Roger Bothwell

I opened the door about five this morning to let my dog out and was smacked in the face by the most wonderful blast of cold air.  It was marvelous, refreshing and invigorating.   I know I should have been energy conscious and quickly closed the door to save household heat but I was prodigal.  I held the door open and basked in the luxury of fresh air.  Wow.  It was terrific.
 
So easily we grow accustomed to the norm we don’t notice the norm itself is degrading.  In this particular incident the air in the house had slowly grown stale.  But that isn’t nearly as important as the concern that we become accustomed to the values and norms of the world around us.  We all do it.  J. B. Phillips in his paraphrase of Romans 12 says, “Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God re-mold your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity.” 
 
It is so easy to grow lukewarm.  All we have to do is nothing.  It happens all by itself.  Fortunately things happen to us, like a blast of cold air, and we are jarred into the reality of our state of being.  Then it’s time to take action.
 
New Year’s is on our doorstep and we often make resolutions about doing better at certain things, like losing weight.  That’s important for most of us.  But more importantly is something we talked about yesterday – putting on and wearing “compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” Colossians 3.   That’s a blast for everyone with which we come into contact.

Just hours after England’s three-year-old Prince George appeared at church for holiday services, the knee-length coat he was wearing was sold out.  If you had been quick enough on the computer you too could have had your little boy dress like a prince for only $147.00.
  
Actually, we can do much better.  All of us can dress like a king.   Paul said, “Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ.”  Romans 13:14.  Apparently Paul liked this illustration because he used it in two of his other letters – once to the Colossians and once to the Galatians.  Paul liked nice clothes for what could be nicer than, “Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” Colossians 3:12
 
That’s a very chic wardrobe.  You can go to the closet and say, “What shall I wear today?  Compassion?  Hum, I think today I will wear patience.”  Well, that will not work.  You don’t have to choose, you just wear them all and you will be the best dressed person in the world.  You will be ripe for the cover of all or any fashion magazine because these are timeless classics that never go out of style.
 
Paul said to the Galatians, “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” 3:27   It is exciting to think that we can wear the righteousness of Christ. All of the blunders, stupidity and deliberate acts will no longer matter because in Christ we are as perfect as He is perfect.  I wish that meant we would no longer do all the blunders, stupidity and deliberate acts.  It doesn’t.  It means we are legally covered as long as we are committed to growing in Him.

I’m sitting here looking at an ad in GQ magazine for a thousand dollar pair of jeans.  Both legs have frayed holes in them and they look like they have been tied to the back of a car and dragged twenty miles down a gravel road.   Are people really that gullible?  Surely one could get such a ragged pair of jeans in the throw away bin at the Salvation Army.  It must be something akin to the Emperor’s clothes.  If enough people say it’s cool and chic, someone will buy them.
 
But wait a minute.  Couldn’t someone make a similar accusation against God?  Jesus came and paid a horrendous price for us and what did He get?   He paid for a bunch of losers.  Thieves, boasters, prideful arrogant alcoholics, drug-addicted cruel self-seekers, liars and murderers are what He bought.  I’m not so sure God is a savvy shopper.  Honestly, He has lousy taste when it comes to His friends. Even His enemies picked up on that.  They said, “When the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, how is it that he eats and drinks with publicans and sinners?”  One of His closest friends was a woman of ill-repute.  Why He would even eat with you and me!  That’s getting pretty low.

Ah, but there is a difference.  The thousand dollar pair of jeans will only continue to deteriorate, but all of us reprobates will change.  Someday we will be everything He longs for us to be.  Someday we will be so much like Him we will get confused and think we are seeing Him when we are seeing each other.  So, just maybe, He really is a savvy shopper.

They start the day after Thanksgiving.  Radio stations devoted entirely to holiday music fill our lives with traditional sounds.  There seem to be two kinds.  The first kind play the Rudolf, Jingle Bells and Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer genre.  The second kind lean toward the more sacred or the more classical.  Sometimes I think I cannot bear another playing of Feliz Navidad.  My apologies to my Spanish speaking friends.  I really did like it the first 300 times.  One of my favorite songs of the second kind is The Evening Prayer lullaby from Hansel and Gretel.  It really doesn’t have a strong connection to Christmas but is often played during the holidays.
 
