Each year automobiles become more automated with so many enhancements for drivers that they scarcely need to employ any real skill or caution. There are sensors to tell you when to check for underinflated tires, cameras to give you a full rear view when backing up, control panels to tell you how to navigate, and when your car needs fuel or service. There are also autos that can park themselves without driver assistance. This has gotten so sophisticated that one self-parking car will even start on command, via a smartphone app and go pick the owner up where they are without having to find the car in the garage. Anti-lock braking systems have the intelligence to keep cars from a skid that most drivers lack the skills or ability to avoid. There are also high end vehicles that have sensors to alert drivers to obstacles on the road or if they are getting too close to other vehicles, all through the use of GPS satellite communication. The new model year, 2016, has brought some vehicles with their own wireless connection to the web which is a precursor for the next evolution, the driverless cars.

Driverless cars are already on the road in limited areas that have been given the legal green light to test them. California and Nevada have been allowing car makers to test their designs for the last year and report that over 500,000 miles have been logged without incident to date. The US car maker involved is GM, while Google is testing the Toyota Prius with their own technology. Israel has a company involved in the technology called Mobileye and have been testing the technology on a limited basis in Israel. The IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) have had three models of military vehicles without drivers in use for the past five years. They are used to patrol areas like Gaza. They also have vehicles used to search buildings with small cameras that have 360 degree viewing search capabilities.

Germany has two automakers with designs already in production, BMW and Audi. The expectation is that within a few years they will be available to consumers that can afford them. They are currently working on changing laws in Germany to prepare for the release of the production vehicles in 2017. Within the next few months, some of the German Autobahns in Bavaria will have lanes designated for driverless cars that are being tested. German automakers are committed to the driverless technology but are concerned about the competition posed by the Google-Prius cars in the works. There is certainly a scramble among automakers and technological wizards to get this new technology into the hands of the masses as soon as possible. First, they have to make it completely viable logistically, and then affordable on a bigger scale. Finally, they have to get the laws on the books to accommodate the cars. This could be the biggest hurdle to the process as they will have to be legislated in each country, as well as each state in the US. However, when it comes to the latest technology or innovation, men will cooperate to get it to the masses because it will make those involved lots of money; not to mention this driverless car is just another case in the ongoing efforts of today’s science to throw off the yoke of the natural restrictions of God’s design. To be able to transport oneself – body, soul, and spirit – without investing personal energy or an ounce of animated attention is just another step in Man’s efforts to circumvent the boundaries and restrictions which God set upon this world for our own good. (Refer to Tower of Babel article.)

Shakespeare may have been more right than he knew, but in this case; that has such inventions in it? The thought of driving to work in a vehicle that will do all the thinking for you and assume all the risk is certainly bold and not that long ago unimaginable. But Man is able to accomplish all that he can imagine and the need to have this done has entered the mind of Man. However, there is something really unnatural and creepy about giving total control of your vehicle and your life over to a machine that has no emotional connection to you, nor any other living being you could come into contact with. Yet lives are definitely on the line with a machine like an automated transporter. It is truly like the Transporter movies. Only difference is that the car is in control and not the driver. It doesn’t care about the package, it doesn’t ask about the package, its job is to deliver the package on time wherever it is programmed to go. Science Fiction writers have been sounding the alarm for decades about the rise of machines in the future and the threat they pose to humanity. God sounded the alarm at the Tower of Babel and that’s why he broke Mankind up by natural barriers of land and sea, including the greatest barrier of all language.

We Are Being Enslaved by Technology and Everyone Knows It
There have been sci-fi tales of vehicles that become empowered with their own personality but many times prove a menace. Like the attempt at first to build the Tower of Babel Mankind will regret its attempts to control its own destiny and bypass the will of God who is our actual Father that truly knows best for us.

