Dystopia

We all know “utopia” is an imaginary place where everything is perfect.  “Dystopia” is just the opposite.  It is an imaginary place where everything is dysfunctional like Lucifer’s kingdom. I was tempted to say that this world is dystopia.  If I focus on the world and local news things don’t look very good.  If I listen to the politicians trying to get our votes, things seem horrible. And of course each one is the solution if we believe what they say. But there is another side to our world. There are flowers, warblers, vistas and a whole array of truly beautiful things to capture our attention. This is my Father’s world.

And there is the dilemma.  Is this my Father’s world or is this Dystopia?  It seems that it can be either depending upon our focus.  This is a world filled with suicide bombers and missile-laden drones firing out of the sky like lightning.  The world is filled with good people who daily sacrifice for the benefit of others.  The world is filled with sadistic psychotics. It would be easy to go on listing examples of the dichotomy in which we live.  That would be useless because we know both are here.  Whatever we look for we will find.  There is a plethora of either.

Jesus knew very much of what He spoke when He said, “Seek and you will find.”  The quality of our lives is the fruit of our choices.  If one wishes to live in a dystopia, it’s here.  If one wishes to live in our Father’s world. It too is here.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 5, 2012

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

The Heart of Amos

Amos is called a minor prophet.  He is called that because his book is small.   However, his message is huge and just as appropriate today as it was hundreds of years before Jesus was born.  The heart of his message comes in chapter five.   Speaking for God he wrote, “I hate, I despise your feast days, and I do not savor your sacred assemblies. Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings, I will not accept them, nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings. Take away from Me the noise of your songs, for I will not hear the melody of your stringed instruments.  But let justice run down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Let us not deceive ourselves because of tradition, or habits of behavior, to think that our present way of conducting business is any less offensive to God than it was in Amos’ day.  Society, despite civil rights legislation which should shame Christianity to think we needed secular powers to force us to do the right thing, is still far from perfect.  Our churches still practice discrimination in more than one form.  We should be the leaders and not the tail when it comes to matters of justice and righteousness.

I refrain from mentioning a specific because that would narrow the message to a particular issue.  The call is broader than one issue.  It is about the ability and willingness of God’s people to examine whatever civic or religious group we support and be sure we are not benignly and without thought supporting policies or doctrines that deny a group or a person the right to full participation.  Let justice run down like water and righteousness like a mighty river.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 4, 2010

Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 945474

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Half-truths

I am sitting here looking at a photo of a spokesperson for a hair-care company giving one million dollars worth of PRODUCT to a mission for the homeless in LA.  I am trying not to be cynical about the value of this gift as I think of LA’s homeless being the best groomed people in town.  Perhaps the mission can sell it on Ebay.  Most likely if I knew more details it wouldn’t seem so ludicrous, which is the case with most of the stories we hear.  Often we make snap judgments with very little solid information.  My email fills each day with critical stories about politicians and the like and you know they are prepared by special interest groups preying on the gullible. Facts are often deliberately distorted and half-truths are told to play on our insecurities and fears.

One of the classes I teach each summer is called Research Methods and one of the very first lessons is to ask who paid for the research.  One can find research that will support almost any position.  It all depends who put the numbers together and what is their bias.  Most of us with grey hair can remember when the tobacco industry filled evening television with actors pretending to be doctors as they told us how soothing, relaxing and stress-reducing cigarettes were.  They had all kind of research data to back up their health claims.  One thing we do know is often people do not want the truth.  What they really want is a research study to support what they already believe.

It is the same way with Bible study.  Often instead of looking for truth we instead look for a text to support what we already believe.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 2, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Only One White Hat Needed

I sometimes wish life was as easy to sort out as it is in the old-time westerns when the good guys wore white hats.  I very much doubt there is much of a market for white hats.  Good historians, those dedicated to seeing through our self-created myths, seek to reveal as much actuality as possible.  The more we study the more we come to realize our heroes of the past were just people with good publicists. One of my heroes, Thomas Jefferson, was a spendthrift and a slave holder.  Yet I realize how wrong it is to judge a historical character by today’s ethics.  Unless we know all the details we would be wise to withhold judgment.  Every time and every culture cast their own shade of gray upon human behavior.

