And [Jesus] taught his disciples not to rule over each other, that they had one Father and they were all brothers and sisters. When someone has been given special abilities or wisdom from God, we naturally follow them as “authorities” because we see they have what is good, what is from God. There is no need of human force to make us obey.

…God backs up the authority of those whom he has chosen.

God’s design requires constant together-ness.  We are incomplete without each other.

How does someone that is trying to fill the role of a leader in one of these faith communities learn from this commentary?  Sometimes a guy has to know when he is at the edge of his gifting and when to hand the baton off to keep things going.

http://visitsteve.com/work/talkwithanyone/

A few things come to my mind at this point.

1. As my generation starts to emerge as leaders and business owners and as priority-one consumers for companies to target we need to take a lesson from our grandparents.  They didn’t expect anyone to do anything for them.  They worked hard for very little.  They didn’t have jobs with vacation and sick time, they didn’t have family leave or cushy work environments.  They worked long hours sometimes in hazardous environments, they were entitled to nothing but the right to decide how to live their own lives.  They made sacrifices for the sake of their posterity with little concern for what they might gain themselves.  Many of them fought and died to protect this lifestyle that many of us would whine about daily.  I think that my generation needs to sac-up and chose the HARD thing for the good of our posterity. We have been sheltered by our parent’s generation and perhaps we have been done a disservice.  Perhaps pain needs to be something we show to our children for their survival.  More importantly that the pain is a part of life that is as necessary as the seasons and that putting it off is unhealthy.

2. During times like these we get really focused on our world arena and we watch CNN or MSNBC and we see a globe in crisis.  I think that one of the best things we can do in these times is to invest in our families and our neighbors.  Discover who we are as a community, decentralize and localize our resources.  Be determined to be self reliant and to be concerned for our neighbors. Learn to garden and find out what grows best in your yard.  Get good and taking care of yourself.  If it gets really ugly, its your immediate community and your skills that you are going to depend on the most.

3. Finally a good healthy perspective on what we are putting our trust in.  Are we trusting in a government run by and established by people?  Or are we trusting in the constant and reliable hand of God to provide for us? This isn’t just a question for those of strong or mature faith.  This is a question for anyone that cannot escape the fact that creation testifies to the existence and presence of a God that lives and is concerned about us daily.  We cannot expend tons of energy worrying about things we can’t control.  We need to trust that the world is unfolding in a way that does not surprise this God that we can trust in.

It might be kind of preachy, and its not complete, but its a sleepy summary on my thoughts on current events.

So if you watched the video you get the idea of what it looks like.  If you read the Wiki entry you know what the issues are and essentially how it works.  Now, for my impressions.

Its a blast! It was a little uncomfortable blowing through red lights with the masses because by my very nature I am a rule follower.  When I ride on my own I depend on traffic laws to keep me as safe as possible so ignoring some of the essentials really goes against my grain – but I do understand.  You get comfortable riding in the mass and you get good and weaving around other cyclists and riding in VERY close proximity.  In fact, you get very dependant on it very quickly.  There is safety in numbers.

The message is good. I like what the heart of the event is supposed to communicate.  Alternatives to driving cars everywhere.  Making motorists aware of the presence of cyclists and how they need to keep an eye out for them even when its unexpected.  Cycling is a very entertaining and healthy way to get around.  I would love to see more of that mentality here in Murrieta.

In numbers, people demonstrate the worst of humanity… I wish I could say that everyone there maintained the ideals of the event.  But instead, I heard cyclists taunting motorists.  I heard them calling drivers names and banging on their cars.  I saw some disposing of beer cans on the road as they went along their way.  I saw too many people blowing an opportunity to show that they are truely different by behaving exactly like the people they want to educate.  I have news for you, it doesn’t work like that.

All in all, it was fun and I would love to do it again but I do have my reservations about the behavior of some of the cyclists.  I don’t suppose you can get everyone to behave themselves all the time but I don’t know if it should ruin a thing that doesn’t hurt anyone, the police tend to just keep an eye on and definately gets some healthy attention.

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Ok, I promise next time I won’t even mention my yard.

I wouldn’t do what he does, and he does alienate some.  But there are those that walk away thinking about something new.  God works in mysterious ways…

Now the application here is this: we are going to have programming at the river Friday, Saturday & Sunday. We have a team ministry model at Impact Church so there are FOUR pastors! That means that we should be able to do this. Here is our plan. Friday and Saturday we will have all four pastors out and Saturday night Jeff & Travis will leave so that Church happens as scheduled and expected on Sunday at Thompson Middle School. Vince and I will remain at the river with some of our oversight and we will have church Sunday morning at the campground. This is a cool step for us because we are not a large church and usually we employ our entire ministry staff every Sunday. This is a step toward growth for this ministry and hopefully a step in our reach into our community.

If you live around Murrieta and would like to join us, you are welcome to come along – this is an open event. Go to the Impact Church website and click on the Soak 2008 image or you can click on the image in this post, it takes you to the same place.

So go check out the Impact Church blog and see what is new from the Coffee Table.