The primary theme in these conspiratorial acts, though not fully understood by their perpetrators, is by men having control we can do what God is withholding from us. But by giving control over to emotionless, soulless machines, do we not risk being enslaved to them. Isn’t it true that humanity, if it is not already enslaved, risks becoming enslaved to computers, cell phones, machines of transport, machinery of government and every new technology devised by clever sciences of Man? Most everyone in a modern society, if not all, can’t spend an hour in a day without some technology machinery do some critical thing for them. Should any one of these become unavailable for even a short time we get anxious, even desperate. And we need energy resources to operate all this machinery. Should the wrong computer system go down, i.e. those running the electrical grid, many lives could be lost as a result. The truth is we are already enslaved by the age of technology and it is not just Man that is at risk but the entire planet is in jeopardy from the greenhouse effect to nuclear catastrophes of wars or the ones that have happened at Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and Japan.  

The world we live in now is much like a fishbowl with all the electronic equipment tracking our movements, our shopping habits, personal interactions with people, and photographing us everywhere. We have virtually no privacy on Earth anymore. We are on the precipice of being connected 24/7 through global Wi-Fi and wireless electricity which may seem a real convenience, but it also spells the loss of liberty to move about without authorities knowing about it and observing it.

Admittedly, computers and cell phones are useful tools, when used properly. But they must be tempered with wisdom that comes from the Holy Ghost to show us when to put these things down or even if we can have anything to do with them.

All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.
1 Cor 6:12 

In fact, the very Antichrist will employ technology in the image of the beast that will be used to demand the worship of everyone on Earth for him, or face death. It is not unreasonable to think that technology will factor very heavily in his reign of terror. Machines should be looked upon as tools, not friends or part of the family or anything with a soul. They should not be ruling you or driving you, you employ them for their utility not worship.

This is not simply paranoia, it is real and has become our very existence. The driverless autos will need the technology to have the information the auto needs to make navigational and defensive decisions. It is not a stretch to say that with these cars, the authorities could control where we go at any time by assuming control of the vehicle. There is already concern by the people designing them that the vehicles may be hacked into and crashed or driven by an unfriendly source to somewhere unintended by the owner. Therefore any convenience this offers comes with some serious concerns, never mind any spiritual concerns this would pose.

An article written by an enthusiast of this technology went as far as to claim driverless cars come with the added benefit of not needing auto insurance. In another article, the writer asked the question; who is responsible when the computer fails and it results in an accident? We all know that computers go wrong all the time, servers crash, satellite disruptions, or loss of power, and on and on. There is no infallibility in technology and machines because they are man-made and therefore imperfect. These automobiles would be no different. So to think that these will be real lifesavers, eliminating human error on the roads is quite a stretch. Now we come to the real question for a discerning believer of Jesus Christ and just how this impacts those who believe in his soon return. When it comes to accepting new technology as a believer in Jesus Christ and one who knows that we are only passing through and waiting for his return above all else, we do have to balance what we know about this against living in a modern world. The only way to do that in truth is to seek God early about what if anything you have to do with this.

Driverless cars go a step further, and pose a real concern about allowing machines to control us instead of us controlling the machine. That would seem to be the threat in that we have to have blind faith in a self-driving machine that can have mechanical failure, or be controlled by an outside source. An entity or entities, i.e. Government officials, law enforcement, terrorists, or a sole hacker could bring menace to you or those around you, by assuming control of the vehicle while you are a passive rider in your car. Not just your physical wellbeing is at stake, and others your vehicle could come into contact with, but in truth there is potential hazard to your very soul. To think or believe that this driverless technology will prevent any traffic accident problem while you sit as a passenger, is to place your faith in the wrong thing. To think you can be absolved from any responsibility for what happens on the road and that this will remove the need for insurance is naïve at best. Not with driverless cars only, but anything that requires you to have that level of blind faith, apart from God. It is not God’s will, nor is it possible to live apart or above this end-times technology that is in the spirit and form of the conspiracy of Nimrod and The Tower of Babel. But beware that you are not swept up in its gospel because that is not God’s will. Man cannot control his own destiny nor change his dark and fearful nature by constructing it from his own imagination or ability to reason. it is a matter of the heart, a matter which only the grace of God in heaven can accomplish through the spiritual workings of his Son on mine and your heart.

For more on driverless cars, please see Are Driverless Cars to be Trusted?