Coming up on DTNS. We look back at our 2022 predictions, which came true and which ones were mine This is the Daily Tech News show for Thursday December 29th, 2022 in Los Angeles. I'm Tom Merritt in studio, Colorado I'm Shannon Morse From the Atlanta area. I'm Nico Moncord and in Philadelphia. I'm Stephanie Humphrey And I'm the show's producer Roger Chang folks. Welcome to the DTNS holiday week 2022 predictions results episode where we look back on the predictions we made about technology all the way back a year ago in December 2021 and See how they actually turned out How's everybody feeling about your predictions as we as we get ready to to see how we did I'm gonna say 50-50 I'm not feeling too good at all I Got to stay positive Listen, I Like doing this because it holds our feet to the fire not enough people do this So I appreciate that all of you were willing to come and and say, you know what? Let's let's see what I said. Let's let's evaluate how we did It's not that you'll get it wrong. Everybody gets them wrong. It's when you get it, right That that's what makes it worth doing it. That's the beauty part. Exactly All right, let's start with you Shannon your first prediction that will cover was that Google would release a wear OS smartwatch Using their own hardware such as tense or and or they're tighten them to chipset So I would say technically I was incorrect They did release a wear OS smartwatch and it was made with their own hardware But the chipsets that they chose were not their own hardware They actually went with a Samsung Exynos 9110 as well as a core to cortex a 53 cores So the internals were not Google But the rest was I think we give it to her. What do y'all think I? Mean are we doing like half points? Can we do partial credit? I'm looking at the fact that she said we'll release a wear OS smartwatch using their own hardware such as She left a little wiggle room there. That was a suggestion. So you were technically right, I guess Yeah, all right. All right. We're giving you the point. You get it. Thanks. I appreciate that point What about this one late 2022 we'll see Google start teasing a foldable Android phone, but it won't release until 2023 Okay, this one's fun because in just like the past couple of weeks or in the last week We've started to see leaks of renders and dimensions of a pixel fold phone So we have an idea of what it looks like, but these are leaks So I don't necessarily know if Google has you know leaked these to the press Or if this is something that people have internally like kind of gotten through other means And we also don't know if these are factually correct yet But we we do know that Google has announced that they're going to be making a foldable in 2023 so that is something that we can look forward to but so far Google has not Specifically said like yes, this is what it looks like. So yeah, we've seen leaks and that's about it But I am I'm very excited given that this has just happened in like the last week. Yeah You're making it under the wire there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know about this one though because you said they would tease it Yeah, I don't know if the leak counts as a tease. I don't think it counts Personally since it could it could be incorrect like we do not know specifically yet So I would say don't give me that point I'll be honest to myself Yeah, I mean, I guess if it's all kind of based on rumor and speculation you can't really say Yes Google's not actually releasing or teasing. So I Think we we may have to say no on this one. Yeah, here's the thing We you know pulling back the veil we do record this before the the actual absolute end of the year We give her a provisional zero Because we still have time they're still time. Yeah That's true. I mean they could come out with a confirmation on their Twitter account That's usually where they come out with leak confirmations So I'm definitely gonna be keeping tabs on it because you know if these if the specs are correct is looking pretty cool Yeah, I'm pretty excited about it. We'll update the show notes or run a scroll or something All right news Yeah, your last one here is log for shell will lead to several data dumps and leaks in 2022 from vulnerable servers that attackers were actively targeting before the patches became available This this was correct So we did have for example the cyber security and infrastructure security and agency or CISA here in the United States They even came out with information back in July saying that like 130 gigs Of data was stolen via these log for shell Vulnerabilities through VM where horizon so VM where horizon was the really big one that people were talking about over the summertime but there were also unpublicized leaks and Information internally with businesses that I don't necessarily have access to but I know happened That that included data leaks that happened from log for shell But given that that information isn't necessarily public The one that I'm gonna stick with will be the VM where horizon one that was a really big one So it has been a major issue and it continues to be a problem to this day Log for shell is still a vulnerability that a lot of companies have not patched Yeah, but given patches are now available The prediction that I gave in this video Was correct it indeed came correct within the first couple of months of 2022 So how are we feeling we giving her the point give her the point. Yeah. Yeah, I mean even if this is a little bit like saying You know the basketball is arcing towards the basket and you're like I'm gonna make that shot like you know This is this is a hard one to get wrong But if Michelle had started I believe in Like Q4 of 2021 so we already knew it was gonna be a problem and then it kind of expanded from there So, yeah, it was a it was a good one for me to put in there. It was a strong one. Yeah It was strategic prediction predicting, right? You get points for that if nothing else All right, Stephanie, you ready to go for yours? All righty, let's go First one you made was we will see another even more catastrophic AWS outage I I don't know that I can get maybe partial credit for this maybe yeah, cuz there were some outages There were some outages. I mean I was thinking back to the one that happened back last December that like yeah Completely obliterated so much, you know so many different Services, so I don't think we've seen something to that magnitude But we've definitely seen some fairly major outages specifically this month. There was something in Ohio In the eastern region that that affected AWS for about an hour and a half almost so You know, I'm happy to not take this point if that means that we have not seen You know outages on the level of last December, so you know, but but we've seen them So yeah, I mean that that's kind of inevitable But but I'm happy to not to not take this point considering we haven't seen anything as bad as as what happened last year But in your prediction, you did not say that it had to be as bad. You just said kind of straw Like what what to find it says even was that even more catastrophic? So so I think I was going off even more worse than than last year So I mean, I'm happy to I'm happy to be wrong about this one. I'm just gonna leave that one there I'm happy to be wrong. I feel like if you had just said we'll see another AWS outage You do you get a whole point? Oh, yeah, even more Yeah, do we give her a half? Yes. Yeah, I'm gonna say a partial credit. All right. Yeah, we'll do that Your second one was a couple got married in the metaverse. There will be more metaverse relationships divorce, I think I should get a point for this one. We're definitely seeing the rise of You know platforms and spaces in the metaverse where people can can meet and meet up and get married Marriage is still not technically legal in the metaverse, but people are having ceremonies there and you know It's become an entire industry. So I I think this one kind of has has panned out pretty well Yeah, and you put a question mark by that divorce that was not part of the prediction And that was just a kind of a bonus thought There so yeah, that would have been extra credit if that came to you, right Right. There's even like international marriages going on. I've seen yeah, right where people get married by zoom So that they they could so that they are they're able to get married even though They're not in the place where the licenses or something. I can't remember all the details But there's all kind of different things happening now And you know now people need a software engineer in addition to a wedding planner And and it's just it's become this entire industry, you know So it'll be interesting to see going forward if I guess, you know I'm not making predictions for next year But it'll be interesting to see if we find a way to make these marriages somehow legal because they are Sort of cementing or officiating the marriage through yeah and blockchain now It's still not the same as actually being married legally in any particular state But it'll be interesting to see how they make these legal if if if that's possible Yeah, as I understand it you have to do the paperwork for the marriage still the license and everything that Additional way and then you could have your ceremony in the metaverse because nobody really cares about the ceremony as well Right. Yeah. Yeah. All right. All right. Yeah, full point for that one Shannon. Nika. Yeah, I would say yeah Yeah, I think so. All right, all right Then the final one Apple introduces hardware that finally makes VR cool slash mainstream Now if we go off of finally makes cool mainstream Then maybe we don't get the point but you know, we are you know Apple is introducing a headset The date keeps getting moved. Yeah all over the place for next year. So I think the latest is is later on in the year 2023 Will it make VR cool and mainstream? I don't know about that just because I think the potential price point is still going to be out of reach for so many people It's looking to be around $2,500 for this for this thing. So I don't think that makes it Mainstream for anybody even the the biggest Apple aficionados That that price point is just too high to make this something that is gonna see massive adoption When it comes out next year, this is where we need rollover predictions. Yeah Cuz Apple hasn't introduced anything yet. So so you know like you you haven't got the details You haven't got the things Apple itself has not said a thing about this, right? You do investors, right? But I bet by the end of next year you'll be able to point to this and say nailed it, right? It just it was just they didn't make the deadline They didn't make the deadline, but there are you know patents out for Software and all this other stuff. So I think it's you know, it's gonna happen. It's gonna happen It's definitely gonna happen around the bend. Yeah, but but will we all what will we all be wearing them? Probably not big shrug. Yeah Shannon Nika there. Are we giving any points here? I'm gonna say zero, but it's a zero with a very positive motion You were ahead of your time girl You go Zero with an asterisk Of that's a really good one for yet. Yeah, yeah, who knows they may surprise us All right, Dika you ready I'm ready So your first prediction was affordability availability and mainstream adoption AR VR headsets of of AR VR headsets, especially for typical in-person events like concerts sporting events multi-stream in-person and virtual events Yeah, I gave too much detail I think so Yeah, because the the affordability kind of knocks me out because I didn't specifically say Apple I just said VR headsets overall and we did get the announcement from Facebook Well meta about the meta quest pro, but that's starting at $1,500 We just talked about the coming around the bend of Apple with their reality OS or reality want to wear it whatever they're going to eventually call it so In theory and I guess technically the headsets, you know, particularly on the meta side have been announced but I think the