Colossians 3:8-10
But now you must get rid of all such things—anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. 
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The United States Constitution grants its citizens the freedom of speech.  It is essential in a democratic society to allow its people to have a voice.  As sinful beings driven by selfishness, we captives to our foolishness.  We play with foul language like adolescents discovering a new toy.  We throw razor laced words at one another to rip people to shreds without getting any blood on our hands.  God grants us the freedom to choose to be better.  Let's choose this day to put away the language that makes us all look like fools or felons.  Let's choose this day to look and sound a little more like the One in whose image we were created. 
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Let us be holy.  Amen.

Psalm 49:13-15
Such is the fate of the foolhardy, the end of those who are pleased with their lot. Like sheep they are appointed for Sheol; Death shall be their shepherd; straight to the grave they descend, and their form shall waste away; Sheol shall be their home. But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will receive me.
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Given that the psalmist wrote centuries  before Christ and that the prevailing understanding of afterlife was pretty final,  the psalmist still makes a bold statement.  God will receive  me.  On the most part, we all walk around with a load of shame that feels
like an itchy wool coat in the middle of a suffocating summer.  We walk around that way because we don't know what else to do.  We walk around that way because we have pronounced a sentence on ourselves and it feels right to feel awful. Perhaps what, in the end, labels us all as fools indeed is that we think that having shame means we have to melt into a puddle of our own human
swill. The psalmist models righteous living for us.  Not dripping with shame but standing boldly in the presence of the one who can show us where to hang our coat and help us live. *     
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Free us from shame and help us laugh again. Amen.

Ecclesiastes 1:9-10
What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, “See, this is new”? It has already been, in the ages before us.
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Last week I was absolutely transfixed watching the live internet feed from the exploratory vessel Nautilus whose crew was in the Gulf of Mexico.  They were using unmanned robotic equipment to photographic and retrieve samples from a 19th century shipwreck. We were all looking at things that no human eye has seen since the ship sunk many years ago. I was looking at it through my own handheld wireless device.  I was able to type questions to the crew who within minutes answered my questions through the audio of the live feed. The author of Ecclesiastes is right that there is nothing new under the sun - we have always been curious humans. We have always had history. We have had scientists. We have created complex technologies. That is not new.  What is new is each day. What is new is how we enter the gift of each new day that God has given us with a sense of wonder. "Is there a thing of which it is said, 'See, this is new?'" Perhaps what is new is not a thing at all but you and me with God's divine spark and delight. 
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What shall we explore today, Lord?  Amen.

Genesis 18:26-28
And the Lord said, “If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will forgive the whole place for their sake.” Abraham answered, “Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes. Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five?” And he said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.” 
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We are a confusing lot. We want freedom, but find rest within the comfort of boundaries. We understand the need for rules but bristle over the notion that we cannot make the rules or define the consequences. We want God as comforter but not as judge. We are complex beings.  Why does it surprise us that God is a complicated character?  God pronounces judgement on the people of Sodom but he listens to Abraham's appeal on their behalf. At the end of the day, we may not like certain aspects of God's nature, but the fact that God listens better than we do is a grace.  
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Holy God, may we learn to listen as you do.  Amen.

Luke 11:9-13
“So I say to you, Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish? Or if the child asks for an egg, will give a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
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Okay, I read the last phrase "give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him."  Is that new? Who put that in there when I was looking? Jesus says, "Ask and it will be given you" and we rarely read any further because we just whipped out our Santa Claus lists.  We think we are so mature now that we no longer ask for a new bike or the brand name headsets. Now at least we know to ask for bits and pieces of spirit - strength, patience, healing, wisdom. Have I ever said asked, "Lord, give me your Spirit?"  What would be the circumstances that would motivate me to ask that?  Would I be desperate? At the end of all options?  What would happen if God answered that prayer?  Be afraid. Be very, very afraid.  And then pray like Jesus taught us asking for what we truly need - God right here, right now.
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Come, Lord Jesus.  Amen.

