Welcome back to our second lecture, BC213, the End Times. Yeah, so during the break, we just did a quick search online and found out that Indian soldiers fought in World War I, World War I along with the Allied forces against the Ottoman Turks to set that area free. So that was the involvement of Indian soldiers at that time, World War I, 1918. All right, so let's just pick up where we pause, just to give a little bit of history to the regions that we have been talking about and then we'll get into studying the scriptures. So we're talking about a little bit of the history of Israel as a nation, 1948, Israel became a nation, next major thing, 1967. The Six Day War, Israel captured the old city of Jerusalem. This became, this was very significant, they got control of the city of Jerusalem. And then as an outcome of that, there was a resolution made that part of the east part of the city will be given to the Arabs under Arab control. The western side would be under Jewish control. There have been other battles that have happened, a lot of attempts to establish peace in Israel, in its relationship with the Palestinians. That's been an ongoing effort and we've seen over time different efforts made trying to establish peace in the Middle East. And we are aware of the current conflict that's going on and efforts by the United States or European Union trying to bring some sort of understanding for peace. For example, the most recent thing that's happening is President Biden proposed, let's create Palestinian state, give them their own place. That was the only way for peace. Prime Minister Netanyahu says, no, no, no, we will not do that.  It will all be under Israel's control and so on. We don't know what's going to happen, but that whole effort of how do we bring peace in the Middle East, that still is going on. Just highlighting a few things that are biblical relevance. Israel becoming a nation, the regathering of people into that land has been something that has been foretold in Scripture. Isaiah 11 verse 12, God says, I will assemble the outcasts of Israel. I'll gather them from the four corners of the earth. Isaiah prophesying, okay, I'm bringing them all back.   Ezekiel 36, 24.  And all of this happened in just one, in almost like a suddenly, in a day. And Isaiah says, who has heard of such a thing? Shall the nation be born at once? As soon as Zion was in labor, she gave birth to her children. A nation was born. So the establishing of Israel as a nation is something of great significance and importance for us from a biblical perspective. Now what we are to bear, and if you see the map on page 39, Israel has a large control of a large part of this land, but there are regions what we know as known as the west bank, west of the River Jordan, west bank. And then there's a Gaza Strip. There's a small portion on the western side along the Mediterranean Sea that are occupied by the Palestinians. And that is where a lot of conflict is happening right now, the Gaza Strip. That's where Israel has been bombing, trying to get rid of the Hamas, the Palestinian group. And so there's conflict going on. And that small piece of land is causing so much of a problem here. And west bank, that's where other Palestinians are. And Israel has been trying to reoccupy portions of it, put up their own settlements and so on again. But Palestinians want this as their own land, want to be identified as an independent sovereign state. So this is where the trouble is going on. And then the focus then is on Jerusalem, right? So in Jerusalem we have... So in Jerusalem, Palestinians, Gaza, west bank, just give you some information here.  And page 41, we're highlighting those regions where there is conflict going on. Now, the points of conflict, the Temple Mount. So this is what we had mentioned earlier. For the Jews, it goes back all the way to the time of Abraham. Because on Mount Moriah is where Abraham offered, or he brought Isaac to be offered as a sacrifice. David bought that mountain, made a sacrifice on it. And so on that mountain, Mount West Solomon built a temple. So it's a very sacred place for the Jews. But it's on this place where the Muslims have their mosque and the Dome of the Rock. So around 86, 85, top of page 42, there is the Dome of the Rock and also the Al-Aqsa Mosque that has been built there, established there. So if you look at a little picture of this, I think you're on page 44, you can see in the center of the Temple Mount is the Dome of the Rock and towards the wall is the mosque. And so this whole Temple Mount has both these structures which belong to the Muslims. And then on the western wall, so you can see the picture of the Dome of the Rock, on the western side, that is where the Jews are allowed to come and offer prayer. They're not allowed on the eastern side of the Mount, of the Temple Mount. So that's on page 45. You have some pictures of them coming and praying. So this whole Temple Mount has become a point of conflict. And as we look at Bible prophecy, there has to be a third Temple built here because we say third Temple because first Temple was built by Solomon. The second Temple was the renovated Temple that was rebuilt by during Ezra's Erebel that time. So that was destroyed. So now on this place, a new Temple has to be built. We call it the third Temple or the millennial or sorry, the third Temple, the millennial Temple would be the one that's cleaned up and set aside afterwards. So right now there is no Temple, but there has to be a third Temple because the Antichrist is going to go in here. First of all, he's going to allow the sacrifices to resume.  So how is all this going to happen? We don't know. All we can say at this point is the Jews are ready to rebuild the Temple. They have everything ready to put up the Temple. But as of now on the Temple Mount is the who Muslim structures the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque. And it is not going to be easy for anything to happen there. So it's a very tense situation, very difficult situation. Another thing to keep in mind is the Jewish settlements. So once Israel came back to their land, they started rebuilding, establishing, rebuilding their cities and rebuilding all their homes and so on. And what is interesting, and again, people who study all of this can explain it, Jeremiah 31, 38 to 40, Jeremiah had prophesied that the city will be built and he mentioned the sequence in which things would be rebuilt the tower of Hanel, the corner gate, the hill garb, the valley fields, the brook-kidron, horse gate. And what people have observed is, have followed how the settlements have been built. They tell us that the way Israel rebuilt itself across the land took place just in this same order. So this is again an amazing thing, that the way Jeremiah prophesied, in the same way everything was rebuilt in the land in this order. So that's something interesting, something to keep in mind. And the settlements are going on here. So the relationship between Israel, Egypt and Syria is something to keep an eye on. Right now things may be tense. It is on high alert on all sides because north side, there is Lebanon and Syria, south there's Egypt, west there's Jordan, Iraq, Iran. So it's always on high alert because any of these nations could attack against. But when you look at into the future, Isaiah 19 talks about Egypt turning to the Lord, a highway connecting Egypt and Syria, Isaiah chapter 19, and Egypt and Syria becoming friends with Israel. So this will most likely be fulfilled during the Millennial reign of Christ. When Christ reigns, then all these things, all these nations will become friends with Israel and this high-level people. So that's in Isaiah 19. And for us, how should we look at Israel, you know, at the church, Israel and the church? And how should we look at Israel or Zion and Jerusalem? So I've just given some notes there on page 48 and 49 that we understand that right now God is working through the church and the church is ministering to the Jews and the Gentiles. The church is made up of believers belonging to the Jews, whether they're Jews or Gentiles, and we are preaching the gospel to the Jews and to the Gentiles, leading them to Christ. And God is making of both who one new man, Jews and Gentiles, are coming to faith in Christ. The tribulation period will see a lot of focus on Jerusalem and Israel and what happens with them during that time. And so when we go through revelation, we will see how God is working through Israel or in Israel as a nation, what has been prophesied. So keep in mind that God has not given up on Israel just because he's working through the church right now. So we are in what we call as the church age. The emphasis is on the church, but it doesn't mean God has said Israel, bye-bye. No, he's still got a plan for them. He's still going to do things for them as a nation. So just keep that in mind. And so as a church, we pray for the peace of Jerusalem. We reach out to Jews and Gentiles with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Okay, what the Bible has foretold, this is in page 50, what the Bible has foretold about Israel, that Jerusalem will become a troubled spot. There will be a peace treaty for three and a half years or false peace. And we will go through this as we look at the series of events and how they will happen. I'm just giving this as a preview. And then there will be the great tribulation during which God will do things in and through Israel. And then everything will culminate with the battle of Armageddon and the second coming of Christ. And during the millennium, Jesus will reign out of Jerusalem. And from there, he will govern and rule over the nations. We'll go into these details in the coming chapters. Okay, all right. Chapter number four, Bible prophecies of coming world events. So what we want to do now in chapter four is to start, is to get a good picture of the sequence of events. What is going to