affordability really kind of knocks the wind out of the sales a bit because You know $1,500 for the meta quest pro the assumption is that the reality one or the Apple headset or Apple glasses or whatever they're gonna call it is going to possibly be around 2000 so the affordability the availability will be there the availability is there, but the adoption and affordability I think are really Unfortunately hard sells because not everyone is going to be able to spin that amount of money on A headset we have the current Oculus which is I think like $300 from the quest to the quest to that people have and use quite a bit but As far as you know, the I guess More mainstream type usage I think it's it's going to be a hard sell especially on the prediction of the affordability angle. So Kind of but I don't know. Yeah quest raising the price Was it was was unfortunate there? I think I'd give you more more credit on the adoption part than you're giving yourself like we we definitely saw more people buying these things there was a blackpink concert in in in Fortnite, but it was kind of a you know metaverse VR Presentation where if you were looking at it in VR, you could zoom in around there was some World Cup stuff that that's being done in VR I don't know Stephanie. You're the one that we just were like nope They didn't make it so you don't get credit. Yeah, how do you feel it? I think we all Felt like this whole meta and you know meta more than anybody probably felt like this whole metaverse thing was gonna be a lot Bigger thing than it ended up being and and who knows eventually where it ends up going but I think as far as You know concerts and sport I mean, I guess since we have seen those things I'd be willing to give, you know partial credit partial. Yeah. Yeah, it's not like those things have not happened at all I think they maybe haven't happened in the at the scale that you know, we may have all expected them to yeah But but they have happened so we got to give we got to give partial credit. I agree All right. All right, so we're giving you we're giving you a half point there. Okay. I'll take it Yeah, you got you got some of it, right? I think you could judge your next one is being true for all the wrong reasons, right? Exactly crypto And I guess the definition is what are we considering mainstream we have All of these bankruptcies of these crypto currencies we have these crypto Billionaires all of a sudden losing all their money some of them unfortunately losing their lives People, you know really just kind of tanking their Investments in this because I mean it's just been over this past year. It's just been repeated issues and issues with the way that Crypto is being managed how it's being handled, you know with the voyager It was like, you know, we lost all your money, but we'll give you voyager corn coins and it's like what am I gonna do with this? That's not equal to the actual dollar amount that I put in there So in the sense that everybody's talking about it There are a lot of people who have invested in it from, you know Celebrities and you know, the super wealthy down to your everyday man who has, you know, sank money into crypto So I guess technically it went mainstream, but not necessarily in the best way Yeah, what's more mainstream than scandal and seriously You kind of got to give it she didn't say yeah, you know mainstream where everyone would have some It's now a part of the public lexicon and definitely. Yeah, so yeah, I think I think that one gets a point. Yeah This this is this is a good example of how to craft your predictions, right? Yeah, well done the first one was the first one was a little bit too detailed All right, and then your third one was easy availability of electric vehicles including a massive increase in charging stations So for this particular one, I think we may have just gotten this in under the wire I believe middle of this week General Motors announced that they were rolling out a new program of Installing the first of 40,000 new EV chargers We have the Biden infrastructure bill to kind of point to where they allotted you know toolkits for a network of 500,000 electric vehicle chargers and this includes not just You know the larger cities and metropolis areas this includes rural areas as well So I think I think this one hit as well I Mean the only thing I'd pick on would be the word massive what wait, how do you how do you interpret the word massive? I mean, I'm not mad at that though Especially you know based on what what Nika just said about, you know, they possibly 500,000 new chargers 40,000 GM like that It could be massive. We're exactly we can make the case for massive for that So yeah, I guess in relation to where it is now or what it was Or that is if you look at the relatively relativity aspect, it is quite a jump in you know Every company most every car company now is coming out with the EV line if they don't already have it And it's becoming, you know, the the cars themselves are becoming more popular. So By default, you know people need places to charge a vehicle if they're using it to travel Around their state around the country. So I I think so. Um, I think it only from here. I think it will only get bigger Yeah, yeah I give her a point. I give the point for that one. Yeah, we're giving you the point. Good job. All right uh folks How did you do on your own personal predictions? Let us know by email We've got an email address. Send us your your thoughts or or anything feedback at daily tech news show dot com Now it's time to get to my predictions. So I throw myself on the mercy of the court Here we go the first one I said and I think we were all all Even if we weren't exactly like excited about cryptocurrency, we were all thinking it seemed to be going up Uh, you know in in in many ways. I said And this isn't a cryptocurrency thing, but it's it's in that realm Decentralized identity projects would get momentum and uptake So ways to validate your uh, your identity In in a web 3 quote unquote way like like some way that where your identity You didn't have to log into a central server controlled by a company. You'd be able to validate your identity some other way Are we including like pass keys and things like that in there? Yes Because Like if that gets me a partial credit then yes Pass keys are becoming very popularized a lot of um, a lot of brands are implementing pass keys For example, chrome is we just learned about that um on day of recording. So I I think that definitely gives you At least half a point Yeah, I pass key honestly was probably in the back of my mind But really wasn't what I was thinking I was thinking more about solid You know those like uh tim Berners-Lee's uh, erupt like verify. Yeah stuff like that But uh, if you're all if y'all are gonna give me the half point for pass keys, I'll take I'll take sure Yeah, and I mean, you know again momentum and uptake is subjective So it maybe didn't get the type of momentum you were expecting But but we are seeing things move in that direction. So I'm I'm with the half point. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Yeah I think that's fair. Uh, my second one. Oh my gosh When matter launches expected in june, which it didn't launch in june I should have just predicted it won't launch in june would have nailed it. Uh, it launched in october Uh, it will measurably boost smart home adoption, which it hasn't because it just launched in october I thought it would launch in june and it would boost things more We'll probably see that get boosted a lot more last or next year Um, we'll probably hear about it a ton at ces in january, but yeah I don't I haven't seen a boost in smart home adoption. It's way too early It was probably too early for it to launch in june and really this this was a incredibly aggressive prediction It was aggressive. Yeah, uh, but I think it will I think this is another role Like if I could roll it over then yeah, it will eventually I think have an effect It just I I it wasn't going to have an effect that fast But the fact that matter did ultimately launch and it is starting to Kind of take root a little bit. I mean, I'd give you half for that. That's incredibly generous For the fact that matter did launch and I think once people really Understand what it can do and the way it can improve You know, if you choose to go the smart home route I think it's going to ramp up pretty quickly once people really Understand, you know, what it is and what it can do for them. I agree. Tom. You should just roll that one over Yeah For anybody who remembers what rollover minutes used to be All right, this last one, uh, Stephanie Stephanie, uh, was very skeptical of this one when I made it And I don't I don't feel good about being right because of the reason but I said the chip shortage will end Uh, and uh, it turns out. Yeah, because of inflation and and a decline in purchasing power We've got chip gluts. We're all broke. Yeah, we can't afford to buy chips. We're plenty of them. Yeah Well, it's the same as nika's, um, you know cryptocurrency goes mainstream It went mainstream for all the wrong reasons and and same here that the chip shortage ended for all the wrong reasons. So It means that the chip chip cost will decline and we'll be able to build and computers again next year We have seen some gpu prices coming down, which is a good sign. All right, all right But you got to get the point though. Yeah But it's yours All right, uh, so, uh, now it's time to turn to sarah lanes predictions Hey, everybody, uh, sarah here with my predictions for what was going to happen in 2022 So I was feeling pretty good about this first one and I think I got partially right Certainly not all the way right, but I had predicted that apple would announce a vr headset this year didn't happen Still probably happening. Well, it is happening. Uh, but it didn't happen in 2022 But what I did say was The vr part of the announcement would be that there would be a big fitness plus tie-in fitness plus is obviously apples um Way to do a variety of exercise classes and yoga and stretching and meditation and stuff from more or less the comfort of your own home And uh up until now it's needed an apple watch. So at the end of 2021, I didn't have an apple watch I I do now so I've since uh gotten used to fitness plus and it's a really good product But uh, I uh, a lot of people are going to be left out if they didn't have apple watches or had some sort of alternative smart watch so, uh, what apple did announce When it announced the series eight apple watch and some updates to fitness plus earlier this year Kind of in its fall announcement, uh, big lineup was that fitness plus was going to be able to use without an apple watch So, you know, I was kind of on to something there. We didn't get that vr headset We might not even get it in 2023. In fact, it's looking like 2024. But yeah, never know But let's call the 25 right on that one Moving on elan musk stepping down his tesla c who was my second prediction didn't get that one, right? Very much a fail Elan musk has been in the news for the better part of this year to my anger and fury Not because for any reason just because sometimes I just don't want to talk about the same person every day But uh, he took over twitter, uh, is still in that Seat is still the tesla ceo. Don't think that's going to change Before the year comes to a close. So He definitely dominated the news But not for the reasons that I thought he would but in my defense. I did think that His problematic being in the news was going to lead him having to step down as tesla ceo Maybe because of you know, some sort of conflicts of Whatever and uh, no, he sure doubled down and just bought another company instead. Uh, so now we're in a very different situation Finally and this one was a little bit of a uh, a softball to myself, but I said nfts While now observed with caution would be something that we Used to do and we used to talk about and we all lost money on in 2021 I think that's pretty fair now. I'm gonna say full disclosure. I've never bought