Summit Ministries + Aliens in Congress | Livestream AMA

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Are we live? Are we live? I think we are.

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I think we are. Welcome, everybody. Welcome. Are we?

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What's up, everybody? I am I have not done this in a very long time. So you're gonna have to forgive me.

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We're back. We are back. And that's hot.

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The studio space is it's it's still a work in progress.

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As a matter of fact, I've already forgotten one piece. I'm professional.

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I'm professional. Here we go. Yeah. What is up, everybody? It's been a little while.

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Been a little while. So, yeah. Come on in. Come on in. Alex Harmony Music. Let me explain,

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Sean. Welcome. Welcome. I'm very glad that you're here. This is a

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Wise Disciple live stream. This is really happening. It's Thursday, August the third. Not the normal day that we that we typically do this.

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So I apologize for that. If you were keeping tabs in the community post, it all came down to one wire.

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And that was dramatic. I don't know if you can see. I ripped a lot of these fingernails off waiting for this wire to show up.

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If you happen to be watching for the very first time, my name is Nate Sala and welcome to the new studio. It's a lot like the old studio.

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But bigger. I don't know if you can hear the echo in this room anyway. And I don't know if a lot of you care to know about what my studio looks like from the other end of things.

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But I'm certain I could show you that. I don't know. Other people do that. I think it's really great.

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I don't know if anybody cares about that stuff. So I haven't done that before. Yeah. Come on in.

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If you're here, let me know where you're watching from. And also send me your questions because I'm if you just send them to the comment section of the chat there,

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I'll try to answer them in a little bit. So yeah. Again, everybody, thank you for Matt.

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Thank you for joining and everybody. Looking forward to chatting with you there. Somebody said so professional.

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Yeah. I'm sorry about that. It's the little things. It's the little things. By the way, speaking of little things, if you are so inclined, we still have merch at the merch store if you want to check that out.

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I don't know if you want to rip Wise Disciple. My microphone smells like syrup.

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Moving on. All right. That was the non sequitur. The last time I actually sat in front of this camera and spoke to you directly was probably about seven weeks ago.

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So yeah, it was a long time ago. I think it was a little over seven weeks. I filmed a bunch of videos back then.

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I just sort of just churned them out, you know, boom, boom, boom, and then scheduled them all to release each week.

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First time I ever did anything like that. And then I just packed up my entire house and moved my family all the way out to Nashville, Tennessee.

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So that's. Yep. We are not. We're not in Vegas anymore.

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So yeah. Yeah. This is this is Dolly Parton territory now.

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So and, you know, God moved us out here for a reason.

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And hopefully you saw my previous video where I talked about, you know, the dream that I believe

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God gave me and how that sparked my leave in Las Vegas. Well, now we're gone.

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So my family and I packed up our pod and we drove directly out to Lookout Mountain up in Georgia or to wait.

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Yeah. Tennessee, Georgia border to spend some time with summit students at Covenant College. And I spent the entire month of July out there, had some great experience with the students.

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I was able to teach first state evangelism and walk the students through the art of developing leading questions, which is principally speaking.

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I mean, that's required for good cross examination. And so I was a lot of fun. It was it was really great.

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Had a chance to get to know some of the students in particular, just as we were on campus, you know, walk into activities and things like that.

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And then now, literally just about a week ago, summit sessions ended. And now

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I'm back in the Nashville area. So ready to party with you on the channel. I want to talk to you briefly about summit just for a minute, if you can indulge me, because summit is amazing.

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All right. And I know that I'm biased because I work there. But like I said, this was an amazing time. And I want to talk about why it's amazing just for a split second.

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All right. So if you're still, if you're coming in here. Oh, Moose Chuckle, you're in Old Hickory.

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Yeah, I'm about 15 minutes, 20 minutes away from Old Hickory. So that's amazing. Yeah, come on in and throw your questions in.

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Wow, Thomas from Scotland. Thank you so much. Yeah, for jumping on with me. Anyway, so let me talk about why summit is so amazing just for a split second.

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God gave me a front row seat to be able to see what the Holy Spirit was doing in the lives of students as they came to Covenant College.

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And of course, you know, I can't share too much. Got to be careful about what I say, specifically details and stuff with students.

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But overall, summit is doing some of the most important work for the kingdom of God right now.

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Now, why do I say that? Well, it's because if we as Christians are going to be intentional and think through how to navigate this difficult, hostile environment, right, where the culture, they're not post -Christian, they're anti -Christian, as Sean McDowell puts it, well then intentionality is key.

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Strategy is key. You know, the right kind of strategy. Engaging all Christians to be able to be effective and to navigate their faith in a time like this.

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And I've always said for many years that this comes down to developing a strong biblical worldview in the next generation.

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Playing the long game, thinking about our children as they grow up and then get out into the culture and engage it for Christ.

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Thankfully, the people at summit agree with my assessment, and they are doing the hard work of developing a strong biblical worldview in students.

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And I just, I kind of logically knew this, I just, I was not sort of emotionally prepared to literally in real time watch as students would walk in to, it's a two week session up in Summit.

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They would walk in, some of them not wanting to be there, you know. Some of them, mom and dad forced them to go, okay, let's be honest.

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But by the end of the time, those same students, they were leaning in, they were engaged, they were transformed.

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And so, I can't overstate this enough, but Summit Ministries is doing some of the most important work that we will ever do as Christians right now.

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And I'm so proud to be a part of this organization and to walk alongside other brothers and sisters who have the same heart.

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You know, they're trying to do the work of training up the next generation in a biblical worldview. But if you're like me, you're probably wondering, like, okay, but there's so many other organizations out there,

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Nate. Like, what makes Summit different, right? How does, what is Summit doing? Is there some secret, you know, to taking a student who, like I said, not engaged, not leaning in, perhaps borderline apathetic to the

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Christian worldview, and flip this student around in two weeks to the point where they are transformed?