unfold? Okay. And then we will, as part of this, we will also do an overview of the book of Revelation. We'll just go through Revelation chapter, but I mean, just giving an overview of what is going to happen. But let me just introduce this topic today and we will continue this next week. So if you look at the chart, so this is a chart we will refer to often. And so we are right now in what we refer to as the church age. Right. And we're coming to the end of the church age. So the next major event that's going to take place is the rapture of the church. Okay. So the big question, when will the rapture of the church take place? Will it happen before the tribulation or in the middle of the tribulation or at the end of the tribulation? Right. So our position is that the rapture of the church will take place before the tribulation. And we will give many reasons, as in the same chapter as we go forward. Why we say that? Why do you say, biblically, right? Why do you say that the rapture of the church will take place before the seven years of tribulation? We'll give reasons for it, okay? But that's a big area where people have questions. Why do you say that? We will have that reasons. So the rapture of the church will take place and the believers will be taken into heaven. Right. Those who have died before, we will all receive glorified bodies, will be taken into heaven. Seven years on the earth will be seven years of tribulation. We will be in heaven and there will be things happening in heaven. Right. And we will look into detail what will happen in heaven when we are there during the seven years. At the end of the seven years, and what will happen here on earth during those seven years, book of Revelation, journey through it. End of those seven years is the battle of Armageddon, Revelation chapter 19, when Christ and all of us return with Jesus. So that's the second coming of Christ. So when we say second coming of Christ, we are referring to the rapture of the church, we will call it rapture of the church. But second coming of Christ, we refer to it when he comes at the end of the tribulation to establish his kingdom here on earth. The rapture of the church is his secret coming because everybody won't see him. He'll be in the clouds. The Bible says we will meet the Lord in the air. So he's not coming onto the earth, we're meeting him in the air in the clouds and so shall we ever be with the Lord. But second coming, he's going to come, he's going to set his foot on Mount Olives. He's going to establish his kingdom right here on earth. Okay. What happens at the end of the seven years? So we will look at scripture for all of this. Okay. I'm just giving us an overview and outline. Now, during the seven years of tribulation, there will be many people who will believe in Jesus because they will read the scriptures, a lot of things. There will be the preaching of the gospel that will happen on the earth. They will believe. They may be martyred. They will also be raised. Those who have died during the tribulation believing that they'll be raised. And we will reign and rule with Jesus for 1,000 years. During this time, Satan will be bound. He's taken out of the way. So this is referred to as a millennium, the thousand year reign of Jesus. Jesus will rule on the earth for 1,000 years at this time. At the end of the thousand years, Satan will be lost for a short period. He will try to deceive the nations once again. And God will, he'll go attacking Jerusalem. God will intervene. And Satan will be bound and cast away into the lake of fire forever. And at that time, every person will be raised and then we have what is the great white throne judgment. That's the final judgment, the great white throne. Then we will all be taken out of the way. So the believers will be taken out of the way into heaven. All the others will be sent to the lake of fire. And there will be new heavens and the new, everything that we know, the universe as we know, the current heavens, current earth will be dissolved. And God is going to make everything new. And we will, we have a little insight into what there's new heavens and new earth look like in Revelation chapter 21 and 22. So there will be new heavens and the new earth and heaven will be established here on the heavenly city of Jerusalem. We'll come down to the earth. We will be here. Okay? So we're going to look at all of this in detail. Okay? So let's pause here. We are going to now, so that's the overview. So what we're going to do from next class is we're going to look at each of these step by step. We're going to read the scriptures. Okay? Look at the scriptures for each part of this and try to understand how it's going to happen. And we will also journey through Revelation, give you a little insight about the outline in Revelation. Okay? To help us understand the sequence of these events. And we'll answer questions along the way. Why do we say, you know, rapture happens, etc., etc. We will answer questions as we go along. Okay? So let's pause here. Any questions on just what we talked about? We did a little bit of geography, which areas to think about. A little bit of history about how Israel became a nation and some of the important wars. We don't have to study Israel history in detail, no, just to have some idea. And then an introduction to the overview of events. But we will get into the details of scripture by scripture. Any questions for today before we pause? So let's close in prayer. I know we are finishing half an hour early, but you can relax for half an hour. Let's pray. Somebody could pray and we'll dismiss. Father, we thank you for this day, for this time, Lord. We come to your presence, Lord. And thank you what we have learned today, Lord Jesus. And give us understanding so we can learn deeply more further. Thank you for your word. Thank you, Lord Jesus. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. Amen. Thank you everyone. So next week we get into the details of the sequence of events. Have a good week. Thank you. Bye.


Welcome to ITU Telecom World 2017 here in Busan in the Republic of Korea. I'm very pleased to be joining the studio this morning. I'm Mr Din Hui Ban who is Chief of Enterprise Application Center for the Office of Information and Communication Technology of the United Nations. Mr Ban, thank you very much and you've been with us today. Good morning. Good morning. Now I'd like to start off by talking about digital transformation. It's the theme of this year's Telecom World Smart Digital Transformation. What does that mean to you? When I hear smart digital transformation, I think of how the United Nations can apply digital technologies to make the life of the people better. In this ITU 2017 event we talked about internet 5G, we talked about smart tourism, intelligent transport, ICT for civic engagement. I think those are examples of smart digital transformation as I can see today. Now obviously all of these bring lots of opportunities but lots of challenges as well. What about the Asia-Pacific region specifically? What challenges do you see here? Well Asia-Pacific is a very, it has a very diverse landscape with over 4.5 billion people. It's home for nearly 60 percent of the world's population. It has seven out of ten most populous countries in the world but also some of the smallest nation islands in the Pacific. Now the digital landscape is also very diverse in the region. The digital transformation is not at the same speed and some countries are focusing more on catching up with digital infrastructure. All the countries have passed that stage and they invest more in transformation in areas such as e-government, public safety, healthcare, environment. So one of the challenges that I see in the region is the digital development is not equal in many countries. Infrastructure development often goes to large cities and not enough to remote areas. So I think governments need to step in in order to reduce this digital divide and allow a more equal digital development with incentive for companies, private sectors to invest more in less populous areas. And how are you working with ICT to support the United Nations in the region? So under the guidance of Ms. Atefe Riyachi, the Assistant Secretary General of ICT, we the Office of Information on Communication Technology provide solution to support United Nations mandates in sustainable development, peace and security, humanitarian aid, human rights and international law. More specifically in the region, we are working closely with UN sister agencies in the areas of urban development, education, disaster reduction. We provide ICT solutions for smart cities, for remote learning, for early disaster warning. A large component of our portfolio also includes ICT solutions in support of peacekeeping operations. Now the United Nations peacekeeping force is 100,000 troops and many of them come from this region of the world. Yeah. And in terms of the attendance here at IT Telecom World, why do you think it's important to be here? Well, yeah, well the biggest takeaway for me, for us, the United Nations team here, is we could see the evidence that the digital transformation of our life is accelerating. Now the ITU event itself is an opportunity for us, for the United Nations to share our experience, but also to learn from other experience and an opportunity of networking as well with companies in the private sector and with all the organizations that share the same goals of applying digital technologies to improve the life of the people. And have you got a key message for participants here? Come back next year. So we will be there, we will try to be there. I think it's in South Africa, Durban is a bit far for us, but we try, we attended last year as an exhibitor and we come this year again. So next year we try to come back again. We look forward to having you. And thank you very much, and thank you for being with us in the studio today. Thank you.


