Welcome back to the Breakfast Sun plus TV Africa. We set off with the first conversation and we're looking at the fact that this has generated a lot of conversation. You call that the cyber attack on the National Management Identity Commission where you have hackers boasting of gaining access to the database and we'll be looking at the implication of that security bridge on our economy and this morning we have Song Waluu Timilay joining the conversation. He is a data and software development strategist. Let's go to have you join us this morning. That's all right thank you so much Song Waluu Timilay for joining the conversation. I set off with you. What are your reactions when you first saw that news and had the story of the cyber attack on the National Management Identity Commission? I mean I felt a bit disappointed that I can't think of what I mean. I'll say this. When it comes to data security, there are various layers to be used. We have the policies, we have the privacy policies, we have the privacy, we have the data protection policies and I mean so many other layers of which it is not I mean I don't believe that there's one way out of security but how the security is being managed so how the issue was being managed before that kind of thing. So probably probably I mean I thought really I really liked the fact that I haven't and I really liked the fact that I haven't and I really felt very shocked when I had about the situation. Well I think there's also some clarity you know with regards this. Mr. Timilay, can you hear us? Yes I can hear you. Okay I was saying that there is some clarity that we still need to of course share with regards this particular situation with the NIMC. Apparently it seems like the story wasn't entirely true that there was a break or that you know there was a three million NINs that had been breached and all of that I think you know we soon need to get clarity with that and we hope that the NIMC puts out an actual message stating what happened but the conversation really is you know understanding how safe data is in Nigerian hands of the Nigerian government. There's very very vital information that is in you know the hands of the NIMC and so when this broke there's a lot of people who said oh well we're not shocked is the Nigerian government is the NIMC you know nothing you know there should be that secure and it's not you know a shock that anyone can break into it. So can you clarify you know for us you know if you understand the levels of security that the Nigerian government puts in place with regards data? So when you come to data security, there are various layers to it and we cannot just look at Nigeria as a country and say maybe our security policies are not properly put in place but the thing is it's a continuous process in ensuring that security is being protected. Now I have to continuously keep trying various technologies various strategies to ensure they are able to break into you know your system. One is your encryption trying to break into your encryption and another one is the kind of firewall that is being used which I mean I can't say and that's why we cannot really still ascertain to now if the NIMC's information were actually revealed and it was actually properly it was actually until now I'm not sure we've confirmed if they actually got access to those information that actually belong to the NIMC but the thing is that before an attack like this can occur there will be some pre-consignation you will see that something like that is about to happen and sometimes it would be like a breach it could be caused by a breach in data policy in the policies that have been put in place and somebody was actually used to implement them to get access to this kind of information so I mean we can't we can't generalize data protection to just Nigeria you know because you know some of this Nigerian some of these servers are not even listed in the country so the level of security that has been put in place sometimes the level of security that I mean is in place sometimes it's not really really it's not really we can't really say that we can't really say that it's the Nigerian government policy that controls it like you know like everything that you know there's been control locally but in terms of our security in terms of the security that we have in place I mean I think by doing well yes we can still do better and we can still ensure that the hands that are actually managing it and the kind of policy that we put in place can be improved or not okay but I'd like to find out if there's a possibility that this can happen because I also remember vividly that you know the Commission leadership had raised some concerns that there were plans to attack you know the space and these were some persons you know from maybe Iran Israel and what have you planning you know that particular attack at the time and it was it was more like the Commission was in the know so is there possibility that that can happen and secondly what are the measures that can be put in place to ensure that you know that doesn't happen paraventure that happened because we know that with every time you have all of this incident or report you would always have an institution or an agency coming to refute all of those claims so I'd like to find out from you being an expert in this you know fuel is that tendency that that can happen and what can you know the agency itself due to ensure that that doesn't happen yes talking about if it will happen if it can happen if you will happen the question is is there possibility that that can happen because I'm saying that the leadership of the Commission had raised some concerns prior to this time that there were plans you know more like they got a tip-off that attack was going to happen that some persons were planning to launch an attack on some of you know very vital government agencies and institution and so the question is is there a possibility that this can happen and if that's the case what can the people do what can government now do to ensure that that doesn't happen so so when you come like I said earlier when it comes to data security there are various layers to it and there's no one there's no one to steps to data security but there are various layers to it and ensuring that you put various steps in place talking about if it can happen yes it can happen yes it can happen if a proper attention is not being paid to all exactly and the actual bridge that it is in the system now I can't really say for now on that okay this is how if it happened this was how we were going to mention this to our system you know because how far what is there we have I mean ensuring the cluster of information the cost of information that being sent out and being pulled out we have APIs and we have APIs that other top agencies are using to you know the reason to access those information from the government and all but now the major the major concern the major concern is what is the expertise of the people that actually managing the server quality you know these informations are actually very private their private information that even if there was a bridge in a particular cluster of data security that cost the bridge it would be probably will not like to reveal that to us and it just depends on how how fast how fast did they see this penetration how fast did they see that there was a patch that is trying to get into that server and how fast were they able to respond to it if the response was if the response time was slow it will happen and this is where you know the kind of policies the kind of policies that they put in place comes to play how well are you monitoring what they have and where it's been monitored it's a very vital function that can actually determine a response time to data security bridge all right um Mr. Timile there's a term that I kept seeing yesterday and that is the S3 bucket can you help clarify what exactly that is yes so the thing is that the S2 bucket is more like a cluster is more like a cluster for information where you know it's more like a cluster of information now the thing is that you wait trying to access the information are the information encrypted encrypted and they are safe in different layers so that is actually the S2 bucket is like where the penetration actually occurred okay and you know is that a normal occurrence or was is there does that show that there was a lapse somewhere you know with regards protecting that bucket yes yes special that I was a lap somewhere but I mean I will really not because yesterday when I was much later yesterday I kept on seeing some information that I mean the information that when it's not actually the way I know actually information from I can remember this moment but I mean I mean so go ahead and go ahead and share with us you know what we what the risks are with regards a breach of that level what type of information is you know very very likely to be lost or to be taken so the MIMC has quite a number of information and the way the system was built the beauty to the way that I mean they verify your information to be able to get access to money those now the banks use it verification verification companies use it various agencies have access to this information so now this the way the region comes into place is that you have this information somebody else has my information I can actually can actually give out enough information about me you know so she makes his axe okay what is the top back of this person he can see it what is this and I'm good that is it was access more information is it was after my information which is actually very big please accept from that also having access to 23 million