an nft I've dabbled in crypto just a bit Um, and I got a little sucked into it at the end of 2021 because there were just high valuations for things and people seem to be able to Make money out of thin air. Uh, that is has not been the case a year later. We've seen a lot of projects nfts among them really plummet in value and doesn't mean that uh, there's not still a lot going on there But I think a lot of people lost money and just said, okay Hold on. I need to be a little bit more careful about what kind of stuff I'm getting involved in in the future Like what is this? What you know, what does it mean to me? Who's the community? And you know, am I really a person who's buying art anyway? And and or we're creating arts You know, there's a lot of creators have have started to think a little bit harder about You know, how they fit into this um, this this whole world Yeah, and I think 2023 is going to be a lot more of the same You know, we're we're still trying to figure it out. But those were my predictions Uh, I think I I think I did okay I've never gotten three for three in any year that we've done this before so I feel fine How well do you guys think that I did? Yeah, the second obviously number two is wrong. Yeah No point for number two Negative because he got a he got a different CEO title and additional Negative one Um Number three, I think is is kind of um I think it's another one of those like I in fact, I don't even think it's it's right for the wrong reasons Like she kind of said like uh, it'll be something we did and talked about and lost money on and and those are all true So, yeah, yeah, yeah Uh, like are people still talking about NFTs because I haven't heard that Yeah, but she didn't say we'd keep talking about it. She said we'll do it. We'll talk about it and then we'll lose money Like if you want to get you know Into the semantics it it feels like It it feels like she's saying it'll be something we did and then forgot about yeah Lost money, but I don't I don't think we're I don't think we're gonna forget about them I think there's no around and everything. Yeah, but but I think that's it's it's um, I think it's accurate enough Yeah, I agree. Yeah, I'm with that. I'm with you on that. I think that's a point. Yeah, that's a point. Yeah, that's She's arguing for a half point on the fitness plus launch even though there was no VR headset to go with it So they did launch fitness plus But they tied it into the apple watch There's no hardware. Yeah, except for the watch. There's no you don't you don't need the apple watch They launch fitness plus so you don't need the apple watch anymore But there's no headset hardware. Yeah Yeah, right Right, because it but that but the but it was pretty much all about the headset You know, it wasn't about the fact that this plus was yeah, the predictions about the headset It's not about really fitness plus launching or not launching or She added the apple watch will no longer be required. Maybe a quarter point. Okay. Well I I mean if you want to get technical We love sarah. Like I I'd be happy with a quarter point. All right. All right. Yeah, it seems like We'll give her a quarter point. Yeah, the rest of all Because like come on Don't be green All right, uh, well, there you go. That is our our check-in on our predictions from 2022. Thank again Thanks. You all for being willing to do this. This is good fun. And I appreciate you being good sports about it We will now check in with roger chang for the final tally of how we did Roger So, uh, let's do a quick, uh overview shannon got two Stephanie got 1.5 Mika got 2.5 Oh Tom got two and sarah got one and a quarter Mika Wow, and I didn't I was not confident Right Yeah Way to go that wasn't confident at all. Well done And then now you start a consulting business. That's the next right, right Based on your past wins a future performance is no predictor of past performance You know and then yeah, and then you charge people $10,000 an hour. Yeah. Yeah I will say overall all of you did a pretty good job like of reading the Reading the tea leaves as it were and kind of extrapolating what would happen I mean, you know, some of the some of the stuff is like, you know, black swan stuff like the whole elan musk I think but but for the most part, I mean, you know, I think everyone did better than than they thought they would Yeah, yeah, I agree. Definitely. Yeah, nothing was nothing was outlandish. It was all all Within the realm. So yeah good good good stuff Of course, everybody stick around. We will be doing our predictions episode for next year with We'll be subjecting a whole new crew of people to the scrutiny So so keep your eye out for that in the feeds But before we go here a big thanks to everybody here For participating Stephanie Humphrey Well done. Congratulations. Happy new year. Where can folks find more of what you got going on? You can just follow me all around the web at tech life stuff I'm usually hanging out on instagram most uh, most of the time. So at tech life stuff Fantastic nika monford uh our champion. Where can folks find more of what you got going on? I am at tech savvy diva on all the social media outlets But for now you can finally find me mostly on twitter Okay, shannon morse. What about you? youtube.com slash shannon morse spelled just like my name I'm actually doing a predictions video which was very much inspired by dtns Where I brought on some of my tech youtuber friends and asked them what they think is going to happen next year So if you want to hear even more predictions after watching the dtns prediction video, check it out Excellent the more predictions the better. Thank you shannon. Appreciate it And thanks to everyone for helping support the show All year long in 2022. We could not have done it without you. You can always support the show at any level and we've got new reward merchandise Every three months you stay a patron You'll get a different item with lenper altas nine year anniversary art on it Dtns is turning nine on january 2nd So sign up now if you haven't already daily tech news show dot com slash patreon No live shows this holiday week We're normally live monday through friday for 30 p.m. Eastern 2100 utc That'll come back january 3rd at daily tech news show dot com slash live But we are back tomorrow with our tech predictions for 2023 with will smith Ayaz akhtar and andrea jones roy talk to you then This show is part of the frog pants network Get more at frog pants dot com Diamond club hopes you have enjoyed this program You


Happy Ilouha Friday and welcome to Perspectives on Global Justice Think Tech Hawaii. This is your host Beatrice Cantelmo. On today's episode we will be talking about two very challenging topics. The refugee crisis in Europe are under prevalence of N types of human trafficking that refugees are vulnerable to and the reasons behind it. We will also examine strategies that could be implemented that would help decrease human trafficking cases involving refugees not just in Europe but all over the globe. We're very fortunate to have a guest Eva Hernandez-Zeno, a graduate student of Hawaii Pacific University whose study focus is on organizational development and change and that she will guide us in this dialogue. Well, thank you so much for being our guest today. Yeah, thank you for having me on the podcast. I love this kind of collaboration work. Yeah, no, absolutely, you know, and so is about perspectives and I think you have some really good things to share with our viewers and so before we get started, you know, in the, you know, hitting the road running, I would like to give you an opportunity to let our viewers know where do you come from and, you know, what are you studying and, you know, where things at in your graduate studies? Yeah, thank you. Yeah, so I am from Mexico City and my dream has been to do work that helps people in any kind of capacity of even like non-profit organization work or, you know, with IGOs. So, I mean, yeah, it's been my whole time, my career has been devoted to any work in that area. Yeah, but so I was, I did my undergraduate studies in international relations and then now I'm doing organizational development and change. Right, so let's talk a little bit. What is organizational development and change? What do they focus on and it's quite a unique focus? Yeah, yeah, so we do what we do is consultancy and but my focus is going to be to helping non-profit organizations take on challenges. I mean, working for a non-profit org is can be challenging. Right. So what kind of challenges do you foresee tackling and supporting NGOs with? Yeah, probably funding. Funding would be, you know, one of the biggest challenges and also really just making sure that the mission and vision really do solve some of the gaps that are around, you know, the areas that states need, that cities need. So, yeah, when I moved to Hawaii, I immediately noticed a thing of, you know, a gap in homelessness and therefore I immediately wanted to jump in and help in any way I could. Right. So it just really aligned with what I wanted to do, yeah. Well, that's perfect. What brought you to Hawaii? My partner, yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, that's the best way to be in Aloha is with love, right? Yeah. That is great. Well, we're very fortunate to have you here as part of our O'Hana. And so, well, today we're going to be talking about your studies. So tell our viewers a little bit of the background of, you know, how did you choose to work on refugees and human trafficking? And what are your findings, you know, what are you learning along the way? Yeah, so I seek to, you know, and apply for the United Nations, Model United Nations graduate program for HBU, which is the graduate school I go to. And they granted me the, you know, the opportunity. And the entire, it just shot off after that, the opportunities. And really learning more about refugees and IDPs. What does IDP mean? So it's internal, displacable, internal, displacable people. Right. So yeah, people, you know, who are within the country, but for some civil, or if any civil problem, they have no home or anywhere to go to. Right. So the refugees that you are focusing on come from which regions mostly? So we're focusing, this year we're focusing on Syria. Yeah, so therefore we're focusing on anybody in Syria who is displaced or who is a refugee. And likely they're probably a bigger target to human trafficking. Right. So let's talk about the connection between being a refugee, which you're already in a very vulnerable state, you know, being displaced.  And what is it that makes refugees more vulnerable to human trafficking? And then what kinds of human trafficking are you able to document that these individuals are, you know, experiencing? Yeah. So I think for the first question, refugees are very vulnerable. They have, I mean, if you think about how much time it takes for somebody to actually get refugee status, it takes six months at the earliest amount of time. And that's in Europe, in the U.S., Mexican border. We have to add maybe a couple of years there. Yeah, absolutely. So to answer that question, yeah, that's why refugees are so vulnerable into human trafficking. So when you see them being trafficked, is it happening in the encampments where they're waiting? Are they taking a different route or being lured or offered something and then they trust and leave and they get trafficked? Then what's going on? What is the trend? So from the research that I have done is really about paramilitary groups who are intervening in the conflict as well. But on that behalf, some people are really, really poor and living in Syria. And so that's the only thing they can do. Right. And when you talk about human trafficking, because they are like a plethora of ways that a person can be trafficked, it can't be sexual trafficking, it can be forced labor, it can be organ harvesting, legally. What are you all finding then? What is the age if there's any track of age of people who are being trafficked on gender? So what we have found so far with my committee of the General Assembly to the United Nations that we're doing, it really is more focused on not on age, but really women and children. So they are being organ trafficked. They will actually, they will actually sell their organs because they have no economic sustainability. So wait a minute, let me see if I understand this correctly. So women and children are being trafficked because they're mostly vulnerable. But for organ harvest trafficking, so like, what, like livers, kidneys, oh. So the most trafficked organs are the heart, liver and kidneys. So wait, if you can't donate your heart because then you're dead. So these people are actually being murdered. And these organs are going well. Is there any study that tracks where they're going? They, so what, it's work just done with paramilitary groups.  