I have been attending a Sunday school class at our church on soteriology (the doctrine of salvation). During the last class the teacher drew a crude diagram on the dry erase board of an evangelism tract from the 1940′s. On this sample ballot God votes “yes” for your salvation, Satan votes “no” and the deciding “yes/no” vote is up to you (clearly Arminian). Someone made an offhand comment about it being a good thing that we were not in Florida (re: the voting debacle surrounding the 2000 Presidential election). I chimed in with a rephrasing of the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:3-9), which we had read earlier in the class. It gave this person the giggles so bad that she had to leave the room.

Here it is in a more refined form.

The Parable of the Voter

A voter went out to vote. And as he voted, some chad fell to the chad collector, but the voting machine devoured the ballot anyway. Other chad fell part way, where they dangled from the ballot, since the depth of punch was weak, but when the ballots were counted the chad were pressed back into their holes. And since they had not been freed, the votes withered away. Other chad fell for multiple candidates running for the same office, and the voting machine choked on the ballots. Other chad fell good and clean and produced a vote that counted, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has a voting stylus, let him press.

Monergism, an excellent resource for information on reformed theology, has been completely overhauled. Not only does the site look great, it is way more functional, too. Kudos to Tim, who blogs about the redesign here.

When I first started the Monday Meditation segment I usually wrote the posts the night before. After a while I began to pen them first thing in the morning. It sounds rushed, but like a lot of my blog posts the ideas had been kicking around in my head for a few days (though they were shorter back then, too). However, lately I have found myself writing the meditations on Monday evening after the kids have gone to bed. Tonight is no exception, except that I watched two episodes of 24 first. And so here it is another late night (Tuesday already) and I am blogging instead of sleeping. The funny thing is that it seems that with each passing day, week, month and year I try to do more with my time and am actually accomplishing less.

On the way home from work, with stops at Office Depot, Bi-Lo and Food Lion in between, I caught part of a piece on NPR’s All Things Considered titled Finding Binge Absolution in a Do-Si-Do, in which Marc Acito talks about the seasonality of Girl Scout Cookies in our modern on-demand society. It reminded me of an interview that Ken Myers of Mars Hill Audio conducted with Dorothy Bass, who is the author of Receiving the Day: Christian Practices for Opening the Gift of Time. You can listen to the audio (and more) by going to Mars Hill’s demonstration issue page (click on ‘download mp3).

It struck me as I listened to the interview again how worship involves all of life, such that even the shape of our days and seemingly simple things like seasonal fruits (or in Acito’s case Girl Scout Cookies) are significant in reminding us of our place and priorities in the world.

Below is a transcribed and edited (for punctuation) version of the interview.

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This week’s Friday Vespers comes from the article that I linked to last night. Note the themes of self-denial, willful death and gracious resurrection that are the lifelong pattern for all would-be disciples in Christ (Luke 9:23).

L

ORD God, eternal and almighty Father, we join with the first Christians in praising you for the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have received forgiveness and eternal life. We thank you too that it became the custom of the church to prepare for the celebration of Christ’s resurrection in a time of penitence and self examination. Grant us, therefore, gracious Father, the grace to observe a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on your holy Word. Grant that we may remember that though we are dust, and to dust we shall return, that we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever — Amen.

— Reverend Dr. Craig R. Higgins, On Keeping Holy Lent, 2000 *

* Republished by permission.

I was sad to hear the news this morning that former NBA guard Dennis Johnson has died. I grew up in the 1980′s literally glued to the television following the rivalry between the Celtics and the Lakers, back when NBA basketball was still a team sport and worth watching. Johnson was a key player in arguably one of the best teams in NBA history—along with Danny Ainge, Kevin McHale, Robert Parish, Bill Walton and Larry Bird—the 1985-86 Boston Celtics. That’s great company, but DJ stood out as someone who gave his all for the big and small plays alike.