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Day 1482 – I Do – Humor Unplugged

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Welcome to Day 1482 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

I Do – Humor Unplugged

Wisdom – the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your Captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. This is Day 1482 of our Trek, and time for a 3-minute mini-trek called Humor Unplugged. Our Thursday podcast will provide a short and clean funny story to help you lighten up and live a rich and satisfying life. Something to cheer you and give a bit a levity in your life. We are told in Proverbs 15:30 A cheerful look brings joy to the heart; good news makes for good health. We are also encouraged in Proverbs 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength. Consider this your vitamin supplement of cheer for today. So let’s jump right in with today’s funny which is titled:

I Do

Suzy and John got all dressed up for Ann’s Wedding, and they were so excited to take their four-year-old Emily with them to attend her first wedding. Ann was Suzy’s best friend and college roommate, and they adored Jim, her soon to be husband. They arrived in plenty of time and Emily was very well behaved. The wedding went off without a hitch. The bride was radiant, and the groom looked impeccable. The church was decorated elegantly, and little Emily was in awe of the entire ceremony. Afterward, they attended the reception, which was a grand event.  Little Emily didn’t eat much at the reception and seemed quieter than her usual self. John and Suzy thought she just must be tied from all of the excitement. On their drive home, little Emily remained sort of solemn as she stared out the window. Suzy turned to her and said, is something wrong Emily? Emily thought for a bit and finally spoke. “Why did the lady who was supposed to get married changed her mind?.” Suzy asked, “What do you mean, Emily.” Looking sad, Emily replied, “Well, she went down the aisle with one man and came back with another one.”

I hope that brought a smile to your face today. If it did pass your smile onto some else, we all could use a kind smile each day. Our Thursday thought is, “A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, with the same person.”

Here is our verse for today:

Proverbs 18:22

The man who finds a wife finds a treasure, and he receives favor from the Lord.

Just as you enjoy these nuggets of humor, please encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along tomorrow for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’

If you would like to listen to any of our past 1481 treks or read the Wisdom Journal, they are all available at Wisdom-Trek.com.  I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day will be downloaded to you automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most importantly, I am your friend as I serve you in through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal each day.

As we take this Trek of life together, let us always:

  1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
  2. Love Unconditionally
  3. Listen Intentionally
  4. Learn Continuously
  5. Lend to others Generously
  6. Lead with Integrity
  7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you tomorrow for Futuristic Friday!

Day 1481 – Family Terminology and Heavenly Host – Worldview Wednesday

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Welcome to Day 1481 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

I am Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Family Terminology and Heavenly Host – Worldview Wednesday

Wisdom – the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. Today is Day 1481 of our Trek, and it is Worldview Wednesday. Creating a Biblical Worldview is essential to have a proper perspective on today’s current events. To establish a Biblical Worldview, you must have a proper understanding of God and His Word. This week, on our Worldview Wednesday episode, we will continue our study based on a course I recently completed taught by Dr. Michael Heiser. Our study is titled “Sons and Daughters of God: The Believer’s Identity, Calling, and Destiny” Throughout this multi-week course, we will demonstrate that, in the Old Testament, “sons of God” and “holy ones” refers to supernatural beings whose Father is God and who work with God to carry out His will and that this divine family was present before humanity. By fully engaging with biblical texts such as Psalm 82; Psalm 89, and Deuteronomy 32:8–9, our study will show that this divine family functions as a template for God’s human family. God desires of humans, as His imagers, to participate in His council. This study addresses issues such as polytheism, the nature of the (little ‘g’) “gods,” and the uniqueness of Yahweh. Within this study, we will apply insights to the New Testament texts and shows how the metaphor of being in God’s family informs our sense of identity and mission as believers.

Family Terminology and Heavenly Host

·      Segment 20: Family Terminology Is Intentional

Introduction

We’ve spent a lot of time talking about the sons of God in the Old Testament. We had telegraphed at the beginning of the course that we are paying attention to this family terminology because it’s going to provide a useful, intentional template for us to understand how God looks at His human family, His human sons, and His human daughters. They’re going to provide the sons of God, the supernatural ones, sort of a framework for us to think well theologically about ourselves.