So they're just finding ways to solve, solve economic, economic issues, but based on really terrible human rights violations. Oh, absolutely.  So like, what are the ways that the investigative work is happening? Like people who survived coming back to report, how do they go to the hospital, really sick from after the butchering that they have to undergo and that's how authorities find out. Well, to be honest, the only work is done from organizations who are covering this kind of work. So Amnesty, you know, some of my sources are from Amnesty, or UN news sources and CIA. So that's who that's the only reports we get because it's such a, it's such a recent kind of, it's a recent problem. It really is happening right now. So therefore, you really have to have, you know, quick back kind of, you get quick kind of cover of it. So therefore, some type of documents take forever to be issued and published. Right. And so what is the global response like from the UN, for example, Amnesty, with regards to these new investigative findings? And are there any urgent action that's about to going to be issued or ways to educate refugees about what they are vulnerable of and ways that they can maybe try to protect themselves? Is there any plan in place or talks about it? Yeah. So I think this is a really cool opportunity with HPU that, you know, we get to go in and throw some resolutions or really research and they will actually look at our position papers and see what we think about it and see all the work that we've done and consider it. But other than really would be the resolutions and... Right. So let's talk about resolutions like for our viewers who are not familiarized with UN, working resolutions, how it works. So you have an investigative process and an issue that has been identified. Once you did both parts, then there is recommendations. And then what happens with those recommendations? How do these recommendations and issues become a resolution at the UN?  So it would be a ratified resolution or something that the more countries that are able to collaborate, which I think is really the purpose of the United Nations. And I really have to thank HPU because they have taught me that, you know, that it really is a collaborative space. Followed many. Yes. We're going to take a minute break and be right back. Cool. Awesome. Aloha. This is Winston Welch. I am your host of Out and About where every other week, Mondays at 3, we explore a variety of topics in our city, state, nation and world and events, organizations, the people that fuel them. It's a really interesting show. We welcome you to tune in and we welcome your suggestions for shows. You got a lot of them out there and we have an awesome studio here where we can get your ideas out as well. So I look forward to you tuning in every other week where we've got some great guests and great topics. You're going to learn a lot. You're going to come away inspired like I do. So I'll see you every other week here at 3 o'clock on Monday afternoon. Aloha. Aloha. I'm Wendy Lo and I'm coming to you every other Tuesday at 2 o'clock live from Think Tech Hawaii. And on our show, we talk about taking your health back. And what does that mean? It means mind, body and soul. Anything you can do that makes your body healthier and happier is what we're going to be talking about. Whether it's spiritual health, mental health, fascia health, beautiful smile health, whatever it means. Let's take healthy back. Aloha. Welcome back to Perspectives on Global Justice, Think Tech Hawaii. This is your host, Beatriz Contambo. And we are here with Eva Hernandez-Zenon. And so Eva, so we were talking about you turning in the research that it's being done. Are you working alone in this investigative work? Or do you have a partnership with older students? Yeah, we have other students working on it. And my closest committee, so we're in committees. Kisha, she's from China. And she's brilliant and an awesome co-worker to do this research with.  And so you're all going to be working together. And then the collaborative combined efforts of all of your studies will then comprise the writing of the findings of your studies and then goes to the UN. And then what? Then what happens? What would the UN do with your collective work? So what we do then after the papers are all turned in. So every committee has to write a paper. And then we all turn it back into our professor, Andrea Malgi. And then she sends them out. So we have several edits to make sure that it is aligned with what we're doing. And to make sure that we did the research as we could. But yeah, so then after that, once it's there, they look at the contact. And they could send it back if something, you know, if something was wrong or if they need further clarification. So there is a checks and balance. And you have a process to follow through. One of the things I really appreciate about NGOs like the UN and especially Amnesty International is how thorough they are with their investigative work piece. It takes a while to get done and complete it. But by the time it is published, it is based on factual evidence. And they talk to so many different sources to be able to examine different facets of, you know, a particular issue. So in your ability, like as a researcher now and as a graduate student, are you able? Are you going to be able to travel, to see the site or connect with other researchers who are in different sizes? Because you guys are looking at this in Syria, but are there other countries involved? Yeah, there are a bunch of, there are so many countries involved in it. And it's cool just when I was looking through the list of countries involved. There are even graduate schools from Mexico, you know, from where I'm from, that will be involved. So I will be able to connect back. Right. And are they focused on refugee issues and concerns in Mexico border and in Central America? Are they going to be working with different regions? So yeah, I didn't specify. So every committee has one country or, well, every, so as a, as HPU, we have Syria. So every other college has a different country to focus on. But then they also have committees within and each committee focuses on different topics. So my committee is General Assembly 3 and then we focus on disability of elderly and then human trafficking and humanitarian aid. Right.  Are there any older types of human trafficking are you all looking at? So like sex trafficking or post labor or the above? I think all of them are included in it.  So it's in there. But also it's when you do research, you have to make sure you put, you know, put notes or, or what, what kind of where the source comes, where the source comes from. Yeah. So it's really hard, sadly, to be able to know the death toll of how many people are actually being human trafficked and how many people are, you know, just the organs are being. Yeah. So you mentioned that within the scope of your study, you're also looking at disability rights and elderly issues. Yeah. So, I mean, I think so for Syria, you know, which is what we're focusing on the nation we're focusing on. Being in Syria, I can't even imagine it, first of all, but also being an elderly and not being able to maybe evacuate where you live and anything else. It would, it would definitely be detrimental to to your living circumstances. Right.  Or are you guys still trying to sort that out? I'm not, I'm really not sure. So I would, I would be lying if I, if I, you know, said something. Yeah, you're learning. Yeah. And that's okay. Yeah. Okay. But I imagine that regardless of percentage that there are seniors that will have extra challenges and regardless of whether the place is under conflict or not. But yeah, that really sucks for them because not being able to move as quickly or having mobility issues, for example. And I think that could be applied to pretty much anywhere being disabled and not especially as an elderly citizen anywhere and not being able to move around, you know, and just evacuate for anything. I often think, like, of the largest, you know, famine in the world right now being in Syria, and the largest humanitarian crisis, and we always have images of children, which, you know, it breaks, I think, everyone's hearts. And it's right there. But I really think about the seniors.  Yeah. It'll be interesting to see what you find out in your studies. Yeah. And I'm really excited to be doing it. Yeah.  Physical, cognitive and emotional. In regard of. Of the disability. No, I think, I think in regards with that, you know, that scope of looking at disabilities. I don't know if you're looking at just the elderly or if you're looking at all ages. Yeah, we're, we're just so my topic, yeah, it's more focused on elderly with disabilities, but I think it could be definitely top down and just making sure that children are also disabled. Anybody. Right. So I know that part of your gift is to be able to nurture those seeds of investigative work. Craft the findings, prepare the report and then you release it to the world of the UN. And they are the ones who will decide on any kind of resolution that they would pass. But if you had a magic wand on, you could say, I wish I could influence these kinds of resolutions. Just from the little bit that you already studied on and found, what would these resolutions look like? And if anything is possible in the world of anything is possible. I love that question. That's awesome. I would say anything with children, honestly, if a child can grow up and and have any opportunity that they could have, I would be happy with that. There is nothing else that would make me happier than that. That's very powerful too. And so like if you were to think a magic wand for women and children who are more successful to being trafficked, human trafficked, what kind of resolution would you wish to see it implemented between countries? Because I know that this is an effort that has to be embraced by many countries, right? No, for sure. Yeah. I think women and children should be treated equally and really, really powerfully thinked upon. But a resolution would be to do anything you can to help that. That group not being so vulnerable, right? Yeah. So safeguards, right? Yeah. Ways that would... The group. Programs, you know, that would prevent that they would, you know, not so much intervention work which is necessary, but the prevention piece of it, which is so crucial education and security and safety, right?  Community, security, resiliency, anything that can help women and children be safe and grow up in this, you know, in our communities. Yeah. And experience the good and the beautiful parts of, you know, being a human being in planet Earth, right? In this path we call, you know, life journey. I can't believe that 30 minutes passed so quickly. I know. But I hope you'll come back many times and that your peers will agree to also come so we can get a little bit more of a blurb also of what they are doing. Thank you so much for your, you know, commitment to focus your studies in what you do. Thank you for being here. Yeah, absolutely. And this concludes our episode of Perspectives on Global Justice for today. Thank you so much for watching us and until next time, we hope.