phone numbers what is that much access to emails address you can call them and actually place some pranks on them and they need to get it over there I'm able to get stuff out of them so I mean that there are lots of things that we don't visit that there are lots of things that we don't that information yeah and and you know we're in 2022 already I'm sure that information technology is developing really really fast is there new levels of internet and data security that we should also maybe be looking towards you know getting into or you're using yeah so the thing is that a lot of this data security there was before but what happened is that applications are developing a lot of applications are developing new patches are coming out new loopholes new clothes are getting open and because of the last five but whoever the security model you have you have to constantly agree it's built to meet up with the level of technology that is occurring because if that's not done you don't see you just because a lot of times a lot of times new threats have been discovered and they are being updated by the day so you know you don't use again that I mean you whatever security whatever you have you have to ensure that your domains are properly secured you have to ensure that you have your data encrypted even though it's inside the database and showing that the data is encrypted and if you don't have a set in a crypto code even though you are able to access that information the information is useless to you because you don't have your crypto code other other other mediums are ensuring that you know when you're putting out data from the database or you know the kind of API's that the NINC and the others use when they are putting out information they don't get more than the information they need it also helps data security and ensuring that because if you're putting out if you're putting out information from the server and you have been able to pull out more information that you need it is also always an avenue of penetration other thing is like take for instance a lot of websites now use social logins they don't use them they don't use logins from within they don't use logins from within the application just to ensure that they are hitting the amount of information that penetrates into the database server and I mean so many other things so many other things which we just need to just continue to keep working on it keep our eyes open keep seeing what the trends are and keep ensuring that our systems are being upgraded so some people have also said that you know collecting data cannot guarantee you know the safety of the people because first of all the reason for the collection of data over time the NIN registration was on the premise that it was going to help in the fight against insecurity in Nigeria and that's on the one hand on the other hand some people are also saying that with this the ricks losing the identity that people's identity could just be you know taking off entirely and then you don't have an identity how true is this and what are your thoughts? I mean sometimes I don't understand Nigerian government and I mean fact that the way we change government and we just come to the new policy is always alarming and I know that even for the NMC system that we are doing this between the national and domestic card we are still doing that for the water scan I mean I'm amazed at the fact that we are always taking information and we are always taking information over and over again why don't we just have one system that works and I mean my own suggestion and what I always feel like and will ask you that we have an immigration system that works we have an immigration system that has been standard for years that the standard for years and I know that the NMC can have I mean could have been this but I don't think I've ever had this with a national with a migration and passport system why don't we have a system like this why don't we have just one system that takes in all this information and everyone has an access line information from it so that our security can actually be concentrated into one sport our own security and all data can be concentrated into one sport I mean talking about security and getting on data I mean all I feel is that this information should be taken out of one sport let us focus on security on that one sport let us ensure that you know it is top notch and every other sector, every other processor are picking those data from you that's what happens in every other advanced country and I don't know why we have to do that do you agree that people can lose the identity if these you know claims are really true people could lose the identity but I mean I doubt if the identity can be lost I doubt if those information can be lost because people can take you out someone can decide to take your identity and information and become you impersonate you you can't take my finger prints even if you take my I mean you can't take my finger prints and you can't have my new why you can't have my new now so the thing is NMC they don't just work with just information and the phone numbers I don't they also work with the passports they also work with your finger prints they also work with your finger prints so let's say they want to break into the application they want to break into the server they want to replace my finger prints I mean they want to replace my finger prints now this person I replace my finger prints does he have finger prints before now does he have an IMC record before now I don't even understand what I'm saying so I mean that would create duplicates that would create the duplication of finger prints in the database so the chances are slim the chances are slim that you cannot not exist because of this kind of bridge has happened I don't know if you understand what I'm saying yeah find a question in one minute if you can does Nigeria have a hacking community does Nigeria have a hacking community yeah yes Nigeria has a hacking community but the community is larger than just Nigeria Nigeria is a small place the communities are larger than Nigeria these are communities where people teams of hackers work together teams of hackers from various parts of the world come together and sometimes you see Nigerians you see Nigerians at the top of those profiles probably there will be things that are even much more bigger than Nigeria's security and trying to break into them and sometimes I mean some use it for the negative purposes and some use it for positive purposes some people use it to show the bridge in your system so that you can upgrade it why some people use it to break into your system and sell your information so Nigeria has a hacking community but sometimes bigger than Nigeria okay good thing is you know every now and then I've heard you know people mentioned that Nigeria's banking sector is one of the most secure in the world and so would you know continue to lean on to that narrative thank you very much Sunwo Timilain for joining us this morning and have a great day ahead thank you so much absolutely and away from the discussions on hacking and the NIMC of course we will give you further details with regards that story it seems that it was a false alarm we're moving away to Mali now where there's a little bit of controversy with Echoas and the coup and the coup plotters in Mali we'll talk about that when we come back stay with us


everyone. It's your girl, Kenzie here from lean sports guards and I am ripping brand new release today of 2021 panini Donress optic football hobby six box half case break number eight. Pick your team got Andrew L. Bills, Andrew G. Bucks, Anthony D. Chargers, Eric C. Dolphins, George Y. Panthers and Broncos Grant B. Falcons, Harper B. Bangles Jags, Jacob D. Eagles, Jeffrey H. Jets, Jim A. Browns, Jose S. Rams, Josh I. Seahawks, Mark L. Steelers, Matthew G. Titans, Michael Y. Texans, Nicholas U. Saints, Paul N. Cowboys, Raquel B. Patriots, Ryan A. Cardinals, Ryan P. Washington, Washington Colton, Viking, Sean M. Niner, Sean T. Giant, Steve O. Lyons, Steve I. Raiders, Stuart Z. Steve Hackers, Tim C. Chiefs, Travis N. Bears, and Will W. with the Ravens. All right, best of luck, everyone. Thanks again for the fill. Here we go. Last pick your team of the daytime next half case is going to be a random division. Got Givante Williams. We've got Kenneth Gainwell on the pink velocity to 79. Eagles. Givante Samuel Jr. Blue to 179. Justin Fields, Bears, Bull. Chicago, Travis N. Nice field. Great start to the break. We'll mag that one for you. Wow. Got Zach Wilson-Rookie, and Orange Travis-Kelsie to 199. Chiefs. Aqua to 299. Elijah Molden Titans. Murray Rogers-Blue to 179. Devontae Adams. Grinch, we've got Aqua to 299. Curtis Samuel. Dutch Palmer. Andre Cisco, Raider-Rookie Hollow. Jax, Spiro Cox. Got P.S.2. Kidarius, Tony on the elite series of rookies. Giants. There you're round tree. Silver circles deck. Prescott, Cowboys. ATN, we've got Gold. D-Hop for the Cardinals. There you go, Zona. Nice Gold, DeAndre Hopkins, and it's bookend. 10 of 10. Congrats on that one. See another Gold vinyl before the end of the day. You think we can pull one off, Jake? I hope so. Hollow, Aaron Rogers. They get the Remandry at Stevenson Auto Gold Vinyl. That was pretty cool. Beautiful looking card. Sean Wright, we've got the rookies insert. Amanra, St. Brown, Lyons. Smith-Bahoko, Sam Darnold Hollow. Panthers. Leo Jones, Felipe Franks. Stevenson. Retro series, Sean Alexander. Seahawks. Chairman Kitty, we've got to 99. A Tarris Marshall Jr. on the Blue Raider Rookie Auto Panthers. Let's hit Panthers. There's Smith-Morset. Slash Pack, box one. We've got White Hot Rookie's Travis E.T. & Jr. Jax. We hit a Patch Auto Berry Sanders out of 25 out of the very first break. Nothing since then. PS2, Blue Raider Rookie, Simi Fahoko to 179. Pretty hard pulls. Zach Wilson, Aqua Triquan Smith 299. We've got Chris Carson Hollow. Tramacitty Rookie. There's Smith-Morset. Retro series, Rich Ganon Hollow. Raiders. We've got Red Justin Fields to 99. Bear! Another one. Wow. With a Blue and now a Red. Lowest number. Well, besides the Mills on the lime green. I would say on the top four quarterbacks that we've hit today. 