On June 13, 1966, the Supreme Court issued its landmark Miranda vs. Arizona decision, ruling that criminal suspects must be informed of their constitutional rights prior to questioning by police. 

That’s right, for the last 50 years, every time someone got arrested on TV you heard those Miranda Rights that begin with “You have the right to remain silent. If you give up that right, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law…”

Our rights are very important to us in the USA. We exercise our right to vote. We protect our right to keep and bear arms. We definitely prefer rights over rules. Maybe this is true of citizens of other countries as well. 

You’ve probably heard it said of someone who makes a lot of bad decisions, or has some crazy beliefs, or who has very little common sense: “He/she isn’t playing with a full deck.” And, if you are in the South, it was probably followed by “bless his/her heart!” 

Truth is, none of us start out with a full deck, spiritually speaking. In fact, God was well aware that He was creating us to be incomplete, not all there, a few nuggets short of a Happy Meal. He created us missing a piece that we need to live complete lives and He bids us to come and receive that piece directly from Him.

I’ve only watched a handful of wrestling matches in my life. I know some people love them. My favorite was a live amateur event at a local community center, where you could clearly see that the punches being thrown were not connecting with the opponent’s face. I think they wore masks to hide the fact that they were laughing when they should have been looking tough.

Christians wrestle – with or without the tights and capes and masks of the WWE.

Haven't all of us mothers been victims of that chant when we just couldn't get to a child as fast as they want us to or maybe when they are up at 6:00 am and ready for pancakes on a day when you hoped to sleep in a bit?

God is our Father. Christ is our Brother and Betrothed. Where is Mom? What is she doing? Let's talk about that.

Motherhood is the ultimate roller coaster, isn't it? Great joy, paralyzing fear, heart-busting pride and nail-biting worry. Or maybe your faith was/is such that you never feared or worried or your child's behavior was such that motherhood was all pride and joy for you. If so, congratulations and please skip the next two paragraphs ofthis blog to save me the embarrassment of what I am going to confess. 

I was recently searching for video of people singing the praise song “Days of Elijah” (written by Francis Robert Mark) to show it to my husband. I want to add it to our selection of praise songs for our band, but I knew if I just sang it for him he would not get the real beauty of the song. 

The most enthusiastically performed version that I could find was a video of US Marines in fatigues singing it. I have no idea if they were stationed far away or just on base at home. However, as Marines do, they added their own piece to it – “Hoorah!” “Lift your voice – Hoorah! – It’s the year of Jubilee. Out of Zion’s Hill salvation comes.”

This is a reflective season for those of us who keep the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread. In preparation for the Passover we reflect on the amazing and undeserved sacrifice of the perfect Lamb of God. For the Days of Unleavened Bread we think about the sin that remains in our lives and strive to remove it as well as removing the leavening from our homes. At the foot-washing ceremony, an important part of the Passover service, we recommit ourselves to serving our fellow man. 

I also usually get a pedicure as part of my preparation, just so my calluses and dry feet don't tear up the hands of the person washing them.

I don't know about you, but for me it can sometimes be very difficult to let go and let God take care of things. Even when I have "given it to" God in prayer, I can lay awake at night taking it back to worry over the situation some more. 

Society tells us that we can and should be masters of our own destinies, and our own human nature confirms it. We want to feel the empowerment of doing it ourselves from the time we are little and first tie our own shoes. 

The stakes are even higher we feel like we are drowning or that someone we love is drowning - overwhelmed by grief or fear or pain or sickness or other suffering. We think "if I don't swim (that is, if I don't take action and do something), I will drown.

In art, perspective has to do with the vantage point of the drawing or painting. M.C. Escher if famous for the way he bent perspectives in his artwork. (See “Relativity” http://www.mcescher.com/gallery/back-in-holland/relativity/ for an example.)

In life, my personal perspective can influence my judgement or cause me to look at things differently than others who’ve had a different life experience. For example, in my perspective of living in the United States, my family lived rather modesty on my father’s income with seven kids in the house a one point. I might even term us as poor. However, the fact that we had clean drinking water and an indoor bathroom and at least 7 pair of underwear at any given time made us very rich by the standards of the majority of children in this world. Much of the world would have an entirely different perspective of my life.

Could a robot do your job?  Robots or, more likely, robotics have been taking over human jobs for decades. Do you feel like your job is safe from robot encroachment? I’m hoping that my sales job is too nuanced for a robot, but I may just be fooling myself.

I recently read an article on LinkedIn by Alec Ross titled “Could our future nurses and caregivers be robots?” Ross postulated that, in a reversal of the norm, robot technology for care-giving and companionship might be a technology that reaches the mainstream through adoption by the elderly first. That’s right, young people, your grandma might get a Jetson’s family style Rosie the robot maid long before you do.

You know her as Rahab the Harlot. In fact, you will rarely read her name in the Bible – Old Testament or New Testament – without her personal tagline of “the harlot.”

Rahab’s story is told in Joshua 2:1-21 and 6:22-25. I know that some people say that she was maybe just an inn keeper. But the Hebrew word used for “harlot” tells me otherwise. The Greek word used for “harlot” in the two passages in the New Testament where she is listed is also very clearly defined as prostitute. Seems like she was, in fact, a harlot.

Last Monday was Ground Hog Day – a day when we ask a rodent to predict the weather. In case you missed it: Spring is coming early this year. Here in Texas it seems like winter isn’t coming at all. And I’m not mad about that.

To many folks, Ground Hog Day means watching the movie of that same name, starring Bill Murray and Ande McDowell. In it, Murray’s character gets stuck in a loop of time – going through Ground Hog Day again, and again, and again, and again. Murray’s character does everything in his power to try to get out of that loop, but he can’t.

Super Bowl Sunday is upon us in the USA. This coming Sunday, the Carolina Panthers and Denver Broncos will battle it out in Super Bowl 50. So, this is a big game. I was skimming the news this morning and saw the on-going hoopla over the dabbing and dancing in the end zone of Cam Newton Panther’s Quarterback. His quote back is this, “if you don’t like it, don’t let me into the end zone.”

Providentially, our lesson today in the Beth Moore Bible Study, Esther: It’s Tough Being a Woman, covered the celebration of the Jews of Persia over peace they achieved after the victory over their enemies that had planned to wipe them out in one day. It’s an incredible story and a great study.

If you saw the animated film The Lion King, you probably recall the song “The Circle of Life.” For the film, of course, the idea was that when you die your body nourishes the earth so that flowers and plants can grow to provide for the next generation.

When it comes to real life, those of us who call ourselves Christians must consider more than just what happens to our bodies when we go. We must consider more than what we will leave to our children or the success of our business lives. We must consider the Spiritual legacy that we will leave behind for the next generation.

Sometimes at certain times we, as Christians, may be tempted to figuratively "beat someone over the head with the truth" or with the Word of God. Sometimes, in certain cases, we may be tempted to say "God, I know vengeance is Yours, so I give it to you," and then advise God on how to do that by really "giving it to them" - like David did occasionally in his Psalms (see, for example Ps. 58:6-7).  Maybe we even look forward to Jesus' return when He will rule with a rod of iron and think “I know someone who needs to be hit with a rod of iron.” (Rev. 12: 5; 19:15) Maybe we even point other sinners (not me!) to Hebrews 4:12 with an attitude that says (though we might not actually say it) "read the Word - it will CUT you."