The lyrics are as follows, “When at night I go to sleep, fourteen angels watch do keep: two my head are guarding, two my feet are guiding, two are on my right hand, two are on my left hand, two who warmly cover, two who o’er me hover, two to whom ‘tis given to guide my steps to heaven.”  I encourage you to listen to it on any one of many renditions on YouTube.com.
 
The assurance of God’s care and love for us is essential.  Tonight I especially think of all the children of Aleppo, who, while not Christians, are just as loved by God as we.  He knows their fears, hunger and pain.  Just this week we sent $500 from Spring of Life to western Uganda where we received an urgent plea from a pastor who is protecting and trying to feed 23 refugees from tribal killings.  

This world is not a fair place but our heavenly Father watches and cares and will someday make all things right.  Christmas is to remind us of that Father who gave us His only Son to mend this broken world.

When our grandson arrived this morning, he had just driven all night from North Carolina.  As would be expected he immediately fell asleep.  Silently I picked up his glasses noting that like most college boys his glasses were fingerprint smeared.  When he awoke and put them on his world was vivid and clear because grandpa did his thing.  Jesus tells us to call God, Father, but on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel God looks more like a grandfather.  My thoughts paraphrased Jesus’ words, “If we as human grandfathers know how to clean our children’s glasses, how much more will our Heavenly Grandfather enable us to see more clearly.”   Matthew 7:11 – sort of. 
 
In Proverbs 4:18 Solomon wrote, “But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shines more and more unto the perfect day.”   Isn’t it interesting that as we age our physical eyesight grows dim but our understanding of life and its challenges becomes clearer?   I once heard an aged man say, “If I had it to do over again I wouldn’t change a thing.”  Honestly, I thought, how could you be so dull?  Didn’t you learn anything along the way?  You had to have made mistakes.  We all do.  Would you really do it all the same?  The wise learn from their mistakes.
 
Life is all about learning.  Eternal life is all about learning forever.  I have many really bright friends. I can hardly wait to talk to them when they are 200 or 300 or more.  I know I will be more wowed by their comprehension and cognitive powers because I am wowed now. Until then I pray that our Heavenly Grandpa will continue to daily clean the smudges off the glasses of our minds.  

One afternoon when our older son was only three years old we were heading south from Nairobi when suddenly a giraffe started running alongside our car.  Its lanky trot was beautiful to behold when Eric exclaimed, “Never in all my life have I seen something like that.”  Well, me either.  But my lifespan and his were just a tad different.   Jesus’ promise to us of eternal life (see John 3:16) presents an interesting possible scenario.  We are three thousand years old when we get to see an amazing super nova explosion. Turning to a traveling companion who predates us by a million or so years I say, “Never in all my life have I ever seen something like that.”  Laughing at my innocent youth he says, “Actually, neither have I.  Didn’t Paul say something to Timothy about not allowing others to despise our youth?  
 
So much about life is relative.  I have a friend with a very old chocolate lab.  The gray muzzled guy has had a long life of sixteen years.  Jesus pointed out a poor widow who gave a mite to the temple and told us she gave so much more than the rich who gave out of their wealth. While teaching in Russia one of my students invited us home.  He and his wife were very proud of their home.  It was a very large metal culvert converted for living by building a wall on each end.  For them it was a mansion compared to most of their neighbors.
 
The next time we are feeling pretty good about our goodness we need to remind ourselves that Jesus was perfect and our righteousness is like filthy rags.  (Isaiah 64:6)  But the good news is despite that.  He covers us!!  Merry Christmas to us! 

Tonight was the last class for this semester.  We traditionally have pizza.  So there I was coming from the far end of the parking lot carrying seven extra-large pizzas and my book bag filled with all that stuff teachers accumulate during the semester.  Before I got to the building I was puffing.  As I leaned on the pad that automatically opens the doors one of my female students also got to the door.  She said, “Can I help you carry some pizza?”   This was a “girl!”  Really now, I needed to protect my masculinity and as I started to say, “No thanks. I’ve got” my brain hijacked my stupidity and I blurted out, “Oh, yes please!”  I was about to allow my foolish pride kill me.  Proverbs 16:18 – Pride goes before a fall, might have taken on meaning all of its own. 
 