6 of 99. Beautiful fields. We'll mag that one too for you. We've got Javante Williams. Purple Raider Rookie to 50. Jamar Chase. Goals Harper B. 3 out of 50. Heating up with some color for sure. Mag that one too. Terry McLaurin on the hollow. We've got Javante Williams. Rookie King's Velocity. That is really cool. You go Broncos on that. George Y. Not numbered on this one. It's a really cool looking one. Chabalcox. Diamond Brown on the rookies. Shelly, we've got Hunter Long on the pink Velocity to 79. Dolphins. Round Tree Blue to 179. Cam Acres. Ramps. PTN. We have JC Horn Hollow raider Rookie. Panthers. Trayvon Moerig. Got Dominators. Devontae Adams. Orange to 199. Jacob Harris. Ramps. Sean Wright. Aqua to 299. Heinz Ward. Steelers. JC Horn raider Rookie to 30. Jeremiah Owosu Kora Moa Browns on the pink Velocity raider Rookie Auto. You go Browns. Trevor Lawrence Rookie. Last pass box two. Bateman legendary logos. Derek Carr. Blue, Brennan Iuk to 179. Devontae Smith. Orange to 199. Dihawk. Cardinals. Tom Slater, Nelson Aguilore. Hollow. Fired. We've got Kellan Mond Rookie. Mack Jones raider Rookie. And Lyme Green. A Berry Sanders to 35. There you go, Lyons. Nice Lyon King for the Lyons. Tucker Blue. Fleepe Franks to 179. Falcons. Davis Mills. We've got Hollow. Rhonda Moore. Cardinals. Joseph Assai. This is Patrick E. T. on the rookies. Frank Newsome. We've got Aqua to 299. Jake Funk. Ramps. Warner Red to 99. Julio Jones. Titans. Longwood Ray Lewis Hollow. Ravens. Young, Frank Darby. Pretty Pay. Red Hot rookies, Najee Harris for the Steelers. Andre Siscoe. Rising Sun, CMC. Lil' Herbert. Aqua, Mark Andrews to 299. Ravens. Harris Marshall, Jr. Pink. Velocity, Jonu Smith. Patriots to 79. Bolton. We've got to 75. Rated Rookie Red. Diamond Brown for the Commanders. Washington. G. Pat Farmuth. Last Pack. Box 3. Kylin Hill. And Global Hollow. Amon Ross St. Brown. Lyons. Drew Sermon. Kyle Hitts. Great Series Rookie. Shai Smith. Orange, Ron Nelmore to 199. Cardinals. Alvin Joseph. We've got Silver. Circles to 125. Ian Book. Saints. Jalen Waddle. Got Hollow. John Riggins. Jess. Joe Montana. Alex Letterwood. Diamond Brown. We've got Red to 99. Robert Tonian. Packers. Chess Rat Blue to 179. Amon Ross St. Brown. Lyons. Amon Drew Stevenson. We've got to 50. Levi on Woosarrique on the Hollow Auto. Lyons. Woosarrique. Chris Evans. Newsome. Global Hollow of Nelson Aguilore. Raiders. Heart Long. We've got Aqua. Zach Wilson to 299. Jets. Nice hit. York. Jeffrey H. Some nice Wilson's so far today. We'll mag that one for you, Jeffrey. Congrats. Jacob Harris. Purple to 50. Patrick Queen. Nice color match there for the Ravens. Jake Fonk. Deontay Johnson. Hollow Steelers. Viva. Greg Russo. Kyle Hitts. Hollow. White Top. Rookie's. Jalen Waddle for the Dolphins. Jalen Darden. Orange to 199. Zach Cunningham. Texans. Eliza Mitchell. We've got Silver Circles to 125. Devon White. Bucks. Caleb Farley. Hollow. Red to Rookie. Devontay Smith. There you go, evils. Tannenel. Got Jamar Chase Rookie. Bangles. Last pass, box four. Steven Collins. And the Rookies. Inserts. Mack Jones. Just five. See another downtown. Got Jamar Chase Rady Rookie. Silver Circles to 125. Richie Grant. Falcons. Greg Russo. Chris Carson. Rollo. That's Kyle Hitts Rookie. Caleb Farley. Retro. Hollow. Vince Young. Titans. Pete Werner. We've got Aqua to 299. Joe Montana. Niners. Great Newsome. We've got to 99. Mack Jones. Hollow. The Rookies. Insert Auto Patriots. Boom. First Mack Auto of the day. Raquel B. Beautiful Mack Jones. Sam calls him Mack Daddy. Nice hit there. Heck yeah. It's about time we see some ink up in. Now we just need some tealaw ink. Green and longwood. Then I think we've seen all of them. Bill's Redemption. Got Legendary Logos. Hollow. Josh Allen. Bill's. We pay Raider Rookie. We've got My House Inserts of Jalen Hertz. And Aqua to 299. Derek Carr Raiders. Got Mack Jones Rookie. And Pink Velocity. Jamal Adams to 75. Seahawks. Santa Collins. Jamar Chase on the Raider Rookie. Hollow. No Bengals. Nice Hollow there. Trace Sermon. Great Iron Kings Rookie. Niners. Laundrie Stevenson. Frank Darby Blue. Raider Rookie to 179. Falcons. Evans. Orange to 199. Tyler Lockett. Seahawks. Leatherwood. Adams-Thelen Hollow. Trace Sermon Rookie. Hunter Long. Gifted Rookies. Tray Lance. Niners. Red to 99. Blake Martinez. Giants. Jay Funko. Blue. Jordan Poyer to 179. Bill's. Box 6. See you downtown on the last box. Cornell Powell. Kenny Galladay Hollow. Sheriff Patterson Rookie. Got Gibonte Williams. Great Iron Kings. Broncos. Najee Harris. Blue. Clinton Portis to 179. Redskins. Washington. Rodriguez Rique. Christian Barmore. Orange to 199. Trace Sermon. Blue. Michael Carter to 179. Jets. Grant. We've got Redemption. Good luck everybody. We've got Kyle Pitts. Rookie. Great Iron Kings Auto. First Pitts Redemption of the day. There you go. Falcons. Nice hit. Grant B. Here we go. All the Redemptions today have been paid. Hits. Fields. And Chase. All the Redemptions we've pulled today. Calvin Joseph. My House. Jalen Hurts. Eagles. Got Jalen Waddle. Aqued at 299. Rated Rookie. Tutu Atwell. Rams. Trumbull. Owosupora. Moa Hollow. Rated Rookie. Browns. Police Series Rookie. Jalen Phillips. Black Pandora. Daniel Hunter. To 25 Vikings. On the Black Pandora. Cadarius Tony. Orange. Payton Manning to 199. Colts. Ian Book. We've got Hollow. Ray Lewis. Ravens. Hilton. Eric Stokes. Kyle Trask Rader Rookie. We've got hollow legendary logos. Josh Allen. Bill. Jalen. Aqued at 299. Travis Kelsey. Chiefs. And last pack of the break. Truba Hubbard. And paint velocity. Joey B. Second year. There you go. Bangles. Nice way to end the break. 73 of 79. All right. Give me one second and we will do a recap here for you. We had CMC. Ferry Sanders. Daniel Hunter. Tutu Atwell. Elijah Molden. Christian Barmore. Rhonda Elmore. Jacob Harris. Michael Carter. Frank Darby. Amon Rossi Brown. Felipe Franks. Simi Fajoco. Richie Grant. Ian Book. Hunter Long. Kenneth Gainwell. Javante Williams. Rookie King. That's a cool card. Autos. Teres Marshall Jr. For the Panthers. Diamond Brown. Washington. Levi-Anne Wuzerike. Lyons. Awosukura Moa. Browns. We had the Gridiron Kings Auto. Redemption of Kyle Pitts. We have the Mack Jones to 99 for the Patriots. Jamar Chase. Hollow. Bangles. Aqua to 299. Jet Zach Wilson. Blue Justin Fields to 179. Bears. Red Justin Fields to 99. Bears. And then purple. Jamar Chase to 50. Another fantastic break. Thanks again everyone. We've got the last break of the daytime. Random division is coming up shortly.


All right, can you tell me who you are, sir? Yeah, good morning. I'm Lieutenant Colonel Mario Iglesias. I'm the product manager for the Bradley infantry fighting vehicle, and with the EO Ground Combat Systems here today, fielding the Bradley game force system. What can you tell me about the training that's been coming up, sir? Yeah, right now we're in the middle of doing the operational new equipment training for the Bradley crews, so we're going to learn about all the new capabilities and how to operate this new Bradley A4. And they can finalize that with a gunnery, and they'll be fully qualified to be the first unit in the Army to operate the A4. What makes these vehicles different or even better? Yeah, so there's a lot of different investments. The Army's made to make the Bradley continue to be able to grow and accept new technologies. The main difference that the units are going to see right away is the powertrain. The new engine we put in there, by significant amount more horsepower, there's new transmission. So a whole new powertrain to allow the vehicle to be much more maneuverable. As the vehicle's aged over the past decades, we've added an additional armor onto it. So now we need to give it additional engine power in order to make it so it can keep up with the other units and the AVs and the team, primarily the tank. The new Bradley A4 also has new power generation systems. So as we put new electronics in the vehicle, we've had to have more power distributed throughout the vehicle. Technology's gotten a lot better. The way we use power is a lot better. So as new Bradley can support a bunch of new survivability, like new counter-IDD technology that we've put on there, it's interesting in the future, new active protection systems, and new network capability. So that's a big part. Additionally, before the driver, we have a better viewer now. So there's, we call it driver viewing enhancement wide. So you can see a lot more wide for the road versus the passes a lot more narrow. Those are the main upgrades we put in there. There's a couple others, those are the main ones. Why does this matter, sir? It matters because our adversaries and our ability to defeat them are directly aligned to our soldier training and the technology we provide to them. The technology in this new A4 will make sure that it is a dominant infantry fighting vehicle for many years to come while we wait for home FV. This will give the capability to soldiers to ensure that they can maintain combat dominance. All right, sir, thank you very much. Thank you. Can you do a sign off, sir? Absolutely, yeah. This is Lieutenant Colonel Mario Blasius with the Bradley A4 Fielding. Sign off.