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I remember talking to a senior pastor of a church, I think this was last year.

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He's a senior pastor at a megachurch on the East Coast, and he sent his son to Summit a couple of years ago.

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And the way that he described it to me was, Nate, a light switch turned on for my son, right?

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So, yeah, what is the secret to what Summit does? What's the magic sauce? It's funny, because this is fresh in my mind, so that's why

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I'm talking to you about this, but I was just at a conference near Atlanta. I was teaching on Summit's philosophy of education when it comes to biblical worldview.

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And here's the answer. It begins first by understanding what a worldview is and how it's expressed, okay?

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A worldview is a pattern of ideas, beliefs, convictions, and habits that help us to make sense of God, of the world, and our relationship to God in the world, okay?

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Maybe another way of saying the same thing is a worldview is a lens through which and by which we see the world around us, all right?

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And that lens is shaped by our ideas, our beliefs, our convictions, and our habits.

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Okay, that's a worldview. So, if we know that, well, then the next question is, how is a worldview expressed in a person?

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Well, there's three ways, okay? Through our thoughts, through our desires, and through our actions.

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If you think about, you know, what goes into a worldview, right? Particularly a Christian worldview, some concepts,

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I'm sure, pop up, right? They come to mind. Like, for example, the resurrection of Jesus, amen?

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Somebody can amen that, right? The doctrine of original sin, you know, biblical theology proper, right?

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These concepts belong in the category of what we know or what we think, so that's category number one.

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But wait a second, there's more than that, right? There's more that goes into a Christian worldview, right?

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There's also a sense of justice, you know, a desire to be right with God, a desire for God to be glorified in all things, okay?

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Well, those concepts belong in the category of desires. That's category number two, right?

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So, what we desire to happen. Well, and then finally, there are other concepts, like, just to finish out and round out our worldview, other concepts that shape how we see the world, which is fulfilling the

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Great Commission, amen? Right? Forgiving others as Christ has forgiven us.

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Belonging to a good church. And all of those concepts fit into the category of actions.

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And so, what we see, if we really think long and hard about this, is that worldview is expressed three ways.

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Thoughts, desires, and actions. So, that means for the one who wants to build out somebody's worldview and train up a person in biblical worldview, we need to engage those three categories, okay?

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Now, I think you're already starting to understand other people, organizations,

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I'm not going to name names, doesn't matter, perhaps even our churches make a mistake because they think that in order to develop worldview, we only need to engage one category, which is somebody's thoughts.

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They do not intentionally engage a person's desires as well in order to shape action.

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And ultimately, when that happens, when you only focus on thoughts, you undercut the act of developing a strong biblical worldview.

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And so, again, at Summit Ministries, we recognize that desires are all wrapped up in worldview development, and we engage the desires just as much as we do students' thoughts, okay?

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Now, I'm going to turn a corner here. Yeah, thanks, guys, for sticking in with me.

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I'm going to turn a corner and start to answer your questions, but here's the last piece on this, and then we'll answer questions, all right? Maybe this is a video for another time.

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Maybe I can unpack it. I'm riffing here, okay? So, bear with me. I also have, yeah, no comment.

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The facial hair in the community, it either really, you know, is a good thing for people, or it really upsets people, my facial hair.

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Anyway, moving on. I lost the thread. The secret ingredient to engaging these three categories of worldview expression comes down to one thing.

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So, here's the magic behind worldview development. It comes down to meaning -making, okay?

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Another word for that is processing, okay? See, it's not just that students get 60 hours of worldview training from established faculty in the areas of theology and apologetics at Summit Ministries, because that's exactly what happens, by the way.

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But students are also given the requisite time to process what they heard in an environment that elicits that processing experience, and in the act of processing out loud the things that they heard, students are able to make meaning out of the training that they received.

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It's not just information anymore. Now, they make meaning to the information as it applies to their lives, and that is the secret sauce for strong worldview development, okay?

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Hopefully, I'm talking to a youth pastor out there, you know what I mean, or I'm talking to a homeschool parent, or whoever you are, you know what

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I'm talking about. Something's resonating, because that's why we are so successful at Summit Ministries. We've been literally doing this for 61 years, okay?

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That's how we see students go from borderline apathetic to all of a sudden, the light switch comes on, as the senior pastor that I was talking to on the

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East Coast told me. And again, Summit, as far as I can tell, is the preeminent organization that understands this meaning -making process better than any other organization.

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And so, I strongly encourage you, if you know of a student between the age of 16 to 22, you need to send them to Summit Ministries over the summer.

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It will transform their life. If you have any questions about that, well, that's literally my role at Summit.

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So, you know, reach out to me. If you have any questions, you can email me at hello at wisedisciple .org.

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My sons are going to Summit when they're old enough, they don't even know it yet, okay? So, all right.

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Okay, we got some people in the chat here, excellent. I got some questions from the community tab, so let's go ahead and go there.

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Now, this is me, partly why I'm doing this live stream is just me checking to see if all the equipment, you know, is working properly.

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It's been a little while. For some reason, like I said, my microphone smells like pancake syrup, so that's fantastic.

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Okay, let's... Yeah, here we go. Let's go ahead.

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Bear with me now. I'm a professional. Hold on. Let me see if I can...

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Yeah, there we go. Got some questions here. And thank you for the questions.

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Brooklyn, let's go to Brooklyn Hallett first, which, by the way, I don't know if you know this, but I had to rearrange my entire studio setup here and I have to get used to it because I used to be in videos...

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Where is it? That way. So, I used to be on the other end and look at my monitor, which was over there.