All of my life I have heard that pride is a sin.  But I have come to believe that should be qualified.  I have yet to discern how being proud of others can be harmful.  I am very proud of my sons.  I am super proud of my wife.  I am proud of my very obedient dog.  If being ashamed is the opposite of being proud then Jesus is proud of us.  Hebrews 2:11 says, “So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters.”  The “them” in that sentence is you and me.  How could it be that Jesus is proud of us?  It’s an overwhelming thought.  Again I think I need to qualify this by saying, “Sometimes.”  It would be smug to say otherwise.  There are some moments that are not so great.  He must be proud of what we will become someday.  His love knows no bounds.

My mother used to make me clean my plate every night.  Her rationale was there were children in China starving; therefore, we should not waste food.  My question was just because someone else doesn’t have enough food why do I have to overeat?  Child developmentalists today do not recommend making children clean their plates as long as the children realize there will be no dessert in place of the peas they choose not to eat,
 
This all came flooding back to me this evening while watching families streaming out of Aleppo telling stories of mass executions of families.  Here I sit in my Archie Bunker chair in a warm house with no viable threat to my safety.  One of my students complained this week about something being unfair.  The issue was trivial.  Life is not fair.  Why should we have so much?  Why should we have billion dollar submarines electronically walling us off from our enemies?  We have more chance of drowning in a bathtub than being harmed by a terrorist.
 
There are so many things in the universe that are not fair.  We complain that it isn’t fair that we have to suffer because of Adam and Eve’s mistakes.  Yet I don’t hear anyone complaining that because of one man’s righteousness all can be forgiven and given the gift of eternal life.  See Romans 5:19.  
  
I don’t want to make anyone feel guilty about their blessings.  We should rejoice and be thankful for all we have.  At the same time we shouldn’t forget that our opportunities are not necessarily because we made wonderful choices in life.  We didn’t ask to be born in America or Sweden.  It happened to us. 

It’s that time of year when college teachers really do work.  Finals, essays and other projects pile up in a seemingly endless heap.  While pondering what grade to give a particular student I suddenly remembered being on the receiving end of zero grade.  There was attached note from the prof.  “This was an exceedingly interesting five pages worth the above grade.  Thanks for the entertainment.”  It was the only time I have ever struck out so poorly.  Usually one hits a foul ball or two before being out.  This was three whiffs.
 
Now decades later I would like to speak on behalf of the value of a zero.  A zero stops you from continuing on a pointless path.  A zero is a great place holder.  I love zeros in my checkbook when they follow a prime number.  The more zeros the better as long as they are left of the decimal point.  When I was little I loved the equation “x divided by zero.”  It meant I got the whole pie.
 
There is a zero all of us should covet.  It is a capital zero at the top of the list of our sins.  Each of us has tallied up an impressive record of misdeeds, but not to worry.  God has promised “”I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.”  Isaiah 43:25.  That’s a great zero.  If you are looking to receive a truly marvelous Christmas present this year, please take advantage of this offer.  It doesn’t come wrapped in pretty paper.  It comes to us blood stained from Calvary.  “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” I John 1

Long I stood pining over the Oreo section.  When I was little there were only Oreos.  Now the selection is wonderful. There are double stuff, triple stuff, orange flavored, mint flavored, thin ones (Why would anyone want a thin one?) vanilla flavored and then I saw it – Mega Stuff.  Wow – instant salivation.  But, Christmas is almost here with all its sweets.  More sugar is NOT what my house nor my body needs.  But it was MEGA STUFF!  What if they were only for the holidays?  Maybe it’s now or never!  (My family doctor is going to read this and just shake his head in frustration.)
 
I never ever dreamed there could be too much stuff between those two wonderful cookies whether chocolate or vanilla.  Perhaps it’s my age. But I twisted off the top cookie. (Either could be the top.) and went for it.  Instant satisfaction followed by “Ohhh, that’s too much.”  Alas, I should have known.  There can be too much of anything except one thing.  (I’ll get to the exception in a moment.)
 
I am so dull.  I should have remembered Proverbs 25:16.  I just read it about a week ago. “If you find honey, eat just enough – too much of it, and you will vomit.”  And there is Titus 2:2.  “Teach the older men to be temperate.”  Why not the younger men and women?  You don’t have to teach older women to be temperate.  Grandmas are wise.
 
Now there is one thing we can always have in excess.  Yea, two things.  Love and mercy can never be overdone.  “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.”  Ephesians 2   Awesome!