Sunday – Part 2 – the attacks & fireworks and begin

Our committee conducted hearings on our new Form Of Government proposal on Sunday. There were a few Overtures proposing an alternative point of view. Some of the arguments were civil, some were not. One Presbytery put together a little comedy video to express their objections to the new form of government that was to be proposed. The video (from the Presbytery that contains Hollywood) depicted boxers slugging it out, and a referee that allowed the boxers to get away with fighting dirty. Although, very creative, the tone of the video was disrespectful of the task force that spent 2 years on the proposal and hit below the belt like their boxers in the video. A new friend of mine from the committee stood up after the video and called them out. He stated that the video was in poor taste and did not reflect mutual respect or brotherly love in Christ. Several on the committee voiced agreement and an apology followed. This incident set the tone for our committee to work together in mutual respect even in disagreement over the next couple of days. The leaders of our committee commended us over the next couple of days in how we worked together.

Sunday night there was a dinner on Nicolet Island, an island on the Mississippi with some entertainment and fireworks. We had to take buses to get to Nicolet Island and it takes long lines and a lot of buses to get 2000 people anywhere. I went for dinner and as usual sat with a bunch of people I had never met before but found the conversation easy and fun. I ended up leaving before the fireworks for fear that I wouldn’t get back to the hotel till after mid-night and our committee was scheduled to start early. It is sometimes a bit of a trial to be hanging out in crowds of 2000.