Author: Ian Bothwell

I am so depressed.  I just watched the 6:30 evening network news.  It wasn’t just the news about Ukraine or the terrorists in Nigeria trying to turn the clock back to 1500 AD.  That was bad enough.  But there was the addition of an endless amount of commercials for drugs for disorders I have never even heard of.  Drug companies must sit around inventing new afflictions so they can sell medications not only for real ills but for fantasy ills.  Knowing how suggestible people can be they know there is always a percentage of the population that will say, “Hey, that’s me. I need to tell my doctor I need that pill.”

I have figured out why we like to talk about the good old days, which were not.  We were just uniformed.  We didn’t know about all the horror around the world.  But now we have network news on TV.  Night after night there are reports from some part of the world with the day’s worst stories.  Maybe I need one of those advertised pills for depression. I didn’t need one until I watched our planet’s worst.  That must be the drug company’s marketing strategy.

Whatever happened to the good news? Unemployment continues to drop.  Then there is the really good news.  I mean Good News.  We have a great report.  Jesus is alive and well.  He loves us.  He is preparing a place for us.  While we by ourselves can never be worthy, He is worthy.   He is anxious to have as many as possible take advantage of what He did for us.  Just accept the Gift and it is ours.  There, now I am not so depressed.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 9, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I have a new definition of futility.  This morning I watched a hummingbird trying to get nectar from fake flowers my wife has on the porch.  If it isn’t real there isn’t anything worthwhile.  Many years ago I heard an entire sermon telling us not to worship idols because it makes God mad.  He never addressed the issue as to why it made God mad.

God is our father. Like any good parent He wants the best for His children.  He is frustrated when He sees us wasting our time and other resources on foolishness.  Jeremiah said it so well in chapter 10.  “Someone cuts down a tree from the forest; it is worked by the hands of a craftsman with a chisel.  He decorates it with silver and gold.  It is fastened with hammer and nails, so it won’t totter.  Like scarecrows in a cucumber patch, their idols cannot speak. They must be carried because they cannot walk. Do not fear them for they can do no harm and they cannot do any good.”

Don’t go to an empty well for water.  Don’t go to a harvested field for a crop. It is all worthless.  If the Bible tells us something makes God angry we must always ask why.  Otherwise we make Him out to be a selfish being whose feelings have been hurt.  There is no self in God.  We cannot hurt His feelings.  But we can fill Him with frustration when He offers us the best and instead we settle for some pretty trinket or fake and end up without anything of value.

My poor hummingbird was wasting its time and energy.  Those fake flowers were pretty but that’s all they had to offer.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 8, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

It was a glorious day in New England.  I took a book and sat outside.  It was perfect except I was continually interrupted by birds.  A steady stream of finches, sparrows, catbirds, robins and warblers kept interfering with my reading.  Those were nice interruptions compared to what followed.  Shadows passed over the pages of my book.  Looking up I saw two huge vultures circling over me.  Really?  I’m flattered that I looked appetizing but not today.   No, not yet.  I am still in the oven.  God isn’t done with me.  I still have grandchildren’s graduations and weddings to attend.  Not that I am not already a great grandfather, but I would like to be a great-grandfather.

Actually God is never done with us.  We are like a house whose owner keeps making improvements. It gets grander as the years go by.  While we might fall asleep until resurrection morning the improvements will continue from the moment we wake until forever. There are new skills to learn, new talents to develop, new fields of expertise to master and more improvement to our characters. I have a friend who like me is totally musically inept. He contends he will masterfully play the piano his first day in heaven.  I think he is so very wrong.  Life is about growing.  The journey is usually more exciting than the destination.  If we just popped onto the Great Wall of China without making the journey think of all the things we would miss along the way.

But for now I have a message for the vultures.  “Not yet.  Try me again in about twenty years.  You can have the body because I am getting a new one.”

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 7, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Hummingbirds arrived at our house today.  We did not yet have a feeder in place on the breakfast room window but the hummingbirds came to the very place at the window where the feeder had been last year.   I continue to be amazed.  They are looking good.  I should think they would be tattered and ratty looking after their journey of thousands of miles.  I wonder where they spent the winter.  They were smart to leave this year.  Did they cross the Caribbean and lounge about on a Costa Rican beach while we shoveled snow?