We have already talked about the family terminology; we’ve talked about that there is a functional or a participatory idea with these supernatural sons of God in the Old Testament, and they participate with God in carrying out His will. So we’ve already learned things about their identity, their purpose. So we’re going to learn something about our identity and our purpose, our calling, and finally, our destiny. We will understand how we realize these things, how our status will lead somewhere ultimately, and how we fulfill our calling. Lastly, how we will fulfill the purpose for which we have been made in the future. Think back about the references to the sons of God in the Old Testament. We must think of them as a family and as coworkers to completely understand this point.

Yahweh Decides to Add Humans to His Family

Let’s go back to Genesis, because if we have these concepts in our mind when we read some key passages beginning in the garden of Eden, our relationship to them starts to come into focus. This concept will be part of the foundation for later as sons and daughters, children of God-language in the New Testament. Back in Genesis 1, in the very famous passage about human creation Genesis 1:26–28, we read this:

Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.”

So God created human beings in his own image.

In the image of God, he created them;

male and female he created them.

Then God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it. Reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the animals that scurry along the ground.”

Now, what’s going on here? What we have is we have an announcement, a decree, a decision that has been made by God to create humans. He is now going to add humans to His family. We know from Job 38, where our course started, that He already has a family, a supernatural family, the sons of God, divine beings. This decree, though, is about something similar, but different. We are going to create embodied beings now, and that’s going to, again, inform why God is doing it and what His intentions are ultimately.

Introducing the Idea of Image

So let’s unpack some of these ideas. As we proceed, we’re going to be talking about the family relationship that God has with, not only His divine sons, His divine family, His divine children as it were, but His human children. We’re going to introduce a new term drawn from Genesis 1, that is, the idea of the image or imaging God. It’s going to be very important. It’s going to telegraph the fact that we are God’s coworkers and participants with Him.

So I hope you can see the ideas already. God already had a family. He is adding humans to the family now. The family He already had works for Him; they’ve been doing things. He’s going to add humans now, and humans are also going to (key idea) represent Him, work with Him to do a particular task. It’s a blending of divine family and an embodied family. This plan was God’s intention from the very beginning. The same Creator makes both families, and they are both going to participate with Him in doing the things He wants to be done.

·      Segment 21: Heavenly Host at Creation

Plural Language Indicates Family

Genesis 1:26, the passage where humanity is created “in our image, to be like us,” telegraphs some essential ideas. Fundamentally, it informs us that humans were meant to be part of God’s divine family from the very beginning. You might say, “Well, how do we learn that?” Because as we’ve been taught to think about this scene, it’s just God, and then we have the creation of humans.

What I am suggesting to you is that God’s family, the family that already existed, the members of the heavenly host, are in the scene in Genesis 1:26. The plural language of the verse indicates this. We go back to Genesis 1:26. Just think about it: hen God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.”

So God created human beings in his own image.

In the image of God, he created them;

male and female he created them.

Plural Language Not a Reference to the Trinity

Most Christians, in my experience, have presumed that the plural language in Genesis 1 (“Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us.”) is a reference to the Trinity. I’m suggesting to you that it’s not; the plural is not pointing to the Trinity. You could ask, “Well, why not?”

Well, first of all, if you read the passage, there is no way to limit the plurality language to three, but I would say, even more fundamentally, it makes no sense for God to inform the other members of the Trinity about something He wants to do. The other members of the Trinity are coeternal, so they would already know; there is no point for God to inform them of anything, just none at all.

Plural Language Refers to Heavenly Host

So we have sort of a theological disconnect there. What we have is God announcing His intention to a group, and that group is the heavenly host, the sons of God that were there before the foundation of the world, according to Job 38:7–8. The plural language, therefore, links God to them in some way and also to humanity. There is some linkage created by the fact that we have this plural language. We’re going to talk about that in a moment.