Alright, keep your place in Matthew chapter 6. So this evening in the Baptist basic series we're continuing that we're going to talk about the topic of fasting. We're going to talk about the topic of fasting. I don't know that I've actually heard a lot of sermons or maybe you know any full sermons at all on fasting, but fasting is definitely mentioned in the Bible many times and it's a tool that we have that we can use and many people in the Bible. We can't even, there's so many places in the Bible where people fasted, we can't even go through all the places in the Bible that talks about fasting. So I want to explore this idea of fasting this evening to a little bit of a Bible study on on the what the why the how of fasting and you know what it what it means. So look down at Matthew chapter 6 and look at verse number 16. The Bible says moreover when you fast be not as the hypocrites of a sad countenance for they disfigure their faces and that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you they have the reward, but thou when thou fastest anoint thine head and wash thy face, that thou that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy father which is in secret and thy father which seeeth in secret shall reward thee openly. So let's look at this idea of fasting this evening, see what it is, how we do it and what it means. First of all before I get into fasting I want to just give a little bit of you know the Bible actually has a lot to say about food in general you know the Bible has a lot to say on eating on eating food when you should eat what you should eat all these types of things like the Bible covers everything in our lives and I want to just look at a couple Bible verses on eating and food and that will kind of help us understand you know this idea of fasting a little bit more. Turn to Proverbs chapter 23. So before we get to the topic of fasting and we look at what fasting is why people did it in the Bible should we do it now and and how to do it if we should do it. Let's look at that this evening but let's look at at food first. Look at Proverbs chapter 23 and verse number two. The Bible says in Proverbs chapter 23 and verse number two it says I mean I love this verse here. The Bible says and put a knife to thy throat if thou be give a man given to appetite. So I mean the Bible here is saying he's first of all I mean this is the problem today or not okay I shouldn't even say it's the problem today we have plenty of problems okay but this is a big problem today especially in a country like ours where we're just we're blessed with so much abundance you know the there's there's there's not not you know there's not really a lack of food out there you know this is why a lot of Americans are so unhealthy that they're just you know they're unhealthy you know the Bible here is saying though it's such a serious thing it's like put a knife to your throat if you can't stop eating do anything you need to do it's basically saying to stop eating too much turn to Proverbs chapter 25 just a couple chapters over the Bible even speaks against eating too much sugar I mean imagine the specifics of that and look you know like it's birthday night so it's like once a month we actually we're doing birthday nights like every single night of church when we first started and we're just going to do it once a month because you know we want to have you know some control over you know the desserts in our lives right so have a piece of cake tonight okay don't let this sermon like ruin your evening and your your day tomorrow Proverbs 25 look at verse 16 the Bible says hast thou found honey and it says eat so much as is sufficient for thee lest thou be filled therewith and vomit it you know so the Bible here is it's not saying that that honey is bad it's not saying this sugar is bad it's just saying that if you eat too much it will literally make you sick all right and I look I got a funny story here so I was out fishing I was camping with Garrett when he was like I have his permission to tell this story so I was camping with Gary he was like five or six years old I think you're five or six right pretty young and we were out we were paddle fishing I don't know if you know what paddle fishing is but you basically it's where that there's a spot in North Dakota on the Montana North Dakota border where the Yellowstone River and the Missouri River they converge they come together and during a certain time of year paddle fish run up the river and they congregate in the convergence of these two of these two rivers where the rivers converge okay now the way you fish for paddle fish is totally stupid it's not even a sport as you put a like a big lead weight on a on a drop leader and with a with a big treble hook like this big about six inches up from the lead weight and you just throw this thing across the river again and again and again and you just rip this hook with this weight through the river by the time I would be done paddle fishing I would have bruises on both sides of my ribs from just ripping this weight in this treble hook through the water I've never caught a paddle fish in my life and I've gone like three years in a row and I'd be standing next to my sister who is half my size and she's catching 120 pound cat paddle fish every single year she casts half as far and and half as many times as I do I've never caught one it's the most frustrating thing ever I don't even like talking about it but anyway the second year I went Garrett was with me we were camping out and I was catching I was determined to catch a paddle fish okay so I put Garrett on the bank on the river and I'm out standing in the river paddle fishing and he's he's a little kid and I'm just like all right I gave him a bag of licorice and like a bag of cheetos and I'm just like here here you go you know and I went out and I paddle fish Ronald I could have been that long maybe an hour and I wasn't paying a lot of attention to him but he just sat there with this bag of cheetos and bag of licorice the whole time I was out in the river fishing and I turned around and to come out of the river and he's just covered in vomit you know he just he just and I'm like oh I'm the worst dad ever you know it's like one of those moments you know because he just he just sat there and just he just indulged in too much honey right he proverbs 25 16 himself right and I let him do it so the Bible here saying you know control your sugar intake don't eat too much sugar okay turn to Ecclesiastes chapter 10 the Bible even tells you you know when you should eat and why you should eat the Bible says so I mean the Bible tells us you know to not eat too much the Bible tells us to not be a glutton the Bible tells us you know not to eat too much sugar the Bible tells us when we should eat and for what reasons we should eat look at Ecclesiastes chapter 10 in verse number 16 so don't sit down and just eat like a whole bag of cheetos and and top it off with a bag of licorice all right Ecclesiastes chapter 10 in verse number 16 the Bible says woe to thee oh land when thy king is a child and thy princes eat in the morning blessed art thou oh land when thy king is the son of nobles and thy princes eat and do season for strength and not for drunkenness so the Bible here is saying look when when you have these princes that are just eating in the morning is like that you know woe to that land when you have leaders that are just you know they're just eating to eat for pleasure is basically what's going on here the Bible says and it says in the morning because in the morning nobody's done any work in the morning and in verse 17 it says it's a good land or you know it's a blessed land when the princes eat and do season that means they eat after they've they've done work after they've done something okay and why for strength they eat for strength and not for drunkenness look you should eat for strength after you've worked this is talking about how eating should go together with physical activity or physical exercise this is why you eat but look you can train your body to just eat all the time you can train your body to be hungry all the time last year at work this lady started bringing in this big bowl of candy into work and you know I don't know for whatever reason at two o'clock every single day I went and just grabbed a bunch of these little mini candy bars and those are worse than candy bars because you don't know how many you're eating and you know you eat and look you can train yourself and then I would just crave that at two o'clock every day I would just start to crave that those candy bars but you can train your body to to eat like all the time to be hungry all the time we'll talk more on this later but what just I mean just on a personal note you know as I get older I have found that the best way look I exercise look I exercise I work out on a regular basis by the way homeschooling we're homeschooling we're a homeschooling church here you know exercise and training your kids how to exercise should be part of your homeschooling curriculum okay the Bible talks about it eating properly and exercising you know the public school has PE class the public school has organized sports you say we play sports here we do physical activities here but look you should train your kids teach your kids how to have a regular exercise program our kids are required and we after you require it for a while they start to like it and it becomes a lifestyle for them but they exercise and we provide ways for them to exercise so many times a week every single week it's a lifestyle and that's how that's how your homeschooling curriculum should be you should have that in there okay don't leave any gaps in your homeschooling curriculum but look the personally I have found I exercise and you know I try to stay active and exercise is great it's important okay but the only real way that I have found to lose weight or to maintain weight is to stop eating it is that simple I you know during the week you say well you know weekends I give myself a break okay but during the week I eat once a day I eat once a day I do not eat breakfast and I do not eat lunch and you know what you can train your body to do that I don't even get hungry at lunch anymore I don't even get hungry at lunch and look you that you can also stop your sugar intake and stop that craving for sugar the first few days not going to that candy jar at 2 o'clock was rough but after that your body will will come off of it your body will you know and look and then you will just have immediate weight loss when you start doing this you know so look I mean another problem today is is just lack of physical activity on top of all this eating think of the men in the Bible think of the people in the Bible think of the disciples they were walking everywhere I mean they were walking everywhere constant exercise think of just Joshua we talked about on Wednesday I mean he's he's constantly fighting he's constantly serving I mean but look that the one thing that makes the difference for me personally if I want to lose weight is eating eat less lose weight eat more gain weight it's an