Author: Ian Bothwell

As my son and family were leaving the baggage area at Logan airport they were blocked at the door by a man on his cell phone.  Apparently he wasn’t coordinated enough to walk and talk at the same time.  Neither did he seem to be aware that others needed to get by.  Meanwhile others waiting in cars were being urged along by some very intimating state patrolmen.

Unfortunately sometimes we have people blocking the door to our churches.  I have seen well-meaning but poorly acting older people chase our teens away.  They are made to feel unwelcome because of their dress or jewelry or makeup.  Sometimes they are actually verbally assaulted that they are not representative of Christ by looking the way they look.  But really now, when one stops to think about it, what real harm occurs to anyone because someone else is experimenting and has purple hair?  They will grow up and not look like that for the rest of their lives.  Well, perhaps I should take that back.  I have seen older ladies with purplish hair.

Our churches should be places where anyone is welcome.  If a kid shows up with an arrow through his head and enough fake gold chains around his neck that he looks like Mr. T., who does that harm?   Better that they are with us in church than home watching television or playing video games.  Sometimes we excuse our behavior by saying we are holding up the standards.  What standard?   What about the standard of unconditional love.  What about the real sins of us older people?   I mean the vile ones we carry inside – the ones Jesus cares about.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 19, 2011

Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94547

Rogerbothwell.org

 

One of my favorite things about Jesus was the way He touched people prior to healing them.  In Mark 1 He touched a leper and then said, “I will. Be clean.”  If it had been me it would have been the other way around.  We are very tactile beings and apparently we are not the only creatures God made to be such.  In a recent study at the University of California rats were induced to have a stroke.  The researchers then tickled the rats’ whiskers and discovered something wonderfully amazing.  Neurons that should have died did not.  There was no paralysis where there should have been.  There still needs to be much follow-up research; however, the implications are extremely hopeful.  While it is true, we are not rats and do not respond to things the way they respond, researchers often find correlations.   The message is we might have an opportunity to benefit stroke victims by stroking them until we can get them emergency aid.

In Mark 8 Jesus touched the eyes of a blind man.   In Matthew 8 He touched Peter’s mother-in-law on her hand and immediately her fever vanished.     In  Matthew 9 He took a little girl, thought to be dead, by the hand and she got up. Continuing on in the same chapter two blind men were given sight after He touched their eyes.  In Revelation 7 John speaks of the redeemed as being a huge uncountable multitude.  That is so wonderful.  The exclusionists among us are so very wrong. It isn’t going to be just their special little group.  It is HUGE and Jesus will touch each person one by one.  It will take a while.  Perhaps a century or so but I can wait.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 24, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

So I ask you.  How can a man concentrate on his classroom lecture when a pretty lady comes by the door tossing in kisses?  This is not the first time this has happened.  We teach in the same department and her office is next to mine but she waits until I am really holding forth with some important topic and then she strikes.  I have to tell you even though we are coming up on our 50th anniversary, it is still very distracting.

Life is full of distractions.  When I am in the midst of a task needing concentration a student will stick his head in the door to ask a “quickquestion.”   I hear this so often it really needs to be one word instead of two.  Though it might only take thirty seconds to respond it takes much longer to mentally return to the task at hand.  Our cell phones, iPads and pop ups on computer screens all distract us.

We make a conscious effort to grow spiritually only to be distracted by our children’s needs.  There is soccer practice, or whatever, where they need to be delivered.  As if there is something innately wrong with quiet, our environment so often is filled with background music; usually music we don’t especially like.  The pressures of modern life are one of the biggest distractible foes to personal growth.  One of Satan’s most effective tools is hubbub.   When we are making really good spiritual progress a committee of Satan’s angels meets to discuss our case.   First of their suggestions as to how to thwart us comes, “Just, fill his/her life with lots of responsibilities.  They can be good things.  It doesn’t matter.  Just make it a good distraction.”

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 29, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I bought a new pair of shoes yesterday and put them on this morning for the first time.   They were as perfect as only something new can be.  As I started down the stairs my dog promptly stepped on one with her 80 pounds and one of her nails gouged into that fine finish.  I think I had them on less than five minutes.  Alas.  It also seems that way when I buy a new car.  That first ding seems to occur in the first few days and months go by before the second one appears.

