voting

There was a meeting up town tonight. To discuss and respond to a special 'Consultation Paper' sent out by big church.

We all had to 'vote' at the end. A secret ballot, to ensure, I suppose, that people felt free to give a clear indication of their views on the matter.

Two big votes in a week! (I'm assuming you haven't forgotten either that Thursday this week is the day we cast our votes).

At the end of the meeting this evening, the man who was chairing the thing remarked in the passing - "It would be great if the General Election was a simple multiple choice thing like this where you simply tick one box!"

I've maybe lost the plot a bit somewhere - but I thought that's what we actually do come polling day. A simple multiple choice sort of thing. And you get to tick one box.

Except it's never just quite as simple as that, of course. Any more than it was tonight.

Ticking the 'Yes' or 'No' box, for instance, to the question Have you stopped beating your wife? is not quite as simple a matter as maybe it sounds.

And some of the questions tonight were a bit like that. It rather depends what the question means which box you want to tick. And if you're not really sure you agree with the premise on which the question is asked, what box do you tick then?

Thursday's General Election presents a similar set of problems. Multiple choice and one box to tick - yes. But ...

Are you meant to vote for which party you'd like to see in government? Or which person you think will make the best local MP? In other words, are you meant to be casting your vote for the person, the party or the premier?

Because the box you end up ticking may not always be the same in every case.

And what if the person (or party) for whom you wish to cast your vote has absolutely no real chance at all of being elected. You know that, the candidate knows that, everyone knows that. Which box are you meant to tick?

So multiple choice and one box to tick may seem very simple and fair. But it doesn't quite work like that!

I met with some folk over lunch today with a view to the meeting tonight. We wanted to pray most of all. That's really why we met. We look to the Lord to move in our midst in these days and effect a real change of heart. Only he can do that sort of thing and bring about repentance and renewal in his church.

And that's a lot more complex than a case of ticking boxes! It has to do with the radical work of the Spirit of God in the depths of the human heart.

In some ways it's the very opposite of all this sort of exercise. Far from our standing in judgment on the Word of God, pronouncing our views by ticking some boxes and casting our votes in this way - instead, we humbly recognise that God's Word stands in judgment on ourselves.

Turkeys don't get to cast their vote on what the Christmas dinner menu is. Nor do we ever get to vote on how life's to be lived. What self-respecting turkey would be voting for a menu which involved the turkeys' death?

And which of us will, given half a chance, be voting for repentance and the Jesus way of life which, both alike, involve for us a cross-shaped, costly death?

The first question asked tonight involved us thinking through what was called "the Biblical witness to God's purposes for humanity."

Well, first up, the Bible is more than a witness to God's purposes. Our own confessional standard makes that clear from the start. It's the revelation of God's purposes, not one witness among a number to whom we turn for some insight.

And it's very clear, as the good old catechism says, that God's purposes for humanity have little or nothing to do with our fuliflment and everything to do with his glory. Everything.

In the end of the day it's not my vote which counts, but his. It's not what I think which matters, but rather what he thinks. Not what will prosper and satisfy me, but that which will satisfy him. Not my will, but his. Not my pleasure, but his. Not my glory, but his.

We all must die. We don't get to vote on that. It's simply a case of whether we'll die to self or die in sin.