energy balance it's very simple okay now the Bible talks about eating that's just a little primer what's talk about fasting let's talk about biblical spiritual fasting and then we'll tie these two thoughts together turn to Psalm chapter 35 fasting so fasting is I mean it's all over the Bible it's all over the Bible in the New Testament it's all over the Bible in the Old Testament people are doing it what does it mean turn to Psalm chapter 35 and look at verse number 13 Psalm 35 and verse number 13 and there's a ton of verses on fasting and we're not going to be able to get to them all either but I'll be able to get the point across at least but the Bible says in Psalm 35 13 but as for me when they were sick my clothing was sat cloth I humbled my soul with fasting just that's it right there okay that is the main point of fasting right there and it goes along with the clothing that you see everyone having you know when they're fasting as I humbled my soul with fasting and my prayer returned into my own bosom so fasting we see here in Psalm 35 is to humble yourself before God and fasting so you're using it to humble yourself before God it's the same thing as the clothing so sat cloth so everyone's in sat cloth and they put ashes on their head but they basically were sat cloth what's that it was like a potato sack think of you know you're basically taking off your nice clothing things that maybe might make you feel proud you know when I put a suit on and I you know it's you kind of feel like okay I'm ready to go somewhere and you know you could feel like you're somebody and all this but you're to humble yourself before God you put a potato sack on and you're like I'm nobody you're humble okay turn to Nehemiah chapter 1 and the main thing here so we see with the sat cloth and the fasting it's to humble your soul to humble yourself before God and then it goes hand in hand with prayer whenever you see somebody in the Bible or most times you see somebody in the Bible that is fasting they are either praying or they are getting ready to pray they're getting ready to go to God with something they're getting ready to you know bring something before the Lord okay there's a couple exceptions I'll bring up one of them a little bit later turn to Nehemiah chapter 1 Nehemiah chapter 1 and look at verse number 4 so Nehemiah fasted he fasted look at verse number 4 it says and it came to pass when I heard these words so Nehemiah he heard the state of Jerusalem he heard that all the walls were torn down and they were burned and that everything was terrible and it was not a good situation and he wanted to do something about it he wanted to do something about it came to pass when I heard these words I sat down and wept and mourned certain days and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven again it goes with prayer turn to Psalm chapter 69 turn to Psalm chapter 69 look something was wrong and something was really wrong most of the time that you see people fasting I mean it's a it's a very serious situation and somebody needs to approach God somebody needs to come and ask God something through prayer that's when you'll see fasting come in most of the time in the Bible look at Psalm 69 and verse number 10 the Bible says in Psalm 69 verse number 10 when I wept and chastened my soul with fasting that was to to bring low your soul once again the same thing humbling that was to my reproach I made sackcloth their sackcloth again also my garment and I became a proverb to them that they sit in it they that sit in the gate speak against me and I was the song of the drunkards but as for me my prayer there it is again is unto the award in an acceptable time oh God in the multitude of thy mercy hear me in the truth of thy salvation so fasting is a way to show humility when you come to it to God in a time of prayer so God will hear you so God will answer you in a positive way it's a way to show look it's a way to show your willingness to sacrifice the desires of the flesh it's a demonstration so to speak of your willingness to be obedient so you say I mean she say why why fasting why that one thing there's a lot of things you know in the flesh well first of all you know turn I mean just I don't really have this turn to why fasting research shows that hunger is one of the most powerful one of the most powerful urges that your flesh will ever have turn to Matthew chapter 4 Matthew chapter 4 so I mean it shows it's one of the most powerful human desires this desire of this this feeling of hunger studies have been done in animals that show animals will risk anything in order to you know in order to gain food when they're hungry okay but you know Jesus fasted to did you know that and Jesus fasted for an interesting reason look at Matthew chapter 4 right before right after his baptism and before Jesus was getting ready to go recruit everybody to go on on his on his on his his mission to go and begin his ministry Jesus and Matthew chapter 4 look at verse number one it says then Jesus let up the spirit let up of the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil this goes to show you the temptation that that feeling of hunger is the Bible says that Jesus went and he fasted 40 days and 40 nights and in Luke chapter 4 look I don't believe this was a supernatural event when Jesus went and fasted I believe that he actually went and fasted 40 days and 40 nights Luke gets more specific and says he ate nothing for 40 days you can go 40 days if you are a healthy individual without eating you can't go without drinking anything that's why I said he ate nothing I believe that this was not a supernatural event this was a that Jesus the man put his body his flesh through this why to be tempted of the devil because Hebrews chapter 4 says that he was that that like as us he was tempted at all things yet without sin so he went to be tempted of the devil to show that in an extreme case before he began his ministry in a very extreme case that he could still go without sin he could still go without sin so all that just to say that hunger is an extreme extreme feeling turn to 2 Kings chapter 6 I mean the Bible Eve's and tells us stories and I'm sure we've heard many stories you know throughout history of horrible situations that demonstrate the same thing that I'm going to show you in 2 Kings chapter 6 but people will literally commit murder over hunger 2 Kings chapter 6 look at verse number 26 the Bible says and as the King of Israel was passing by upon the wall there cried a woman unto him saying help my Lord oh King and he said if the Lord do not help me when shall I help thee out of the barn floor out of the wine press look they were they were in a famine they had no nothing to eat and the King said under her what illithy and she answered this woman said unto me give thy son that we may eat him today and we'll eat my son tomorrow so here here these two ladies they made a deal and this lady came up to this other lady and said let's eat your son today and then when we're done eating your son because we have nothing to eat we'll eat my son I mean they're talking about eating their own children look this is literal here so we boiled my son and did eat him and I said under her on the next day give thy son that we may eat him and she hid her own son so this lady she didn't you know she backed out of the bargain she's like we ate you know we ate your son and so I mean she's coming to the King imagine the situation she's coming to the King like look at this horrible injustice this woman did to us and the Kings like they're eating their children is what the King and it came to pass the King heard these words of the woman he rent his clothes and he passed upon the wall and the people looked and behold he had sackcloth within upon his flesh and he was already fasting because I'm sure they were all starving but people will literally murder over food if they get hungry enough so fasting fasting denying this powerful urge to yourself is a humbling situation it's humbling and it's designed to show God in times of prayer that you are willing to deny your flesh for him turn to 1st Corinthians chapter 9 it's a good thing to do to just to show God that you know what I'm I'm willing this is how serious I am I'm willing to be obedient I'm willing to deny myself to humble myself I mean the Lord loves the humble he hates the proud 1st Corinthians chapter 9 look at verse 27 you're willing to deny your flesh before you come to the Lord in prayer 1st Corinthians chapter 9 look at verse 27 the Bible says but I keep under my body and bring it into subjection lest that by any means when I have preached unto others I myself should be a castaway Paul here is talking about the denial of his flesh as a method to keep himself close to God okay he's talking about you know having self-control you know fasting is a demonstration of this it's a demonstration of your self-control to God so look it's a sign of humility and obedience we see that it's an outward demonstration turn to Matthew chapter 6 Matthew chapter 6 go back to Matthew chapter 6 it's an outward demonstration of obedience and humility to God but it is not to be and here's the trick and here's kind of the whole point or one of the main themes of Matthew chapter 6 that we just read it is not to be an outward demonstration to man and that's what Jesus was was ripping on in Matthew chapter 6 look at verse number 16 moreover when you fast be not as the hypocrites of a sad countenance for the disfigure their faces they may appear unto men to fast verily I sand you that they have their reward but thou and thou fastest anoint thine head and wash thy face that thou appear not unto men to fast not unto men to fast but unto thy father which is in secret and thy father which seeeth in secret shall reward thee openly so what are we doing we're praying right we're praying and we're asking God for something right when we're praying and we're in these extreme situations Nehemiah Esther Jehoshaphat you name it people in the Bible David that fasted and prayed and sackcloth they're asking God for something in a time of emergency especially in these cases and look they're asking for God to reward them with a positive answer here and God is saying this is this fasting you're supposed to do it in a way that you're not doing it to be spiritual to other people you're not supposed to come to church and be like you know maybe look fasting is something that people in the Old Testament New Testament it's available to you you should do it you should spiritually fast if you have something that is heavy on your heart a big decision in your life you should fast but I'm not going to come and tell you that you know I've got this big decision in my life and I'm fasting right now like when I was telling you I was fasting that's just that's fasting for health reasons and things like that when I fast spiritually that's between me and God I am not supposed to come to church and be like listen I got this big thing going on and I'm just I'm just I've been fasting for four days and you know you come to church and you're like you know you're like everybody's like what's wrong