Author: Ian Bothwell

This afternoon at the deli section of our supermarket we ordered some sliced cheese.  Carefully the man put on his gloves to protect us from germs.  The problem was as he was carrying the cheese to the scale he coughed on the new slices.  When I pointed it out to him he acted genuinely surprised.  The question is was he surprised that I pointed it out or surprised that he had unconsciously coughed.  Obviously we did not buy it.

As we walked away I wondered how often we unconsciously sin. I think we would be horrified if we knew.  It is in our nature.  It comes as easily to us as breathing.  Lest at this point you become fearful, thinking if this is true then you are lost. Allow me to reassure you that while God wants us to be perfect, He is very aware that we are not.  Therefore, we are covered with grace.  Ah ha someone will say.  You are using grace to excuse sin.  No, not at all.  Continued deliberate sinning with no effort to do better is abusing God’s love.  Thus we negate our salvation.  But should we want from the depths of our hearts to do better and just not do so does not negate His gift to us.  What we are talking about here is a relationship of love and understanding.  While every parent wants their child to walk without falling that parent does not throw the toddler out of the family because they stumbled.

Jesus said, “If we as humans know how to give good gifts to our children how much more does our heavenly Father.”   We are not better parents than God.  He’s the best.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 27, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Today the Christmas music on the radio sounds wonderful.  Forty-eight hours from now it will not be nearly as pretty or satisfying.  The human mind fascinates me because the music will be the same.  It is our minds that are in a different place.  On Christmas Eve, a humble looking man stood outside the door of our grocery store.  He held no sign.  He held no can.  But people consistently gave him money as they departed.  If he stands there two days from now people will most likely call the police.  So what will have changed?  The sun will be the same.  The air we breathe will be the same.  But something will be different. It is our minds that will have changed.

Psychologists, politicians and preachers would love to understand the workings of the mind.  Unfortunately con men seem to be best at this art. Perhaps there isn’t much difference between any of the four I just listed. Politicians promise us a host of good things that rarely materialize. Preachers often manipulate emotions with scare tactics and soft organ music. The problem with that is the effect is short lived.  The next morning people are back to normal wondering what happened to them the day before.  Surely the best way to influence someone is to inspire them instead of frightening them.  While it is true God will accept people whatever the motive (He’s that anxious to save people.) it seems the best way is to instill in them God’s love and care for them.  After all, the Bible says, “For God so loved the world.”   Love is what God is.   You don’t have to be afraid of someone who loves you.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 25, 2008

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

 

Identity theft isn’t new.  According to Romans 8:16 we are God’s children and co-heirs with Christ to the treasures of God’s Kingdom.   Since Eden Satan has been extraordinarily active in pursuit of God’s children.  He hates the fact that we are going to inherit something he used to have and stupidly threw away.   He wants us to be as miserable as he.  He is more than a Grinch.   He makes the Grinch look angelic.  This person is evil through and through.  Stealing your identity as a child of God is one of the few joys he has.

I love being a child of God.  It comes with a host of benefits.  We are reborn with a silver spoon in our mouths.  The wisdom of the universe becomes available without a library card.  Health care, including psychiatric care, is available with no co-pay.  Fear for the future dissipates as we grow to realize our Father is in control.  Guilt over our mistakes and overt misbehavior is lavishly washed away.  The stars are no longer decorations of the night but future travel locations.  We will hobnob with Biblical greats, galactic ambassadors, intellectual giants, and creatures beautiful and witty.  I realize at this point I sound like a promoter for Star Trek but far from it.  There are no Klingons on the other side of a neutral zone.  There is no neutral zone.  All will be ours as children of the King.

Our identity as part of heaven’s royalty is our most prized possession.  Don’t leave home without it.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 24, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

I really like Nestles Butterfinger candy bars.  However, I cannot seem to get the hang of eating one without making a mess.  Little pieces of the chocolate shell and also the nougat inside end up either on the outside of me or on the floor.  The cleanup process almost counters the enjoyment of the eating.  As I hold one in my hand I weigh the pleasure verses the cost.

