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Day 1389 – Dealing with the Unchangeable – Meditation Monday

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Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 1389 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Dealing With The Unchangeable – 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 1389 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.

Most, if all of like to be in control, and change circumstances and events that make us uncomfortable. Today let us meditate on:

Dealing With The Unchangeable

Dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic has been difficult for nearly everyone. One of the reasons is that, for the most part, it is out of our control, and there is little we can do to change that. We do not like situations and circumstances which we cannot change. When you really think about it, there is probably more we don’t have control over, than what we do have control over.

Many things about your life boil down to the hand you have been dealt. You can’t change the fact that you were born in that place and with certain givens for your appearance, IQ, or physical skills. Education and training can open some doors for you, but they cannot change your past, make you taller and more athletic, or alter the fact that some people are unfair in the way they treat you.

Even though most of our life circumstances are beyond our control, we are all still tempted to fret and complain about things that cannot be changed. Of course, they cause distress. They certainly put us at a disadvantage in certain contexts. They mustn’t be allowed to define or defeat us.

The people who do best with life move beyond the temptation to whine and feel sorry for themselves. They face their disappointments and move beyond them. They acknowledge life’s bad breaks and look for ways to turn them into growth moments. They work from a half-full rather than half-empty glass mindset.

These people have a different attitude than the defeatist and whiner. They have found a way to make lemonade from their lemons. There is a section in John Baillie’s “A Diary of Private Prayer” that reads…

Teach me, O God, so to use all the circumstances of my life today that they may bring forth in me the fruits of holiness rather than the fruits of sin.

Let me use disappointment as material for patience;

Let me use success as material for thankfulness;

Let me use suspense as material for perseverance;

Let me use danger as material for courage;

Let me use reproach as material for longsuffering;

Let me use praise as material for humility;

Let me use pleasures as material for temperance;

Let me use pains as material for endurance.

Your attitude today will make all the difference in everything that matters.

When a given day begins, countless things are headed your way over which you have no control. It may be bad weather or someone’s bad temper, a deadline that won’t budge or a client equally resistant to change. The one factor you can control through it all is your attitude toward them.

Since you have been raised to new life with Christ, set your sights on the realities of heaven, where Christ sits in the place of honor at God’s right hand. Think about the things of heaven, not the things of earth. For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, who is your life, is revealed to the whole world, you will share in all his glory (Colossians 3:1-4 NLT).

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 1388 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 1388 – Life After Covid-19 Part 1 – Ask Gramps

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Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 1388 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Life After Covid-19 Part 1 – 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. This is Day 1388 of our Trek and time for our Philosophy Friday series. Each Friday, we will ponder some of the fundamental truths and mysteries of life, and how they can impact us in creating our living legacy. As we continue on this trek called life, sometimes we have questions about life, so our Friday trek is a time where we can ‘Ask Gramps.’  Gramps will answer questions that you would like to ask your dad or granddad, but for whatever reason, this is not possible. No matter how old we are, I know that all of us would like the opportunity to ask dad or gramps questions about life in many areas.

We may mix it up a bit on our Friday episodes, but will strive to keep them down to earth and enjoyable.  If you have any questions that you would like to ask Gramps, please email them to guthrie@wisdom-trek.com

So the question for this week is:

“Hey, Gramps, I realize that after this whole Covid-19 pandemic is under control, life will take on some sort of normalcy for most people. I can’t get my head around how life will change with so many people out of work and many businesses not being able to survive. What is your take on how life will be after Covid-19?

Life After Covid-19 Part 1

This question is certainly too broad to answer in one segment, so this will be the first of several ‘Ask Gramps’ feature which will analyze various areas of life, and how this pandemic will impact them. Please make sure that you download our Friday podcast sessions to follow the complete analysis. Better yet, subscribe to Wisdom-Trek so you can gain a bit of wisdom five days a week.

While I am not a prophet, nor the son of a prophet, speculation that I have about life after Covid-19 is just that, speculation.  Although after nearly 64 years of life and over 40 years as an entrepreneur and small business owner, I have already been through several business cycles. I am also a father of five grown children and seven grandchildren. Throughout the years, I have been very active in church ministries and other community groups. Since my primary career focus has been technology, I have been at the forefront of changes in business and society throughout the years. With that being said, I will try to add some enlightenment to your questions. One thing that sets this pandemic situation apart from all other world events, including the two world wars, is that Covid-19 has impacted all nations of the world and has brought all economies to its knees. In some ways, this may be good. While we may not all be in the same boat, we are certainly all experiencing the same violent storm. Some of the boats are sturdy and well built, and its occupants won’t be impacted significantly. Others are swept away by the raging currents either through the loss of life, or complete financial devastation, leaving them stranded alone, and they will have to start over with nothing.  We who are more fortunate must be willing and ready to help those who are devastated. Especially as Christ-followers, this must be our high calling after Covid-19.