brother nothing I'm fasting and you know I'm super spiritual you know and you know it's an outward demonstration to men at that point and God says at that point good enough you know you've got your reward because as I come to church and I'm up here and I can hardly preach because I'm just like I'm so much more spiritual than all of you because I've been fasting for five days you know that's my reward because when you all think I'm awesome because of that you won't but when you all think that that's great God's just saying you know that's your reward right there your reward is that you know you went and bragged on how great and spiritual you were that goes for anything by the way you know they're trying to out spiritualize everybody else I mean look there's your reward right there okay I mean that's the whole thing the part of the theme of the beginning of Matthew chapter 6 was just doing all these outward things to be look at how spiritual I am but the Bible is saying that we have this it's something that we should use but keep it between you and God keep it between you and God it's that's what spiritual fasting not you and everyone around you I mean example there's a lot of examples of this today went you know when I was a Lutheran and Catholics the same thing you know it's everybody what did you give up for lent you know and I was just talking about what they gave up for lent and no one ever really gave it up anyway that I ever knew I'm sure some people do but it was just all about telling people what you gave up for lent you know or the oh man I used to work with this Jewish guy and this Jewish guy so you know you know as a as a Jew he became a religious Jew and he can't eat bacon and every single time we went to my wife is laughing because she knows every single time we go to dinner anywhere at any company event anything whatever this guy was just like is there bacon in this you know cuz you know I can't have bacon he just had to announce to everybody at the table that he can't eat bacon he asked one time if there was bacon and mashed potatoes and I'm like man who puts bank I said this I was like who puts banking and mashed potatoes you know Ash Wednesday you know everyone walking around with the cross on their forehead it's the same thing it's the same thing you have your reward you're doing things to be seen of men God's not interested in that God here is giving you some tools he's giving you some tools look prayers a tool that we have we can go in a closet and we can meet with God we only have one mediator Jesus Christ we can go and we can just meet with Jesus anytime we want that's a tool this is like a this is like a bolt-on you know extension of the tool is what it is it's like a it's like a lever you know on the wrench think of it that way but it's between you and God nobody else turn to Isaiah chapter 58 Isaiah chapter 58 and it matters it matters if you do it for the wrong reasons or you do it to be seen of men it's of no effect it's of no benefit to you so why would you do that Isaiah chapter 58 look at verse number three people fasting for the wrong reasons you can see this in the Bible as well Isaiah chapter 58 look at verse number three the Bible says wherefore have we fasted say they and thou see us not wherefore have we afflicted our soul and thou take us no knowledge behold in the day of your fast you find pleasure and exact all your labors behold you fast for strife and debate and to smite with the fist of wickedness you shall not fast as you do this day to make your voice to be heard on high is it such a fast that I have chosen a day for man to afflict his soul that's he's saying that's what it's for to afflict your soul is it up to bow down his head as a bull rush and to spread sackcloth is it is it to bow down his head as a bull rush and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him what they'll call this a fast and acceptable day to the Lord is not this the fast that I have chosen to loose the bands of wickedness to undo the heavy burdens and to let the oppressed go free that you break every yoke is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry and to the bring the poor that are cast out to the house when they'll see us the naked they'll cover him when they'll hide us not thyself from thine own flesh these people are fasting for the wrong reasons here they're doing it the wrong way you know in the day of their flat fast they they find pleasure and in and they're exacting all their labors they're not they're not fasting for the Lord they're fasting for the wrong reasons with the wrong heart so your motives matter and the Bible says in Matthew chapter 6 these people they have the reward they have the reward so you know in conclusion you know tonight you know fasting is biblical it's something that we should do it's something that it's a tool that you should use in your life so you say how do I do it how do I fast well I mean you know let me just give you some examples of spiritual fast turn to Daniel chapter 10 I mean first of all you could just not eat for 24 hours that that's a that's a decent fast not eating anything for 24 hours if you're not used to doing that that will be a challenge for you it will be a sacrifice for you to do that to not eat anything for 24 hours 48 hours it can be done okay I mean so you could I mean but when you when you set a fast to yourself keep it private and follow through on it you know I mean it's I mean think about it you're trying to show your own I mean just think about the silliness of this for a second okay you're trying to and my wife and I kind of you know she she knows when I'm fasting and I know when she's fasting obviously not to to you know impress each other or whatever but because we're living together you know and you know she's cooking the meals and and I'm seeing her and I'm like let's go to dinner and she's like I can I'm like oh man but I mean you know the point is is that it's a it's a challenge it can be a challenge too too fast but just think of the silliness of declaring okay I'm praying about something I have a bad situation in my life or I have a big decision coming up that's another good one I have a big decision I don't want to make the wrong decision okay I need God's help on this so I'm gonna fast I'm gonna fast for 48 hours I'm not gonna eat anything for 48 hours I'm gonna drink water but I'm gonna do that and then you're just like you get like hour 12 and you're like man I need a in and out double double right now and you just go have it okay think of the think of the silliness of that you basically told God that you're gonna show him that you're gonna be obedient and you're gonna come to him with a request you're gonna come to him with a request and then you're just gonna just back out of everything you know of your side of the bargain that you made in that case it doesn't make any sense you would be better off not doing it you would be better off not doing it in Daniel chapter 10 Daniel did a partial food fast okay look at Daniel chapter 10 so you could just not eat anything for a day I mean that that's a that's a decent fast Daniel chapter 10 look at verse number two the Bible says in those days I Daniel was mourning three full weeks and I ate no pleasant bread neither came flesh or wine in my mouth neither did I anoint myself at all till three whole weeks were fulfilled so Daniel just he put off in this case he put off you know good food he put off the the king's type food the meat whatever something it was a sacrifice for him and he did it he did that sacrifice for three weeks but look the bottom line is you know make the commitment and follow through on it is the key with fasting okay turn to Esther chapter 4 here's another one it's just a complete fast like eat or drink nothing eat or drink nothing now you make your own you know decisions on on these things but what I'm telling you is you know follow through on the fast that you decide to take Esther chapter 4 she was going to go and she was going to approach the king Esther was going to risk her life for the people okay so she was going to go and she was asking people to pray for her she's like hey pray for me you know go to God for me that I may you know be successful in this case that the king may not kill me look at verse number 16 and she says this she says go gather all the Jews that are present in Shushan and fast ye for me and neither excuse me neither eat nor drink three days night or day I also in my maidens will fast likewise and so I go in under the king which is not according to the law and if I perish I perish of course this famous verse there but she's saying she's saying have all the people eat or drink nothing for three days now that look that that's an extreme one okay that's an extreme one Paul took the same one in Acts chapter 9 when Paul was blinded in the Bible says he ate or drank nothing for three days I mean I mean imagine I mean he's beseeching God I mean he just he just met Jesus on the side of the road and Jesus blinded him and you know he ate or drank nothing for three days like Paul knew what a fast was he was a religious Jew now I mean you drinking nothing for three days is extreme you ever heard of the rule of three the rule of three like if you ever you know read a survival book or something you know the rule of three is this you can go you know what is it you can go three minutes without air you can go three days without food and you go three weeks without water no I'm sorry you go three days without water and you go three weeks without food but I mean you know and you could go longer than three weeks obviously Jesus went forty days forty nights which is possible but I mean that's a general rule of thumb so three days as Esther did without eating or drinking anything that you know that's extreme okay I wouldn't necessarily recommend that one but the point is you know choose a fast there's lots of different types of fast choose something that is a sacrifice to you and follow through on it here's another thing you can do here's another thing you can do you can fast look you can fast from other things there's there's the Bible talks about in Exodus chapter 19 the Bible talks about in 1 Corinthians chapter 7 of fasting from you know fasting from a relationship with your spouse you know the Bible you know talks about you know with consent by the way you know with consent for a time all right but it just it just means what the point is the same is that you are denying the flesh for a certain period of time to humble yourself and to approach God for a request that's what you're doing okay so let me just tie it all together here you know we started out with some biblical advice on food you know but and then we talked about the reasons for spiritual fasting how you could spiritually fast it's something like it's something I we don't talk about it a lot and you know I I don't know if if you all fast or you don't but look you should and and if you're praying and especially if you're praying for something important or you know something coming up you should fast you know you should proclaim a fast to God it's it's available to you okay