Category: devotional

Ecclesiastes 1:18 says, “In much wisdom is much grief, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.”   This is part of Solomon’s dissertation on the futility of life.  The more we know about the world the more we learn of man’s inhumanity to man.  The more we know about ourselves the more knowledgeable we become of our defects and natural depravity.  If one is speaking of the end result of much education and study then Solomon is absolutely right.   With knowledge comes despair because injustice and pain just keep on going.

However, it is imperative to say Solomon is not completely right and had he known Jesus he surely would have added an exception.  To know Jesus is to know what God is really like.  To know Jesus is to know there is hope for a better tomorrow.  Not all tomorrows will be like all our yesterdays. The sun will not always come up and go down with the same wearisome effects. To know Jesus is to know that character growth and godliness contribute to a better eternity with God and it is not merely something that will decay in the ground with those who never bothered to better themselves.

Had Solomon known Jesus he most likely would have amended Ecclesiastes 1:18 to read something like this.  “In most wisdom there is much grief, and he who increases worldly knowledge will increase sorrow.  But he who learns much about Jesus will grow in wisdom and joy.”

Jesus was a game changer. He took the human experience and turned it from futility to purpose.  Jesus showed us that life is full of pain but only for now because a richer, better, fuller future awaits those who grow in Him.

Written by Roger Bothwell on March 4, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

The Chilean earthquake, the seventh largest on record at 8.8, has shifted the axis of the earth.  It is estimated by geologists that our days may now be 1.26 microseconds shorter.  This is much like a figure skater tightly hugging herself and thus spinning faster, so it is with our earth.  If this were maintained for almost a million days we will have lost a second, which means we would live longer.

Considering the loss of life and the tininess of the time loss, it is a tragic way to calculate time.  Actually, biologically we will not live longer, it is merely a time calculation, like losing an hour when we change to daylight saving time.    There are some real ways to live longer, such as eating right, exercising, resting, etc.  We can add ten years or so to our lives by following the rules of good health.   Then again there is the biggie.  We can add decades, centuries, and millenniums to our lives.  We can live forever.  How’s that for living longer?

Of course I am referring to allowing Jesus to be the Lord of our lives. Plus, it is not merely the addition of breathing time.  We are speaking of maximum quality.  The gift of quantity without quality would actually be hell instead of heaven.  Fortunately, He loves us and He wouldn’t think of giving us the quantity without the quality.  I have known many people who wanted the quantity of life here to be shortened.  Circumstances can compound into such a low quality of existence it is horrible to go on.  That is exactly what Jesus wants to save us from.   When Jesus talks about life He is talking about the abundant life.   See John 10:10.

Written by Roger Bothwell on March 3, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

While literally sandbagging the basement door of my home last week to stop a minor flood I got to wondering about the meaning of the expression “to sandbag someone.”   I discovered the following, “To downplay or misrepresent one’s ability in order to deceive someone.”   I rarely talk about Satan because I don’t want to give him any publicity but this is exactly what he does to us.  He downplays his abilities or even that he exists so he can deceive us more easily.   I have friends who don’t even believe he is real. They think he is just a personification of human depravity.  He sandbags us.

The Bible is very clear that he is very real and he hates us because we have the opportunity to receive what he had and stupidly threw away.  Since he has been around for a long time he has had almost endless opportunities to study human nature. While he cannot read our minds he knows people so well he can with great precision guess what we are thinking and what it will take to get us to fall into sin.  We are no match.

Now comes the good part.  He is a defeated foe.  Jesus came, took him on, and beat him.   The first part of Hebrews assures us Jesus was without sin. Jesus promises to be with us always.  See the end of Matthew.  Peter assures us we do not have to depend on ourselves we can tap into divine power.  See II Peter 1.   Paul says it so well in Romans 8, “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers . . . shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Written by Roger Bothwell on March 2, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Situations are created by a multitude of little things.  Often it is difficult to explain why something happened without a long dissertation of things that are almost inconsequential but are indeed not inconsequential.

It snowed.  Okay.  No big deal.  It snows in New England.  We expect it and want it.  It got warm.  We like that.  Some of the snow melted.  It got cold.  It always gets cold here in February.  The melted snow turned to ice. It snowed on top of the ice.  It got a bit warm and a huge storm came through that rained instead of snowed.  See.  This is tedious. But it set up a minor disaster.  The ice with the snow on top created a dam that would not let the water run off the patio and thus created a lake that could only run into the basement under the door.  Horrors.  Time for sandbags – free from city emergency services.   I realize this was a boring paragraph.  But that’s my point.  Small things create situations.