Y'ALL WON'T PLAY THIS FOR ME GAME! Hello? Welcome, everybody, to a YouTube video. Isn't that fun? Ha ha ha ha ha! But before the video, you know we gotta give you a little treat. Ah! Play the treat, Justin. He didn't do it. Justin, the- the treat? He didn't do it. No, no, no, I sent- I sent you the treat. He didn't do it. Justin just- He didn't do it. We didn't have the budget for the- He didn't do it. Okay, just play the- Play the VHS one. Pop it- Justin, pop it in the VHS. Pop it in the VHS! It's me, Ethan Nester, from 2015. Here to tell you, from the past, you gotta take advantage of the show tickets that are on sale right now! But where are they? I'm so glad you asked. There are so many cities around the United States, in a little bit of Canada. Is New York one of them? You bet it is. How about Pittsburgh? Yes, Indianapolis! You're too late! Make sure to go to- I have to do this dot show. And get your tickets now, before it's too late! It's me, from the past! Go to- buy tickets. We are here in Poppy Playtime, which is a game- Jesus. The tone shifted very rapidly. This is a game that people were playing a little bit ago, and I was late to the trend, so here we are. Chapter one, a tight squeeze. As an employee of Playtime Co, you finally returned to the factory many years after everybody within disappeared. Great. I can't wait. From what I've seen in this, there's a lot of, like, being chased, which I hate that.  Her name is Poppy, and she is the first truly intelligent doll in the world. Great. A little girl can talk to her? Uh-huh. Poppy gives her answers. Okay. She is the first doll actually able to have a conversation with a child. Great. Hard to believe? Yep. Just watch. I don't like that man. I don't- OHHHHHH! Poppy is as lovable as a real girl, and she talks like- I thought Poppy was the blue thing. She's almost creepier. She might be- Poppy wants to look her best. I don't like this at all. It's so eerie. It's so weird thinking about- Like the old porcelain dolls that children used to play with. Those things are creepy. 5.99. You've ever wanted to see how all of the nation's favorite toys were created? Oh. Oh! OHHHHH! Ehh! That's so gross. Oh, that's so gross. Come visit the factory. I don't wanna- Oh, here we go. Are we in the game? I don't wanna visit the factory. Poppy playtime. Poppy's little playtime. Everyone thinks the staff disappeared 10 years ago. We're still here. Find the flower. So the staff is still there. So many years later, even after the tour is done. But you know what tour isn't done. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Ooh, what did I say? Ooh. There's- Definitely something happening over there. I'm gonna- Put this in here. Hi, Lathes. Great. But that wasn't in. It's so dark. Oh. Oh. Well, it's not too late to turn around. So thank you all so much for watching. Hope you enjoyed. Uh, I'll see you next time. Okay, I guess we have to do it. Ooh. Is that blood on that? That sure is. E. Press E to interact. With what? This? Oh.  We can make it over. All right. Well, this way we go. Eat healthy like brawn. Oh, it's a train. Oh, that's nice. I like- I like the train. Oh no, no huggy. No huggy. This is already- I- I don't like it. You know? You know? You know what I mean? This is already I don't like it. Can I- Is there a flashlight or anything anywhere? Because it is- Extremely dark. Find the- find the flower. Wait, the flower. We need to remember that. Ugh. Ugh, ugh, ugh. Um, well there's gotta be some sort of clue, right? Some sort of clue to help us get into that- that room over there. So... Let's see if we can find it. Okay. Blue, green, pink, yellow, red. Or green, pink, yellow, red. That was it! I'm a genius! What's that in there? Oh wait, is there- was there blue? Oh, blue VHS. Here we go. Put that guy in there. I just don't want my back to be turned to the door, if I'm honest. Grab pack. Tighten the straps. Hold both cannons. Okay. Pull the trigger to fire. Okay. Pull it again to retract. Great. Well how do I get that? Only fire at small objects. Do not fire at a co-worker. Okay. I can grab off someone's head? Wire's conductive. Use for rewiring. Thank you. Hey. Thank you. I thought that whole thing was gonna fall off and I thought I saw something, but I guess I didn't. That's so cool. I still really don't like this at all. It's creepy. It's just a little creepy. So what am I supposed to grab with this? Huh? Oh. Oh, I see it now. Were there any other hand things? I don't think so. I think it was just the one. I don't like him. Whoa. I can't give him a high five. Why not? See, isn't that a nice high five? What is this shit?  Great. Huh. Huh. Huh. I just don't like this at all. Power. Wait. I'm gonna close that. I'll put it around here. Okay. Dude, be kind to others. Show up on time. Dude, not hide behind the doors to scare Leith Pierre. Don't stay past 8 p.m. Misuse company time. Tamber with machinery. Enter innovation. Wing without authorization. Oh, there's blood here. Huh. Wait, where am I supposed to send the power to? Well, I don't have multiple hands. Right? Oh. Oh, damn. That's pretty cool. Can I bring it over here? Or no? Okay. How far out can I bring it? How long can I make my hand? My name's Huggy. Huggy wuggy. There we go. Isn't that nice? Yeah, that's great. I'm unsettled. Yep.  I knew it. I knew he was gonna be gone. My name's Huggy. Huggy wuggy. Make a friend.  You're brave. You're very, very brave, okay? You can do this. All you gotta do is just get to the other side, I'm sure. Nothing's gonna harm you.  Okay, ready? Three, two, one. Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Shit!  I hated it. I hated it. What's all this blue goop? Oh. Another VCR tape, huh? But where is the tape? Once again, game? It's very, very damn in here. Okay, so we don't have another tape. Not here, anyway. Periodal? Remember to take breaks. Hmm. Yuck, yuck, yuck. Okay, what's... What do we got here? Am I supposed to go down here? I'm just gonna come... Come through here. Grab all my stuff. Just grab some things. No one's gonna harm me. Everything is gonna be fine. Okay. How do I get the second hand? How do I get the second hand? Oh, I want the second hand for sure. Oh, hmm. Oh, right. Some sort of puzzle, huh? I didn't know that I could do that. I still didn't... I didn't see a... Is this where I came through? That's where I came through. We don't need to go back down that hallway. That's spooky-ass hallway. At least I don't think. Was there a... There's just a tube down the... Down the what? There's just a tube lead. Oh, no. Where does the tube lead? Do we have to go down the tube? I don't want to go down the tube. I don't want to... I don't want to go down the tube. Oh!  I almost went down the tube! That would have been crazy. That would have been so foolish of me to go down the tube. Come on back now. Give me that cool hand. You got two hands, huh? What do you mean, grab? Grab it again. Do I need to do two? Is there multiple? Multiple... multiple... There's many ways for me to go. God. I don't like it down here. Not very much. Not very much at all. Maybe I need to go back down here. Oh, what's here? I understand. I understand, I understand. Wait. Here? Here? Is this correct? Where am I going? Ugh, fuckin' A. I don't like the way this is going. I... Oh! Trash!  Where am I? Oh, fuckin' A. Okay, down at the Minion Receptor. Christ. Okay, what do we have here? Make a Friend. Make a Friend, 1960. Our founder, Elliot Ludwig, was a visionary. He set the stage for all of Playtime Co.'s greatest feats. Yet, of all the amazing things that he created, Make a Friend Machine, it's one of the most creative, impressive, and advanced. It's solely responsible for nearly every Playtime Co. toy sold on the market to this day. All it needs is to be fed with the proper parts and then it will paint, assemble, and do a quality inspection of all of the toy all on its own. Gone is the need for complex sorting or backbreaking labor. This machine can do all that and more. Nobody leaves without a toy. Okay, so I gotta make a toy and put it in there. Can I go up here? Let's do some investigative work. Real quick. Oh, love. Is it rust or is it blood? My favorite game! Good job. Good job, me. Oh, I see. Oh, I see. Okay. So, I'm assuming that it currently does not have power. So we are going to have to give it power some way, somehow. Can we not do it that way? Well, what if? How many of you do we need to do? Whoa! That was kind of cool. Okay. Oh, bungee cable! Okay. Well, let's go back down. Wait, did I do something correct? Why is it still electrified up there? Why did that randomly just turn on?  