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Now, I had to put my monitor... Anyway, so it's going to take some adjusting. Okay. Brooklyn said, do you have any recommendations for going from high school speech and debate to college?

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Not a whole lot. I personally did not have students who stayed with me long enough for me to watch them, you know, go to the college circuit and debate.

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So therefore, you know, I did not write a whole lot of letters of rec or sit with students and advise them about particular colleges to go to that would be worth their time with regard to debate.

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Having said that, I'll say a couple of things that come to mind. If you're looking to make the jump from high school to college, it matters who your coaches are, okay?

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And it matters what their record is in terms of sending their students to maybe NDT or CEDAs, okay?

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NDT is National Debate Tournament. CEDA is Cross -Examination

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Debate Association, okay? So what I'm getting at is, if you have a desire to join a college debate team,

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Brooklyn, your goal must be because you want to improve to the level of going all the way to nationals, okay?

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So I think it is incumbent upon you to do your research and find out which college's debate team has a storied history of sending their students to tournaments, okay?

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So if I were you, I'd find a reach out and inquire directly from the debate coaches.

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That's probably the quickest, fastest way to get some of the information that you need, you know? Usually there's a webpage where somebody's contact info lives, and you can just go to the webpage and get that information and then reach out and ask some important questions like, you know, hey, my name's

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Brooklyn. I'm considering going to your college, and I'm really interested in debate.

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Can you tell me more about the coaches and their backgrounds, you know? Can you tell me more about the support programs that they provide debaters, right?

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Can you tell me more about scholarship opportunities for debaters, you know? Can you

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Zoom with one of the coaches and just get to know them a little bit better, right? Hear about their philosophy of coaching.

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Hear about some awesome stories from tournaments past. If you hear about stories from tournaments past, that means they go to tournaments, okay?

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You know, and all of this is just going to paint you a picture about the college debate team and whether or not you should make the jump.

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Sometimes a college debate team doesn't exactly align with your intended focus of study or your options of college to attend, right?

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So not everyone can go to Harvard and join their debate team, but, you know, very often

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I think you'll find a good match. I mean, if you are blessed enough to attend one of the Ivy League schools, well, then it's very likely that the debate team is going to be rigorous.

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It's going to provide you some excellent training and some excellent opportunities. So yeah, you know, hopefully that gives you some pieces to think about.

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Also, I will say this. Beware of colleges who overpromise things.

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Okay, I've not seen this personally, but I've heard things before, okay? But again,

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I think you can get a great sense of what a debate team looks like if you just reach out and inquire. So that's what

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I would recommend. Okay, let's move on. Jackie Wheeler says, what is your take on all the current

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UFO UAP talk? Okay, here we go, here we go.

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Do you believe it's aliens or another supernatural force? Also, do you believe there's room for aliens to exist within the

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Christian worldview? Okay, Jackie. Thank you for the question.

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Oh boy. I have not talked about this at all, because I figured, you know what, some of the other guys, some of the great, you know, sort of Christian voices, particularly on social media, on YouTube, man, they're talking about this like crazy.

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I mean, what else can I say about it? But I, yeah,

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I, well, put it this way. You've got hearings in Congress from folks who, as far as I can tell, are not making up the news that aliens and UFOs are among us and interacting with us, and they have been for years.

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And so yeah, I get it. It creates this mystery surrounding aliens and UFOs. What are

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UAP? UAP stand for Unidentified Authorized, or Aerial Phenomena, I don't know, whatever.

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It's something like that, right? You know, and the questions abound from Christians, right?

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Like, what, what, what the heck is going on, right? Does the Bible have something to say about it? It's funny, because, yeah, let me see if some of my other stuff works here.

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So, bear with me as I, this is always the best part, is dead air.

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Let me, let's have some fun. Let's make sure all my equipment works so I can do some debate reaction soon.

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Let me see if I got, yeah, let me see if I got, if I got this ready.

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Let's play this. So there was,

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I had to remember this from a couple years ago, where Obama made the rounds.

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Any Obama fans in the audience, because I'm about to do an Obama impersonation, because whenever I see his face,

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I have to try to do, now I'm, I'm rusty. So maybe my Obama's not as good as my Trump, but, cuz it's been a while.

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But anyway, Obama made the rounds cuz he was, he did this, watch this. Obama know about UFOs.

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When it, when it comes to aliens, there's some things I just can't tell you on air.

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He was asked about the UFO frenzy in the wake of that explosive 60 minute story on Navy pilots, who've seen things they just can't explain.

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Um, I, um, I, I'm gonna share my thoughts.

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Just bear with me, okay? Revealed to James Corden, he was eager to find out about real close encounters when he became president.

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Truth is that when I came into office, I asked, right? I was like, all right, you know, is there the lab somewhere where we're keeping the alien specimens in spaceships?

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And, uh. Um. I mean, who, who is this person? Like, you know, when we're talking about aliens, like, what is, uh, huh?

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What? I mean, um, anyway.

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Uh, you know, they did a little bit of research and, uh, uh, the answer was no.

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But, uh, so I, uh, uh, uh, uh, I went to the

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NSA and I, I said to the director, uh, where are the aliens?

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And, uh, he said, uh, Mr. President. Don't be a poopoo head.

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Um, anyway, Obama, you know, sort of made the rounds. I think this was a year ago or a couple of years ago where he skirted the issue as it, you know, sort of appears to have happened, uh, you know, on, on James Corden show.

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And so it just actually, it raised people's dander, like, you know, like, whoa, you know, what's he hiding?

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It doesn't mean we're alone in the universe. There's footage and records of objects in the skies that we don't know exactly what they are.

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I love Obama too, because Obama, so I don't want this to be just me doing Obama for half an hour, but like,

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I love how Obama, when he wants to not answer a question, he just basically says the most elementary obvious things, right?