It’s like that with lies.  A tiny exaggeration here and there is no big deal.  Or is it?  Once a foundation is laid for a scenario it often becomes necessary to continue to embellish so the original story continues to make sense.  Neighbors fight with neighbors often over something very small that compounded into someone shooting someone.

One of life’s great lessons is watch the little stuff because little stuff has a tendency to become big stuff.  Tell the truth.  Say I’m sorry. Be quick to give more than you think is fair because what you think is fair usually is smaller than what others think is fair.

Basically do what Jesus told us to do.  Go the second mile. (It’s the second mile in our heads.  It’s the first foot for the person we offended.)  See Matthew 5:41

Written by Roger Bothwell on March 1, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

In 1945 the Japanese had been fighting American soldiers for over three years.  They were convinced that they could not lose the war because their gods had made them superior.  They were a chosen people.  Americans were a mongrel people who were not racially pure.  It was unbelievable that their warriors were losing island after island.  When Americans reached Okinawa it became evident that heaven had deserted them.  In despair thirty thousand military and civilian personal hurled themselves to their deaths from the top of an Okinawaian cliff.  They could not endure the shame.

There is something deep inside the human psyche that makes us want to believe we are God’s favorites.  Young people knock on my door and tell me they are God’s elect and my baptism is of no value unless I am rebaptised by one of them.  Group after group, denomination after denomination, nation after nation believe they are the chosen ones. It is not an idea foreign to my childhood.  I even learned memory verses from Scripture to support this deep basic human hunger.

Could it be that God is not and has never been impressed by groups and organizations?  Could it be that God is instead searching for humble individuals who deem themselves unworthy and come to Him as one willing to be used in any way God needs to further His kingdom?   There is a very interesting verse in Revelation 7.  John wrote, “After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindred, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, . . .”  It seems to be about people and not about groups.

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 15, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

It’s amazing what a dog will do for a treat.  When I ask our lab to shake, as she picks up her paw she cocks her head and gives me a crazy look as if to say, “Look, this is really stupid.  It serves no real function other than to make you happy, so here. Now where’s my treat?”   Actually it has gotten even worse.  When she wants a treat she taps me with her nose, sits down and picks up her paw.  I think the psychologist Skinner would say I am the one who has been conditioned.

I am so thankful God does not ask me to do mindless things that I might receive blessings.  There is no eleventh commandment that says, “Shake.”  God is so practical.  Each commandment comes with a blessing not as a care package from heaven but as a result of doing something very useful.  For example the first command says not to worship idols.  Of course that would be stupid because a piece of stone or wood can’t interact with us.  The fourth commandment tells us to rest every seventh-day.  If God didn’t command that most of us would work seven days a week and burn out at 35 or 40.   If I honor my parents, my children will see me do this and they will then treat me the way I treated grandma and grandpa.

Everything God asks of us is sensible, practical and leads to the abundant life Jesus promises to us.  Even the Old Testament food requirements in Leviticus were there to keep the children of Israel healthy and well.  What a wonderful God.  He doesn’t need His ego to be massaged by our behavior.  He just wants us to be happy, safe and well.

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 16, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

Frogs are fascinating creatures.  They come equipped with an amazingly accurate tongue that can snag all manner of flying food.  However, there is a problem.  If there is no flying food they will starve to death.  We can put all kinds of nutritious morsels in front of them but if it isn’t moving they will not eat it.  In an age of constant media saturation with flashing lights, stirring sounds, blazing pictures and the best media producers in the world filling our senses, I wonder if a Bible sitting quietly on our bedside table can catch our attention.  I wonder if we have become frogs when it comes to our spiritual diet.

It is difficult for John, a Galilean fisherman, with little education to compete with 21st century media.  Mark Zuckerberg, the developer of Facebook, is the world’s youngest billionaire because corporations pay him very large amounts of money to advertise on Facebook.   Corporate executives know where our eyes are and pay a lot to catch our attention. So just how would Matthew, a first century tax collector, get us to notice what he wrote?  If it were not for one very important advantage that Matthew and John have, it would be a lost cause.  Their writing would fade into the abyss of historical writing.  However, their advantage is something no media expert could ever seek to match.  It is called the Holy Spirit.