Can we even begin to imagine God’s reaction to Adam and Eve’s disobedience?  Eden was perfect.  Genesis one finishes with God critiquing His own work.  He said, “That’s very good.”   We have no idea how many millenniums of thought and planning went into this magnificent planet.  It was here that He prepared a perfect home for a perfect couple made in His image.  Angels must have been overwhelmed with the artistic design and scientific balance for life.  Surely there were tears shed all over heaven when the news spread regarding the now flawed paradise.  This was not a gouge mark.  This was not a ding.  This was destruction.  Death had come to Earth.

God Himself would offer that first sacrifice as He explained to them what it represented.  As graphic as that was I doubt if they really got it.  No one really got it until that night in another garden.   Jesus clung to earth begging His Father for another way and if there was no other way to give Him the strength to do it.   He did it.  Now we know.  But do we?  Surely we would be more motivated if we really understood.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 18, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

My exquisite art teacher reminded me this morning of something so true and very important.  When you strike middle C or any other key on a piano all of the other strings on the piano harp vibrate with it.  It literally sets the tone.  It’s just like people.  When we strike a tone others around us respond in kind.  A few months ago someone entered my office to complain about the hostile environment.  I had to admit my surprise.  What hostile environment?  I was surprised but not puzzled.  All I had to do was look at the person’s face and demeanor to know they were telling the truth.  As they moved about striking a tone others around responded in kind.  Primarily we are responsible for what happens around us.  I say primarily because never is something like this always true.  There can be another strong person in the room who is spoiling it for all others.  That’s why one of the most important questions to ask before hiring someone is “What was it like where you worked prior to this?”

Many years ago I had a similar conversation and that person said, “It’s like this everywhere I go.  What’s the matter with people?”   I do believe the key word there is “everywhere”.   Who is the one person present everywhere she went?

Jesus certainly put out the right vibes.  The crowds couldn’t stay away from Him. “The people saw them departing, and many knew him, and ran afoot thither out of all cities, and out went them, and came together unto him.” Mark 6.  We have within our power and even more so can have divine power to strike the right note, the positive note to make life better for all around us.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 17, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

One of the treasures I have from my father is an old globe he had in his classroom.  It maps wonderfully exotic places like Siam, Rhodesia, Palestine, Gold Coast and Keijo.  Holding a globe and turning it this way and that causes one to wonder about the way things are.   I can untip the axis and do away with the seasons.  There would be perpetual sunshine on the poles making it a very interesting place to live with the sun never rising high in the sky.   I can turn the axis at a 90 degree angle and have the sun come up in the north and go down in the south or vice versa depending on which direction I spin it.  Continents look very unfamiliar when oriented differently.  North America becomes almost unrecognizable when turned on its side and has no state lines.

Perhaps the second most important text in Scripture is “In the beginning God.”  We can be filled with a host of questions about rocks, continental drift and the ring of fire but as long as Genesis 1:1 is we have no fear for the future.  Asteroids can go whizzing past us at 26,000 miles an hour and we know God is still there and all will ultimately be well.

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man, that thou visits him?”  Psalm 8.  And the answer is we are the sons and daughters of this Most High God who but breathes and worlds come into existence.  How grand for us.  We are so blessed.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 16, 2011

Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94547

Rogerbothwell.org

 

There are stone walls littered through the forests of Massachusetts.  Decades ago people actually tried to farm in places that only grow rocks.  Each spring before trying to plow they derocked and built these old fences just to put the rocks somewhere useful.  There are still a few stone foundations now covered with vines and oak and maple trees growing where there was once a room.  Sometimes I sit and listen. If I really concentrate my mind supplies the voices of family.  It’s interesting what one can hear in the silence of the forest.  Mixed in with the breeze one can hear the “teacher, teacher” of ovenbirds and the laughter and tears of those who struggled here.

We live in a noisy world.  It is difficult not to hear an airplane or a chainsaw intruding on what should be our chance to hear silence.  It is a treat to find a moment when we can hear the rush of blood through our ears.  Even now as I write the computer is softly serenading me with Beethoven.  Have we so filled our lives with sound that we have become addicted and find silence uncomfortable?