Right. Good morning everyone. Welcome to a new session. Let's begin this time with a word of prayer. Maybe Japhina, is it okay if you can lead us in prayer please? Sure pastor. Dear Heavenly Father, we come to you under the name of Jesus. We thank you for this beautiful day and for the beautiful class we are about to have. God, we invite your Holy Spirit to lead us and to guide us. We thank you for our pastor. We thank you for everyone who has joined us. Help us to open our hearts and eyes and understand every single thing that our pastor is teaching so that we can apply it and we can preach the gospel fully. We place everything in your hands. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you Japhina. Alright, so we've come to the last section. I know it's been a long study, a lot of material that we covered. First we looked at the covenants and how God placed all these wonderful covenants speaking to Abraham, to Moses, to David. These wonderful covenants that he is still so faithful to keep. Then in the second section we looked at the cross which we completed last class. We looked at how the cross is the most wonderful thing that has ever happened in humanity. The cross was not something that is a second thought, it's not an afterthought, but the cross was a place. The Lord Jesus in the scripture says that before the foundation of the world we preached Christ crucified. So Jesus knew what was ahead of him and we looked at what Jesus did when he went on that cross, what he achieved for us. He completely nullified, destroyed the powers of the devil. He completely broke the chains of the enemy. Colossians chapter 1 says he defeated the enemy completely. We also saw how because of sin that entered through Adam we all fall into that sinful nature. But Christ because of what he did we don't have to live in sin but we can live righteous before God. So we looked at all these wonderful truths but what is important for each one of us as believers is that we must live this truth. Every day of our lives, every moment of our lives we must say, God we thank you for the cross. We thank you that without the cross we are nothing. Without the cross we will be just sinners and we will be led to eternal damnation. But it is only because of the cross that we are where we are. And so here is our authority as believers we must use this authority that Jesus has given us. Remember what Jesus said? He said, I have given you the authority to trample over snakes and scorpions. This is why he was alive. He was talking about what he was going to achieve in the future. So you and I have authority. We do remember that the enemy is a defeated foe. Yet he's able to do so much damage in this world but we as his children must know, must understand that we are free from sin. Now some of the important points we learned from the whole aspect of the cross was one. We are not in condemnation anymore. Remember we studied about the covenants how they would make their offering and they will go back home but there was still guilt. There was still condemnation. There was still the feeling of there is sin in my life. The book of Romans says it beautifully. It says therefore now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Then we also looked at how in the old covenant there was just a covering of sins but in the new covenant there is washing away of sins through the cross. And so all these wonderful truths I know that we all know these truths but it really impacts us when we begin to live in it. So I would encourage you whenever you have time, whenever you feel you want to study more just go back to these portions. Refresh yourself. Say God I want to thank you for the covenants that you have given us. Thank you for the blood, for the cross of Christ. Thank you for through the cross. This is wonderful saying the cross is a place where there are four absolutes in life. One is sin, two is justice, three is love and four is forgiveness. These are the four absolutes of life. It's going to be there and all these four converge at the cross of Jesus Christ. The sin of the entire world was put on Jesus Christ. The justice, the righteous justice of God the Father was placed upon His Son. It's a place of love where John 3.16 says for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Jesus died on the cross for us because He loved us. And for forgiveness where even to the point of death Jesus says Father forgive them for they don't know what they are doing. Four absolutes in life all four beautifully converge at the cross. So the cross is the most powerful place in entire humankind. And we as his children are so privileged to be partakers of the cross. So that's wonderful. Let's go into section three which is our last section talking about the blood. All of us I'm sure we all have used these words when we pray or when we're declaring prophetic words.  So what is the significance of blood? We say by the blood of Jesus we declare that you are healed. So what is the significance of blood? Now the word blood is important both in the old and in the New Testament. In the Old Testament we see that blood was shed even in Genesis. If you look at Genesis chapter three all the way to Revelations 19. Remember Jesus is riding on the white horse and clothed in a cloth in a dress dripped in blood. So all the way from Genesis to Revelations 19 there's this aspect of blood. Now we did study about the blood covenant but what is this covenant? What is this blood by the blood of Jesus? What is it that it carries? We know that blood is life but what is so unique about this blood of Jesus? Many people have died many great leaders have died but what is so unique about the blood of Jesus? We sing songs about it.  In the Old Testament the blood prefigures or foreshadows the atonement of Jesus Christ. Remember the Old Testament? The high priest would take the blood and he would put it in the altar. That's a prefiguring of what Jesus would do as a high priest. Remember we studied that Jesus went up to heaven and he gave his own blood to the Father. Once for all making atonement so he doesn't have to do it again and again. Once for all this whole prefiguring the shadows of this you know the altar, the tabernacle, the day of atonement, all of this. All of that can stop because Jesus as a high priest offered his own blood to the Father. Once and for all. It's not like Jesus has to go back and say okay you know let me do it once again or every year you know Jesus has to remind the Father. Father this is the blood just in case you forgot. Now it's done once and for all. Let's look at a few references in the Old Testament. We've already done a couple of these but let's look at a few of them. A covering for Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. Adam sinned, Adam and Eve sinned. They knew that they were naked and God asked them how do you know that and you know it was sin.  The second one would be the acceptable sacrifice of Abel where Abel's offering was more pleasing to God because it was blood that was provided. The shedding of blood. So covenants made by blood. Abrahamic covenant, the Messiah covenant. All of these are life-giving covenants. Now the priests consecrated by the blood and the anointing oil. What the priests would do on the day of atonement is they would first be anointed with oil. And remember the first high priest Aaron, they poured the oil, he was anointed, the oil went down his beard. So oil was a representation again a foreshadow of what the Holy Spirit would do in the new covenant. So he was anointed with oil. Then he would take the sin offering, go into the Holy of Holies and make the offering. And then they had the burnt offering. Now what is the difference between these things? The burnt offering was an offering that everyone could do as in the old covenant. Everyone could do it. It was just an offering to get your relationship restored with God. So everyone would partake of it. The peace offering was more of God, I want to thank you for blessing me and meeting all my needs, blessing my family, blessing my children. So they would do a peace offering. But on the day of atonement, they would not do that. Only the high priest would do. And what the high priest would do is he would take the ram that was killed. He would take the blood and he would put it on his right here, on his thumb, on the right hand and on the right toe. So these three places, he would place drops of blood there. Now why these three places? Right here, what you hear is protected or covered. What you do that is your right thumb is righteous unto God. Three, your right toe, where you go must be holy and sanctified unto the Lord. So that's what the high priest would do. You would take the blood of that ram which would go for the day of atonement. You would take a little of that blood, you would place it, put a few drops on his ears, on his right thumb and on his right toe. To signify these three things. Now we will talk about what the blood of Jesus did through that, right? The same prefiguring. Then atonement for sin by the blood. Now we did look at this previously as well. What Jesus did on the cross was he made atonement. He was our substitute. He went in place of us. Now we were supposed to be on that cross. In place of, instead of, he took our place, right? And so he made atonement for our sins. Remember last week we spoke about how the father, how Jesus, what he did was he took the blood and he went to the father and he made atonement. Meaning he told the father, now when you look at the people, look at them through my eyes. Or look at them through the work that I've done on the cross, right? So when the father looks at us, he's not looking at us. These people are sinful people. But he looks at us through the cross. Yes, there will be people who are living in sin and all of that. But when the father looks at us, he looks at us with love. Because of what Jesus Christ did through his son Jesus Christ. And that is such a wonderful thing. The blood that was shed on the cross satisfies the demands of God's justice. Now, what does the blood do? First one, in the Old Covenant, covering of sins. Two, it's an acceptance of offering. Three, the covenant was established. Transition from slavery to freedom. In a blood covenant, people were consecrated, which means kept sanctified, kept holy unto God. And finally, the blood covering made atonement for sin, resulting in forgiveness of sins. Now, this is what the blood did in the Old Covenant. Now, when we look at the New Covenant, it is not the blood of goats and rams, but the blood of the sinless one. The blood of Jesus, the lamp of God, the one who was without any sin. Let's look at that, the blood of Jesus, who is the lamp of God. Jesus was a sinless, spotless lamp of God. Let's read John chapter 1 and verse 29. John 1, verse 29. Yes, could anyone please read this? John 1 and verse 29. Let's go ahead, any one of us. John chapter 1, verse 29. John chapter 1, verse 29. The next day, John saw Jesus coming towards him and said, Look, the lamp of God who takes away the sin of the world. Amen. Thank you, Defina. John the Baptist is saying, he's testifying of Jesus and he's saying, Look, the lamp of God who takes away the sins of the world. Who told John about this? How did John know that Jesus is going to be the lamp? I'm sure John would have first, the first thing that, you know, would have come to John's mind is the, is a lamp on the day of atonement. The ram that was cut and the blood. The first thing that would have come to his mind was that, but when he looked at Jesus, he said, Now, look, this is the lamp of God who's going to take away the sins of the world. This person that you see, right? Verse Peter 1, 18 to 20, I'll read that. Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things like gold or silver from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ as a lamp without blemish and without sport. He was indeed was, he indeed was fordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you. Now listen to this. Peter is writing to mainly the Jews who have become Christians, but he's writing it to a cosmopolitan crowd. There were some, you know, Gentiles as well. But as a Jew, if I'm listening to this or I'm reading this, he's saying knowing that we are not redeemed with corruptible things like gold, silver, but we are redeemed with the precious blood of Christ as a lamp without blemish and without sport. Now as a Jew, what is the first thing that will come to my mind? Say, oh, a lamp without blemish and sport. That's what I did before. That's what I would go to have a go on the day of a tournament, choose the best lamp without blemish without sport and cut that lamp, take the blood go and offer it to the high priests and the high priests will, you know, go into the Holy of Holies. Now Peter is calling that and he's saying we are not redeemed by any of that now, but we are redeemed by the precious blood of Jesus, the lamp without blemish and this blood, this man, the blood of Jesus, the lamp was there before the foundation of the world, but he was made manifest. John writes it so wonderfully in John chapter one. He says in the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was God, right? So Jesus was being God, he humbled himself, came into this world as a lamp without blemish. That is why we studied, right? Even one sin, you know, one sin if Jesus had committed, there would be blemish, right? Even one sin, but he was faithful, he was obedient and he did it for you and me. Revelation 30 in 8 says, all who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the books of life of the lamb slain from the foundations of the world. Again, bringing the whole aspect of the lamb, right? Right now the Lord Jesus, he's seated in heaven. He's a lamb and he's the lion, right? And it's so beautiful to see that these two aspects, he's gentle as a lamb. The lamb that was taken to the slaughter, the Lord Jesus, that, you know, when you look at the whole picture of what had happened, you know, while we were studying about the cross, how Judas betrayed Jesus, Jesus was taken, he was arrested, taken into prison, beaten. What is all of that? Could not remember, we studied about that, Peter cut off the soldiers here and then Jesus says, put off your sword, if I wanted, will not my father send legions of angels to come and protect me, right? So Jesus was like a lamb, he was just quiet, said, okay, it's time for me to go to the slaughter. It's time for me to be given as a burnt offering. So he was quiet, right? And now the Lord Jesus is a lion and a lamb, right? He has done what the old covenant promised, he has done it, right? His blood has been shed. And if he has become the substitute for all mankind, once for all, he has completed the offering for sin. And now there's no more need of any more offerings, right? Hebrews 724 to 27 brings that out wonderfully. But he, because he continues forever, has an unchangeable priesthood, right? His priesthood does not change. The high priest used to change every, probably every three, four years. But here, he does not change. Therefore, he's able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. For such a high priest was fitting for us, who's wholly harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners and has become higher than the heavens. Who does not daily need, sorry, who does not need daily as those high priests to offer up sacrifices, first for his own sins and then for the peoples. For he did this once for all, he offered up himself, right? He did it once for all. So we are forgiven by the blood of Jesus. Now, can you picture this? When you think about it, we are forgiven by the blood of Jesus. I remember talking to this person from another faith, this happened many years ago, and he was living a very sinful life. He shared with me, he was into addictions and all kinds of wrong habits, but I was sharing with him. And every time I was sharing with him, I kept getting this thought, the blood of Jesus Christ was able to cleanse him. But somehow I was not able to tell him that. All I was doing was, I was bringing out the Gospel, I was sharing with him. I was saying, okay, see, this is what Jesus did on the cross. He died and he took our place. We don't have to live in sin. Just sharing the basic Gospel, the simple Gospel, four minute Gospel, what we studied last year in lifestyle evangelism. As I was sharing, I remember the Holy Spirit reminding me of the blood. It doesn't usually happen, but I kept thinking about the blood of Jesus. So I began to tell him, what is it that in this world, what is it that can give you joy and pleasure? And so he started saying, these are the things that I enjoy doing and most of them were sinful things.  Are you satisfied for what you have done? He said, no. And so I began to talk to him about blood, this regular blood. So I told him, what happens to a person if there's no blood in him? Of course, the person will die, extreme loss of blood. Blood is life. And so as we were talking, I brought out the whole aspect of the blood of Jesus. And what the blood of Jesus does. So by God's grace, it's not about me. It was just that I was reminded of that. I shared with him, I said, this is what the blood of Jesus can do. Right now, you and I are living in sin. If we are living in sin, we need to be washed of it. There is nothing that can wash away our sins. There's no pilgrimage that we can go to. It's not like we're going to have a bath and our sins are washed away. No. So what is the outcome? What are we going to do as human beings? What should we do? I told him, this is what the blood of Jesus will do. It will wash away your sins. And you will be forgiven of all your sins. The moment I said that, all of a sudden, his mind changed. He started thinking, this whole thing of being washed by the blood of Jesus started. I was just sharing simple. But it started hitting him. And so he started asking me, what do you mean washed by the blood? How can I be washed by blood out of it? And I began to explain what Jesus did on the cross.  And a couple of meetings down the line. This young man was so touched by the words, the blood of Jesus that he actually told me. I want to give my life to Christ because these words, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all unrighteousness. I gave him that verse. It kept hitting him day and night, day and night, wherever you go. The blood of Jesus cleanses us from all unrighteousness. And because later on he gave his life to Christ. What are we saying? The blood cleanses our conscience from dead works. We may be living a most terrible, sinful, debauched life. But just a drop of the blood of Jesus can make us new, can cleanse us. That is why the devil does not want us to believe in the cross. He does not want people from other faiths to believe in the cross. Because the devil knows the power of the cross. He knows the power of the blood of Jesus can do. There is no entry when, for example, we pray, Lord cover our house with the blood of Jesus. There's no entry for the enemy. The enemy cannot enter.   Peter writes later on, he says, his blood still speaks. This is not blood that is lifeless. This is blood that is alive. This is blood that is true. This is holy blood. And so, as believers, we must use this, the blood of Jesus. We must understand what his blood did. There are times when the enemy will bring thoughts in our minds, take us physically, bring us, make us weak. But we can say, God, I cover my mind with the blood of Jesus. I cover my body with the blood of Jesus. My family, I cover it with the blood of Jesus. Jesus became the atonement. Just as the day of atonement, the high priest would take the blood. Jesus did that with his own blood. He became our mercy seat, which means our complete reconciliation. Romans 3, 23 to 26, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God sent forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness. Because in his forbearance, God had passed over the sins that were previously committed to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. The word propitiation means an atoning sacrifice, which also means mercy seat. An atoning sacrifice. Right now, Jesus is seated on his mercy seat. He has made propitiation. He has, you know, through the blood, he has made a way for us to come to the Father.  He shows us mercy. Right now, many of us may be living some, maybe some kind of a sin. It's way down deep in our hearts. Nobody knows about it. But I want to encourage you. At the cross, we can find forgiveness. At the cross, there's mercy for us as sinners. We can always go, me included.   