Humans seem to be superior animals but we don’t have all the gifts.  I could never make that trip without a jet plane.  It would be a challenge for me to find the same house and go to the same spot on the same window.  My dog with ear flaps that cover her ears can hear the mailman coming several houses away while I hear nothing.  Bees can go back to the hive and via a sophisticated dance tell the other bees where to find flowers.  I should not be so very smug about being human.

William Bryant said it so well in “To a Waterfowl.”

There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,–
The desert and illimitable air,–
Lone wandering, but not lost.

He, who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

In Matthew 6 Jesus said, “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 6, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

It’s May and time to work on final exams.  Writing exams is a challenge.  You can spend a little time writing the test but those kind usually take a lot of time to grade. If you spend a lot of time preparing the exam, grading can be swift and efficient. Exams have to be fair.  It is easy to fill them with obscure things you said during the semester.   The challenge is to find the essential details of a class that hopefully you were sure to have emphasized.   I have heard profs say, “I taught it but they just didn’t get it.”   My response is, “If they didn’t get it, you didn’t teach it.”   Teaching isn’t merely mentioning something.  Teaching is making ideas understandable and memorable.

Sometimes I am frustrated with sermons most of us can’t understand.  Now I understand that I am not the brightest guy on the block but neither am I the slowest.  I’m quite average and I figure if I can’t get it most of the congregation didn’t get it.  I am frustrated because the Gospel is NOT complicated.  It is true, as Peter said, some of the things Paul said were difficult to grasp; however, the basics are graspable by children. Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.  It doesn’t take a Ph.D. in systematic theology to get that.

There is a final exam for all of us regarding salvation. The questions are not secret.  Number one – Do you love Jesus?  Number two – Did you ask for forgiveness? Number one is natural if you said “yes” to number two.  It seems like a no-brainer.  I have a couple of students in my classes who are poor test-takers.  I know they know the material but they seem to have a brain freeze when I give them an exam.  So I take them aside and ask them to tell me the answers and they can.  Jesus is like that.  He is so anxious for all of us to pass He will do anything even it is reading our minds.  He knows our hearts.   By the way, this is a pass/fail exam.   There are no grades.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 1, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

In 2011 the United States military spent 300 million dollars on camouflage uniforms.  It costs a lot to blend in so no one will notice you.  Adolescents tell their parents they want to be different; however, the irony is at the very same time they want the same jeans and the same shoes as their peers – so they can blend in.  The cost of blending in comes in other forms than cash.  Often one has to pretend to be someone they are not at the expense of knowing what is right and doing the wrong.  Perhaps I am being overly harsh on adolescents because adults are not innocent of such activity.  Often I have sat in committees that required a vote only to watch people hesitate to put up their hands until they see which way the majority is going.  Then they quickly join in, acting as if their vote was their true decision, thus the value of secret ballots.

It isn’t just teens who want to be liked by those around them.  Some people spend miserable lives wondering what others think of them.  They have more than one camouflage outfit.  They have one to wear to church and another to wear to work and yet another to wear to parties. Peter tried to play this game the night Jesus was crucified.  He even added curses to his denial of Jesus.  Surely that would be cover enough.  Unfortunately for him Jesus heard him. The rooster crowed and they looked at each other.  Peter was crushed to think that he had fallen so low.

If you really want to be camouflaged dress up in good works and unselfish care for others.  You will blend right in with Jesus.  People might not know the difference.

Written by Roger Bothwell on April 15, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I have been going to the same credit union for over twenty years and I am still treated like a stranger each time I go in.  Perhaps it is because there is never the same teller.  They must pay horrible wages because their turnover is incredible. I would change to a bank if I thought it would be any different.  We live in a rapid pace world where relationships, if there is one, are fleeting. It is rarely worth one’s time to become friends with someone because next month they will be moving away.  Even our children eventually grow up and move away.

Johnny Cash sang a song titled Hurt.  Some of the lyrics are “My sweetest friend, everyone I know goes away in the end.”  My dad spent his last years alone with his old boxer dog.  How precious are the days when we are with loved ones.  We must cherish them and make sure we don’t argue (no one can fight like a family) when we are with them.  Sure I know that sometimes Aunt Mary can be a crank or Cousin Sal can be a jerk, but just because they are that way doesn’t mean we have to be as they are.

