Author: Ian Bothwell

Just two weeks ago if asked what kind of squirrels do you have in your neighborhood I would have responded, “Gray and red.”  I had no idea that we had flying squirrels.  It seems they are nocturnal and since I am diurnal I had no knowledge of these big eyed creatures.  But for the past two weeks one has taken up residence at night at our bird feeder.

I am delighted to learn something new about my own backyard but at the same time I am a bit chagrined regarding my ignorance. It has been a good experience for me.  It reminds me of how little I really know.  Occasionally someone will phone me asking a Bible question.  When I was much younger I would pontificate answers with great authority.  However, as the years have passed by, I have become aware of the vastness of Scripture and my very minuscule knowledge.  Also, some of what I thought was so I now know isn’t or wasn’t so.

The smartest time in my life was when I graduated from high school.  It has been an intellectual downhill journey ever since.   I have discovered that the more education one obtains the more aware they become of how much there is to learn and how little we know and how little time there is to learn more. Once I heard someone bragging about her education and wondered if she got her degree from a Cracker Jack box.

If you would enjoy the treat of being humbled, just spend a few evenings on a clear night enjoying the two thousand plus individual stars we can see with our unaided eye.  If that were all there was we would be overwhelmed.  But there is so much more, much more, much more, much more to learn.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 18, 2015

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

It’s been a quiet day in Leominster, Massachusetts.  The sun drifted across the sky warming the maples and birches to 75 breezy degrees.  It was a day to go into the backyard with a salt shaker and pick vine ripened tomatoes. We don’t have any tomato plants but we do have a generous neighbor who says, “Come and help me.  I have zillions of tomatoes.”

One of the things I don’t like about the 21^st century is the lack of children playing outside.  We loved summer evenings in the 40s and 50s when everyone’s yard was a playground for all the children to play hide and seek and to fill a mason jar with lightning bugs.  Fortunately the ice cream truck still creeps through the neighborhood playing Turkey in the Straw.  But I do miss hearing “Ally Ally in Free” echoing down the street.

After reading the Gospel of John in one sitting I have this gut feeling that our God is frustrated.  I think He has an urge to say something that just will not work.  Have you ever wanted to say something but just couldn’t get it out?  Is there someone you love but every time you start to tell them the words get caught in your throat?  In a new relationship who will be the first to say, “I love you”?  What if you say it and the other person doesn’t say it back?  Does it sort of just hang out there in no man’s land?

God has certainly been able to tell us He loves us.  He not only said it, He demonstrated it for thirty some years.   Jesus was a walking “I love you” card.  So what is it that He wants to say but can’t?  “Ally Ally in Free.”

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 18, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Are you as irritated as I when the phone rings and you get up out of your easy chair, rush across the room, only to listen to a recorded message telling you that you have been called in response to an inquiry you made?  You know you never made any such inquiry.

In the mornings when I record the day’s devotional on our 800 line* I sometimes discover on the messages left behind that one of those machines called our machine.  In order for it to send its message it first has to listen to ours.  Only then can it leave its message.  I am amused at the idea of the machines talking to each other.  I wish their machine would as a result of listening to our machine repent.  If so then it would stop calling you and me.  A hundred years from now, if Jesus has not yet returned, we can send our personal robot to church in our self driving cars to listen to the robot the pastor sent.  Upon returning home our robot can deliver to us a word for word recitation of the morning sermon.

Sometimes I get the feeling that even though we are in church in the flesh that the same routines and the same prayers are not much different from robots.  If we have a friend to friend relationship with God I doubt if saying the same thing over and over really works.  Imagine an evening out with friends where you said the very same things with the very same words that you said the week before and the week before that. Jesus did say to us in John 15, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.”

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 14, 2015

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

 

I’m sure you have noticed the older we become the earlier we arrive at appointments.  There are exceptions to this.  You can count on some people being late.  It seems to be part of their fabric no matter how old they are.  But most of us seem to follow the “old people show up early” syndrome.  I’m guessing one of the reasons is experience has taught us many things can happen on route that would make us late.  So we build in time to change a tire or take a detour.

It is disconcerting to have tickets for an event and be told late-comers will not be seated until intermission.  How can that be?  I paid for these tickets.  I have always wondered if there were people who planned to get into Noah’s ark but were late arriving at the door.  Wow – talk about not being seated!