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Like, uh, you know, uh, uh, well, let me be clear. Uh, when a UFO is in the sky, uh, there's an object and the object flies, uh, other people see the object and it's unidentified.

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Like, you know, it's like, okay. Okay. Mr. President, you didn't want to answer the question. UFOs are being taken more.

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Let me be clear. Oh, I'm rusty. My Obama sucks. Oh, let me be clear.

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Seriously. More people are coming forward with their own sightings. Shaquille O 'Neal told

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Jimmy Kimmel he's and Shaquille O 'Neal and we're done. Um, I'm not going to do

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Shaquille O 'Neal. Um, let me, uh, let me do this too. Uh, again, professional, like I'm doing this a real time.

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Hold on. Uh, I'm a YouTube influencer guys. Come on now. Uh, give me, hold on.

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So this, uh, I made a joke and I was sort of, but this actually made headlines because there was a congressional hearing.

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Um, a couple of days ago or something, were you guys following this? Uh, I know Jackie was following it.

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That's why she asked the question. Here we go. Um, it's so hard to walk and chew gum at the same time, guys.

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Hold on. Um, this is all the fun editing parts of my videos when, uh, when, when they're before they're edited, it's all this dead air, which

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I absolutely cannot stand here. Here we go. Watch this. Oops. Here we go.

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Rare or isolated. They are routine military air crew and commercial pilots trained observers whose lives depend on accurate identification are frequently witnessing these phenomenon.

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Parts of our government are aware of more. So again, I mean, this is a witness testifying in Congress about things that, and I don't look at this gentleman and I go,

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Oh, conspiracy is making things up. Like I take it at face value that something is going on.

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Right. But the question is what about UAP than they let on excessive classification practices, keep crucial information hidden since 2021, all

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UAP videos are classified as secret or above this level of secrecy, not only impedes our understanding, but fuel speculation and mistrust.

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Yeah. I mean, what are we looking at here? It's, uh, something going extremely fast, uh, perhaps faster than what the normal laws of physics would allow.

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I don't know what that is. It looks like a fly. In 2014,

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I was an F -18 Foxtrot pilot in the Navy fighter attack squadron 11, the red Rippers. And I was stationed at NAS Oceana in Virginia beach.

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After upgrades were made to our jets radar systems, we began detecting unknown objects operating in our airspace during a training mission in warning area, whiskey 72, 10 miles off the coast of Virginia beach.

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So bear with me. So I'm going to, I'm going to give my thoughts on this, um, which may or may not blow your mind, depending on, you know, what side of the aisle you, you fall, but, um, and I'm not going to pretend that what

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I'm going to tell you is the last thing to say about it. So perhaps this is, you know, if there's interest here, this is an open door to a further discussion and we can, we can go deeper in the

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Bible on this. Two F -18 super Hornets were split by UAP. The object described as a dark gray or a black cube inside of a clear sphere came within 50 feet of the lead aircraft and was estimated to be five to 15 feet in diameter.

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The mission commander terminated the flight immediately and returned base. Our squadron submitted a safety report, but there was no official acknowledgement of the incident and no further mechanism to report the sightings.

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Soon, these encounters became so frequent that air crew would discuss the risk of UAP as part of their regular pre -flight briefs.

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Right. Clearly something's going on. Um, if it's, if it's being detected by, well, so that's interesting.

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Look at that. That's interesting.

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Um, if it's being detected by our physical instruments, then clearly something material is being tracked, right?

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I mean, this makes sense. Um, yeah,

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I take it. These are all taken from pilots are reporting UAP altitudes that appear above them at 40 ,000 feet, potentially in low earth orbit or in the gray zone below the

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Carmen line, making inexplainable maneuvers like right -hand turns and retrograde orbits or J hooks.

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Sometimes these reports are reoccurring with numerous recent sightings north of Hawaii and in the North Atlantic. As we looked around,

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I noticed that we saw some. So, I mean, and it just goes from there. So yeah, the question is what the heck is going on, on God's green earth.

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That's probably not the way to say that in God's wonderful universe. Those of you coming in here, uh, yeah, throw in your questions and I'll try to answer this.

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I think I'm going to probably take a few minutes to unpack this. Um, and then, uh, hopefully if there's time after I can,

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I can answer some of your questions. Um, it's funny because there was a headline that I'm just remembering this.

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There was a headline that dropped a few weeks ago about alien sightings in somebody's backyard in Las Vegas.

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Like right before I left Las Vegas, there were sightings of nine -foot, like, tall aliens in somebody's backyard.

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And, uh, you know, which I understand this correctly, came at the tail end of UFO sightings in the sky over Las Vegas.

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Which if you know Vegas, then of course you know that Area 51 is just a few hours north of Las Vegas.

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And full disclosure, I went to Area 51 twice. Um, one of those times,

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I went beyond the barrier, past the sign that says, stop, or you will be shot.

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Okay? Um, yeah, but why did you do that, Nate? Well, because I was unsaved back then, and also largely an idiot, uh, until I was 30 years old.

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So, uh, you know, there is that. Anyway, uh, and if you have questions about that, um,

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I can say more about that. But let's just talk about this from a biblical perspective, okay? Um, if aliens exist, and by aliens

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I mean beings that live on another planet somewhere out in another galaxy in outer space, um, this doesn't change anything about Christianity or, uh, the revelation that we have from God's holy scriptures.

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I don't think I'm saying anything controversial, uh, at this point. We are, we are given very limited information about humanity, uh, in the

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Bible, that we were made in the image of God, uh, we are given the reason and the purpose as to why we were created, um, we're given a lot of insight into our current fallen nature, uh, and how that has affected our relationship with God and with the people around us.