Is it making my friends? Okay. Hey, there it goes! There it goes! Here comes the boy. Hello, boy. I don't know. I literally don't know what I did. I, sure. I guess it just came on all of a sudden. Nicely done. Good. Good for you. Copy, you look healthy. Where's my toy? Where's my toy? Where's my toy? There's my toy! There, there it goes. There he is. There he is, there he goes.  Where do I, where do I go? Down into this hell.  Oh, hug man. Hug man was... Oh! He's coming down! He's coming up this shaft! Don't!  My guy.  This is my least favorite thing ever.  Danger?   Oh my god. Jesus Christ. Where?  Why am I walking so slow? Go. Fucker! Die! Die! Oh my god. I hate everything. Did I get him enough? The flower. The flower. I found the flower. I cannot believe I made it through that in one go. That was a whole lot of luck in just turning at the right time. I hope he broke his back enough. Oh, that says run. No stop. Go back run. Danger turn around. Well, sounds good to me. How many hug boys are going to be down here? I'm still hearing the electrical sound. I think I just had a little glitch in the game. Oh my god. Maybe if I... Nope. Even if I pause it, there's a... Oh well. Sorry guys. Sorry to ruin the ambiance. This is going to be the worst thing ever. Finally. Oh, it's you. Are you? Okay. Shit. That was really good. I really liked that. I really liked how the whole thing wasn't just like being chased by a thing. And it was just the very end. That was awesome. I really liked that. Am I excited to play chapter 2? I don't know if excited is the right term. I'm intrigued. I don't know if I'm excited particularly.  I really like the character design a lot of that monster. That was really cool. I really enjoyed that a lot. That was a good mix of the pacing was really good I feel like.  Because that can get really old really quick. And so I like how basically the whole thing was just a puzzle game that was just building the suspense of because we obviously know that that thing is going to come after us basically once we see it I mean obviously it's in the beginning credits or in the thing or whatever. Is there chapter 2 already? No, it's just chapter 1. Okay. But obviously as soon as it moves it's just like okay, when is it going to get us? And the whole time it just kind of leaves you like just kind of clenching and then you get a little bit comfortable once you get to the toy making part because it's like okay and then it gets you and that chase was maybe uncomfortable. Anyway hope you enjoyed let me know if you did. I'm definitely going to be playing chapter 2 whenever it's out. I don't know if it already is. But thank you guys so much for watching hope you enjoyed it. If you did make sure to slap that like button right in the face and I will see you guys in the next video. Love you all. Stay cranky. Bye.


It seems you're doing really interesting things here with your expanding interest in China and that's always Always really exciting to hear so I wish you good luck with that I think you're going in the right direction, and I don't just say that because I'm a Synologist So I'll talk for a few minutes, and if we have time I'll Show a nine minute video, and then I guess we'll do a Q&A. Yes, and let's see if everything is working It is great So this is a book cover. This is my shameless self-promotion on sale now Now what is curious about the book is that it's about the future about Futurology, and this is actually a big departure from my previous two books, which are also on sale Because in my previous two books I looked at how China's past shapes the present either It's a recent past. It's hundred fifty year history of national humiliation and how that shapes Contemporary foreign policy in this book China or is a world which I co-edited with a colleague that goes even farther back and looks It's sort of classical confusion and you know Chinese civilization how that frames certain issues Now the current book Is about how not it's about the future per se because I can't predict the future I'm not a futurologist, but it's about how Chinese people are thinking about the future and how Their thoughts and discussions and writings about the future are actually telling us about China in the present day Now China dreams became important as the director mentioned Last November because the new General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Xi Jinping mentioned it in his First major public appearance He went to the Chinese Museum of History. He looked at the history of national humiliation whereby the West and Japan abused China and He came out and says wow I have a China dream my China dream is the Rejuvenation of the Chinese nation or rejuvenation of the Chinese race depending on how you translate it and So a lot of people have been talking about the China dream as you surely know for the past Eight or nine months, but a lot of people treat this as if it's a new thing But actually there's a backstory That in my book I look at what we now call the backstory of the China dream and see how people have been talking about the China dream and similar ideas of the China model the China path the China way for the past five six years more or less and There's this big discussion. It's not just defining the China dream people are arguing over what it means and what the China model means and It comes out of a couple of peculiar circumstances one is a leadership transition that We've known for the past two or three years that there was going to be a big group leadership transition in 2012 and then 2013 and whenever there's a transition There's a lame duck effect that people say okay. Well, who's in tow the previous president? People who gave him ideas. They're sort of fading from power Who who's going to provide the new ideas? So a lot of public intellectuals in China started giving new ideas To directly or indirectly influence the new leadership and some of them were successful and you know, they picked or Xi Jinping picked them and their ideas such as the China dream The other context is a more general one in China they've gone through 30 years of very spectacular economic growth and a lot of social change and we hear a lot of the negatives of this in terms of the environment in particular but there's also been a sense of a values crisis in China that People have been talking about the problems that China faces because it doesn't have a new ideology There's been a shift or that socialism is no longer the main ideology. What's coming next or what kind of socialism? Is China going to have so they're criticizing this shift from political to economic values and they a lot of them are saying that China now has a money worshiping society and What is interesting about this to me is that? It shows that people across the political spectrum whether you're in the new left Whether you're a liberal or whether you're kind of a military scholar All of them are saying geez we have a crisis and it's a crisis of values and we need to get some values So some of them are going to socialism for values some of them are going to Confucianism some of them are going to liberalism and other sources But to me the main thing that's interesting is that there's this Intellectual crisis going on in the midst of a transition So these two things coming together meant that there's been a huge amount of discussion in China over what China is and where it should go one of the Things that people talk about a lot is what direction China should take or what path China should take So everybody Especially in in Beijing and Shanghai and Guangzhou They're all involved in what I call pop futurology. Everybody's talking about the future There have been dozens and dozens of articles and books with titles like China in 2025 or 2030 China that kind of thing China in 2049 So what my book has been doing is Looking at what this group of people we can call them public intellectuals I call them citizen intellectuals because there's work slightly differently in China because they have a still have a strong censorship regime But my point is not that these people are censored But that actually there's a lot of new space for people to talk about things There's a lot of leeway to discuss things in China that's often not appreciated and that's spawn this new group of citizen intellectuals who are not necessarily dissidents They're people who are interested in Advising the government they're interested in influencing the direction that China is going to go in So they're not officials, but they're not dissidents. They're somewhere in between. They're a liminal group It's sort of ambiguous They're neither insiders nor outsiders. Sometimes they're inside outsiders. Sometimes they're outside insiders there's this and nobody's really quite sure of The connections that that they're involved in