It is best to keep our heroes at arms length and not seek too much detail. Many years ago we had a family to our home for Sabbath dinner.  Upon leaving the husband reported to others that I, the pastor, was not the man they thought I was.  I don’t think that was to be understood that I was better than he had thought.  His big mistake was coming to dinner.  Some might say, “You should have been better.”   Sorry about that, but, I think I lost my white hat after about one week in the ministry.

Rarely am I surprised or crushed when I hear something negative about a sterling person.  My concept of him is not lowered because I know all of us are very flawed.  But I might think less of the person who bore the bad tidings.  There has only been one among us worthy of the white hat.  See Hebrew 4:15 for the answer.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 2, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Waiting for My Father

When I was a very little boy, before we moved to the country, we lived in a city row house with just enough room between the house beside us to accommodate a walkway and a small patch of ground.   The patch had no grass. It was perfect for playing marbles.  I don’t really remember the rules of the game but there were three small holes I had dug and it had something to do with using a shooter to knock other marbles into the holes.  The very best part of my day was when my father would come home from school. He would get down on his hands and knees and play marbles with me.  I would smooth the dirt, rub the marbles clean on my pants, sit on the steps of the porch and wait for his car, our car, an old black prewar something.  I don’t know what it was.

How strange it is that so many decades later I am still waiting for my Father.  I have grown up in a church that is waiting.  The entire concept of waiting is embedded in its name. I have watched my friends and family engaged in this waiting process.  We speak of it almost weekly.  It is based upon the promises of Jesus.  I wonder if in some undesigned way the waiting has kept us from truly appreciating the now.   We almost want the world to get worse and worse so Jesus will return and take us to our Father. Catastrophes are almost welcomed.

If I read carefully what Jesus said, I wonder if we have missed the promises that once we make Him the Lord of our lives, the blessings and benefits of citizenship in the Kingdom of the Father are not merely the future but are the now.   See John 5.

Written by Roger Bothwell on June 1, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

He Discerns Our Intents

If you are like me most of the disputes in which we are involved occur because of misunderstandings.  Sometimes we mistakenly misspeak and before we have an opportunity to rectify it, it has been taken negatively by another and we are off to the races.  I can think of some really big disappointments that began with great intentions.  However, because we cannot read minds we allow our feelings to be hurt and our response isn’t very positive. We think we have been slighted when it was the last thing the other person wanted.  Failed attempts at humor are a major source of hurt. As a teacher I am most guilty of this.  I joke with students only to see tears well up in their eyes.  Then I am crushed.

I have always loved Hebrews 4:12.  God “is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”  There is no chance for misunderstandings with God. He knows.   Just as it is impossible for us not to be understood, it is also impossible for us to lie to Him.  We shouldn’t tell Him we love Him when we are genuinely angry at Him.  Well, maybe we should.  Allow me to take that back. We can love someone and simultaneously be angry at them.  Parents and children experience this multiple times and He did instruct us to call him “Father.”

Most of the time I am comforted by the idea that He totally understands me. Often we have feelings that are very difficult to articulate and while it might be useful to do so, we don’t have to. He knows. He knows the intents of our hearts.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 28, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

This Land Is My Land

In 1940 Woody Guthrie was tired of hearing Kate Smith sing “God Bless America”, so he wrote “This Land Is Your Land.”   He recorded it four years later.  It has become one of our more famous folk songs.  But, other than Mr. Guthrie, who said this land is our land?  Was it really Manifest Destiny or “might makes right”? What about the few million people who lived here before Columbus?  The history of the world has always been that of the conquerer and the conquered.  How would we feel if at a Fourth of July concert a citizen of the Mohawk nation walked to the microphone and sang “This Land Is My Land”?

We like the word conquer.  Somehow it isn’t as harsh as “took.”  The children of Israel conquered Canaan.   My very first issue with this came to me in Sabbath School when I was about 12.  How was it that only 40 years prior God told the Israelites killing and stealing was wrong?  Did that only apply among the 12 tribes or was that universal?  How was it that the materials used for the building of the temple were offerings and plunder? I understand they believed God told them to take the “Promised Land” but most every war is fought by two sides who believe God is on their side. Just read the history of our own Civil War.