Let me offer some perspective. It has been said that crises don’t so much alter the course of history as accelerate changes that are already underway. There has never been a crisis where this has been more true. In many areas, this pandemic will rattle the very fabric of the world economy and infrastructure by compressing what may have taken ten or twenty years into a one or two-year timeframe.  While these impacts will affect all countries, since I live in the U.S., my analysis will focus primarily on the U.S. If you listen from another country, be assured that there will be similar impacts in your country.  I will explore several areas over the next few weeks, but not in any particular order.

This week let’s consider jobs and manufacturing. It is my concern that unemployment will remain very high for quite some time, possibly for a year or more. Still, the pandemic will actually strengthen the job market long term to the point where we will be actively pursuing more legal immigration through a radical reformation of our immigration laws. There will be an accelerated change when it comes to Covid-19 as related to the offshoring of American jobs. Throughout the world, there will be a renewed sense of nationalism. Whether you like or support President Trump, this renewed focus is what allowed him to become President.

In recent years, businesses have been rethinking the way that overextended overseas supply lines expose them to unacceptable risks. This reassessment got a boost from President Trump’s reorientation of U.S. trade policy. A lemming-like desire for “efficiency” had caused many corporations to move manufacturing over the past two decades to China, Vietnam, and Indonesia, among other places.

Corporations did so to save on labor costs or to avoid environmental standards, but that wasn’t the whole story. Offshoring was a trend that morphed into a craze. Egged on by Wall Street analysts and management consultants, or simply swept up by the herd mentality of their peers, businesses came to see offshoring as something they were expected to do to serve the interests of shareholders. Many failed to weigh the long-term costs independently or meaningfully consider alternatives.

For business, this strategy paid off in the short term. Cheap labor meant higher profits. But for America, the effects were traumatic. The United States lost five million manufacturing jobs. That, in turn, devastated towns and contributed to the breakdown of families, an opioid epidemic, and despair.

As a result of these developments, the offshoring frenzy started to abate. Since the administration first imposed duties on Chinese imports in July 2018, American companies, including Apple, Whirlpool, and Stanley Black & Decker, have either scrapped offshoring plans or announced decisions to move production to the United States. Automotive companies have announced $34 billion in new U.S. investment as a result of the new United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

The Kearney Reshoring Index, which measures companies’ global production strategies, shifted significantly in 2019: Reversing a five-year trend, imports of manufactured goods from low-wage Asian countries fell while U.S. domestic manufacturing output remained strong.

Our experience of the past two months will only accelerate this reversal. As companies prepare to reopen their U.S. operations, many have found themselves held hostage to decisions made by foreign governments about whether their suppliers are “essential” or not. Nearly every day, I read about business leaders who now acknowledge they underestimated the risk in decisions to move jobs overseas or to rely on the production of small but crucial parts in some far-off and often unstable country.  Corporations short-sightedness in our scenarios today reminds me of the story that Jesus Christ tells us when we consider the cost of being His disciples in Luke 1:28-30, “But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you. They would say, ‘There’s the person who started that building and couldn’t afford to finish it!’Today we are just scratching the surface of some of the accelerated changes that we will see in the next few years. Next Friday, we will explore more areas of transformation that is to come.

That is a wrap for today’s question. Join us again next Friday for another question on our ‘Ask Gramps’ episode. Our next trek is Mediation 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 1387 daily treks or read the associated journals, 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 of all, 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!

Day 1387 – A Cake Dilemma – Humor Unplugged

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Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 1387 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

A Cake Dilemma – 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 1387 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:

A Cake Dilemma

With many of us sheltering in place, we have rediscovered our love for cooking and especially baking sweet treats. The temptation to eat all of these treats has also been a challenge for many.  Because of this, a group of friends decided to start a weekly zoom based diet club to help keep each other accountable.

On their weekly call on Monday, the members of the diet club were chatting and encouraging one another to stay the course. When it came time for Margaret to share, she was lamenting, “I gained five pounds since last week. I made the family’s favorite cake over the weekend, and they’d loved it so much that they had eaten half of it after dinner on Saturday.” “Of course, they all raved about it and said they were looking forward to eating the remainder the next day.”