even though It's pretty clear that these people are influential and nobody's really been including me has been able to trace How they're influential so rather than trying to trace kind of how policy is made in China What I do in the book is think about How new ideas percolate up and how new ideas appear in China and how they're debated Quite vociferously often on the web So that's what I'm doing is looking at these citizen intellectuals who you know in previous generations They would have done everything behind closed doors and tried to get an appointment with the party leadership now. They're Yelling and screaming in public space. They're yelling and screaming on blogs and other internet and new media for and As I say on there the goal is to influence public policy But through public public opinion rather than just through kind of back channels which is the normal way of making policy in China and As I was telling people at lunch, I've been writing an essay on the artist I way way And in doing that I was looking at I was reading his father's poems. His father's a very famous communist poet And in 1941 at the Yan'an Revolutionary base in northern China I Ching was there and he wrote a poem called Mao Zedong. So it's he's being a court poet It's very interesting how he's a court poet and in in his poem. He's the poem ends with The new slogan determines the new direction and I thought wow That's what's going on is that this new slogan the China dream is Determining the new direction and what the citizen intellectuals are trying to do is to be a part of A writing of framing the new slogan, okay, so What I do in the book is Is Go through various China dreamers about 20 25 of them And I'll just give you a taste of it. These are people. This is the way people were talking about it before It became official policies. That's why I say pre-official Very popular China dream was a military dream of a strong nation in the strong military and this was this came out in a book by a Colonel in the People's Liberation Army who published a book the China dream in 2010 and His argument is that China can't just be an economic power like Japan China has to be a military power So he needs to he wants to convert China's economic influence into military and political power He came out with the second edition of his book about six months ago after it became official and it's even more you know robust and Xi Jinping went to talk to the military last December and said that his China dream is for a strong military to so he whether Xi Jinping read this book or not. I don't think matters, but he's he's saying he likes that dream That's part of the official China dream The new left the new left is this New left in China is a little different from the new left in Europe, but that's what they call themselves. They're people who want to Have I guess left-wing values, but they're not necessarily Maoist They're China dream especially because there's a bunch of Developmentally economists who are new left people who are thinking about how to organize Chinese economy and how to make it Have socialist modernization rather than capitalist modernization Socialist globalization rather than capitalist globalization So some of them especially who on gong he's been saying that we need to have more state-centric Developments kind of shift away from pro-reform because reform usually means opening up liberalization of markets He's Arguing that China should go in the opposite direction And he's he's quite successful He's one of the people who actually writes China's five-year economic plans a new one came out last year And he was one of the authors so it's I think very important to see how this State-centric quasi socialist view of the economy is still powerful in China There's also a Confucian China dream Also called the world dream There's a philosopher named Xiao Ting Yang who is you know a rather unassuming guy, but he's become very Influential because he's been able to talk about how Chinese ideas can inform The international system and how the Chinese idea of all under heaven or Tianxia Is an alternative to the current world order which he sees is a very bad American US centric world order As I said, he's a philosopher, but people in international relations and diplomacy have really been picked up On his ideas and are using them not just in academic papers, but in policy statements So that's the kind of Confucian dream is this this giant Sino-centric world order There are also some liberals who are talking about the China dream, which is most people find strange usually you think of this as an official party slogan But liberals have been talking about it for the past four or five years as well there's this Newspaper group called Southern Weekend Which actually gives out China dreamer awards every July so every July gives about it picks about a dozen Chinese people and gives them a China dreamer award and it picks out a range of people but The first year it did it was in 2010 and the person that they gave it to and who gave the keynote speech in Beijing was A writer she was a writer at that time Lunging Tai and she wrote about the power of civility and she tried she talked about the China dream in Very different ways the dream of civility of people treating each other nicely rather than dream of a strong state and a military state So she she kind of gave a different span on it now. She's actually the Minister of Culture in Taiwan which shows how these people Start out. I mean When I started studying them She was a citizen intellectual she was a writer based at Hong Kong University But as I was finishing up the book she was appointed the you know Minister of Culture And this also shows us this interplay this movement between Categories the categories out of use of officials distance and citizen intellectuals So it's a very fluid system Okay So Some trends so the pre-official the trends if I want to conclude In the book first, I should say there's a lot of variety amongst the 20 to 25 people that I I Survey and analyze in the book, but there are some general trends And the trends are not just recent trends as they're part of a general shift from the 1970s They did things one way 1990s did things in another way and now in the 2010s. It's a third way So the first shift is in terms of method so first was In 1970 it was scientific socialism everything was had to be understood in terms of Marxist categories and Maoist slogans that shifted in the 1990s to Social science that you have to be scientific so it's sort of a familiar you could say a Western way of understanding Chinese society But now there's been a shift from this social science method to see Problems in China as moral issues and as cultural issues. So it's kind of going from this international or universalistic way of understanding problems to a very Particularistic or exceptionalistic way of understanding problems in China The second trend is for identity People talked about this a lot that In the 1970s the main identity was with Either communism or with the Chinese state in the 1990s that shifted to nationalism So we had books call like with titles like China's new nationalism, which do a good job of describing how Things shifted in the 80s and 90s. I think there's another shift going on right now From nationalism to oh Actually to statism. Sorry. I said that wrong to statism. So the values are not Civilizational but their status that there we can get back to this that people are not necessarily talking about Chinese particular Chinese values as such but Hierarchy stability and unity Again for a strong state The third trend is From revolutionary internationalism in the 1970s to focus on national interest in the 1990s And now what I find is That there was a shift from national interest to see things in terms of these much broader categories The Chinese way and Chinese exceptionalism not just within China But to inform how we understand the Asian region and how we understand the world at large This is all part of what a Historian colleague of mine has called the collective right turn of China's left-wing intellectuals Into from from the left into statism because a collective. Yeah, so a turn to the right When we talk about China, it's always hard to know How to use categories like left right and center so he's playing with that But his his argument is that even though there seemed to be have these progressive values They're actually pushing for a very conservative notion of state power So the trend I think in China It's perhaps not a happy one that Even though officially China is promoting very positive things and talks about win-win relationships with all countries What I see going on in discussions between