God Alone Creates

We also can’t lose sight of the plural language in Genesis 1:26, but then it switches back to the singular. Yes, we have “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us,” but when the creation happens in Genesis 1:27, we read,

So God created human beings in his own image.

In the image of God, he created them;

male and female he created them.

In other words, there is no sense that the rest of the members of the heavenly host help God out in human creation, that they played some role as co-creators. That is not the point of the plurality language. It has a reason (which we’re going to talk about in subsequent weeks), but it’s not that God needed help creating or that we have co-creators here.

Let me illustrate it this way: If I walked into a room—I am just one individual—and I said to everybody else in the room, “Let us go get pizza,” I have announced my intention to the group, but then we use my car. We go to the pizza place I choose. I pay for it, but everyone gets to eat. That’s essentially what’s happening here. There is one actor, God, who makes the decision, announces it to the rest of them, they participate with Him. In a certain way, they get the benefit of it. They are part of what’s going on, but they don’t do certain things. In the case of Genesis 1:26–28, they don’t co-create humanity; the text is unambiguous there. Somehow, the plural language does link God, the members that He is speaking to (the heavenly host), and us (humankind). We need to take a closer look at that, which we will do next week.[1]

That will finish our study for this week’s Worldview Wednesday. Next week we will continue covering “Human Family As Imagers.”  Tomorrow we will enjoy our 3-minute Humor nugget that will provide you with a bit of cheer, which will help you to lighten up and live a rich and satisfying life. So encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along with us tomorrow for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’If you would like to listen to any of our past 1480 treks or read the Wisdom Journal, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day’s trek will be downloaded automatically.

Thank you so much for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and, most of all, your friend as I serve you in through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal.

As we take this Trek together, let us always:

  1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
  2. Love Unconditionally
  3. Listen Intentionally
  4. Learn Continuously
  5. Lend to others Generously
  6. Lead with Integrity
  7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you Tomorrow!

[1] Heiser, M. S. (2019). Sons and Daughters of God: The Believer’s Identity, Calling, and Destiny. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.

Day 1480 – You Can Do It – Wisdom Unplugged

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Welcome to Day 1480 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

You Can Do It – Wisdom Unplugged

Wisdom – the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. This is Day 1480 of our Trek, and it is time for our 3-minute mini trek called Wisdom Unplugged. This short nugget of wisdom includes an inspirational quote with a little bit of additional content for today’s trek. Consider this your vitamin supplement of wisdom for today. So let’s jump right in with today’s nugget:

Today’s quote is from  Charles G. Finney, and it is:  If God commands something, that is the highest evidence that we can do it.  

You Can Do It

It is so easy to make excuses for actions not taken, or decisions not made. It is easy to make excuses or blame someone else for failures in our lives. In most cases though, our excuses are quite pathetic and flimsy. In many cases, excuses are made for not completing something we can achieve; therefore, we are not fulfilling our God-given abilities. Achievement is especially true of God’s precepts for living.  These precepts are already written in God’s Word.  My next statement may sound controversial at first, but it is Biblically based. There are many situations or circumstances in life that you don’t need to pray about. Most guidelines for living for God are already told to us in the pages of His Word. God has already given us everything we need to live a Godly life. You don’t have to pray about them. That being said, ask yourself, why am I making excuses? If God commands us, he also equips us. Free yourself and your mindset from making excuses. Instead, speak words of affirmation which are based on God’s Word. Based on the wisdom and truths available to us, I have something to tell you. Are you listening? Will you believe it when I tell you? Here is the secret: You Can Do It!

2 Peter 1:3

By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence.

That’s a wrap for today’s Wisdom Unplugged quote. If you would like free access to my database of over 11,000 inspirational quotes, the link is available on the main page of Wisdom-Trek.com. Just as you enjoy these nuggets of wisdom, encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along tomorrow for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’ If you would like to listen to any of our past 1479 treks or read the Wisdom Journal, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day’s trek will be downloaded automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most importantly, I am your friend as I serve you in through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal each day.