It is pretty much the same consideration one must make before committing a sin.  Sinning makes a mess.  It ruins or at least complicates relationships or our health.  Before committing a sin one surely would want to decide if the momentary pleasure is worth the lifelong complications.  God knows these things.  That’s why He has told us that certain things are sin.  He wants us to be happy and He knows the complications that follow certain behaviors.  It’s not that God wants to deprive us of pleasure.  The issue is quite to the contrary.  He wants to prolong our pleasure for many years to come instead of watching us spoil those years with a few minutes of destructive behavior.

The wages of sin mentioned in Romans 6:23 are just that.  The consequences of sin are not God punishing us for certain things.  The wages are the natural fruit of certain behaviors.  It is a sin to put leaded gas in a modern car not because the manufacturer will find us and fine us.  It is a sin because it will ruin modern computer refined engines and catalytic converters.  It is just that simple.  God will not add up the number of times we smoked and subtract a month for each pack.  The cigarettes themselves will do that without God’s interference.

This is not rocket science.  It is just plain common sense.  Listen to Him.  He knows.

Written by Roger Bothwell on July 17, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Each morning last week I was given mega doses of steroids.  The hoped for results have been stunning and we are pleased.   However, there has been one side-effect.  I can’t taste anything.  I even went to Taco Bell this afternoon to get something super spicy just so I could taste something.  Cold doesn’t register and I also need to be careful of hot things.  As I sat there eating my cardboard tasting bean burrito I realized how we can lose our taste for things.   Our diets, physical and mental, very much shape our desires.  I grew up putting salt on watermelons and cantaloupes.  To this day I need to put salt on them to find them really good.  Some of my friends who grew up without salt on their melons think salt on melons tastes horrible.  It is like liking or not liking olives.

There is a television station that only plays reruns of sitcoms from thirty or so years ago.  I do so enjoy them.  They are pleasant without the violence and smut.  As for most of the (excuse my expressions here) really stupid and usual vulgar reality shows, I just have no appetite for them.  But obviously someone does or they wouldn’t be produced.

Once again I fear insulting your intelligence by mentioning this applies to our reading materials, our music, our styles of worship and our devotional habits.  If one wants to get to really know Jesus one must read what He said,  about what He did, what He promises to do for us and what He does for us right now.  Time spent will whet one’s appetite for more.   Appetites can be changed.  It just takes a bit of effort.

Written by Roger Bothwell on July 22, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

I learned this week that if one’s infection fighting cells are extremely low one’s body automatically produces a fever without there being an infection.  This protective measure aids in warding off any exposure to infectious germs while the infectious fighting cells are limited in their ability to protect us.  It’s a magnificent backup system.  We are wonderfully designed and made.  It is no wonder after God made Adam He said, “That is very good.”  It was and despite the effects of sin it is still very good.

Over and over again we hear evolutionists ridicule creationists, as if we are naïve hicks from the 14th century.  Really?  Can they explain just this one backup system developing from a process of tiny changes?  They speak of our needing a ridiculous amount of faith to believe in a designer.  However, that is only one leap of faith for us.  In order for humans to be as sophisticated as we are happening in tiny steps one needs a billion or more leaps of faith.  Maybe they are more religious than they know.   Perhaps we are the ones with little faith?

We have been treated with pictures of earth taken from Saturn by our Cassini spacecraft.  This amazingly beautiful blue dot against the backdrop of deep space is awesome.  It sounds totally egocentric to think that we are special.  However, we are.  This blue orb is the focus of the intelligent universe for it is here that God sent His only Son to make right our wrongs.  It is here where the universe saw the depths of horror to which men would go when they beat and tortured to death the Creator of all things. See Hebrews 1.

Written by Roger Bothwell on July 24, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

In the beginning of September, October and November I received very high doses of steroids to compact a white cell blood count that stubbornly stayed above 135,000.    5 to 10 thousand is normal.   Several kinds of chemo would not work.  Some of the chemo treatments seemed as benign as drinking water.  Others made me quite ill without any positive effect.  However, the steroids were successful beyond our hopes and my white count plunged to normal and has stayed that way with one noticeable side effect.  Each of my ten fingernails has three lined indentations corresponding to the dates of the steroid treatments.  The indentations are all spaced the same. It is like rings on a tree recording historical events.

Psychologists tell us our brains record almost everything that happens to us.  Not remembering isn’t because memories are not there.  We merely can’t retrieve them.  Our problem isn’t memory.  It is recall.  If psychologists are correct then we are affected and changed each day by our mental intake.   At the close of each day we are either a better person or a lesser person.  If we were voting on this I am sure we all would vote to end each day being a better person.