One can miss a lot by arriving late.  I have known people who knew they should become Christians but they knew about God’s love and grace and therefore, put it off thinking to take advantage of the offer later on in life.  That might work.  God is amazingly forgiving.  I say it might work because life can end abruptly not affording that late chance.  However, the real issue is what they have lost along the way.  Being a Christian isn’t merely about salvation and eternal life.  There are quality of life issues for now.  Life is amazingly stressful for many people.  A life in Christ can help.  One of my favorite authors wrote, “A life in Christ is a life of restfulness.”  There is a peace that comes with the assurance of salvation.  One’s whole approach to problems is much more sane and relaxed when one is resting in God’s strong hand.  It is foolish to be late.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 15, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

During the seventh-inning stretch at a ball game we traditionally sing the old favorite Take Me Out to the Ball Game.  When we sang “Give me some peanuts and Cracker Jacks” it occurred to me that I hadn’t had a box of Cracker Jacks for at least fifty years.   So I got one.  I opened it and just like I did as a child I dug around looking for the prize.  Even as a child I knew the prize was junk but now it was a piece of paper with a crummy looking picture.  We’ve come a long way from the glory days of a plastic finger ring or some other worthless item.  How can something that is worthless become even more worthless?

Thinking about things being worthless I remembered Ezekiel 7:19, “They will throw their silver into the streets, and their gold will be treated as a thing unclean. Their silver and gold will not be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD’s wrath. It will not satisfy their hunger or fill their stomachs, for it has caused them to stumble into sin.”  The value of things is quite relative.  Shakespeare nailed it in Richard III.  “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse.”

In Mark 8 Jesus said, “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?”  I knew a man who was very rich and I knew he had not come by it honestly.  When asked how he could do that he responded.  “I am not going to heaven anyway so I better make the most of what I can now.”  Worthless – oh so worthless.  What a shame.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 14, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Research reveals that managerial style directly influences workplace productivity.  The bosses who harangue and manage with negativity do not get as much product from their employees as opposed to bosses that encourage workers with positive statements about their workers’ skills and talents.  So why do so many preachers try to motivate their congregations with threats of hell and eternal loss?  Could it be that we grew up with Jeremiah and other Old Testament prophets who really could stick it to their people?  Negativity seemed to work for Jonah when he went to Nineveh, but that reformation was short lived and Nineveh did eventually fall.  Fear is a horrible motivator.

Jesus was so different.  He wanted children to come to Him.  He told Nicodemus that God so loved the world.  He forgave those who crucified Him.  He told Zacchaeus He wanted to eat with him. Over and over His dealings with the common man were filled with compassion and love. The only times Jesus became harsh were when He witnessed the religious leadership abusing people.  See Matthew 23.  And we have to note His crucifixion quickly followed that tongue lashing.

To my colleagues and fellow preachers I appeal to be more like Jesus and less like Ezekiel. People are hungry to be loved.  The news of the world frightens them.  They don’t need to come to church and be frightened even more.  Make church a true sanctuary from the terrorism that stalks our world.  Love your people.  Encourage and inspire.  Inspiration fertilizes growth and becomes a part of people’s lives.  Jesus said, “Fear not for I am with you even to the end of the world.”  We are very much safe in the arms of Jesus.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 13, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Unless you are Rodney Dangerfield or some other self-deprecating comedian, people do not tell lies to make themselves look bad.  When I am ordering a pizza and I am asked for my name I tell them I’m Hercules.  Why should I lie and tell them Casper Milktoast?  The lies we tell about ourselves are designed to make us look better than we are, more manly, more courageous.

In the Gospels the disciples often looked bad.  They fell asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane when Jesus asked them to pray with Him.  That very night they ran away and abandoned Him.  Peter cursed and denied knowing Jesus.  James and John wanted to call lightning down from heaven and burn up a town.  On the beach at Gadarenes they ran away and left Jesus at the mercy of two very violent demon-possessed men.