As we take this Trek of life together, let us always:

  1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
  2. Love Unconditionally
  3. Listen Intentionally
  4. Learn Continuously
  5. Lend to others Generously
  6. Lead with Integrity
  7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you tomorrow for Worldview Wednesday!

Day 1479 – Bible Study – God Desires Us to Learn and Understand – Meditation Monday

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Welcome to Day 1479 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Bible Study – God Desires Us To Learn and Understand – Meditation Monday

Wisdom – the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. This is Day 1479 of our Trek, and it is time for Meditation Monday. Taking time to relax, refocus, and reprioritize our lives is crucial in order to create a living legacy. For you, it may just be time alone for quiet reflection. You may utilize structured meditation practices. In my life, Meditation includes reading and reflecting on God’s Word and in prayer. It is a time to renew my mind, refocus on what is most important, and making sure that I am nurturing my soul, mind, and body. As you come along with me on our trek each Meditation Monday, it is my hope and prayer that you, too, will experience a time for reflection and renewing of your mind.   

We are continuing our series this week on Meditation Monday as we focus on Mastering Bible Study through a series of brief insights from Hebrew Scholar, Dr. Michael S. Heiser. Our current insights are focusing on study habits to build a strong foundation. Today let us meditate on:

Bible Study – God Desires Us To Learn and Understand

·      Insight Twenty-One: Believe That God Will Help You

God wants us to understand Scripture. It stands to reason, then, that he’s perfectly willing to help us do that. I’m not talking about including a formulaic prayer for assistance when you begin your Bible study. I’m not recommending a specific prayer at all, though that’s appropriate. I’m suggesting that you go into Bible study expecting God to help you with something he already wants you to do.

This is how Dr. Heiser explains it. “I learned this lesson in some startling ways in graduate school. I chose a controversial topic for my dissertation. Granted, every dissertation is supposed to blaze a new path, but mine had an element of risk. I was bucking consensus opinions because I thought I’d noticed something unaddressed in centuries (really, millennia) of scholarship about the Hebrew Bible. In grad school, it isn’t enough to say; I don’t think the way everyone else does. You have to offer something coherent and defend it adequately to please a room full of top-tier scholars.

One day I walked into the library absorbed with a particularly vexing problem that I couldn’t unravel in my mind. I was there because I’d come across a reference to an essay in a book that sounded like it might be useful. I went to the stacks to get the volume, and, inexplicably, it wasn’t there. The computer catalog said it had not been checked out, but all I saw on the shelf was a rectangular hole. I had to get to work, so I turned around to leave. My eye fell on a random book whose title I’d never seen. Something told me to open it. I did. To my astonishment, there was an essay in the Table of Contents on precisely what I was struggling with.

I hadn’t prayed before that first incident, but I knew God was looking out for me. I’d do my research and go to the library and tell God I needed direction. I was honest. There were times I felt lost with my topic.

God helped me. The experience I described above was repeated a half-dozen times while writing my dissertation. It got to the point where I wouldn’t leave the library without checking the books on either side of one I’d come for. I always check the shelf behind me, too

·      Insight Twenty-Two: Believing What the Bible Says In Not Bible Study

Not all of the obstacles to studying the Bible are negative such as, not having enough time, not being sure you’ll do it right, not feeling smart enough, not knowing where to start, among other excuses. Sometimes it’s what we affirm or agree with that gets in the way.

I’ve been a Christian for over fifty years. I’ve been to several churches, talked to many people, and taught many adult and youth group Bible lessons. I’ve taught dozens of students in Bible classes over the years. I’m sympathetic to people whose fears impede their progress in Bible study. I’ve been there, so none of those uncertainties irritate me. But one excuse I’ve heard over the years bothers me. It is: I already believe what’s in the Bible, so why do I need to study it? This doesn’t settle with me.

Think about what such a statement says:

  • What I know and believe is the important stuff.
  • My faith is based on something someone told me.
  • I believe what I can t necessarily explain and might not understand.

