{"id":827,"date":"2020-05-29T09:52:33","date_gmt":"2020-05-29T08:52:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uniofglos.blog\/chaplaincy\/?p=827"},"modified":"2020-05-29T09:52:33","modified_gmt":"2020-05-29T08:52:33","slug":"thresholds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.glos.ac.uk\/chaplaincy\/2020\/05\/29\/thresholds\/","title":{"rendered":"Thresholds"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Here\u2019s the reading and the reflection from yesterday\u2019s Communion. We were thinking about Thresholds. I\u2019ve highlighted the five questions I mention, and I\u2019ll put them at the end, in case you want to spend time with them. After the service I played the UK blessing<\/a>, which is beautiful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n


When the Feast of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Without warning there was a sound like a strong wind, gale force\u2014no one could tell where it came from. It filled the whole building. Then, like a wildfire, the Holy Spirit spread through their ranks, and they started speaking in a number of different languages as the Spirit prompted them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There were many Jews staying in Jerusalem just then, devout\npilgrims from all over the world. When they heard the sound, they came on the\nrun. Then when they heard, one after another, their own mother tongues being\nspoken, they were thunderstruck. They couldn\u2019t for the life of them figure out\nwhat was going on, and kept saying, \u201cAren\u2019t these all Galileans? How come we\u2019re\nhearing them talk in our various mother tongues? They\u2019re speaking our\nlanguages, describing God\u2019s mighty works!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n


I wonder if you have been noticing the threshold of the place where you live more recently – the door to your flat or house, or maybe the garden gate. The place where online deliveries arrive and the deliverer steps quickly away.  The place you go past to leave the sanctuary of home and step out into the world. The place where you stand, perhaps, to clap with your neighbours, or to have a socially distanced conversation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I always thought that the word threshold came from the medieval\ncustom of spreading the threshed straw on the earthen floor of houses and other\nbuildings – like a church I once saw in North Wales. You needed a stone or\nwooden barrier to keep the straw in – the threshold. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apparently, this isn\u2019t actually the root of the word, which\nis sad. But it still can mean something which keeps us in – we have been kept\nback behind our thresholds, and some of us are longing to be released.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As well as a sort of barrier, a threshold is also an in\nbetween place – a space between one way of living and another. We are all in a\nthreshold space at the moment – between our old life and whatever life will be\nlike in a different future..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there\u2019s a third way that we often speak about thresholds.\nWhen we say that we are on the threshold of something we mean that we are about\nto embark on something new – it\u2019s is a place of new beginnings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of this was true for the disciples, gathered together for\nthe Jewish feast of Pentecost, 50 days after the Passover. They had been\nmeeting since Easter Day – but still behind closed doors. They were told to\nwait – kept back – not yet ready to go out and tell the world what they knew. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was an inbetween time – between their life with Jesus, watching,\nlistening and learning, and the new life where they would be the ones teaching,\nand bringing healing, and spreading the news of the kingdom. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now they are poised on the threshold of all that is to come.  They are gathered together in a large room,\nwhen suddenly they hear this noise of a roaring wind, and they experience what feels\nlike fire spreading between them – now we might think of a powerful electrical\ncurrent passing from person to person – the Holy Spirit of God. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it\u2019s as if the doors are flung open and they are\npropelled out over the threshold to share their message of all that God has\ndone, not just with the locals but with visitors from all over the world. This\nwas the beginning of a new movement – which we are part of today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So that was their threshold – but what about us? Are there thresholds\nthat we are each standing on, along with the ones we share?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I came across five questions this week, which is what made me\nthink about all of these. The first is this, At which threshold of my life\nam I now standing?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For some of us this might be tied up with the end of the\nuniversity term coming next week – the threshold between this year and the next,\nand maybe the end of our university course and whatever lies beyond – that\u2019s a\nbig threshold. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For others it might be that we are on the threshold because\nof leaving a job, or starting a new one, or because of our stage of life, or through\nsome other change, chosen or unchosen. But maybe even if none of that is true for\nus we still have some sense of a threshold – a sense that in some way we are\nbeing called onward, to something new.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next two questions ask… At this time in my life,\nwhat am I leaving?<\/strong> Where am I about to enter? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We may not find it easy to identify or put into words our\nanswers to those questions. But my belief is that, as we walk with God, just\nlike those first disciples, we are always being invited on to new discoveries,\nnew growth, new ways of living in and sharing God\u2019s love. John O\u2019Donohue, who\noffers these questions, says this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018It is wise in your own life to be able to recognise and acknowledge\nthe key thresholds: to take your time, to listen inwards with complete\nattention until you hear the inner voice calling you forward. The time has come\nto cross.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If we have an inkling of that call, then we might want to\nspend time with two more questions: What is preventing me from crossing my\nnext threshold? What gift would enable me to do it?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I read those questions, my response was – I did all that\nthreshold stuff when I moved to Cheltenham 2 \u00bd years ago – and I\u2019m not in a\nhurry to do it again! But then when I reflected on each question, I began to\nthink of one threshold I may be being called to cross, in the way I live my\nlife – the threshold from doing, to being. What I am being called the leave? A\nfocus on achievement. What I am invited to enter? A place of contentment. What is\npreventing me from crossing this threshold? Habit, years of training… What\ngift would enable me to do it? The grace to let go. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s just an example from my own reflection. For each of us, our responses to those questions will be very different. I think that it\u2019s worth spending some time with them, so here they are again…<\/p>\n\n\n\n


At which threshold of my life am I now standing?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this time in my life, what am I leaving?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where am I about to enter? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is preventing me from crossing my next threshold?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What gift would enable me to do it?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n


Where might the Holy Spirit be prompting you? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What thresholds might God be calling you to cross?<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Here are the prayers that we shared…<\/p>\n\n\n\n