citizen intellectuals and officials is a very stark sense of power politics and zero-sum politics that there is this sense especially in the past few months of a cold war type battle between two social systems And there's been a lot of talk in Chinese press and online About the China dream not just as you know a Chinese way of doing things or Chinese goals But the China dream versus the American dream Where the China dream is good and the American dream is bad that sort of thing How am I doing on time? So I could See maybe I'll skip to Comparing the China dream and the American dream because I also have a Short video Anyway, this slide I will talk about but there's this interesting dynamic between the China dream and what they call the world dream That the world dream is a China dream and the China dream is a world dream We can come back to that later if you want And China dream of the American dream as I said, there's a lot of talk about this lately and As a battle between those sort of a clash of civilizations type framework and this is coming mostly from the Chinese side And they see it as the China dream is a national dream where the American dream is a dream of individuals that The China dream is about order leading to prosperity whereas the American dream is about freedom leading to prosperity And first I think we need to do a Good comparative Analysis of the two dreams we were talking about this at lunch that we think we understand things like the American dream But actually we don't because usually the American dream now just is sort of crass materialism a big house and big car but if you look at how The idea of the American dream has developed over the past century. It's actually more about Qualities and and values and not just about shallow materialism that it's more nuanced in the sense that Originally it was about religious freedom and this is the story of the pilgrims coming to America In the 20th century it was a dream of equality and freedoms and not just freedom And Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech which he gave 50 years ago last week It's actually a very good example of how the American dream is used not just to say hey great What a what a great country we are but the American dream has been used as a critical tool to To show what's wrong with society as well as what is right with society and This is what I'm thinking of this is what I see going on in China as well that The China dream didn't work that well the China dream is also used as a critical tool There's this concept of Johan. It's the classical Chinese concept, which is very popular in the past past century, but the past decade especially it means worrying. This is a job of intellectuals in China is to worry about their country worry about the fate of their country to solve their country's problems and It's curious because this is a literary term and you expect Philosophers and poets to use it but even military intellectuals a bunch of very prominent very right-wing Hard-core military intellectuals are also using this concept of patriotic worrying and one of them The person who wrote the book the China dream He said that actually China needs to be more self-critical that There's this there's a book in English called The China collapse and how China is going to collapse Socially and economically and such and it's regularly criticized in China as being anti-China and China threat This Colonel Colonel Leo He actually said that we need to have more of these China collapse theories and it shouldn't just be Westerners talking about China's collapse. It has to be Chinese people thinking about how China might collapse And he says Americans talk on and on about the decline of America but and they've talked about it's Eight or nine times since World War two and he he concludes that America actually has not declined America keeps bouncing back or Growing so he says well, maybe there's a relation that between these this ability to Use things like the China dream as a critical tool And to stop a decline so to stop it He argues that the reason that America has not declined is because it talks about decline So therefore if China doesn't want to decline it has to talk more about declining now, I'm not sure if the logic is is Is valid, but this is how people in China are thinking about things and it's quite encouraging so even amongst the very right-wing people there is an interest in a broader and more critical discussion of what's going on in China and this actually started happening on January 1st of this year that the southern weekend Group that I talked about That gives out the China Dreamer Awards One of their flagship newspapers published its New Year's editorial saying that the China dream is the dream of Constitutionalism that we want to have equality and dignity and human rights and And it's in the Constitution. So it's ours So it's a very interesting way of them taking Xi Jinping's new slogan which at that point was about you know, 35 days old and Using it to their own ends and what this has actually led to is this huge discussion about the role of the Constitution in Chinese society and constitutionalism as a As a value that's still going on today. I mean there's been a lot of very harsh pushback against constitutionalism, but just because they're still talking about it. I think is quite encouraging The other thing that happens with slogans in China is that they become Satir the site of resistance, but a satirical resistance And that's what this picture is An example of so this you can't see it very well, but it's maybe a thousand people looking at a guy sleeping a naked guy sleeping and This was explained as a study session on the China Dream model So rather than going to a village to see the new model whether it's sort of Maoist communes or Dengist Reform you have to look at a fat middle-aged naked guy dreaming So this is one way of commenting on it Someone else said that what happens with these Slogans often is that they become zombie concepts so a zombie concept is Something like harmony in China. So harmony is everywhere. We have harmonious trains. We have harmonious food We have harmonious everything But so like a zombie harmony is everywhere, but it's completely empty of meaning And that's I think it was probably what's going to happen to the China Dream is that it's going to become a zombie concept in the next year or so Because it's just so easy to say and it sounds good, but the The leadership has found out that they Are having a very hard time controlling the meaning of the China Dream. They thought that they they had it But because dreams are something that each person has it's very easy to people to Discuss their own China Dream and what the China Dream means to them in ways that are quite different from the official view


Every Monday when I can, I answer questions from the YouTube community. I'm still digging through a whole bunch from the first episode of this, so let's begin. SpideySensei72 says, To be honest, I'm ex-military, so I dig the haircut. He's referring to my awful haircut from last month. It's just so rare to see a white dude with a high and tight that's not cop or enlisted. Anyway, what's your idea of a perfect dinner? What would you order to cook? First of all, thank you for your service, ex-military guy. Secondly, I cut my hair really short because it grows like weeds. I'm like Harry Potter without the charm or skill set of a wizard. My idea of a perfect dinner would be tough. I like a lot of meals and I don't like a perfect dinner. I haven't had a perfect dinner yet, so it would have to be something beyond my comprehension. I'm a sucker for a bacon cheeseburger with a nice iceberg lettuce on it, a crisp, rich tomato slice, some nice cheddar cheese. Slightly melted, not fully melted. I don't want it eating my burger for me. A nice medium rare burger on the meat, on the ground beef, and a good artisan bun. Nice glaze on top. I'd of course pair that with some nice wedge fries, lightly salted, nothing overwhelming. A good amount of ketchup for me to dip in. For the vegetable, I throw some broccoli in the mix with some apple slices to complete the fruit set. Throw some caramel dip on there for me to put those wedges into. I've recently been on an apple slices kick, dipping it into the caramel sauce. So good, so good. I'm not a big dessert guy, but I like me some pie. An apple, a pumpkin would be really nice. I like a rich pumpkin pie, a little cool whip on the top to kind of ice this Sunday, and that would be a great meal for me. If I were to prepare the meal myself, I think one of the better things I make is a chicken Caesar sandwich. I start by preparing and simmering some asparagus on low. I then grill the chicken breast for 25 or 30 minutes, whatever it takes, to get them nicely done, juicy, yet cooked completely.  