I am not trying to stir up controversy and don’t seek responses.  I am just thinking about our history as a nation and as a human.  It has been a bloody road to where we are. I am so pleased that Jesus was not the leader of any armed group.  He really was the Prince of Peace.

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 26, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Heaven University

While taking our lab for a snuff tonight, (our old dog went for a sniff, this dog snuffs – really, you should hear her) we were looking at Arcturus and wondered what the beings on its planets call it.  We call our giant ball of burning gas Sun.  I gather that is its name even though we do not capitalize sun.  Since we can see Arcturus it would make sense to believe its planet’s population can see our sun and I wonder what name they have for it.  Perhaps because of Adam and Eve’s transgression they call it “sin” instead of  “sun”.

There is so much to learn.  When I was a teen I thought the idea of eternal life was a nice idea.  Now it is an essential idea.  Part of the problem was when I was eighteen I knew everything.  All you had to do was ask me.  Now I know so little and my curiosity continues to grow.  What Jesus offers isn’t just living forever.  Under certain circumstances that could be awful.  But what He offers is eternal matriculation into Heaven University.  I need a sweatshirt with a big HU embroidered on the front.  I know it might seem like I’m jumping the gun a bit but I already have my acceptance.  Check out John 5:24.  Usually when someone is accepted into a college or university they get the fat envelope with all the forms that need to be filled in.  There are no forms needed for HU.  The Registrar already knows everything about us and when it comes to financial aid, well there is a scholarship that beats all scholarships.  This one comes with housing and all books are included; probably an e-tablet. (See John 14)

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 27, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

The World We Want To See

One of the great wonders of the human mind is the ability to create the world it wants.  We see the things that support our worldview and are blind to the things that do not.  If we see the world as a hostile place our mind will focus on slights and will spin things into a negative.  Paranoia comes on a sliding scale from one to ten.  Some of us are so anxious for this age to come to an end and for the second coming of Jesus to occur we see “Signs of the Times” everywhere.  They are usually negative because that fits an end time worldview.  See Matthew 24.

Then there are those who do not believe the world is any worse off now than it has ever been.  The wars and earthquakes and threats of violence fit into a pattern of history that has been with us for thousands of years. Increased numbers are merely the product of better reporting in an age of instant worldwide news coverage.  For these people the world has always been a dangerous place, so live with it.

There is a third kind of person who, while not being a total Pollyanna, sees the blessings they have and are grateful.  While they recognize bad things do happen, those bad things are far outnumbered by good things.  They minimalize bad things and refuse to let them set the tone for their life. They long for the second coming but are happy to make the best of what is.

There is such a wealth of incidents, good and bad, our minds are intriguingly capable of defining, with an overwhelming amount of evidence, the history and present we desire.  The most difficult educational framework to design for schools is social studies.  Just whose viewpoint will be emphasized in the limited number of pages a history book can contain?

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 27, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Gut-Wrenching Pictures

If you want to feel good about being a human being, don’t read the news today. It features such items as elephants being abused at a very famous circus, a video revealing a woman who died on the floor of a hospital while employees did nothing but watch and walk past her for thirty minutes. And there are more gruesome pictures from Abu Ghraib prison showing stomach revolting scenes of prisoner abuse.

The disturbing question is, “Are these exceptions?”  Most psychologists would tell us they are not.  Instead they become the rule when we humans are given absolute power over others.  Something happens to that nice kid next door when given free reign.  Worse something happens to us when we are given free reign over others.  It doesn’t happen overnight.   It takes time for us to shed our veneer of civilization and get to the core of our selfish being. But given the right circumstance each of us has incredible potential for evil.

I’m most uncomfortable even mentioning it.  It is so much nicer to think of ourselves as gentle, generous, self-sacrificing creatures.   It is true there are some among us who really are that way.  However, there are not as many as we would love to think.  All this brings me to why in the whole universe does God care about us?  In Ephesians 2 Paul wrote, “It’s a wonder God didn’t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he embraced us.”* The next time you are tempted to think God saves you because you are so good, forget it.  We are saved purely by grace.

*The Message Paraphrase by Eugene Petersen

Written by Roger Bothwell on May 27, 2009

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

Rogerbothwell.org