There are times when we may say the wrong things. We may think about the wrong things. But as believers, we can always go back and say, Lord Jesus, please forgive me of my sins. And he is right now seated on his mercy seat. He very willfully and gladly will say, in my mercy, I forgive you. What a joy this is. Right now, again, we need to be careful because Paul writes and he says, if we keep sinning, it's like we're crucifying the Lord Jesus Christ once again. Just because Jesus is seated at the mercy seat, it shouldn't be like, you know, I can go ahead and keep sinning, come back, keep sinning, come back. We can't do that. Right? We must be in a place where, yes, sometimes we sin unintentionally. We can always go to God. We can always ask forgiveness. Yesterday I was reading this document. It was a documentary of, you know, what's happening in the church nowadays, where many, many worship leaders are turning away from the faith. Wonderful gospel songs were written by them. We even sing it now. They've been, you know, in the church for years and years. Many are pastors, children. And they've been there in the church writing songs, leading people in ministry, leading churches, leading worship ministries. But they've turned away from the faith. I was reading about this one, you know, it's an entire documentary and how this young worship leader, he's been serving the Lord for almost 20 odd years. But all of a sudden, he thought to himself, why am I still living in sin? It's been 20 odd years that I am leading worship, leading people into Christ. Why am I still living in sin? So that thought kept counting him.  Why isn't God caring about all of that? People have lost their homes through natural disasters. People who don't have food and clothing and all. So these thoughts started coming into his mind. And eventually, he let the enemy take control and he writes there and he says, I have nothing against Christians. They are wonderful people, but I don't understand their God. So I, you know, revoke this religion and I don't believe in what I've been professing. I turn away from it. I'm no more a Christian. He has lost his faith. Now, after I read that, I was deeply saddened, but I thought to myself, where did it go wrong? And I was just thinking to myself, God, where did it go wrong? I just felt that it was condemnation, right? And all we need to do is go back to Christ and say, Lord, I'm not perfect, right? I'm still a work in progress. But Lord, by your mercy, my sins are forgiven. That's all he needed to do. I'm not passing judgment, but I'm just saying, right? That's all we need to do. Let's go to Christ and say, Lord, you're seated in the mercy seat. You have paid the price. I know I'm not perfect, but you are perfect. Wash me with your blood, cleanse me and forgive me of my sins. It's all we need to do, right? Yes. There are things that are happening around the world. We don't have control over it.  But how can we question what God is doing?  The Bible says that he sustains us. The psalmist says he sustains us in his hand. He who holds the earth and the entire world, the stars, he sustains them all. Will he not sustain his children? And so we must be very careful because the enemy is able to make us, you know, he's an accuser, so he's able to make us feel condemned. Right? Even after we've asked for forgiveness, sometimes he may make us to feel condemned, make us feel that, okay, we are not washed or we are not cleansed by the blood of Jesus. We are still sinful. But I want to encourage you, have faith and know and the Bible teaches us that if you confess your sins, he is faithful and just to forgive you. That should be our approach. The reason I'm stressing out this is because we have a lot of students. We have a lot of young people that we see right now who, you know, get into, who know the gospel, who know the Lord Jesus. But all of a sudden they're turning away. There's no proper understanding. But I don't, I believe that we all understand what the blood of Jesus has done. And it still speaks. The blood of Jesus still works. The enemy, don't believe the enemy's lies where he says, okay, how can that blood which was shed over 2000 odd years ago, how can that blood work now, speak now, heal now, protect now? Not possible. That's the enemy's work. We can say, God, I trust in your word that the blood of Jesus is more powerful than any other work of the enemy. Because he's seated right now in his mercy seat. He has made reconciliation. He has made atonement. Never is God said to be reconciled. God is always the same. He's the same yesterday. He's the same today. He's the same tomorrow. He can act differently towards those who come to him in faith solely on the ground of propitiator sacrifice of Christ. Not because he has changed, but because he never, he ever acts according to his unchanging righteousness. Romans chapter 5 verse 9, much more than having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. We shall be saved from wrath through him. When we look at what's happening around us, it's very eminent, the second coming, the rapture, the things that are happening. It's all aligning to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Lord Jesus can come anytime. The rapture can happen anytime and you learn more in the next year in end times in eschatology and Daniel and revelations. The rapture can happen anytime, but we can understand and know that we have been justified by the blood of Jesus and we know that there is wrath for those who don't believe in Jesus, who have not accepted this. But one thing we know is we are saved from that wrath because of the blood of Jesus. He made Jew and Gentile one. Through him, we offer up our spiritual sacrifices. By the blood of the Lamb, we are cleansed, we are forgiven, we are reconciled, we are consecrated, we are released from dead works, we have been justified and made righteous, we have access to the very presence of God and by the blood of Jesus, we offer up our spiritual sacrifices. What is our spiritual sacrifices? When we pray, when we worship the Lord, these are sacrifices unto God. Remember that verse in Psalms, we bring a sacrifice of praise unto the house of the Lord. We offer unto Him a sacrifices of thanksgiving and we offer unto Him a sacrifices of joy. When we are joyful in the midst of troubles and challenges, it is sacrifice unto the Lord. When we all go through challenges and tough times and we say, God, I trust in you, I know that you are with me. Help me go through this difficult season. Help me to go through this mountain and I know that you will help me to pass through this. When we do that, when we are thankful for that and we are trusting God, it is a sacrifice, a spiritual sacrifice to God. God is pleased with it. When we thank God for what He has done in our lives, it is a spiritual sacrifice. When we pray and worship the Lord in our homes or even in our church and ministries, it is a spiritual sacrifice unto the Lord. The Lord is pleased with us. The Lamb of God, He is eternal. The Lamb of God in heaven is forever. Eternally, He will be recognized as the one who has taken away the sins of the entire human race. Somebody asked me, if Jesus has taken away the sins of the entire race, how come I still feel like a sinner? How come I still am living a sinful life? How come I don't feel like my sins are washed away? Now, the Lord Jesus did the work on the cross. He made it available. It is up to us to receive it from Him. The Lord Jesus is not going to... and we learn more on this as well in the Holy Spirit class as well. The Lord Jesus is not going to force Himself upon us. You have to believe in Me. When you look at the earthly ministry of the Lord Jesus, He didn't do that. What did He do? He went. He found disciples. He said, yes, I'm the Messiah. He didn't say, please follow Me. Please come. He didn't do that. In Jerusalem, they denied Him. His own brothers denied Him. In Jerusalem, they hated Him, meaning the Pharisees and the Sadducees didn't want anything to do with Him. In his own hometown, his own people disregarded Him. Remember Jesus said before Abraham was, I am destroyed this temple. I've built it in three days. What were the reactions? He said, let's kill Him. Let's get rid of Him. What is He talking? But when He went to different places, when He went to Judea, when in Samaria, they accepted Him and He was able to do a lot of ministry in the different, in other places. But Jesus didn't go and force Himself upon the Jews and upon the Pharisees and the Sadducees. He said, remember we talked about this, when the disciples said, how come they are, you know, the Pharisees and Sadducees are leading so many people.  It's like the blind leading the blind. If the blind leads the blind, they both will fall into it.  Let them go their way. Jesus didn't force Himself upon them. He made Himself available to them. Right? And the Roman Centurion came.  Did Jesus say that? He didn't say that. He made Himself available. He said, the Roman Centurion said, you don't have to come home, just pray and my servant will be healed. Jesus said, what a wonderful faith. This man is of great faith. Go, it shall be so. Jesus gave, just heal him, because he opened Himself. And so if we are, or there are people who ask you these kind of questions, why is it that I'm still living in this sinful life or this, there's no peace, there's no joy. That's because we haven't received from Him. He's there, He's willing. But we have to go to the cross. The cross is not going to come to us. We have to go. We have to make that decision to say, God, I'm coming to that place of ultimate surrender and just surrendering to You. And then we will see His love, His grace flow in our lives. Now the Lamb of God, He's eternal. There's no end for our Lord Jesus Christ. What a joy this is. There's no expiration date any time like the thief on the cross who said, Lord, when you enter your kingdom, remember me. Just at the last moment of His life Jesus says, you will be with me in paradise.  Now we must go in boldness. We must go and just pour out our hearts. We don't have to hide things in our heart. We don't have to hide and say, okay, this I will ask forgiveness next year or this I will ask forgiveness after six months. No. He knows. The Lord Jesus knows everything in our hearts but He's waiting for us to ask. As He says, right, ask it shall be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will open. So that's what we must do. The blood of Jesus is able to bring us to a place where we can say, God I'm justified in Your presence. All right. Let's take a break. We'll come back and we'll continue from the next chapter onwards. Let's take a break for 10 minutes. We'll see you at 11.