It may sound harsh, but the presumption that our faith exempts us from thinking clearly about what we believe reveals both a lack of faith and personal insecurity. We fear our beliefs cannot stand scrutiny or that we don’t have the mental muscle to probe Scripture deeply. Frankly, we’ve been conditioned to embrace such flawed conclusions by our Christian communities. Churches are filled with people who are sincere about their faith. They aren’t waffling about the basics of the faith. If every sermon goes back to the simple gospel message, it’s reasonable for them to conclude it makes little sense to study what they already embrace.

That may have “worked” in times past, but we’re living in a different world today. Parents and pastors are no longer the gatekeepers of information and truth. Google and YouTube are. The next generation, and many in our generation, aren’t listening to only Christian voices.

I’m not suggesting that evangelism or the health of the church in the next generation depends on being able to win debates, though losing them will certainly not help. People indeed turn from the Bible despite having access to sound thinking. Immaturity, worldliness, and rebellion are all factors. What I’m saying is what we read in 1 Peter 3:15 Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it.  You can’t rely on what your parents or your pastor told you alone. You must study the Scriptures for yourself. Otherwise, your voice will be no more credible than anyone else whose beliefs are just hand-me-downs.

Joshua 1:8

Study this Book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do.

That is a wrap for today’s Meditation. Next week we will continue our trek on Meditation Monday as we take time to reflect on what is most important in creating our living legacy. On tomorrow’s trek, we will explore another wisdom quote. This 3-minute wisdom supplement will assist you in becoming healthy, wealthy, and wise each day. Thank you for joining me on this trek called life. Encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along tomorrow for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’  

If you would like to listen to any of the past 1478 daily treks or read the daily Journal, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day will be downloaded to you automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most importantly, I am your friend as I serve you through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and Journal.

As we take this Trek of life together, let us always:

  1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
  2. Love Unconditionally
  3. Listen Intentionally
  4. Learn Continuously
  5. Lend to others Generously
  6. Lead with Integrity
  7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you tomorrow!

Day 1478 – Faster Transportation – Ask Gramps

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Welcome to Day 1478 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Faster Transportation – Ask Gramps

Wisdom – the final frontier to true knowledge. Welcome to Wisdom-Trek! Where our mission is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Hello, my friend, I am Guthrie Chamberlain, your captain on our journey to increase Wisdom and Create a Living Legacy. Thank you for joining us today as we explore wisdom on our 2nd millennium of podcasts. Today is Day 1478 of our Trek, and our focus on Fridays is the future technological and societal advances, so we call it Futuristic Fridays. My personality is one that has always been very future-oriented. Since my childhood, I have yearned for the exploration and discovery of new technologies and advancements for the future. I grew up with the original Star Trek series, and even today, as I am now on my 65th revolution around the sun, I still dream of traveling in space. Each week we will explore rapidly converging technologies and advancements, which will radically change our lives. At times, the topics may sound like something out of a science fiction novel, but each area that we explore is already well on its way of becoming a reality over the next couple of decades.

To keep with our theme of “Ask Gramps,” I will put our weekly topics in the form of a question to get us on track. This week’s question is, Hey Gramps, In addition to autonomous and flying vehicles, what are some other modes of transportation that will be part of our future?

 Faster Transporation

Last week we learned how AI, Robots, and Drones could assist during natural or human-made disasters. This week our focus will be on super-fast transportation.   I am using some of the information mentioned in Peter Diamandis’s blogs and book “The Future is Faster Than You Think.”

What’s faster than autonomous vehicles and flying cars?

Try Hyperloop, rocket travel, and robotic avatars.

Hyperloop is currently working towards 670 mph (1080 kph)passenger pods, capable of zipping us from Los Angeles to downtown Las Vegas in under 30 minutes.

Low Orbit Rocket Travel (think SpaceX’s Starship) promises to deliver you almost anywhere on the planet in under an hour. Think New York to Shanghai in 39 minutes.

But wait, it gets even better…

As 5G connectivity, hyper-realistic VR, and next-gen robotics continue their exponential progress, the emergence of “Robotic Avatars” will all but nullify the concept of distance, replacing human travel with immediate remote telepresence.