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Uh, we even know on a very limited scale that there are other beings that God has created who, it appears, do not share our unique quality of being made in the image of God.

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I'm referring to angels right now. So, you know, is it possible for there to be other beings that God has created somewhere else in the universe?

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And the answer is yes, of course, it's possible. But that's not the question to ask, in my opinion.

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I think a better question to ask is, is it plausible that the experiences that folks are having are with alien beings from another planet in our universe?

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And as far as I can understand, uh, you know, as I understand the issue, the answer is no, it is not plausible.

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Um, there's a really great book, it's called, uh, The Privileged Planet by, okay, here we go, um,

31:40

Gonzales and Richards. If you read this book, you will discover that the earth fits into what the authors describe as a

31:51

Goldilocks zone. If you remember the story of Goldilocks, Goldilocks is looking for the perfect bowl of porridge, one that is just the right temperature, just the right size of bowl, etc.

32:01

Well, according to the authors of The Privileged Planet, the earth fits into the Goldilocks zone, which is a rare environment in the universe for life to thrive.

32:10

As far as we can tell, only our planet fits into this

32:15

Goldilocks zone. You know, as we use our instruments to observe other galaxies, we are not finding other planets that also fit into this

32:24

Goldilocks zone. And by Goldilocks zone, I mean a planet that is, uh, the right zone, the right environment, you know, in other words, the planet is not too big, it's not too small, um, has the right amount of water, uh, on the planet to provide an environment for life, it has the right amount of, uh, carbon present for the right chemical reactions to take place for life, you know?

32:48

There are the unique protections that some of the other surrounding planets and celestial bodies, so to speak, like the moon, provide our planet, uh, you know, stuff like that, that's, that creates this kind of an environment.

33:02

There does not appear to be another Goldilocks zone out there in the observable universe, so that's why

33:07

I say this is not plausible that there are alien beings from another planet.

33:13

But, okay, let's concede that for argument's sake. Let's say they do exist. Okay, well, now they need to travel all the way here.

33:22

The problem is, the nearest galaxy is something like 25 ,000 years away, and that's if the spaceship travels at the speed of light.

33:31

So now we're talking about beings that would have to live unbelievably ridiculous long periods of time in order to survive getting here, and that's why

33:39

I say it's, it's unlikely. It's, it's, it's implausible that there are alien beings from some other planet in a galaxy far, far away traveling here.

33:49

Um, as many of you are, you know, Star Wars fans, I hate to disappoint you, there are no

33:54

Wookiees. Uh, anyway. Now, maybe, maybe we're not dealing with interstellar travel, right?

34:03

Maybe we're dealing with interdimensional travel. Okay, that's more interesting because the

34:10

Bible appears to touch on this notion, right? Um, you know, okay,

34:15

Christians in the audience, here's a question for you. Where is heaven located? If you look at the creation account in Genesis, and you sort of, you know, reflect on what we know about science, well then clearly

34:27

God created the universe at a finite moment in the past. Uh, this means that space and time and matter, all these things came into existence at some point, and if you rewind time enough down to the moment of creation, what you have before creation, if I can use those words to make sense of that moment, what that is is an environment outside of space, time, and matter.

34:53

To the best of our knowledge, to me, this is another dimension. The Bible characterizes this as a spiritual realm where a spiritual battle is taking place, and so if you go to Ephesians chapter 6, let's do that real quick.

35:14

Ephesians chapter 6, and where is it?

35:22

Um, uh, verse 12. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the, where?

35:39

In the heavenly places. Okay? This aligns, I think, with a dramatic moment between Elisha and his servant.

35:50

This is a story of, you know, the king of Syria and his army, and they surrounded

35:57

Elisha, and I think it was the entire city of Dothan, and Elisha prayed and asked

36:03

God that his servant's eyes would be opened. Actually, let's be very precise here.

36:14

Where is, whoops, second, somebody help me.

36:20

Second, okay. Second Kings chapter 6, um, yeah, right?

36:32

Okay, yeah. Then, so, verse 17. Then Elisha prayed and said,

36:38

O Yahweh, I pray, open his eyes that he may see, his servant's eyes. And Yahweh opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.

36:54

And they came down to him, and Elisha prayed to Yahweh and said, strike this people with blindness, I pray. And so, he struck them with blindness according to the word of Elisha.

37:01

So, there is something going on interdimensionally which engulfs and surrounds us.

37:09

I was watching, what's that Keanu Reeves movie? Constantine. I was watching

37:16

Constantine and I, you know, was sort of wrestling with Constantine, the film's concept of the spiritual realm, especially of hell, and the way that visually this movie depicted it was basically hell is just spatially, so this is going to break down, in the other dimension, if you walk between dimensions, it's as if you recognize that hell is around you just in the other dimension.

37:49

And so, it seems that similarly, there's something going on here where angels, spiritual beings are all around us, but we don't see them unless God gives us the eyes to see these things.

38:06

And so, what can we extrapolate from this, right? God's other beings, his angels, have the ability to interact with us as they walk between dimensions, so to speak.

38:17

It's not just that Elisha, you know, said, open your eyes, or said to Yahweh, open his eyes, and the servant just saw

38:26

God's horses and chariots, but actually, these things interacted with the

38:33

Syrians such that they actually became blind. So, clearly, spiritual beings can interact with people between dimensions.

38:42

Now, the Bible doesn't, you know, sort of teach this explicitly. There's not a line that says exactly what I'm saying right now, but I think it's easily inferred from the accounts in scripture, you know?

38:53

Jesus told the woman at the well in John chapter 4 that God is spirit, right? So, I mean, if you just think in terms of, like, you know, putting these pieces together all on the table, sort of laying them out there in order to make sense of what's going on with these hearings in Congress, it seems more likely that we're probably dealing with interdimensional beings, okay?