Margaret went on. “Well, the next day I kept staring at the other half until finally, I cut just a thin slice for myself. You know how it is, one slice led to another, and soon the remaining half of the cake was gone.”  “I am just so frustrated with my lack of willpower, I knew that John would be as disappointed as I am.”

The other members of the group all commiserated with her, expressing their empathy until finally, Julie asked, “what did John say when he found out?” Margaret smiled and blushingly said, “He never found out. I made another cake and ate half of it!”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, “Oh, you want your cake and eat it too? You bet! What good is a cake if you can’t eat it?” 

Here is our verse for today:

Numbers 15:20

Present a cake from the first of the flour you grind, and set it aside as a sacred offering, as you do with the first grain from the threshing floor.

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 1386 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 Philosophy Friday!

Day 1386 – Mastering the Bible – Acts and Israelite Culture – Worldview Wednesday

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Welcome to Day 1386 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

I am Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Mastering the Bible – Acts and Israelite Culture – 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 1386 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. Our focus for the next several months on Worldview Wednesday is Mastering the Bible, through a series of brief insights. These insights are extracted from a book of the same title from one of today’s most prominent Hebrew Scholars, Dr. Micheal S. Heiser. This book is a collection of insights designed to help you understand the Bible better. When we let the Bible be what it is, we can understand it as the original readers did, and as its writers intended. Each week we will explore two insights.

Mastering The Bible – Acts and Israelite Culture

Insight Sixty-Three: The Book of Acts is Both Prescriptive and Descriptive

One of the most controversial questions concerning the book of Acts is whether it is prescriptive or descriptive. The two options are clear enough. The prescriptive view says that the practices of the early church in the book of Acts are normative. In other words, they should be practiced today. For some, this extends to experiences as well. They argue that believers today should be experiencing displays of power, like speaking in tongues and healing. The descriptive view argues that Acts simply describes what happened. For this view, there is, therefore, no requirement to imitate precisely what the early church experienced or did.

It isn’t hard to discern that there is truth in both positions. The difficulty is one of extent. The book of Acts very obviously prescribes things like believers meeting with regularity, prayer, meeting each other’s needs, and appointing leaders (both Jews and gentiles). But are we to presume the leadership of the church has apostolic authority? Should we meet in house churches daily (Acts 5:42)? Should we expect to perform signs and wonders, and if so, are they only to be performed by apostles and those upon whom they have laid hands (Acts 2:43; 6:8; 8:6, 13; 14:3)? In modern times, when wealth is held in ways outside tangible goods, how can we truly have all things in common (Acts 2:44)? It seems clear that these things are, at least to some extent, only descriptive.

This question is directly related to apostolic authority. While the book of Acts clearly shows the apostles appointing servant leaders in the church (Acts 6), there is no evidence that the office of apostle has continued. There were several kinds of apostles in the New Testament. The Greek word (apostolos) simply means “sent one,” so it generally refers to individuals sent to help other churches. In cases like these, modern translations at times render the term as “messenger” (2 Cor. 8:23; Phil. 2:25) One specific group of “sent ones” were the Twelve (John 20:24; Acts 6:2; 1 Cor 15:5), those who had been taught by Jesus. When choosing a new Apostle to replace Judas, this is what Acts 1:21-22 says, “So now we must choose a replacement for Judas from among the men who were with us the entire time we were traveling with the Lord Jesus— from the time he was baptized by John until the day he was taken from us. Whoever is chosen will join us as a witness of Jesus’ resurrection.”

Paul directly encountered Jesus (Acts 9) and was taught by him personally (Gal. 1:12; 1 Cor. 11:23; 15:3b so he rightly belongs to a second group of people selected by God to minister to gentiles (1 Cor. 15:7—9; Gal. 1:19; 2:9; Acts 13:2-3; 14:4, 14; 15:40; 1 Cor. 9:6; 1 Thess. 2:6). So far as we can see in the New Testament, it was apostles in these two groups that laid hands on people to gift them for service in the power of the Holy Spirit. That gifting included the power to do signs and wonders, which was critical for the early church, whose new message (repeatedly called a “mystery” in the New Testament; e.g., Eph. 3:3—6; Col. 1:26—27) had to be validated as actually coming from God. Consequently, to argue that everything in Acts is prescriptive requires the continuation of the second group. This group did not continue for the obvious reason that the original apostles were all dead by the end of the first century. While the apostles appointed leaders in the early church (including gentile churches founded by Paul), their status could not be duplicated.

