happened to sin in our society, you know Back when I was a kid I'm an old man now and back in the 50s Or 60s when I was young nobody Nobody would let a drag queen torque In the face of a third grader I mean that that would have never happened But through systematic desensitization It means to be consistently and repetitively exposed to something over a period of time You become desensitized to it. It doesn't seem real anymore Uh going going to an extreme example The nazis Were systematically desensitized They shot a guy in the head unarmed person. They dropped dead The first time they did it it bothered them The second time they did it it kind of hurt a bit But by the 15th or 20th person they had shot in the head The washington fall over They didn't feel it anymore. They were systematically desensitized If you've been in church a long time, that's very dangerous Because you become desensitized to what The woman with the alabaster box felt see the The whore in the story Was the only one in the room that got a miracle Did you know that? Did you see that? The religious people got nothing that just the christian disciples. They got nothing In simon the leper when when uh jesus was anointed at simon the leper's house. That was a later incident One of the disciples judeus filed a complaint He said man, we shouldn't be pouring this moron On jesus. This is nuts We should have sold that the thing was worth a lot of money Well, yeah, you know, she she cranked out a lot of tricks to get get the alabaster box and the The ointment that cost a lot of money But she flipped it financially and made much more than she invested because of her more expensive johns But that woman was so ashamed so lonely so lost and so sick of being demon infected And so sick of sliding down through the gates of hell That she became desperate And she came to jesus. She was not systematically desensitized to christ he was a fresh Savior to her And you know what the problem is the main problem You forgot You forgot. Have you been a christian a long time? Oh, that can be a big problem. Can't it? Yeah, being a christian a long long time is really not good Because you kind of now taking jesus for granted you take the church service for granted you take the praise for granted All you somebody teaches out of the bible you kind of take that for granted you've heard a thousand bibles Stories you've heard a thousand bible studies you heard a thousand sermons I don't know you're not there anymore. You kind of check out in church You ever stand in the back of your church sometime? Go ahead and do it.  They're shaking their head. They're nodding off They're they're not hearing any anymore. They have become tone deaf See And in 2022 you were tone deaf in 2023 No Not this year You're going to download the holy ghost and his power.  They're not going to get pregnant again They're not going to get married again.     He forgave every sin you ever committed And you were so grateful.  It was so exciting and then later on you lost your first love Revelation 3 And you forgot And when someone forgets What they were forgiven They find it difficult to forgive others Because they forgot What they were forgiven They forgot You remember if you do remember you'll always be able to forgive others Because jesus said Freely you have received So freely give you can forgive your parents now in 2023. They're done They're not your parents anymore. Anyway You're not you're not a smith or jones or a balance willow or a gonzalez anymore. Listen You are in the family of god and your name that is not your name anymore. You have a new name written down in glory revelation 3 You're a different person you belong to a different family and you don't have your parents anymore. You're having a father you should parent now You transitioned from your family Into his Amazing isn't it?   And when she left there She never went back to prostitution.  They've been released from you go in peace What he said That's what you will do you'll go in peace amazing Because you remember what you were forgiven of You don't take it for granted anymore.  Okay listen You've got to make major changes in 2023 and you're going to do it. It's going to happen this woman did This woman I don't know if this was a new year's event But I don't know for the sake of this bible study. I think I'll miss make that up This was a new year's event. She wanted a new year She wanted to start over And she did she started over huge She started over big time That's what's going to happen to you Okay, you remember what you were forgiven of And because you remember now You can forgive others You you're not going to lose