Welcome to Day 1409 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to WisdomOur World Is Shaken – Meditation MondayWisdom - 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 1409 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. 


I am on my 64th revolution around the sun on this oasis of paradise that we call earth. On this earth, from the beginning of creation, there have been problems. I must admit though the first six months of 2020 has been what we would call a humdinger, and not in a good way.   I think we are all a bit shaken at the moment. Today let us meditate on:


Our World is ShakenThere have been many twists and turns in my life. There have been many unexpected ups and downs. I am sure you have experienced the same. We would like to make sense of it all, because we desire to be in control, which we are not. We desire to have meaning in what has and is happening, but that is not always the case. The older I get, the more I can relate to wise King Solomon in his old age. He wrote in Ecclesiastes 1:2 (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+1&version=NLT) , “Everything is meaningless,” says the Teacher, “completely meaningless!”


We have heard thousands of times in the past few months that we are living in unprecedented times. We want to think that there has never been a time like we are currently facing. There is an ongoing worldwide pandemic that has claimed over 500,000 lives, and maybe many more. Now we have global unrest about injustices and prejudices, which are resulting in peaceful protest, and very unpeaceful rioting causing additional loss of life and destruction of property. We want to think that nothing like this has ever happened, that this is all new. Once again, wise King Solomon buts it this way in Ecclesiastes 1:9-11 (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+1%3A9-11&version=NLT) History merely repeats itself. It has all been done before. Nothing under the sun is truly new. Sometimes people say, “Here is something new!” But actually, it is old; nothing is ever truly new. We don’t remember what happened in the past, and in future generations, no one will remember what we are doing now.


In addition to global devastation, many individuals are also experiencing life-altering situations, many of which are personally devastating. These situations shake us to our very core. We feel like we are reeling out of control. We need a place to pause and regain our center.


So did the Christians at the end of the first century. Rome was trying to wipe out Christ-followers from the face of the earth. Their worlds were shaken to the core. The old apostle John writes to help them regain their center. Every day their world was spun wildly out of control by the ever-present threat of persecution. Their numbers were small as they gathered for...