I then throw those on the grill towards the end to get that butter melted in, really infused into the bread grains. During the chicken cook, I whip up a Caesar salad, get that all mixed in nicely. Get some croutons in there, some Caesar, of course, as the name goes.  I put that Caesar on, and I lay out three strips of asparagus, close that thing up. It is a beautiful meal. It's a beautiful hearty dinner. Emmett asks, have you gone to the galaxy's edge rise of the resistance ride? It was amazing for me, except for my sister crying the whole time. Ugh, sisters are the worst, Emmett. Get rid of her. Go on the ride alone or find a buddy to hang. I have not been there myself. I haven't been to galaxy's edge. I'm in Minnesota. I don't have access to it easily. Jump on a plane to go to Florida, I believe, unless it's also a California Disneyland. I don't know, but it wasn't completed yet when I was there with the family and then COVID hit. So we haven't been back since.  So we're just kind of waiting until things start to simmer down a little bit, like a year or two from now. Nathan Shack asks, favorite video game in the last decade? I just got done sheeting all over that Uncharted trailer recently. I think the Uncharted games are some of the best that I've played in a long time. I know that other video games have done combat better and other elements of it, but I think the overall packages of those games are so well done, and I love the characters and the story. I've played through them multiple times each. So I'd say the Uncharted saga, the four games, plus the side game with Chloe, Lost Legacy, that one's great too. Yeah, I think Naughty Dog did such a good job on those. Last of Us is really cool as well, story-wise, the first one. But I don't have that much fun playing the Last of Us as I do Uncharted.  I've played a ton of games though. I'm actually a big gamer. I was doing Twitch for a little while, but I had to focus on one thing over the other. If you want to check me out there, it's twitch.tv slash Adam Olinger. I haven't posted a new video in months, but you can kind of look through some of the backlog. Zachary Sabine asks, how old are you? Also, how have you been staying fit in the last two years? Well, Zachary, age is just a number, but I am a spry, 38 years old, pushing 39 come November, late November. I have a birthday coming up. That's going to be a tough one, 39. It's just on the precipice of 40. I've seen some coworkers and others recently where I was like, damn, gained a significant amount of weight in a small amount of time. It's amazing what inactivity and being home can do for one. I work out every morning. I think that helps. Dedicating an hour to working out every day, lifting weights is certainly paid off. I've been doing that pre-COVID, I'm doing it post-COVID, or I guess during, we're still in it. I go on walks every day with the family. We got back into Pokemon Go just recently again.    We're just stupidly obsessed with it right now for no reason at all. It's pretty pathetic what's going on over at this house. It's a pretty sad state of affairs. But it does get us out of the house walking a bit more than we would normally to hatch eggs and to find Pokemon. This is my life at... Again, I'm 38 years old. I'm an adult male. Dieter Bastion, if I'm saying that name right, says, I don't know, it's probably out of the question because the internet, YouTube can be a cruel place. Would you consider doing one movie or review? Doesn't matter what.  I apologize if I mispronounce your name. I see you comment all the time. Really appreciate it. Love the comments. Love reading them. My kids haven't been in any videos in a long time, but they actually have been in some. Olivia's been in two or three. I know she did a review when I was doing car side reviews for Jungle Book. It was funny. She's probably... God, she's probably like seven in that video. And she's for some reason got a British accent. No idea where she developed it, but whenever she was on camera or doing like pretending things, she would have a British accent. So it's very funny. It's actually a cool review. I do kind of an artsy shot on it too, a lot of different angles. And since I'm not in front of the camera, I'm able to have more fun experimenting with some of the cinematography. So that's worth watching, I think. I'll try to remember to link it in the description. Also, Connor and Olivia were both in the Jurassic World review, the movie feuds episode. It was Jurassic Park 2, or no, what was that for? I think it was a movie feud episode. It was Jurassic World, and they were both in it co-hosting together. I really liked that video. I think it's hilarious because the kids are both young. Connor can barely talk. I translate much of what he says at the bottom. Olivia's just cringy and embarrassed by him. It's really funny. I'll link that one as well too. As for doing something now, I don't know. My kids are nine and 12 now. They certainly could, I guess, if they wanted, but I don't really want to make this a family thing. We did actually a short video. Lindsay, my wife, wanted to do a show on a different channel completely that she was going to do, where it was like the Olinger family kind of a thing, but we're so boring and lame. I was like, this isn't going to work. This isn't worth our time. But we did shoot a pilot episode. I didn't release it anywhere. I think I'm going to put that on Patreon. I'm going to try to put that on Patreon soon for people, just because it's something for them to watch that actually shows our whole family being kind of silly. So if you want to be a Patreon for even a dollar, you can check that out. I will try to get that out even this week. Owen Menning asks, what is your favorite retro game and what is your favorite modern video game? Well, Owen, I covered the modern game, I think, with the Uncharted series, even though they're not that new anymore. Horizon Zero Dawn, I guess, would be something that I really liked from the last four or five years. I'm super excited for the sequel. Retro, I don't know.  I'm retro now. I grew up with the Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo. So a lot of those games, I love the Streets of Rage trilogy, I really like. I have the newer one. I played that on Twitch. Not too long. I mean, it was a while back now. But when the game came out, I played it. I really like Streets of Rage 2. I love all the Mario games. I think they're just fantastic. Even Mario 1 is so, like, it holds up so well. There was a part of me that wanted to start speedrunning it for fun, but, God, that would take so much time and effort and I don't have it. I have to focus on one thing. My problem is I want to, I love life so much. I want to try all these different things out.  Also, big fan dude, I discovered you on random with the Loki video, and it's been great since. That's awesome to hear, Miles. Thank you. Those TV show reviews take a while to do because, you know, you actually have to watch them all and then talk about them in a way that would kind of cover the whole season. I sometimes think it's not worth my time, but it's awesome to know that some new people are coming in from those videos, so thank you for letting me know that. As for what I watch on Netflix, it's probably just kind of like how anybody else decides what to watch. I usually see what's trending, what shows up, recommended on my feed, and I think to myself, is this going to be worth it? Probably not, but could it be worth it from a humorous standpoint if it's going to be so bad I can review it and entertain people? So I usually do it like that. GamerGator asks, have you seen the Bully Maguire memes? I'm sure you have, but still, they're comedic gold. This isn't my first rodeo on the internet. I've seen them. I love them. I think they're great. It's partially the reason I wanted to revisit Spider-Man 3 and see if it was everything it's cracked up to be, and I did that video not too long ago defending the film and how it's aged a lot better than initially thought, and I find myself appreciating it, and partially because of the Bully Maguire memes. They're so freaking good. Cindy Chung asks, were you in drama class in high school? Did you take any classes in college, university, that were related to moviemaking? I've said this a couple times now in the Q&As in the past, but my father died when I was 16 in high school, so my college outlook was not ideal. I did not care at all about college. I didn't care about getting out of bed in the morning most days. So I did go to like Hennepin Tech, a technical college. It was supposed to be a two-year associates. It was going to be for filmmaking. I did have some film courses when I went. Most of the time I would drive to the college and then sleep in my car through the class. I went to a different college, Normandale Community College. It was a nice community college, and I also failed out of that one in the first year, I believe.  