39:16

Well, the Bible describes some of these beings, okay? I mean, this doesn't exactly take God's word by surprise, so,

39:23

I mean, there's not a whole lot of, you know, inferred. The thing is,

39:29

I don't usually make kind of snap judgments in this regard. I try to, you know, hear all the facts.

39:35

As far as I can tell with the, especially the congressional hearings and things like that, like, there's no actual physical evidence.

39:41

Nobody has trotted in dead bodies of biologics, as one of the witnesses called them, at least not today, unless somebody caught a headline and I missed it.

39:51

Let me, I'm sorry, while I'm pulling up all these screens, I lost you guys and your comments.

39:58

So, there we go. Yeah, so I'm gonna try to see if, you know, maybe one of you is probably a little bit more up to speed on the congressional hearings and watching the

40:10

UFOs and, you know, the stuff like that. Romy Urock says, how should we best witness to the extraterrestrial,

40:18

Nate? First -date evangelism. First -date extraterrestrial evangelism. Anyway, I think as the hearings continue, if there's more physical evidence that's presented, we'll be able to speak a little bit more clearly about what's going on.

40:32

Um, but even if there were physical evidence, like these biologics, as one of the witnesses, you know, said that there are, there's some room somewhere in some government facility that has dead alien bodies, uh, this doesn't contradict what the

40:47

Bible teaches by any stretch, you know? There's room in the universe for these types of beings, and so I think over time we'll just have to learn more and figure out what exactly is going on here.

40:58

Having said that, let me remind you of something, because I don't want this aspect of sort of what's been floating around in alien lore to get lost now that we're sort of talking about, you know, biologics, real sightings confirmed by the

41:14

NSA, confirmed by the government, all that stuff, right? And so I just want to spend a couple more minutes on alien abduction cases, because I think those are fascinating, but they're also very telling, okay?

41:27

And so I'll try to provide some links after the live stream is over to a couple of pieces of literature that you can follow up on, um, so, but let me just say this couple things to bear in mind, and then

41:37

I'll try to take some of your questions here. By the way, so grateful for you guys. So grateful to be doing this, and, uh, really appreciate you all.

41:46

Um, okay, let's talk about what is called in the literature, sometimes referred to as classic abduction syndrome.

41:57

So, I did a little research on this a little while back, because this has been a question that's been floating around in the

42:03

Church for years, you know? What about alien abductions? What about UFO sightings, right?

42:09

So, like I said, I'll try to provide links to this, but, um, let's talk about an actual abduction case that's usually fleshed out through some form of hypnosis after the fact, right?

42:21

Which is typically how this kind of goes. During, um, capture, uh, so somebody who is an abductee, during that, which usually happens at night, um, while the abductee is driving in a car, you know, they're sitting at home, they're, um, they're sleeping in a bed.

42:39

Usually how this kind of case goes is a light or a

42:44

UFO appears, and then the abductee blacks out. And then only later through hypnosis, um, or sometimes, you know, through a triggered event, they remember what happened afterwards, okay?

42:56

But then they're looking back. And usually how it goes is, well, they're paralyzed, um, the abductee is paralyzed.

43:03

They're levitated out and upward in a beam of light, okay? Many have claimed to have been transported through solid objects, like walls, um, like, like a roof, you know?

43:15

Like, right through a car. Um, which, okay, stop. Think about that. Doesn't that seem to be more in line with, um, out -of -body experiences, right?

43:26

Um, you know, near -death experiences that some people have had, right? Okay, just putting that out there.

43:33

Then, uh, the aliens, they sometimes will appear out of thin air, uh, they'll walk through solid objects to, to get at their, their, the abductees.

43:45

The abductees are then brought to kind of a waiting ship where they are surrounded by another group of these beings, these aliens.

43:52

But it should be noted that aliens, you know, the, the appearances, uh, and the way that the abductees describe these appearances of these aliens, they change depending on what country one is abducted in.

44:04

Have you, did you know that? So, for instance, in America, uh, aliens are small, they're gray beings with, like, these huge black eyes, right?

44:13

And small slits for mouths, right? But in England, in Europe, they're tall, they're blonde, they're

44:19

Nordic -looking, you know? Um, in South America, aliens are very hairy, they look like Bigfoot, uh, they look like other monster types.

44:27

And so, you, you gotta ask the question, well, what's, what's going on there? Like, what's the difference in appearance from, you know, the, the same supposed race of beings, right?

44:38

Um, but let's, let's, let's go a little bit further. Abductees, you know, they're, they're, they're brought in, they're experimented on with primitive surgical tools, right?

44:48

So, again, I am characterizing the sort of typical alien abductee experience, they call it classic abduction syndrome.

44:58

With the primitive tools, this is kind of odd, right? Because you're thinking, you're thinking to yourself, okay, these are advanced space travelers, right?

45:03

They create ships that defy the laws of physics, as a lot of our, you know, our, our fighter pilots are seeing this now with their recorded technology, they're amazed.

45:14

So, so they can build amazing ships, and then they show up with a dirty scalpel to, what, operate on abductees?

45:22

That's, that's a little interesting, right? The aliens, as they're doing this, this sort of surgical procedure, so to speak, they usually tell their captives that their, that their intentions are really good.

45:33

Um, that they're actually here to help, uh, that they created life on Earth. Um, some have even disguised themselves as Jesus Christ, they've, they've disguised themselves as other people, like the

45:43

Pope. Um, other well -known celebrities, including, like, sometimes dead spouses, you know, um, in order to gain trust from the abductees, right?

45:55

But then again, you gotta stop and think to yourself, okay, well, but why? Like, is there a need to manipulate your appearance in this way, right?