Welcome. This is Melissa Armo, the stop swisher. I'm doing a St. Patrick's Day special for the GAP Options newsletter. So many people want to trade options with me, and so this is your opportunity. You can sign up for this now, even though St. Patrick's Day is in front of the week. I've already had people inquiring. Again, you don't have to have taken my class in order to sign up for the newsletter. There's no prerequisites for this at all. I do think if you want to join, if you want to do the class, that's great. You're going to learn what to do, but if you're somebody that doesn't really have an interest in learning, and you just want the picks, and you want to start trading right now, then you can sign up for this, and you can join, and you can be a part of the group. Lots of nice calls here, even today. So if you would like to, you can email me at MelissaStacksWish.com. If you want to take advantage of this special, it is running through St. Patrick's Day, March 17th. You can call me at 929-3200 Gap if you have questions, and you can email me as well. I'm following you on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or Skype. So again, the St. Patrick's Day Gap Options newsletter special is as follows. If you sign up by March 17, St. Patrick's Day, again, you will get a discount. The normal price for 12 months is $69.99. So I'm doing a special that is $1,000 off, so you pay for $59.99 to get 12 months, and you're going to get the Gap Options course free, which is March 21st, 11-3. So this takes you actually into March of 2025. This is a long time to be in the letter. From now until 12 months from now, you get all the trades to the rest of this year into March of 2025, and you're going to get this class free. And you can start trading now. Again, really nice calls here. We're on fire for the year, but mainly I've just been extremely focused, and the opportunities have been there. The opportunities have been there in the market, and I'm seeing them when we're doing them. So email me at Melissa at the St. Patrick's Day St. Patrick's Day. If you want to sign up, you must email me for sign up forms. And again, you can start trading right now. I've talked about options so many times, and one of the things that people love about options is because you can make a lot of money in options when you get through overnight moves. I'm not taking the trade before the move happens. I'm taking the trade when I see the Gap that I'm writing it. Again, these are things that you can learn from me as you're trading with me, but if you want to learn the whole shebang, you have to take the Gap course. That's the two-day class, and that class is March 16th and 17th, and you're welcome to sign up for that too. But trading is something you want to do on the side just to support your current job, your current lifestyle, your current financial situation, or just do it part-time. Trading is a way to make extra money on the side. It's all about feeling secure in who you are. I was talking to this conversation with somebody yesterday, just yesterday, like how much money would it take for you to not have to worry? And that's a different amount for literally every single solitary person. So once you can be honest with yourself about that, then you know where to go from there. If you're someone that needs daily picks, weekly picks, consistent picks, you want to get out of the cycle of confusion with not knowing what to do in a very tricky market and follow someone that knows what they're doing, and again, I've been trading for a very long time. I started trading in 2008. I can't even believe it, but it's true. Now here we are, it's 2024, and now we're talking about 2025. This is today's pick. Again, I'm still on this trade. We'll see where it goes, but if you were on the newsletters this morning, you would have gotten this trade. We did the target calls. I called the 165 calls, and I sent this letter out in the morning today. So again, if you were on the newsletters, you would have gotten this this morning at 8.25 a.m., you don't take the trade until after the end, and again, theoretically, who'd you have gotten this today, but I don't know why you would have, okay? This is a trade that we were doing out until March 15th, okay? So this is plenty of time to do it and give this a chance to do its thing. Again, we are looking for momentum. We want to trade momentum, and I'm looking to do it with a gap. Targeted earnings last night. I didn't know who's going to gap down, gap up. I didn't even know who's going to be in a nothing burger gap. As it turns out, it was a bullish gap, and it was a good gap, or a gap that rated per by a 26-point rating system to take it in the direction of the gap, which is exactly what we did. We went long because this is a call. And on the newsletter, we do calls and puts. Again, I'm buying the call, selling it to exit, buying the put, selling it to get back. We're not doing any complicated option strategies at all here, okay? This is based on my rating system. This is based on trading the gap of momentum, okay? So this is something that, again, narrowing it down one pick a day, two picks a day, you've got to get the move. It's about working smarter, not harder, and I think a lot of people just struggle with that, because I think more trades is better, not necessarily. If I have a lot of good picks, yes, I'll call five, six, seven things in one day. But that's not every day, okay? And it's really about the quality. So it's finding the quality and finding what to do. But this is a nice bonus to have the options course for free with this special. And again, we do mostly short, which is kind of ironic. We did some short today too, but I put the target one in here because we did that in the room as well today. But if you're someone that really, really, really is just all over the place where you're trading, you need to have a newsletter like mine to have someone and something to follow. And again, you're going to get the half-day class for free with this. Now, this was another short that we did. This was Google. This was back a couple of weeks ago. Again, this is almost a month ago. It started going Tuesday to the 13th in the morning. Most of the trades come in the morning early in the pre-market. I sent out the Google so you know what to do to organize. You're ready to go. You could have bought to put in this, which is basically a short, okay? Here it was. So you take it, boom, get the drop, boom. You could have been out here, could have been out here. This was a nice trade. I don't always think it's a good idea to hold it the last day, but this was a very nice trade. Now you sense you can't beat that with a stick, no matter what your sizing is, you could have traded this. Advanced trader contract, position size of 100 contracts. This definitely had volume. We always trade options with fine. You could have made 21,000. A 233% return investment, 12 contracts. You could have made 25, 20. And again, you could have held the select action a little bit more. Your sizing has to depend on number one, the size of your cash in your account. Number two, why not you have it set up as a margin account or cash account, or if you have restrictions on how many trades you can take. Those are questions you have to ask your broker or you could ask me to. But if you're new, I would be in no more than three things at one time. You know, just so you know, to get used to what we're doing here. Because you want to be able to give the trades a chance to work. And you want to be able to consistently size yourself the same amount on every trade. That's extremely important too. And this isn't an exact size. It's close enough. You can't be risking $1,500 in a trade if you're supposed to be risking $300. You know what I'm saying? Take a trade you risk $1,500. And then the next trade you risk $1,200, that's close enough. But you can't be risking $301,700 or $1,000. That's all over the place. And you're not going to see consistent results on your P&L. Now, as I was saying in reference to what I do, how I make the picks, I'm looking at the gap. And for those of you who don't know what is a gap, a gap is a difference to the closing event. Again, target was a gap up today. Target was a bullish gap. Stunt's gap was every single solitary day. But not every gap is a good gap or what I call a golden gap.  I'm looking for gaps that are predictable. How do I do that? I use my reading system. It's not a gambling. It's not about 50-50. You have to put the odds in your favor.  Because the fact is, if you don't have a consistent strategy to follow to make money in the market, the market will eat you up with a spoon.  It's also not going to go straight down. But that's why you have to get in, get the move, get out. Get in, get the move, get out. And the whole key to options is really getting the big fat bars.   You can call a chunk in and out. You can hold overnight if you want if you're waiting for something to go, like I'm doing with Target. But the fact is, we're doing pretty fast trades in reference to options. We want to make money on a consistent basis. These are not swing trades. We're getting in and getting out, whether it's in one day or a week. It's the idea of not holding something for days and weeks and months and years. It's the idea of building up your account, taking a small account and building it. Taking a large account, building it even more. Increasing your risk. Making money over time. And many of the trades, like I said, we are getting really nice extensions on this year simply because of volatility and has been in the market. Today is no exception to that. Today is exactly what I'm talking about about the sell-off we're getting right now in the market. But if you've been somebody that's been trading alone, or you've been in Reddit chat rooms or other chat rooms that you've lost money in, you're taking trades and ideas from complete strangers that you don't know and you don't know their strategy. Now, while you're not going to learn my strategy unless you take the golden gap course, if you have been following me for a while and you know me in the sense that you've been following what I do and have the feel and idea of what it is, have called me on the phone, talked to me, emailed me, something who have followed me as long as I've had the business. More than 10 years. The fact is, you know that I know what I'm doing. And you have to get to a point where you can trust me in order to say, wait a minute, this is a good one, this isn't a good one. And again, Target was a good one today. If you want and change the library mode, you're going to have to do the golden gap class. It's a class I teach at once a month. But if you have no interest in doing the class, and again, you sign up for the newsletter, it's a nice way to make money a sign if you have an extra job doing something else. But the immediate benefit of everything I do whenever I try to call on the options newsletter, I'm reading the gap. So I'm reading the gap for you, essentially, when I'm calling the options newsletter trades. I get in the morning, I rate the gap. If it reached 20 points or more, we take it in the direction of the gap. So the upcoming class is soon. If you want to do the big class, if you want to do this, it is the weekend in St. Paul's Day. It's March 16th and 17th class tuition is $69.99. It's $9.00 to $5.00, class is online. You can be anywhere in the world and take it. And again, the combo includes the trends, which is March 19th. And again, that is a Tuesday. Class tuition is $74.99. I'm doing a special four class, which includes the room and the newsletter free for one year. If you want to sign up for this, it's huge. Got to sign up for the combo. It's $74.99. If you want to do this, you're going to get the whole shebang. Now, if you want to do just the newsletter, again, that's perfectly fine. But the options newsletter is the options class and the options newsletter. And again, you're going to get a discount on that through St. Paul's Day for $59.99. The March class special includes the golden gap course and the trends course and the room and the newsletter for one year. And that takes you into 2025 as well. So again, the newsletter, standalone, no prerequisites. You save $2,000. Again, this also takes you into 2025 for getting the options trades. You have until March 17th to sign up for this, which you can sign up today and you can start trading with us. And I wouldn't delay. I'm calling some really nice trades. I'm extremely focused. I mean, the better we're doing, the more focused I've been. We're having one of the best years we've had so far. Starts to the year. I can say that. But again, it's about me staying focused and I'm in a really good place right now. I just really, really have a wonderful, wonderful life where I am right now. So I think that's contributed to my ability to be able to pinpoint, see things, trade better. And everybody's on board. So I've been talking to people. So people have been making some mistakes about their sizing. And that's why I mentioned that earlier. It's something you can fix like that in a tweet. If you know you can't afford NVIDIA, and it costs $2,000 to a contract, you don't do it. I'm calling plenty of other trades. I don't think I'm calling too many. I think I'm calling just the right amount. I think, I don't think we're trading. I think we're doing great this year. But your sizing counts, because again, if you take five trades and you're supposed to be risking $500, and one you take and risk $2,000, and that one loses, you're going to have to take four trades just to make up a round of the $500 risk to be breakeven. Keep your risk the same. The only ones we're really doing that are that expensive is NVIDIA. Honest to goodness. That's it. Everything else is so reasonably priced. So staying focused and doing the trades, you can afford to be in. And again, follow the momentum. Follow what's happening. And if you have any questions, you want to sign up, email me or let's set the stops, swish.com. Have a great day.