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The Election

April 19,  2009  - Dale

As I write the Indonesian Electoral Commission website says they have so far counted 8,422,691 votes in the National Parliamentary Election - so there are quite a few still to count.  However the general shape of the results is already well known.  The names of the actual representatives elected to the various governing bodies have not yet been announced.

When the names are announced many will be disappointed that they missed out. No doubt there will be appeals and accusations of errors and so on. Standing for election is  a risky process and not all of us would be prepared to submit ourselves to such public judgment. So all respect to those who stand in elections.

Some elections don’t require a candidate to volunteer. People are just chosen. Head-hunters look around for the best person for the job. Although not everyone who is chosen accepts the choice. Sometimes the choice is the other way. Some are chosen to lose their jobs. Not much opportunity for refusal there.

It depends where the power lies and what the choice is about. God also does lots of choosing and it is easy to think of his election like a human election.  Not all of us act like children picking teams for a football game, “Pick me! Pick me!” But there is a feeling that God’s choice for his team is connected with how well we could contribute to the team.  Or perhaps whether we can persuade him we are one of his friends (many human choices are not made on merit but on relationships).

But does God pick and choose his friends? And if he does, on what basis?

One of the problems God has is that he doesn’t have very many friends. He has lots of competitors. Humans who think they should be God – at least in the areas of life that affect themselves. While most are quite happy for God to keep the universe running (supposing that they think he had anything to do with it in the first place) they don’t want him interfering in their management of their personal world.

The result is a serious dislocation of relations between God and humans, and a serious messing up of God’s world. So how does God choose people to be his friends and to be loved as part of his team?  Not randomly; not on merit; not on capability; not on potential; not on performance. Not even on need.

God chooses people to love for no other reason than that he loves them.

Dale