46:06

This was so noted that some alien abductee researchers, they asked a question, and these were not

46:12

Christians, but they were saying, well, wait a second. If we allow that these beings that are interacting with abductees, that they're actually good, that they're actually benevolent, well then, why do they feel the need to use the cover of darkness to perform good deeds?

46:30

Because usually these things happen at night. Why do they feel the need to paralyze us and render us helpless to resist in order to, you know, take us up to their ship?

46:38

Why do they feel the need to cause fear and pain and deception consistent, you know, with actual, like, malevolence and not, you know, great, high spiritual motives?

46:53

Right? What's interesting, too, is the after effect of an abduction, which for some is the most telling aspect of an abductee's experience because usually the abductee changes their philosophical outlook on life.

47:13

They change their personalities, you know? It's interesting because a lot of abductee surveys have revealed that the majority of abductees, they have a new interest after their abduction, quote -unquote.

47:30

They have a new interest in paranormal activities. They have a new interest in sort of Eastern religions, in New Age paganism, in the

47:39

New Age worldview. So, by the way, everything that I'm telling you, I had to sift through and do research to write a couple of articles.

47:45

This was years ago at Wise Disciple, and a lot of this was taken from a book called

47:54

Alien Intrusion by Gary Bates. I mean, I sort of, you know, pieced information together from various sources, but I would recommend

48:04

Alien Intrusion by Gary Bates. The author points out that, again, impartial research shows most abductees have in the past dabbled in the occult, even if it was relatively minor.

48:22

And so, as you sort of put all these pieces together, right, it appears that dabbling in the occult is a common prerequisite for an abduction case, a classic abduction syndrome case.

48:37

And then, afterwards, it intensifies after that. And so, you gotta be, put all these pieces together, you start thinking, well, what is the point then?

48:46

What's going on here, you know? But here's the last piece that I want to leave with you, and then I'll take some of your questions.

48:55

There was a story of a man who, I think this was like Christmastime, he was being abducted, and this came out later,

49:04

I think through hypnosis, but he was being abducted, and his alien abduction was stopped in its tracks in the middle of his abduction.

49:15

He was levitating off his bed one night, his wife is laying asleep next to him, and because he was so afraid, he cried out for Jesus Christ.

49:27

And the man said that when he did that, whatever was pulling him out of bed withdrew, and the man fell back on the bed.

49:34

He said when he hit that bed, he bounced so hard it woke his wife up, and his wife was wondering why he was jumping on the bed.

49:41

Okay? As a matter of fact, again, and I think Gary Bates shows this in the book, there have been more people who have had this similar type experience, which is abductions that have been stopped by invoking the name of Jesus Christ.

50:00

And so, again, put it all together, right? Why would extraterrestrial travelers from another planet be using primitive surgical tools, even though their ships are amazing, how can they be so affected by the name of Jesus Christ that it would stop them in their tracks and cause them to flee?

50:19

Again, I propose to you, Paul tells us in Ephesians chapter 6, right?

50:31

We're dealing with a battle. It's a struggle, and it's not against flesh and blood, but it's against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places, right?

50:41

That's why Paul tells us, put on the full armor of God, right? So that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.

50:49

So, I'll leave it to you, you know, like, aliens, you know, they can walk through solid objects, supposedly, you know, they're conveying messages that they are the true creator, not

51:02

God, you know, these UFOs can defy the laws of physics, abductees before and after their abduction experiences appear to embrace

51:13

New Age and occult practices. We have an explanation for this, right? I mean,

51:19

I think the Bible has always given us a category to think about these creatures. These are demons. These are evil beings.

51:26

When Jesus was on this earth, he cast out demons that had the power to control people in the first century. This spiritual warfare that the

51:33

Bible depicts has not stopped, ladies and gentlemen. People are still being manipulated by the wicked forces that Paul described in Ephesians.

51:41

I say all of that to say, it's easy to forget about the abduction cases because now we're talking about, you know, well, they're here, you know, there's implications, you know, for these things, you know, and of course, when we hear more from the hearings in Congress, I'm sure there's more to say, but those are some of my thoughts on that.

52:01

Let me go to your questions because I'm running out of time and I didn't even hit all the comments.

52:10

Ethan Forrest says, could abductions be excuses that husbands use when they want to take a long weekend away from their wives?

52:19

Maybe some husbands. Samuel, this explanation makes it seem much more plausible.

52:26

Yeah, I don't know. Well, here's the thing too, like, I could be wrong. Like, my take could be way off, you know, but I'm just trying to be careful with the pieces of information that we have, recognizing that there's not a clear picture here.

52:39

I don't think there's enough information for us to formulate a clear picture. I think the Polaroid is still developing on this one.

52:45

And so, I'm trying to infer based on the information that we have. Back to orthodoxy.

52:56

The only question is, how do we preach them? For demons, you don't, they already know about Jesus, right?

53:03

They know his name and they tremble, so maybe just say his name. Amen? And then you, yeah.

53:13

Okay, let me find some questions in the few minutes that I have left. What's interesting, so back to orthodoxy, he says, what's interesting is also how ages ago the pyramids and Aztecs and so on made amazing structures, some in which we could not replicate today.

53:29

Where did these ancients learn it? Yeah, so I don't know a whole lot about that.

53:35

I'm sure ancient aliens has had, you know, plenty of fun with, you know, looking at the architectural structure of pyramids and things like that.

53:46

I would say, generally speaking, there's a great explanation that Michael Heiser gives as to why pyramids were structured the way they are, and I'm not going to be able to get into it right now.

54:00

It's maybe again another video, but you gotta think in terms of what their goal was and what they viewed the gods as and where they knew the gods would always be.

54:14

Okay, so just real quick, if you think of every account in the

54:19

Old Testament specifically, because, and I use the Old Testament because many pagan nations had a similar view if you do sort of a comparative study of ancient religions.

