Were you taking notes during Sunday’s sermon as I was? I asked Pastor Lacey for links, quotes and questions for my personal reflection this week and am sharing them with you. (Jane Smith)
A photo of trapeze artist Kristen Finley in mid-air was our starting point. (I think this is the one.) Read more about Ms. Finley’s life story in this video.
Paul Tournier, a Swiss physician, and pastoral counselor writes about “the middle zone” as the space a trapeze artist is in when they are in-between the bars. He used the analogy of a trapeze artist swinging on a high bar to the utmost distance it can carry them, then turning loose and reaching hopefully and courageously for the next bar. There is breathless suspense of mid-air placelessness as the person just hangs in the air, holding on to nothing. Everyone is holding their breath — the artist as well as the watching crowd — until the transition is safely made. Tournier writes that the middle zone is never crossed until the trapeze artist finds “enough hope to let go of the past and take the leap of faith into what is next.”
Susan Beaumont reflects on liminality.
How to Lead When You Don’t Know Where You Are Going by Susan Beaumont
“When a group of people is between something that has ended and something else that is not yet ready to begin. In liminal seasons watching and waiting can be difficult, overplanning can be futile, and it simply isn’t helpful to pretend that we understand what happens next. Liminality is simultaneously dangerous, alluring, and sacred. God’s greatest work occurs in liminal space.”
Questions for the congregation:
1. What have we left behind?
2. What is being released?
3. What is our greatest fear?
4. What would freedom look like for us?