Let’s dive in.

Hyperloop One: Los Angeles to San Francisco in 35 Minutes

Did you know that Hyperloop was the brainchild of Elon Musk? It is just one in a series of transportation innovations from a man determined to leave his mark on the industry.

In 2013, in an attempt to shorten the long commute between Los Angeles and San Francisco, the California state legislature proposed a $68 billion budget allocation for what appeared to be the slowest and most expensive bullet train in history.

Musk was outraged. The cost was too high, the train too sluggish. Teaming up with a group of engineers from Tesla and SpaceX, he published a 58-page concept paper for “The Hyperloop,” a high-speed transportation network that used magnetic levitation to propel passenger pods down vacuum tubes at speeds of up to 670 mph.

If successful, it would zip you across California in 35 minutes—just enough time to watch your favorite sitcom. In January 2013, venture capitalist Shervin Pishevar, with Musk’s blessing, started Hyperloop One with Peter Diamandis, Jim Messina (former White House Deputy Chief of Staff for President Obama), and tech entrepreneurs Joe Lonsdale and David Sacks, as founding board members.

A couple of years after that, the Virgin Group invested in this idea, Richard Branson was elected chairman, and Virgin Hyperloop One was born.

Josh Giegel, co-founder and chief technology officer of Hyperloop One, says, “The Hyperloop exists, because of the rapid acceleration of power electronics, computational modeling, material sciences, and 3D printing.”

Thanks to these convergences, there are now ten major Hyperloop One projects—in various stages of development—spread across the globe. Chicago to DC in 35 minutes. Pune to Mumbai in 25 minutes.

According to Giegel: “Hyperloop is targeting certification in 2023. By 2025, the company plans to have multiple projects under construction and running initial passenger testing.”

So think about this timetable: Autonomous car rollouts by 2020: hyperloop certification and aerial ride-sharing by 2023. By 2025— going on vacation might have a totally different meaning. Going to work most definitely will.

On September 15th, just three days ago, Elon Musk announced that the Loop Tunnel under Las Vegas is nearly complete. This experimental, novel tunnel will carry 16 passengers maximum, up to 155 MPH along its underground tunnels. This prototype is just the beginning.

But what’s faster than Hyperloop?

Rocket Travel

As if autonomous vehicles, flying cars, and Hyperloop weren’t enough, a couple of years ago, while speaking at the International Astronautical Congress in Adelaide, Australia, Musk promised that for the price of an economy airline ticket, his rockets will fly you “anywhere on Earth in under an hour.”

Musk wants to use SpaceX’s mega-rocket, Starship, which was designed to take humans to Mars, for terrestrial passenger delivery. The Starship travels at 17,500 mph. It’s an order of magnitude faster than the supersonic jet Concorde.

Think about what this actually means: New York to Shanghai in thirty-nine minutes. London to Dubai in twenty-nine minutes. Hong Kong to Singapore in twenty-two minutes.

So how real is the Starship?

“We could probably demonstrate this [technology] before the end of this decade,” Musk explained, “but it’s going to take a while to get the safety right. It’s a high bar. Aviation is incredibly safe. You’re safer on an airplane than you are at home.”That demonstration is proceeding as planned. Musk announced his intentions to retire his current rocket fleet, both the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy, and replace them with the Starships in the 2020s.

LA mayor Eric Garcetti tweeted that SpaceX was planning to break ground on an eighteen-acre rocket production facility near the Port of Los Angeles. April of last year marked an even more significant milestone: the very first test flights of the Starship rocket. The fact is, sometime in the next decade or so, “off to Europe for lunch” may become a standard part of our lexicon. 

Avatars

Wait, wait, there’s one more thing.

While Technologies such as self-driving and flying cars and Hyperloop and low orbit rockets will radically change the traditional transportation industry, there’s something on the horizon that will disrupt travel itself.

What if, to get from A to B, you didn’t have to move your body? What if you could quote Captain Kirk and just say: “Beam me up, Scotty.” Well, shy of the Star Trek transporter, there’s the world of avatars.