For me this is evidence that the Gospels stories are true.  If these men were making up stories they would have been like the rest of us and they would have made themselves look quite a bit more heroic.  Both Peter and John testify to the veracity of their stories by saying they saw, they heard, they touched with their own hands the Lord of Glory.  See I John 1 and II Peter 1.  They were eyewitnesses.   When television was new to us Walter Cronkite narrated a program called You Are There taking us to historic events and giving us front row seats.   Peter and John and the others Were There and they shared with us the unvarnished truth about what they saw.  Jesus was wonderful and they were not.  Jesus was perfect and they were not.  If they were lying to us surely they would have looked much, much better.

Written by Roger Bothell on August 12, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Oh, she was an ugly little girl.  She was probably six-years-old and very ugly.  There was nothing wrong with her hair and nothing wrong with her eyes and cheeks.  Her nose was a nice normal nose. But she was an ugly little girl because of her mouth.  We were in an ice cream store when she came in with her grandfather.  He bought her a nice cup of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream and cherries.  As he handed it to her she decided she wanted sprinkles. But it was already paid for and he tried to explain.  Oh, dear.  I’m so glad you were not there to have to witness what happened next.  This was when she turned ugly.  Out of her mouth came a series of “I want.”  Next she was lying on the floor screaming that she wanted sprinkles.  Oh, she was an ugly little girl.

Strange isn’t it how selfishness makes us ugly.  Ugliness happens when we only think about ourselves.  Divas are not beautiful.  They only think they are.  I have never met anyone who wanted to be ugly.  People spend billions on cosmetics and stylish clothes trying to be appealing when all they need is a smile and a kindness extended to another.

There is a wonderful song in the musical Annie.  The words go like this.  “Check out ourselves ‘cause you know you’re never fully dressed without a smile!  Your clothes may be Chanel, Gucci your shoes crocodile, But baby you’re never fully dressed without a smile.”

If only that ugly little girl had smiled and said, “Thank you grandpa for the ice cream,” she would have been so beautiful.  Alas, hopefully she will learn.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 11, 2015

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I have an on-line student this summer that has not turned in any assignments.  He has not responded to my emails.  He doesn’t answer his phone and will not return my voice mail messages.  We have run out of time.  If he will only respond to me perhaps we can work out something.  Other than going to his house and waiting on his porch I don’t know what to do other than sadly decide the course is lost.

There is a poignant passage found in Luke 13.  Jesus sits on the Mount of Olives looking over Jerusalem and sadly says, “How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.”  There are things out of God’s hands.  He has given us the power of choice.  We, not He, are in control of our destiny. God can call us.  He can email us.  He can sit on our porch but if we don’t respond He has to allow us to reap the fruit of our decisions.

If God should force any of us He would violate His own ethic and lose the battle with Satan who has claimed God is a tyrant.  He is anything but a tyrant.  While it is true we are born with the preprogrammed characteristics of our parents and grandparents, that does not mean we are forced to behave in any particular way.  While we have tendencies and biases toward certain actions we are still in control and can if need be call for divine help.  II Peter 1:4 is very assuring. We have great and precious promises that we can participate in God’s divine nature.  The power is given.  It is ours!

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 11, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org

 

The katydids have begun their summer song in Massachusetts.  Their songs blended with the wooing sounds of the tree frogs fill the evenings with magic. Local lure says our first killing frost will now be six weeks away.  That means we will have a killing frost in the middle of September.  That seems way too soon.  But wait, I looked this up and discovered some say it is nine weeks until the killing frost.  That sounds more like it.  But then again I found someone saying it is twelve weeks.  I’m confused.

It is the same consternation I feel when listening to interpreters of Bible prophecy.  It seems that almost every preacher has a unique prediction regarding what is happening in the Middle East and when Jesus will return. Each one has verses to support his\her special insight. But they aren’t saying the same thing. I am thinking they are about as accurate as our New England katydid prophecies.

In regard to Jesus’ return He said, “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”  Mark 13:32.  It is true that we should be aware and not have our heads in the sand.  It is also true that knowing or not knowing should not make one iota of difference in how we live each day.  Our personal goal should be to be as much like Jesus as we can and that should be the case if He was coming tomorrow or sometime in the next millennium. In Luke 19:13 Jesus said, “Occupy until I come.”  Don’t stop living. Let’s just be the kindest, most caring, most honest persons we can be.

Written by Roger Bothwell on August 8, 2014

Spring of Life, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574

Rogerbothwell.org