•Acts 27: 21-44•“Yet we also face an important possibility: social progress may require that someone push the system to its limit. Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa, Aung San Suu Kyi, Martin Luther King, Jr and Mohandas Gandhi, to name a few, risked social disaster by unleashing uncontrollable forces.” –Ronald Heifetz, “Leadership without Easy Answers” •“Living systems seek equilibrium. They respond to stress by working to regain balance. If the human body becomes infected by bacteria, the system responds to fight off the infection and restore health. When a fire burns down a forest, the seeds that routinely blow in from a distance now take root in the ash. Knocked out of equilibrium, living systems summon a set of restorative responses.” -Heifetz•“Like living systems, social systems under threat try to restore equilibrium. Generally, equilibrium means stability in which the levels of stress within the political, social and economic areas of the society are not increasing. Yet there is nothing ideal or good about the state of equilibrium per se. Indeed, achieving adaptive change probably requires sustained periods of disequilibrium. A society may operate without increasing levels of stress, quite oblivious to the bankruptcy that lies ahead. Without a general climate of urgency – the feeling that something must change – the society may do nothing until it is too late. How to manage sustained periods of stress consequently poses a central question for the exercise of leadership.” -Heifetz•“Exercising leadership from a position of authority in adaptive situations means going against the grain. Rather than fulfilling the expectations for answers, one provides questions; rather than protecting people from outside threats, one lets people feel the threat in order to stimulate adaptation; instead of orienting people to their current roles, ones disorients people so that new role relationships develop; rather than quelling conflict, one generates it; instead of maintaining norms, one challenges them.” –Heifetz•Genesis 4:8-10•“Judaism was and remains the world’s greatest religion of protest. The heroes of faith did not accept; they protested. They were willing to even confront God Himself. That is how God wants us to respond. Judaism is God’s call to human responsibility. The highest achievement is to become God’s partner in the work of creation. •We know that Judaism involves collective responsibility (kol Yisrael arevim ze bazeh), “All Israelites are responsible for one another,” But it may be that being human also involves collective responsibility. Not only are Jews responsible for one another – so are we all, regardless of our faith or lack of it. ” Rabbi Jonathan Sacks • “It seems, though, that the Torah sets a high standard for the moral life. It is not enough to be righteous if that means turning our backs on a society that is guilty of wrongdoing. We must take a stand. We must protest. We must register dissent even if the probability of changing minds is small. That is because the moral life is a life we share with others. We are, in some sense, responsible for the society of which we are a part. It is not enough to be good. We must encourage others to be good. There are times when each of us must lead.” -Sacks•How to Survive a Shipwreck1. Trust God2. Embrace the Possibility of Newness3. Take responsibility for others in the boat4. Say goodbye to our old boat and hello to an island5. Love - see others not as objects but as beautiful and valuable people that are so much more than what society tries to define them as