it's very very biblical it's very biblical but look here's an interesting thing that I just want to close with this evening the rules and the concepts in the Bible as with look they are almost they're always if it's a command in the Bible you say okay these are commands about they're always good for us they're always good for us fasting is a powerful spiritual tool that we can use but it's a way to humble ourselves before God it's an outward demonstration to God it you know and it should be done you know with humility between you and God but look as with all other things just think about fornication and drunkenness and just sin in general if you follow God's commands on these things it's literally good for you physically I mean that's the the beauty of the the body and then you know this is becoming kind of a trendy thing like this intermittent fasting you know he's starting to be the new trendy type of diets you're starting to see it turn to Proverbs chapter 23 but there's a lot of health benefits to you know intermittent fasting which is basically what you know fasting in the Bible is about it's not like you fast forever look at Proverbs chapter 23 in verse 21 the Bible says for the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty and this is really interesting and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags so the Bible here is comparing somebody who's a glutton because look science will tell you the same thing that somebody who's a glutton you know what they're gonna do they're gonna be tired all the time you know what happens when you eat too much you get tired I mean don't you have that I mean you eat a bunch of turkey at Thanksgiving and you eat way too much food and everyone just takes a nap afterwards everyone falls asleep you know what happens when you fast you know what happens when you stop eating too much you gain energy you gain energy I told my wife when I started doing like that intermittent fasting and I started you I mean I just felt like a different person I mean it was crazy I mean it was a you don't see a lot I mean you know we take vitamins and we do all these things but I haven't done too many things in my life that it made such a big difference as that it's just it was a super big change but look even I looked up health calm here's some here's some scientific things that just eating less intermittent fasting will do for you blood sugar control it'll boost your immune system I mean hello blood pressure it'll fix blood pressure problems heart health heart disease kills I don't know everybody I mean heart disease is a huge problem in the United States it improves brain function I'm still waiting for that one it boosts metabolism like it just makes everything better so not only are you eating less but your metabolism gets gets higher that's why you lose weight so fast and then here's a really I've solved a huge mystery here I've solved a huge mystery look at increases HGH and testosterone like 5x after two days you start inner intermittent fasting and testosterone and HGH human growth hormone increase especially in men after two days I mean this is the main reason I'm convinced of it that men have less testosterone than they did you know if you ever heard the you know read the article you are half the man that your grandpa was I mean literally testosterone is dropping like 1% in men in the United States every single year it's ridiculously scary it's just it's because we don't exercise and we eat garbage that's what it is mystery solved but look this is I mean this is the reason that you know it slows aging it prevents cancer there's a whole slew of other things but I made up one on my own okay I mean I mean I felt so much better I'm gonna continue doing it as long as you know as long as I can but look here's the thing maybe God who designed this thing this body that we're living in was actually on to something when he gave us all this advice on how to eat when to eat what to eat you know how much sugar to eat you know you know what a lot of people in 2020 died from not to get into it but they died from a lifetime of gluttony is what they died from you know mankind I mean I mean just think of the mankind thinks that we can just go through this life and do whatever we want for decades and there's gonna be no consequences I mean it's you know we can live however we want we can deny ourselves nothing whatever I feel at the moment I'm gonna have that that's that's where we're at in this country and there will be no consequences to anything that that's never gonna be true no matter how people think you know it should be true that is never going to be true ever but let me add number you know the what let me add one more at the end of the list it is good for us it is good for us in general to learn to deny the flesh that is good let's say you pray you pray every day but you know every two weeks you have something that you have you know you it's real serious or it's a bigger concern you know if you put in fasting into your you know more serious prayers or however you want to implement in your life look that's gonna be good for you that's gonna be good for you spiritually that's gonna be good for your relationship with the Lord and look that is gonna be good for you physically and it's gonna be good for you spiritually in the sense that it will give you training in denying the flesh that's gonna give you all kinds of training to deny the flesh because look what did Jesus choose what did Jesus choose to be tempted of the devil he chose hunger why did because it's such a powerful feeling it's such a powerful fleshly desire if you can learn to control that one I think you got a chance at controlling sin in your life you're gonna deal with this flesh your whole life on this earth as long as you're living on this earth you're gonna have temptations and these fleshly desires you might as well get good at controlling it and this is a good way to do it it's a good way to do it just it's such a great example of how things in the Bible things that God puts in place for us are just they have so many other benefits that we don't even think about so I mean fasting it's a it's a it's an outward denial of the flesh it humbles us before God when we come to God in prayer but look it's a good thing to do in your life in general and it will just give you so many benefits in your life all right let's have some cake let's pray


There are more fibrous proteins. The next one I'm going to show you is elastin. So elastin reminds, it reminds us a little bit of collagen, but where collagen is very strong elastin you can probably almost guess from the name what it contains. So elastin has a property of forming the actual, the amino acids backbones are relatively short or yes, compared to collagen and you would have lots of chains and then these chains are, they form crosslinks because they contain, these chains contain lysines, well whatever something like this. So they're normally curled up and then you have lots of small crosslinks between them. Lysine itself that's a charged amino acid typically and lysine would not crosslink but lysine there's called lysyl oxidase and then you have an extra molecule between the two chains that helps create this link. It's beyond the protein part of the course, but the whole idea is that you have something that's almost spring-like here and quite flexible and then we have small, think of them as more rigid rods between them. Now what happens if I take this entire structure and pull it? If you pull it the whole idea is that I'm not going to change the crosslinks but these structures that were previously curled up they can now take almost this form right? So they're going to be stretched out and in principle it can be significantly longer than it was before. So this creates an elastic structure that there is also the built-in tension here, I can stretch it and when I let go of it it's going to go back to its previous form. So with tension I'm going to extend it and when I let go of the tension it will relax back to its previous form. That creates a number of structures such as blood vessels in your body because our blood vessels in particular when you, well you are young, I'm not anymore, when you're young these are very elastic structures and they have to be elastic just because with every single heartbeat we're changing the pressure quite a lot in the blood vessels but then we gradually get older. Well in principle what mostly happens is not so much the blood vessel changing but what happens is that we're depositing calcium and fat and other things on the inside that gradually harden up the vessels. It's not the blood vessels per se that become stiff but all the deposits on the inside which eventually lead to coronary heart disease then later. But there are other things not necessarily related to age. What if the agent that created these cross-links, two license will not spontaneously cross-links, you needed those enzymes right? So what if you develop a deficiency in those enzymes for whatever reason? Well if you have a deficiency in those enzymes we're not really going to create as many bonds between these walls anymore and then you might have blood vessels that rupture and that can in worst case lead to an aorta rupture which is something that is probably way about 50% lethality if it happens outside a hospital at least. So this is potentially dangerous, it's potentially very severe diseases and it's something we would like to get better at treating. The other aspect is that all these blood vessels of middle age to elderly people like me what if we could somehow treat this? What if you need a bypass surgery in a few decades? What we try to do today is we try to take blood vessels from your thigh or something but those blood vessels are not necessarily in a whole lot better shape it's just we take them because they're compatible with your body. What if we could make an artificial blood vessels because again that these are just amino acids in theory we should be able to express these in bacteria. That's actually what the part on the right here is that is an artificial elastin like molecule where you create a something that's based on amino acids so again it's biocompatible but it's engineered it's man-made. There are there are other challenges with this they will they might wear out eventually you would ideally like the body to somehow start filling this in with its own cells. That starts to come with bioregeneration and everything and there have been a number of scandals in this area. Polo Macharini was one of them but the promises for this field are great. I think we will become better and better doing this with technology but make no mistake it's not easy and think of this as research hopes we're still not doing this regularly yet but in contrast to say material science or something the advantage of doing this with proteins is that we will always have materials that are inherently biocompatible. They should not set off your immune defense which is a huge advantage so that's elastin. I'm going to move over to the last fibrous protein we're going to be looking at which is keratin.