Insight Sixty-Four: God Never Intended That His People Be Permanently Identified with Ancient Israelite or Jewish Culture

God didn’t ordain the culture of patriarchs like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They were part of the ancient Near Eastern world. The law given to Moses presumed preexisting cultural values common to this wide geographical region. This is evident in part because the laws of other nations have some overlap with laws in the Torah. This is not to say that Israel had no unique laws or cultural trappings. There was such an overlap, but it was tied to faith in the God of Israel, the God of the Bible.

From the call of Abraham forward, God’s relationship with Israel hints that God’s human family would extend beyond the world of the ancient Near East. God told Abraham in Genesis 12:3. I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.

Even though Abraham and Israel were called to be distinct, God knew his salvation plan was bigger than any ethnic or cultural identity. The book of Acts makes this point unmistakable.

Acts 10 records the conversion of Cornelius, a Roman centurion, and a gentile. His is the first conversion account of a non-Jew in the New Testament. Peter played a central role in this conversion, but only after God had given him a dramatic vision that would convince him that the gospel of Jesus, Israel’s Messiah, was for gentiles as well as Jews as recorded in Acts 10:11-15. He saw the sky open, and something like a large sheet was let down by its four corners. In the sheet were all sorts of animals, reptiles, and birds. Then a voice said to him, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat them.” “No, Lord,” Peter declared. “I have never eaten anything that our Jewish laws have declared impure and unclean.” But the voice spoke again: “Do not call something unclean if God has made it clean.”

The dietary laws of the Torah were well known to Peter. Judging by his response to the vision, he strictly observed them throughout his life. The divine command to “kill and eat” unclean animals, and the interpretation of the vision, was an object lesson for Peter. God would direct him to the house of Cornelius later in the chapter (Acts 10:17-33). To his surprise, he was expected. Cornelius had been seeking God (Acts 10:1-8), and God answered by sending an angel to tell him a man named Peter would tell him what he needed to hear. When Cornelius told him about the angel, the vision God had sent him earlier opened his eyes in Acts 10:34-35. Then Peter replied, “I see very clearly that God shows no favoritism. In every nation, he accepts those who fear him and do what is right. The result of Peter’s visit opened the floodgates to the spread of the gospel to “all nations of the earth” (Gen. 12:3), irrespective of culture.

That will conclude this week’s lesson on another two insights from Dr. Heiser’s book “Mastering The Bible.” Next Worldview Wednesday, we will continue with two additional insights. I believe you will find each Worldview Wednesday an interesting topic to consider as we build our Biblical Worldview.

Tomorrow we will continue with 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 1385 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!

Day 1385 – Do Not Fail One Another – Wisdom Unplugged

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Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 1385 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Do Not Fail One Another – 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 1385 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  Michael Baughen, and it is:   Do not let us fail one another in interest, care, and practical help, but supremely we must not fail one another in prayer.    

Do Not Fail One Another

At all times, but especially in times of crises like the Covid-19, we need to seek out those who are in desperate need. There are so many individuals and small businesses who have been financially and physically devastated. If we are going to live our faith, then we need to be willing to show it by helping those who are in need. I realize that you may not be able to help out financially yourself, but is there some other tangible way to assist? I realize that we are just starting to come out of our shelter in place guidelines, so now is the time to start planning on how you can tangibly make a difference in the lives of your family, your neighbors, your church, or social community. Yes, for a while, we may need to be inconvenienced and continue some social distancing while we are among groups of people, but that should not stop us from making a meaningful impact on the lives of others. We can learn how important this by reading James 2:14-20

  • Faith without Good Deeds Is Dead

What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well”—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do?

So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless.

Now someone may argue, “Some people have faith; others have good deeds.” But I say, “How can you show me your faith if you don’t have good deeds? I will show you my faith by my good deeds.”

You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. How foolish! Can’t you see that faith without good deeds is useless? If you are unable to assist others tangibly, or if you are part of a higher risk group, you can assist even more powerfully through effectual and fervent prayer for those in need.

James 5:13-18

  • The Power of Prayer

Are any of you suffering hardships? You should pray. Are any of you happy? You should sing praises. Are any of you sick? You should call for the elders of the church to come and pray over you, anointing you with oil in the name of the Lord. Such a prayer offered in faith will heal the sick, and the Lord will make you well. And if you have committed any sins, you will be forgiven.

Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results. Elijah was as human as we are, and yet when he prayed earnestly that no rain would fall, none fell for three and a half years! Then, when he prayed again, the sky sent down rain, and the earth began to yield its crops.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 1384 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!