Colossians 2:6-7
As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. 
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I talked to a person yesterday who was wandering and rootless.  Years of her life had been traded away for evenings of drug haze.  Relationships were twisted and uncertain. She wrung her hands as if to grasp something solid but evermore saddened by the discovery of holding nothing but herself. She has the chance of healing or death at her finger tips. She has much work to do in sorting out the unhealed wounds that she has had inflicted on her and the ones she has made.  No matter where we are in our lives, there is still hope of new roots. Take hold of the truth - both the painful truth and the joyous truth.  We don't deserve a new life but that is exactly what Christ offers. 
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For all the lost, help them find roots - For all the rooted ones, help them reach out.  Amen.

Psalm 85:8
Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace  to his people, to his faithful, to those who turn to him in their hearts. 
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Some of the best teachers I  have ever known are the ones who seem to have a presence and ability to manage dozens of noisy children without ever having to raise their voice.  I am not one of those people.  I usually have to find a volume off the scale to
command their attention and, then, I only have a nanosecond to keep their attention long enough to say what I need to say.  There are those who wish that God would use his big outdoor voice to speak to us so that we can hear.  There are those who can hear God even when God whispers because they are so tuned into what matters most.  I want to be one of those people.  Don't you?
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We are learning to listen, Lord.  Amen.

Hosea 1:7
But I will have pity on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the Lord their God; I will not save them by bow, or by sword, or by war, or by horses, or by horsemen.
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I was watching nautiluslive.org last night. It is a live feed on an effort of archeological recovery of items from a 19th century shipwreck beneath the Gulf of Mexico.  The robotic craft is equipped with a few different tools to lift the delicate items into a bin to be brought to the surface.  The scientists brainstorm about what tool to use that will work for a particular item.  Whether it is a war to wage or items to recovery from the deep, we consider the tools we have the work with.  What will be most effective?  Our choices are always limited.  Throughout the scriptures God often chose to work his will through the tools in the human inventory - often weapons of war.  But there were times when God chose to use his own resources.  God is saving his people and his arsenal of tools is limitless. Thanks be to God.
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Holy God, use us as you will for the sake of your people. Amen.

Genesis:50:15-18
Realizing that their father was dead, Joseph's brothers said, "What if Joseph still bears a grudge against us and pays us back in full for all the wrong that we did to him?" So they approached Joseph, saying, "Your father gave this instruction before he died, 'Say to Joseph: I beg you, forgive the crime of your brothers and the wrong they did in harming you.' Now therefore please forgive the crime of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. Then his brothers also wept, fell down before him, and said, "We are here as your slaves."
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"Helicopter parents" is a phrase that refers to parents who protect and rescue their children and fight their battles for them. In their defense, it is because the children are so greatly valued. We want no harm to come to them physically or emotionally. Sometimes it just isn't a good idea to be flung into the deep end of the pool and left there. However, the time comes when boys become men and girls become women and they must know how to fight their own battles and stand on their own two feet. The sons of Israel could no longer count on their father to bail them out of trouble or use his power to manipulate what they wanted to achieve. They were left with the option to start to grow up by learning to get on their knees. That is an important part of growing up - to know one's limitations. 
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Lord God, grant us the gifts we need to serve your purposes in the world. Amen.

Luke 10:41-42
But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”
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There will always be "many things"  and there will always be "one thing - the better part."  We have hovering over us the spinning, brightly-lit, musical mobiles of distractions.  We are delighted when an infant hears a noise, turns its head, manipulates its fingers, follows a light, recognizes a smile.  Within a few short years, we are asking children to do what even adults do only with difficulty - stay focused.  Add to the mix the necessity of choosing our priorities knowing that what is not chosen will be unfinished and we have to learn to live with that.  The choices I have made alone are never as good as the choices I make knowing Jesus is in the room. 
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Holy God, shine your light on the one thing that is needful.  Amen.