Heaven isn’t about streets of gold.  (Gold is cold.)  It is all about family.  It is being with grandma and grandpa and having them in their prime.  Heaven is about not being a stranger anymore.  In John Jesus calls us His friends.  It is one of the warmest things He could have ever said to us.  It is about changing the lyrics to Hurt.  “My sweetest friend, everyone I know stays forever.” I like that.  A lot.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 2, 2014

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

As I drove past a pizza place this afternoon I saw a sign that said, “Boston Strong.”  There is a lot of that around here since the marathon bombing. What was interesting was underneath was another sign that said, “Help Wanted.”  So, much for being strong.

But wait.  If I look past the irony of the sign there is much truth here.  Really strong people who know they are strong are not threatened nor are they hesitant to ask for help.  Strong people aren’t afraid to say, “I don’t know” as opposed to some people who stutter around trying to come up with something so they don’t look stupid or uniformed.  The best answer is, “I’ll see if I can find out for you.”  Strong people can stand back and let others shine without having to interrupt to tell “their” story.  There will be another day to tell “their” story.

Jesus had much to say about this. His parable in Luke 14 is just one example. “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor . . .  take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all the other guests.”

If we are called to be of service to others, and we are, than one of our responsibilities is to make others look good and shine.  I am preaching here to myself because I have a bad tendency to want to jump in with one of my stories.  But if we gently bite our tongues we will do so much better.  We can be strong.  Jesus Strong.

Written by Roger Bothwell on April 29, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

True value and real riches are not what appear on a balance sheet.  I don’t want to devalue the luxury of having one’s bills paid.  But we can only wear one pair of shoes at a time and one shirt and one pair of pants.  (Well, I guess you can wear more at one time but why?)  Real wealth is all about people. Having friends who call you when you are not feeling well, having people who need us, having family surround the dining table on special occasions is what life is about.  After eating someone often says, “Let’s go to a more comfortable place to sit.”  But, that cannot be.  There is no more comfortable place than that table where you can interact face to face.  To get up breaks the spell.

In the Old Testament God is a fearsome warrior who fought for His people.  In the New Testament Jesus tells to us we should pray to Our Father.  Jesus talks about being our friend.  Paul speaks of us becoming sons and daughters of God.  As the centuries rolled on God continued to reveal Himself to us and each picture was clearer than before.  The clearer the picture the more exciting.

I can understand why it is difficult for some people to believe in God.  The universe is so vastly endlessly filled with literally zillions of suns.  The very idea of a God who controls all of that and who at the same time wants to be our personal friend is truly outrageous and preposterous.  It seems as if we would believe that we could be accused of being the ultimate egoists. Go ahead call us names.  That’s okay.  Because with a friend like Jesus we are really really rich.

Written by Roger Bothwell on April 26, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I used to sit in church in Africa and wonder how many people could sit on a pew.  I finally decided the answer was “One more.”  It filled me with awe.  I would be sure a pew was full and then someone else would come and somehow he fit.   The need for personal space seems to be cultural.  I’m sure it has something to do with an entire family living in one or two rooms as opposed to most of us growing up with our own room.

Have you ever had someone keep invading your personal space when talking to you?  They press in and we keep backing up, but to no avail.  They just keep coming.  And it is doubly bad if they had garlic for dinner.  Now I say this in contrast to my wanting to be really close to the people I love.  The closer the better.

Most cars today have bucket seats, which are nice, but the best time was when the front seat was a bench. It was always so wonderful when your sweetheart slid over into the middle instead of hugging the door.  Love overrules our normal personal space need.

It reminds me of a hymn I grew up singing.  “I am Thine, O Lord, I have heard Thy voice, and it told Thy love to me; but I long to rise in the arms of faith and be closer drawn to Thee.”  We are told that John pressed in close to Jesus at the last supper.  Some might say it was because he was politically ambitious but I think it was so much more than that.  John was a teenager and Jesus was his idol, his role model, his messiah and John couldn’t get close enough.

Written by Roger Bothwell on April 24, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org