Star trails are the very best first project for someone new to astrophotography and in this video I'm going to show you everything that you need to do to capture and process both star trails photos and star trails time lapses like this and we're going to do this completely on your iPhone so let's jump right in the only things you'll need physically are an iPhone I'm using the iPhone 13 in this video but any iPhone will work and some kind of tripod or other way to keep the iPhone very steady while we're taking the pictures of the stars in this video I'm using a little smartphone clamp attached to my normal tripod but I've also had great success with a $12 generic smartphone tripod that I got off of Amazon so you don't have to spend a lot of money on this project that one worked great what I liked about the design of this cheap one that I got is I can put it anywhere and travel with it very easily I've tried placing it on my car on a table on a trash bin the only thing is since it's not very tall it's probably not the best tripod to use on the ground and that's it for physical items all you need is your iPhone with a fully charged battery and some space and the tripod that you can put your iPhone on in the digital realm we need a few different apps and a couple of those do cost a few dollars to download but I think it's well worth it for what they can do they're not subscription based it's one time fee and then you have them forever so let's go through the apps one by one the first app is Stellarium mobile it is free and what it does is it puts a planetarium right on your phone we'll use it to find the celestial pole which I'll explain a bit later the second app is nightcap camera this one costs 2.99 at the time of recording and if you're all interested in astrophotography on the iPhone nightcap camera I think is the one app to get we can create basic star trails images with just this app but it's also going to do a bunch of other stuff the third app is star stacker it costs 3.99 it is optional it's only needed for the complex workflow that I'll go through but I do recommend it because it gives us more control when creating the star trails images and it also gives us that option to turn our star trails into a time lapse video which I just think is really cool the fourth and final app is snap seed this app is free and it's my personal favorite app for editing astrophotography or any other kind of photography on a phone with it we can control things like the contrast and saturation in our photo very easily and this will allow us to put our final touches to taste on the photo okay with all of those apps downloaded the next step is to get outside on a clear moonless night and the final result is going to be better the darker your sky is so if you know of a park or even just a country road where it gets really dark that's ideal I'm now going to show you how to capture the star trails and I am filming this during the day so that you can clearly see what I'm doing but of course when you really do this you'll want to do it at night okay the first step is to open Stellarium and when you hold it up and move the phone around you'll you can see what stars are visible in whichever direction your phone is pointed and for your first star trails project I suggest that we point at the celestial pole all the stars in the sky appear to move around this point because it's the axis of rotation for our earth and that is what star trails are they're the visual evidence of the rotation of the earth so to find the celestial pole in the night sky in the northern hemisphere it's quite easy you can just click the search up here at the top type in Polaris which is a bright star very close to the northern celestial pole and then you just follow the arrow until you are lined up with Polaris it's at the end of the little dipper in the southern hemisphere there is no bright star close by unfortunately but you do have a constellation that is close to the pole called octans so you can type in octans O C T A N S and it will point you in the right direction so now we have to set up the iPhone so that it's pointing physically at the celestial pole and we'll stay put so you're just going to take your tripod here and I'm going to do mine horizontal rather than a vertical photo for me I think it looks better that way but of course it's up to you you might feel differently you're just going to put the phone into the clamp like that make sure it's not touching any buttons and just make sure it's nice and stable and then you're just going to point it up at the stars and lock it all down pointed at the celestial pole next we'll open up nightcap camera app and I'm going to show you the capture part in two different ways this first way is easier but the results are not quite as good but they're still excellent and we also can't turn this first method into a video the other advantage to this method the simple method is it doesn't take up a lot of space on your phone we're just going to end up with one star trails picture in the end so if you want an easy method go for this one it's still very satisfying believe me but for people that are willing to spend the four dollars on the star stacker app and also are okay with a bit more complexity stay tuned because in just a couple minutes we'll get to the more complex way to do this but first the easy way with the easy way all you have to do is open nightcap camera tap this star icon in the lower corner and turn on star trails mode you then will just tap on the screen where the stars are where the night sky is and allow nightcap to automatically set the focus and exposure level and when it's focused you should see little pin points of light like this and it will lock the focus there so you don't have to worry about it and then just press the shutter button right here it will count down and then turn solid red that's on you know it started and then all you have to do is just watch the star trails image will be created live right on screen just make sure not to bump the tripod and I would suggest waiting at least 30 minutes this is what it'll look like after 30 minutes but an hour would be even better to get longer trails when you're done just press the red button to stop and that's it exactly what you saw on screen will be saved as a photo on your phone okay next I'm going to go into the complex method but if you're not interested in that and just want to skip to the editing portion with snap seed you can hover over the video and there will be chapters allowing you to easily skip ahead to that part so I'm going to show you this more complex method next but before I do I want to share a bit about this video's sponsor Skillshare Skillshare is where I go when I want to learn some new skill or some new pieces software right now one of my goals is to learn blender and so the reason is I want to make these 3d fly-throughs of astrophotography I had an old workflow using photoshop and after effects that I think can be made much better if I actually learn 3d software so I've been sampling the different blender courses on Skillshare and one thing I like is that there are several different instructors so you can find one that gels with your learning style I'm currently taking your first day in blender 3d by southern shoddy 3d and learning a lot about how to get around in blender learning how the toolbar works and how the different layouts work in the timeline and all this different stuff that I need to know so if you'd like to try Skillshare I have a special offer just for you the first 1000 people to use the link in the description we'll get a one month free trial of Skillshare okay in the more complex method instead of being in star trails mode we want to change that to stars mode and then we want to tell it to turn on the interval timer so that's in this gear icon right here we want to turn on the interval programmer and this both both of these right here make sure this is set to five seconds we want this one set to take photos for infinity exposure should be set to five seconds and if you want to do a countdown to start you can set that right there okay and then the only other choice in here is we want to choose tiff high quality jpeg or jpeg and this depends on how much storage space you have on your phone and how much you want to use up because this method is going to take lots of individual photos you know hundreds and so I have lots of room on my phone so I'm going to choose tiff but if you didn't have much room on your phone you could choose jpeg okay then we can close the settings by just tapping the gear icon again and now we're going to set focus and exposure by just tapping on the sky and wait for it to find the stars and focus on them and now we're all ready to go so we can just go ahead and click the shutter button and it will count down and then start taking pictures and we ideally want to let this go for at least an hour the longer the better if you are worried about battery life leaving your phone out in the cold that long you can hook up a power bank ahead of time when it's all done we are going to open the star stacker app and the way this one works is you're going to start by tapping on this little pictures icon in the upper left this lets you pick your pictures so this is a little tricky but what you want to do is just sort of drag your finger over the pictures like this and then drag down faster and it'll allow you to pick lots of pictures at once so I'm just going to keep dragging down until we have all of these pictures of the stars selected this will take a little while because we took several hundred pictures this is another advantage of this method if you've made a mistake in any of your pictures like I did here with this one you can see I had my red light on in front of the camera which is a mistake and I don't want to include that in the final stack all I have to do is unselect it and not pick that one and then I can continue selecting more pictures after that so that's another advantage of the flexibility of this method is if anything they don't like happens while capturing you can just unselect those pictures okay there we go I'm done I've selected all my pictures I took one thousand nine hundred and twelve pictures of the stars all in a row it took a few hours to collect that many then I'm going to click add okay up at the top it says checking this will take a while since we're using so many pictures we'll just give it some time let it do its thing and then it says ready for stacking so to actually stack the pictures what we want to do is click up on this stacking icon this has all the options for stacking and I'm just going to do trail style full I'm going to do the full resolution I'm going to turn warp mode off and I'll click start and then this will take a while with this many pictures you know it depends on both the number of pictures that you have put in and the speed of your iPhone I guess but you can see mine here is going in real time right now and it's saying two three four so it'll take a few minutes to stack them all but just like what we were seeing in nightcap camera a fun thing about the stacking process here in this app is you can watch it stack live and it gives you a live update of what it's doing but I'm going to speed this part of the video up okay so we went through stacking just a picture but now let me show you what to do if you want to create the video because this app does have a limitation and that it doesn't seem to like to select for you to select too many images when you're making a video so I'm just going to select the first 200 here and I'm going to turn the video on to stacked leave all the rest of the stuff alone click start okay and then we can click the export button and choose movie and if it worked you should see this save video option right down here if it gave a corrupted file you won't see that save video option so then just try fewer input images but I found 200 is safe so I'm going to click save image and now if I look at my videos I can see there it is now if I wanted to do a longer animation than this a longer time lapse what I could do is just delete those first 200 images select the next 200 and make another video and then with all of and then just keep going like that in batches and string them together in iMovie which is free on your iphone and if that sounds too annoying yet another way to make the animated time lapse video is just to make a screen recording of your iphone as the star stacker app is doing this stacking of all 1900 photos that I took and then what I can do since I have this screen recording is just click edit on the screen recording and crop down the video to just that portion right there portion of the screen done and then you have and then you can trim the video down to just the part where it's going and you have a finished time lapse video it'll be a little bit low resolution but perfectly good for a phone so or sharing on social media so that's an even easier way to make the time lapse okay and then the last step in creating our star trails image is editing and we're going to use snap seed to do this so simply open snap seed click open open from device and pick your image there we go then click down here to tools and choose tune image the very first option and then you can see that top one up there right now says brightness so if I go left or right it turns up and down the brightness I'm going to leave brightness alone but I'm going to take my finger and scroll up and if I scroll up I can see all the different options here in tune image so I'm just pushing my finger up and down on the screen to get to different options I'm going to go to saturation and I'm going to bring saturation way up now I could bring it all the way up to 100 I think that looks pretty cool to see the different star colors but I'm going to do something a little bit more understated and do maybe plus 50 or plus 60 okay and you can play around with some of these other ones ambience and highlights and so forth to alter the image to your taste now I think it already did a pretty good job with the star the natural star colors so I wouldn't necessarily want to mess around with warmth unless you were going for just a fantasy image but if you actually want to see the natural star colors don't mess around too much with the color temperature just mess around with saturation and contrast and things like that all right I think that looks good so I'm going to hit actually let me show you one more thing if you just tap and hold you can see before and then if you let go it shows you the after so it's sort of a subtle change but I think it looks really nice like that so I'm going to go ahead and click this little check mark down in the lower right hand corner and then click export and export a copy so now if I look in my photos there's my final star trails image which I think looks really good well I hope this star trails tutorial was helpful and I hope to make ones like this for android phones and maybe DSLR users in the future so let me know in the comments if you have any questions till next time this was Nico Carver, Nebula Photos, Clear Skies