54:33

Every time that God appears to, just about every time that God appears to people in the

54:38

Old Testament and there's a significant moment there, it's on a mountain, okay? So, then you gotta think to yourself, and this is

54:46

Heiser's characterization, you gotta think to yourself, okay, here's some people that want to meet with God or gods, right?

54:51

Whether you're the true followers of God or you're something else, following a pagan god. But you recognize that these gods, they're all hanging out in mountains, you know?

55:01

A lot of times when we need to go to them or we want to talk to them, we have to go up a mountain. What if we just built our own mountain?

55:08

And so, that is the explanation of the structure that leads to a peak, which ultimately is what we, you know, we now refer to as pyramids.

55:17

And that was the desire was that if people created a mountain structure for the gods, the gods would come down and dwell with them.

55:24

And so, I think that's helpful to think through. I think Heiser's right on that.

55:34

Yeah, Ethan Ford, did you know that the name Foo Fighters came from World War II war pilots that saw UFOs buzzing around American and German boomers?

55:42

I actually did. And so, the Foo Fighters has been a staple in sort of the background of my growing up experience.

55:52

You know, I grew up, I was born in the 70s, so I grew up with, you know, I mean, this was, you know, I'm unsaved at the time, but I'm listening to Nirvana.

56:00

And then, of course, Dave Grohl, and then famously Kurt Cobain commit suicide, and everybody's like, you know, what's happening?

56:07

And then, literally, 94, 95, we find out Dave Grohl started a new band.

56:13

And it seemed a little college project -esque with their first album, but they've actually stood the test of time.

56:20

And yeah, Foo Fighters, I was a fan. They still have some really good songs. I Am A River is a very, very cool song.

56:30

Anyway. Boy, we're already out of time. Wow, this hour went by really quick.

56:40

Yeah, I don't really see a whole lot of questions. Okay, well, excellent. Somebody over in on the comment side,

56:48

I got time for one more. Somebody said, Romy Urock said, are you now a

56:53

Nashville hot chicken guy? Let me tell you something. I used to live in New Mexico, Romy Urock, so green chilies are where it's at, okay?

57:01

So yeah, spicy food is a must in the sala home. I used to joke around with my boys at dinnertime, because I'm usually putting something spicy on top of my food.

57:11

You know, I'm dicing up jalapenos, or I'm doing something. And so sometimes I'll pull out a jalapeno from the fridge, and then

57:16

I'll just wave it to the boys, and I'll say, hey, boys, anybody want to be a man tonight? You know, and they'd laugh.

57:24

My boys know better than to take me seriously. Anyway, well, let me close with this.

57:32

I told my wife one hour, and I got to keep track here. We are still unpacking, if you can believe that, in this house, and in the surrounding area here, where I'm set up in my studio.

57:43

So I need to get back to that. But listen, I am so grateful to be back. I'm so grateful to be spending this time with you.

57:50

Here's what I want you to wait for, please. Very soon, very, very soon, next week, question mark, question mark, question mark,

58:00

I'm going to turn on the Patreon, and then we're going to see what God will do. There are some wonderful ideas that I have.

58:08

I've been trying to behind the scenes also talk to people that I respect. And I don't know if I can name drop, but Michael Jones and Cameron Bertuzzi gave me some pretty solid ideas about what to do in terms of providing some extras, some top tier extras for patrons.

58:27

I'm going to turn that on. And I just want to see what happens. This is a little experiment. You know, what could we possibly do together in order to raise the level of discourse as a

58:38

Christian society, as a Christian people in a culture that is largely anti -Christian?

58:44

What could we do together? What could we do to create a space in churches, in homes, and in neighborhoods so that we could have difficult conversations and we could actually clash, but do it in a manner that we're ready when we're standing in front of non -believers and people of other religions and faiths?

59:04

I want to find out. I want to explore that. I think the very first thing that I'm going to do is I'm going to invite patrons to join me live as I go through my debate reactions, and I'm going to include you, the patron, in my debate reactions.

59:17

So, we're going to walk through debates together. Perhaps we'll go through opening statements and other segments that usually

59:23

I don't do for time, and then I'm going to incorporate your thoughts as well, get your voice in these videos as well.

59:30

I think that would be a really, really great exercise to do together so that we're all growing in the same area of communication, and there's a lot more ideas to come.

59:40

So, just put that in your calendar. The Patreon is about to get turned on, and I would highly encourage you.

59:48

Join me, because I think we can have a lot of fun together, and I think we can grow together, and I think this is going to be an amazing experience.

59:56

Yeah, that's about it. I got a video promo for the Patreon. It's coming out in a couple of days, and yeah, like I said, you've got brand new videos and things.

01:00:06

I got to figure out what to do with the rest of the space in this new studio.

01:00:12

I don't know if you noticed, but I'm missing a couple pieces here, too. So, anyway. Well, hey, this has been so great.

01:00:20

I'm so grateful that you sat with me. I really appreciate you guys. I'm hoping that God is going to do an amazing work in your life, and then

01:00:31

I'll have a front row seat to what God is doing. You know, just like I did with the Summit students, I would love to be included in what

01:00:37

God is doing in your life. If you ever need prayer, please feel free to reach out to me.

01:00:43

I would love to pray for each and every one of you, and please do that. So, again, it's hello at wisedisciple .org.

01:00:51

Yeah, send me your prayer requests. A lot of you send questions, and I try to answer them. I apologize for those of you that emailed me in the last month.

01:00:57

I was away from a lot of technology, just being with the students, but I'm back, and we're going to hit the ground running.

01:01:06

So, thank you very much. Thanks for spending time with me, everybody. I really appreciate you, and yeah,