In Luke 6:12 we read the following about Jesus. “And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.”  He had no iPhone to create a musical background.  It was the silence of a Palestinian night that surrounded Him.  How I have often wondered how He filled those hours.  Did He pray out loud and break the silence or was it an internal meditation with the Father?   Some night in the silence He prayed for you.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 15, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

I wonder how many guys have used the line “You complete me”?   It really grabs a lady’s attention even if she knows it’s a quote from the film Jerry McGuire.  I’ve tried it on my wife with stunning results.  What is interesting is the line is not original in the movie.  I believe Paul was the first to use it when talking about Jesus.  Colossians 2:10, “You are complete in Him.”

In our quest for development we are so aware of our deficiencies. If we were on our own in this pursuit we would be doomed to failure.  It is just part of being human that the better we know ourselves the more aware we become of our needs.  Surely discouragement would eventually overwhelm us when we realize there is a certain point in the aging process that our cognitive skills and our physical skills aren’t what they used to be.  When my family says to me, “Are you all right?” I realize I am sending subtle signals I thought I was covering up.

Fortunately for all of us the completeness encompasses the entirety of our being and with Jesus as our righteousness we stand before God not as a forgiven sinner but as an individual who has never sinned.  I have a friend who tells me he wants to check my record when he gets to heaven.  I just smile because I know the only thing there is the good stuff.  The bad stuff isn’t just a secret between Jesus and me.  It’s gone!  I love it!  He will be so frustrated because he is suspicious I have a pretty raunchy record.  He will never know because I’m not talking and neither is Jesus.   Jesus completes us!

Written by Roger Bothwell on July 8, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

 

 

It’s not my age.  I have always had difficulty handling strings of numbers that are spoken too rapidly.  My definition of “too rapid” are numbers spoken faster than I can write them down.  When I was a pilot and needed to talk to air traffic control or the control tower I always spoke very slowly.  They would respond with headings, altitudes and clearances at the same pace.  If I forgot and rattled off the plane’s number the numbers I got back were way too fast for me to comprehend.  It is the same way with my phone’s voice mail.  People leave a message saying, “Call me” and then rattle off their phone number with such speed I never can get it.  If they wonder why I do not call them it’s because I have a policy.   If I cannot get their number written down after listening to their message four times, I give up.

Obviously I am not like God.   Number one – He never gives up.  Number two – He gets it the first time.  He doesn’t need to listen four times.  Number three – He actually gets it before we even call.  He’s been watching and He knows our need and knows what to do.  Sometimes when we pray we tell God our problem and then we tell Him how to solve our problem.  When we think about that it is rather insulting.  He is God.  He knows.  He doesn’t need us to explain.  Recently I was at a large gathering and the person who prayed told God who we were and where we were and why we were gathered and what we needed from Him.  Instead of talking to Him as an intelligent being we treat Him as if He was some vending machine in the sky.

Written by Roger Bothwell on July 7, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

There is a story in the news about a man who after accidentally throwing away his wife’s ring went to the city dump and crawled through tons of trash and filth to find it.  He found it.  My first inclination was to equate this with God sending Jesus to paw through the filth of sin on planet Earth looking for diamonds.  Obviously my ego saw myself as one of the diamonds.  Sorry about that.  I cannot help the self-love.  It is endemic to our species.   However, on second thought I realized how wrong I was.  This is not a good illustration because it assumes the masses of humanity are trash.  Not so.  Each child, each person is, flawed though we may be, a product of God’s creative love. There is no such thing as human trash.  As much as Jerry Springer and Maury Povich seem to find the worst of humanity to display on television, those people are but victims of ignorance and of our voyeurism.  We look at them and gloat that we are not so vulgar.  See Luke 18:9.

Then there are those horrific moments when we are overwhelmed by our unworthiness and think we are the human trash. That is such a depressing experience.  Lucifer delights in those moments.  He thinks we will just give up and not take what Jesus’ offers.  Do not despair.  Even though your community makes you feel ostracized Jesus never does.  Even though decades can pass and people still look at you as a pariah, Jesus never does. You are the object of His redemptive love because He formed you in His image.  I know it is difficult for us to believe but Jesus still loves His old friend Lucifer.

Written by Roger Bothwell on November 12, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org