Following the Rules

I was recently in contact with our regional rep (Cathy Eberly). I asked her about other communities that had "WAITING LISTS" - I haven't seen that in our community for a long time. I asked "What are they doing, so that we can learn from their success." To sum up her answer "They are following the rules." And the icing on the cake is 'It's not about the weekends, it's about the 4th Day.'

Now we are following the rules a LOT better than we have been in the past, but we still waffle when the hard choices come in to play. Like - the cut off for deciding the weekend event is two weeks before, registration forms in hand. We get close and the board has to make the call but we 'waffle'. "The teams have worked so hard." "I taked to my pilgrim and they say 'Yes' and I' bring the regisitration form Thursday evening." The list goes on. It was hard to do some table arrangements for the Men's walk due to table leaders and assistants having pilgrims on the weekend. Conference room members are not suppose to sponsor pilgrims. How can you do your sponsor duties while you're in the conference room?

Bottom line, we have to stop thinking about our own interests and think about the bigger picture. The Emmaus movement is to strenghten church leaders, not to give someone a weekend warm fuzzy. Until we do that we are misrepresenting the program. Christians have a label that they must be tolerant and accpting of all people and ideas. But Jesus didn't waffle when Peter refused to be washed by our Lord. He said "Unless I wash you, you will have no part of me." Talk about throwing the baby out with the bath water! Jesus knew what the disciples needed to be taught and how. Peter thought he knew better, for in his mind, he was unworthy. He thought he was being humble and maybe he'd be an example for the others. God had other plans, "My way or the highway!"

The Emmaus program has a plan and a 'recipe.' When you talk to the people that see all the communities and know what is and what isn't going on, then you can get an idea of what we need to do. Until then we will fall short. We've seen the Grand Rapids community die. We need to support our board and stand behind their decisions so they can do the right thing. The board signs a covenant saying they will follow the 'plan.' That is our permission to have weekend events and call them the "Walk to Emmaus."

We need to let them do the job without putting pressure on them because we might not get our way. I know it's hard because we have relationships that can be fractured and broken. There are still some people who are upset with me because of the way we changed 'Candlight.' I was on the board when we made the decision to 'follow the manual.' It's been years since we've done that, but if the subject comes up, my old friends get upset and start giving me flack.

The community needs to wake up or we will wind up like Grand Rapids. I believe in the Emmaus movement. Full weekends are awesome. Let's get back on track.

GLYASDI
~ Rocky