Many things that happen to us are the result of circumstances beyond our control.  Today I got caught in a massive traffic jam.  All I could do was sit and wait.  However, there are things that are under our control.  Our reading, our use of media, our interactions with family, friends and colleagues are just some of the things we can control.  If we consciously use them to better ourselves and others we can finish each day being a better person.  Check out Philippians 4:8.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 20, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Snow blowing is quite fun.  Shooting snow several feet into the air creates a beautiful sight.  However, you can’t do it without getting it on you.  Either going out the driveway or coming in, one way or the other the wind will catch you and turn you into Frosty the snowman.  It is much like slinging mud on another’s reputation. We deliciously tell a tale about someone but in the telling we ourselves have lost stature.  “A gossip betrays a confidence, but a trustworthy person keeps a secret.”  Proverbs 11:13

Granted it is difficult to keep a juicy bit of information secret.  Like small children we want to walk around saying, “I know a secret.  I know a secret.”  But really there are some things better left unsaid, both for you and for the other.   I grow nervous in church when before someone prays they ask for prayer requests.  Sometimes, and I don’t think for some it is innocent; some will use the occasion to spread a story while pretending to cloak it with Christian care.  It usually goes something like this.  “Please pray for my husband’s brother who was arrested this week for beating his wife.”   Ouch.   We didn’t need to know that.  God knows all about it.  We don’t have to inform Him in the presence of anyone.

Now that I am as old as I am, often I am tempted to write a book about being a pastor.  I could fill it with wonderful stories of care and miscare and trust and betrayed trust.  I would give the characters fake names but people are smart.  They could figure out who I was writing about.  So the book will go unwritten as it should.  Just as God blots out such things so should we.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 19, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

Today was paper grading day.  Every job has its bad aspect and this is the part of teaching I totally dislike.  Making judgment calls on essays can be so subjective even when using a rubric.  What is the difference between a B+ and an A-?  I don’t really know.  While plowing my way through the essays it occurred to me that if we had to take an exam to receive eternal life we would be in big trouble.  Eternity requires perfection.  You have to ace life every day.  A 99% just one day and it’s all over.

In Romans 5:12 Paul wrote, “. . . through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, . . .”   So we are lost not only because we didn’t get a perfect score but because Adam didn’t get a perfect score.  At first this might strike us as being very unfair.  However, one thing we can always count on is God is very fair.  Therefore, Paul goes on to say in verse 15, “For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!”

Jesus did it.  He was perfect.  He gives His perfection to us.  It is His gift to us.  By grace we become citizens of His kingdom and members of His family.  One thing we can never say is God isn’t fair.  He is faithful and just.  This is an incredible thing beyond what someone could invent.  It is not a cleverly designed fable.  This is the core truth of eternity.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 18, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

I first saw The Sorcerer’s Apprentice when I was a little boy.  It is part of Disney’s film “Fantasia.”   Mickey Mouse is the protagonist.   He is the apprentice whose master has gone away leaving Mickey to carry water from the well.  It is hard work and with no one watching the apprentice casts a spell on a broom so that it will carry the water.  But soon it goes awry.  The brooms multiply until Mickey is almost drowning in the water being carried in.  He lost control.

Many years passed before I first read Ephesians 5:1 – “Be imitators of God.”  Paul is speaking of imitating God’s character but I wanted to imitate His power. I wanted to be like Elijah, Elisha, Peter or John.  I wanted to say, “Rise and walk.”   And I could not understand why God would not allow me to help people.  It was then as an adult I once again watched The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and then I understood.

I would misuse it.  I would use it for self.  I would abuse it and like Mickey abusing his master’s power; soon it would destroy me and those around me.  It is not a matter of God not wanting to share.  It is His wisdom that knows better.  In Ephesians 4:13 Paul speaks of our attaining a whole measure of the fullness of Christ.  It sounds wonderful.  It makes me hungry.   I once heard a preacher say he like Elisha wanted a double portion.  Frankly, I would be happy with 50%.   Fortunately we are the children of a very wise Father who is vigilant and diligent in His gift giving.  We don’t give a Ferrari to someone too immature to have a driver’s license.

Written by Roger Bothwell on December 17, 2013

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

Rogerbothwell.org