An avatar is a second self, typically in one of two forms. The digital version has been around for a couple of decades. It emerged from the video game industry and was popularized by virtual world sites like Second Life and books-turned-blockbusters like Ready Player One.

A VR headset teleports your eyes and ears to another location, while a set of haptic sensors shifts your sense of touch. Suddenly, you’re inside an avatar inside a virtual world. As you move in the real world, your avatar moves in the virtual.

Use this technology to give a lecture, and you can do it from the comfort of your living room, skipping the trip to the airport, the cross-country flight, and the ride to the conference center. The Covid-19 pandemic will accelerate this by several years.

Robots are the second form of avatars. Imagine a humanoid robot that you can occupy at will. Maybe, in a city far from home, you’ve rented the bot by the minute—via a different kind of ride-sharing company—or perhaps you have spare robot avatars located around the country.

Either way, put on VR goggles and a haptic suit, and you can teleport your senses into that robot. This allows you to walk around, shake hands, and take action without leaving your home. Like the rest of the tech we’ve been talking about, even this future isn’t far away.

In 2018, entrepreneur Dr. Harry Kloor recommended to All Nippon Airways (ANA), Japan’s largest airline, the design of an Avatar XPRIZE. ANA then funded this vision to the tune of $10 million to speed the development of robotic avatars. Why? Because ANA knows this is one of the technologies likely to disrupt their own airline industry, and they want to be ready.

ANA recently announced its “newme” robot that humans can use to explore new places virtually. The colorful robots have Roomba-like wheeled bases and cameras mounted around eye-level, which capture surroundings viewable through VR headsets.

If the robot was stationed in your parents’ home, you could cruise around the rooms and chat with your family at any time of day. After revealing the technology at Tokyo’s Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies in October, ANA plans to deploy 1,000 newme’s by 2021. With virtual avatars like “newme,” geography, distance, and cost will no longer limit our travel choices.

From attractions like the Eiffel Tower, or the pyramids of Egypt, to unreachable destinations like the Moon or deep sea, we will be able to transcend our own physical limits, explore the world and outer space, and access nearly any experience imaginable.

Final Thoughts About Transportation

Individual car ownership has enjoyed over a century of ascendency and dominance. The first real threat it faced—today’s ride-sharing model—only showed up in the last decade. But that ride-sharing model won’t even get ten years to dominate.

Already, it’s on the brink of autonomous car displacement, which is on the brink of flying car disruption, which is on the brink of Hyperloop and rockets-to-anywhere decimation. Then there is the morphing of avatars. The most important part: All of this change will happen over the next ten to fifteen years.

Welcome to a future of human presence where the only constant is rapid change.

Imagine how all of this technology will also allow us to rapidly spread the Good News of Jesus Christ and facilitate the building of God’s Kingdom on earth, as it is in heaven. As more people all over the world become hyper-connected, there will be no limit to our reach. I have to admit, I do get excited when I dream of the potential that emerging technology will provide to us in the next few decades.

Mark 16:15

And then he told them, “Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone.

That is a wrap for today’s question. Join us again next Futuristic Friday as we look at another exciting exponential technology area on our ‘Ask Gramps’ episode. Our next trek is Meditation Monday, where we will help you reflect on what is most important in life. So encourage your friends and family to join us and then come along on Monday for another day of ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’ If you would like to listen to any of the past 1477 daily treks or read the associated journals, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. I encourage you to subscribe to Wisdom-Trek on your favorite podcast player so that each day will be downloaded to you automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, but most importantly, I am your friend as I serve you in through this Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal.

As we take this Trek of life together, let us always:

  1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
  2. Love Unconditionally
  3. Listen Intentionally
  4. Learn Continuously
  5. Lend to others Generously
  6. Lead with Integrity
  7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

I am Guthrie Chamberlain….reminding you to ’Keep Moving Forward,’ ‘Enjoy your Journey,’ and ‘Create a Great Day…Everyday’! See you on Monday!