The very same Spirit that moved Matthew and John to write their incredible accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry moves upon our hearts twenty centuries later.  When we see our Bibles and feel a tug to open and read, that isn’t just idle curiosity or guilt, it is the Holy Spirit Himself wooing us.   We must not ignore it.

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 25, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

The first time I ever drove a hybrid car I sat behind the wheel trying to start the engine.  I pressed almost every button I could find thinking something was wrong.  Finally, I put my foot on the pedal and the car moved. What a surprise!   It was great fun coming to a stop at a traffic signal and hearing nothing.  I was sure the car had stalled.  I learned.  I am not surprised to see more and more hybrids on the road.

2 Peter 1 fascinates me.  Peter talks about our being hybrids.  He tells us we can, right now, become partakers of divine nature.  We don’t have to be “only human.”  Peter must have realized how incredible this sounded.  It is surreal and difficult for us materialists to grasp.  God wants to live in us.  He wants to share His power with us.  He wants us to live above our fallen human natures.  He wants us to share and taste the future.  I am not surprised Peter referred to this as an exceedingly great and precious promise.  It was unlike anything people had heard before.

So what does it mean?  Basically, we have no excuse for failure.  So often we excuse our lapses by saying, “Well, I’m only human.”   Hey, that doesn’t have to be. There will be no Freudian blaming our forefathers for our phylogenetically inherited endowments.  Even though we were not born with a blank slate for a mind, even though we are born preprogrammed, this promise means we do not have to be slaves to our inheritance.  While we cannot overcome by ourselves the truth is we are no longer on our own.  We can, right now, be supplied with external power.

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 25, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

One of the problems with teaching my Human Development classes is I start seeing things in people around me.  For example, one of my lectures is on Freud’s stages of development.  He maintained if one does not satisfy each stage as we grow, we develop a fixation that remains with us for life.  Now, I have this student who is always chewing gum.  I mean always.  I think she must sleep with it.  Therefore, I conclude she has an oral fixation because she never successfully completed her first stage of development, her oral stage.

I now conclude that I have a Jesus fixation. I can never get enough. I read about Him.  I read what He said.  I read what others write about Him.  I think about His interactions with people.  I think about His sacrifice.  I think about what the Book of Hebrews has to say about where He is now and what He is doing.  Just as my student is not satisfied neither am I satisfied.  I want more.

There is an irony in this because Jesus once said, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.”  I know what He is saying.  He is the most satisfying philosopher I have ever read.  He supplies me with assurance for eternity. And yet, I am still hungry for more.  Not hungry for something else.  I am hungry for more of Him.  I want a deeper experience.  I want to understand more about what motivated Him to come here.  I want to know why He loves you and me so much.

I have a Jesus fixation.

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 24, 2010

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

Rogerbothwell.org

 

You should not see my car right now.  It is supposed to be shiny maroon but instead it is a dull gray. There are no shiny spots because all is crusted with winter salt. When I sit in it I think I can actually hear the salt eating away at the chassis and body.  It’s ten years old and still does not show any rust.  I wonder how much longer I will be so fortunate.  Perhaps I am the recipient of a two and a half thousand year old promise.  “I will prevent pests (rust) from devouring your crops (car), and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit,” says the LORD Almighty.”  Malachi 3:11

I would like to think so. In Malachi 3 God promises to pour blessings out of the windows of heaven on us if we are faithful.  Someone might easily say it has nothing to do with that.  The reason is it is a well-made car.  There seems to always be a way to take credit away from God.  Perhaps God wants it that way.  It would be so easy for Him to do things that would be positively beyond doubt.  But He seems to want us to demonstrate faith.  Faith seems to be essential to our spiritual growth.  When a woman touched the hem of Jesus’ garment she was instantly healed and He said, “Your faith has made you well.”  Again He said to a man whose sight was restored, “You faith has enabled you to see.”  And in Mark 9 He told a father that only faith could help his son, to which the man said, “I believe, help my unbelief.”

Could it be in our scientific age of inductive reasoning that we too often explain things away and cheat God of His glory and ourselves of wondrous blessings that would come if we only believed?

Written by Roger Bothwell on February 24, 2011

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

Rogerbothwell.org