No one holds you accountable in college. It's not like high school. You don't have a mom and dad yelling at you. You don't have teachers or the school even caring if you come in. You paid them. Like I said, I did end up getting an associate a third time around after taking a year and just figuring my life out and what I want to do and how I'm going to move on from the loss of my father. I did end up getting the two-year. No big deal. Long, long time ago at this point. The moviemaking stuff and all that, I learned on my own pretty much is how it goes. We had the old big camera with the VHS tape. We constantly filmed, constantly tried new things. I watched a ton of behind-the-scenes stuff back in high school. I was obsessed with watching those. You know, like David Fincher movies like Fight Club, even Home Alone how they did that stuff. I found it so fascinating. A lot of Steven Spielberg documentaries. And so that stuff really helps and just experimenting with the cameras and with audio and with just music and how you can really play with that stuff.  That goes a long way. That was all pretty much self-taught. I did have a video class or two when I finally graduated from college at my other two-year place, but not a lot. Alright, that was another Q&A video. Thank you very much. I'm still churning through those initial questions. If you have something you're dying to ask, you can put it in the comments. I can't promise I'll get to it now, but I would like to address as many as I can from that initial batch still. So look for these every Monday unless I get sick again or something comes up, but I'm really trying to dedicate this once a week still. Thank you very much. Subscribe if you haven't. Like the video. It helps, I think. And share this channel around. Please share it around. Please join me on Patreon. It's only a dollar a month. There's a tier at a dollar. That's not even like a fifth of a cup of coffee from Starbucks. Skip the tip there and give me one. Just the tip. Just the tip. I know that sounds sexual. It's supposed to. Thanks again for watching the Q&A. You don't have to join me on Patreon. You could join right here on YouTube.  You might see them in the comments once in a while. People have an MF for movie feuds or a Deadpool or whatever. They're kind of fun. They're different. You get perks there as well. Like access to the cringe and other shows that I haven't released on my channel. So you get a little bit something more than just saying, hey Adam, good job. I support you.


So go around. If you take an engineering brain that has compassion or just a human-centered kind of a way, like we can fix everything. Feel like we can make everything better. My journey to becoming a professor, it's interesting. So I remember watching a show called MacGyver and thought it was fascinating how he would always find solutions to get out of trouble with the most obscure random items. And I just was fascinated. So I would say that definitely was a spark. When I was a sophomore at RPI, I took a class called Introduction to Engineering Design, and it was in that class that I remembered an idea that I had in third grade to build a double-dutch jump rope device that can replace people to turn the ropes. And the double-dutch machine was definitely the first time I saw something from an idea to a working prototype. But I started to realize that I wanted to think a little bit more beyond just traditional mechanical engineering. Engineering is usually focused on making a physical product or system of some kind. And if there's not a clear pathway towards that, then it's not an engineering problem. I like the challenge of stepping into uncomfortable places and asking questions that most people won't. For example, hair, just how can engineering impact hair care? Just because as a woman of color, black woman, hair, it's a big deal to a lot of us. When I became a professor, I collaborated with another faculty member, and so we worked together and did some things that garnered a lot of media attention because it was just different. Like, when do you see mechanical engineers working on hair? At the PhD level, I brought psychology into my work. Because I got outside of the traditional engineering box, I was allowed to tap into human problems, human things that resonated with me that caught my attention. Like, my compassionate design work, that was inspired by a conversation with a woman that counsels breast cancer survivors. She shared the story of one person that when she would go in to get a mammogram, she would say, it's me against the machine. And I just heard those words and I said, like, why are we creating things that people feel like is an enemy to them and it's so scary for them? So compassionate design, the framework was created to help engineers know how to think about end users in a certain way. And we call it compassionate design. So a person in the category of like the mammogram and radiation therapy, how do we design so that they have a sense of security? They're not feeling fearful. My motivation is some of the literal things engineering can do, yes, products, systems, but the analytical thinking that we can bring to social problems, like those things motivate me a lot.


Your dreams are about to come true. Your breakthrough is on the way. The toughest times come just before the greatest blessings and God is getting ready to catapult you into greatness. Statements like those find their power by pooling on a person's deep longing to be successful, wealthy, put together, respected, and otherwise well-positioned in life. In fact, the word breakthrough has become a Christian code word. That means the day I never have any more struggles. We have sermons that give you steps to a better you and keys to success in this area or that area. It seems that every message you hear is about how your dreams are just within arms reach. The reason we have so much preaching on climbing mountains is because we don't have the faith or power to move mountains and we lack faith and power because we lack the preaching of the cross. Sadly, many are promising a life without troubles, trials, sacrifice, our commitment and honestly that's just contrary to what Jesus told us. John chapter 16 verse 33 says, in the world you shall have tribulation but be of good cheer I have overcome the world. Sure, the blessings of God abound in the life of every believer. He prospers, provides for, protects, and loves his people. God does not despise the prayer request.  But one thing we should all remember, God's cause takes precedence over the believer's comfort. So let me just be real with you, many are deceived by a false gospel that requires nothing of them. Jesus himself said in Mark chapter 8, if any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life you will lose it but if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the good news you will save it. Jesus spoke those challenging words just after prophesying his own death. His disciple Peter was resistant to the idea of Jesus giving his own life on the cross. The Lord rebuked Peter saying, get away from me Satan. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view not from God's. Think about those words, get away from me Satan. Those are harsh words but those harsh words exposed the source of Peter's resistance to the cross. Resistance to the cross is satanic. Think of how the devil tempted Jesus in the wilderness. Satan offered to Jesus a crossless path to glory. Yet Jesus filled with both the word and the spirit overcame the temptation to deny the cross. He chose instead to deny himself. A crossless gospel is a christless gospel. The gospel is not about self-help or self-improvement, it's about self-abandonment. It's not about your dreams, it's about God's will. We must stop trying to build what God has told us to crucify. I'm David Diger Hernandez and this has been your moment of truth on the Encounter TV network. For free weekly content including Bible teachings, videos of the power of the Holy Spirit in action and more, sign up to my email link list by going to davidhernandezministries.com slash email. Thank you for watching Encounter TV. Don't forget to subscribe. Also, help me win souls by spreading the gospel through events and media. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter by clicking on the donate link now.