Offering 4 | Autumn
unoccupied, swept, and put in order: reflections on interior thresholds + thin places
picture—pexels
A Thin Place
As I walk in the chill of the early autumn cemetery air, the dearth of life confronts me as I pass row after row of cold granite and marble— reminders of the many departed souls whose bodies have returned to the dust from which they came.
I’ve walked these historic paths many times before, and as they unravel beneath my feet on this particular morning, I am covered by a canopy of gold, red, and orange—leaves like embers drifting down from heaven, each one an invitation to listen, to remember that I am not alone.
October has found me and her winds greet me with the echoes of a hallowed and haunted melody—beauty and death are beginning their dance once again and I find myself at the threshold of a thin place.
Celtic Roots
The conceptualization of a thin place has its roots in ancient Celtic Christianity. In the Celtic tradition, a thin place is a space where the veil between heaven and earth becomes mysteriously thin—the perception of our reality holds truer and more concrete than the lens of abstraction we typically view our fallen world through.
In her book Braving the Thin Places, Julianne Stanz writes,
“ Thin spaces are wild, messy places where God is at work. Time seems to stand still, there is a discernible sense of sacredness and the world around us speaks its own story to those who are listening.”
In our post-reformation and post-enlightenment faith culture, especially in the context of evangelical Christianity in America, the idea of listening to the world around us is a spiritual practice that has been lost in the stagnant waters of a faith culture that values dogma over divine receptivity.
The concept of a thin place may even raise a sense of uncomfortable unfamiliarity and skepticism in those of us who have been taught to wear our caution like a badge. We have been told in one way or another that our caution equals a commitment to truth and that the faculties of our curiosity might vitiate that truth altogether.
We have been immersed in a faith culture of doctrinal predilections and denominational fidelities that have been used as a sort of spiritual anesthesia on our receptiveness to the movement of the Holy One in and around us—our hearts are still beating, but our souls are asleep to the divine mysteries that are being made alive in and around us through the reconciliatory work of Christ.
Birthed in a Strange Land
The unique tradition of Celtic Christianity emerged within a largely pagan culture whose fabric was intricately bound to a supernatural polytheistic worldview.
In some ways, the wisdom of Celtic Christianity—Christ in the Celts—was truly a miracle. In other ways, though, just like every movement within Christendom—Orthodoxism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and otherwise—it had flaws and theological oddities unique to the culture from which it sprang.
We do not have to agree with the whole of the Celtic Christian tradition in order to honor the movement and wisdom of the Spirit at work in the tapestry of that time and place.
It was caution without curiosity that revealed the cowardice and callousness of those workers of the law who carried a disproportionate amount of traditional dogma compared to humble receptivity.
It is easy to disguise our caution as discernment while remaining completely closed to the stirrings of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and lives.
The Ways of Incarnation
The early Celtic Christians believed that God, through the incarnation of Christ, came to us in our humanity—not merely in the context of our flesh and blood, but in our earthed humanity—ground beneath our feet, sky above our head.
“…For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.” Colossians 1:19-20, emphasis added
Birthed in a culture already tied to an intrinsically spiritual worldview, the Celtic Christians had a unique capacity and keen awareness of this Divine reconciliation. Their lives were lived as if the division between the secular and sacred were truly—and not merely abstractly as is so often the case today—being brought together in renewal and harmony through the blood of Christ’s cross.
Instead of hiding from the Presence of God among the trees of the garden (Gen. 3:8), the early Celtic Christians lived openly amidst “the trees of the garden”, embodying a humble receptivity that enabled them to be more fully aware of the voice of the Lord, comforted—and not accused—by the sound of His steps in the cool of the day.
Indeed, they lived fully present to the mystery of the great reversal, familiar with the echoes of Eden breaking in all around them.
Our First Thin Place
Eden was our home—our first thin place. It was a perpetual place of thinness, not because of its geographical location, but because the Presence of God with us was completely unhindered and the threshold to intimacy with our Creator was fully accessible.
And then came the great fall—the eyes of our first parents were opened and the threshold to the Presence of God was compromised. Our boundaries became obscured and we found ourselves at the threshold of death—a great chasm now separating us from our garden home— our thin place with God.
Unoccupied, Swept, and Put in Order
At the beginning of last month, I came across a passage of scripture that startled me. As September’s days unraveled, I befriended this peculiar passage in a posture of curiosity and spent time meditating on it, ruminating on the themes of thresholds and thin places that jumped off the page:
“Now when the unclean spirit comes out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and does not find it.
Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came’; and when it comes, it finds it unoccupied, swept, and put in order.
Then it goes and brings along with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they come in and live there; and the last condition of that person becomes worse than the first. That is the way it will also be with this evil generation.” Matthew 12:43-45 emphasis added
The Parabolic Discourse
The backdrop of this parable is found in the middle of a discourse with a group of scribes and Pharisees who moments before were seeking a physical sign from Jesus in a vain attempt to convince themselves of his divine authority (Matthew 12:38). Jesus quickly rebukes them and points their attention toward two stories—
The repentance of Nineveh in the days of Jonah.
“The men of Ninevah will stand up with this generation at the judgment, and will condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.” Matthew 12:41 emphasis added
2. The raging appetite for wisdom observed in the Queen of the South in the days of King Solomon.
“The queen of the South will rise up with this generation at the judgment and will condemn it, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and behold something greater than Solomon is here. Matthew 12:42 emphasis added
In both instances, Jesus contrasts the divine receptivity of the subjects in these stories with the wicked and empty motivations of a generation that was self-righteously cautious and entitled.
Ninevah…the Queen of the South…they were receptive to mere shadows of what was in front of them.
But the Pharisees? They were unable to behold the very Light that had casted those shadows. They were standing face to face with that “something greater” and they could not see it.
About halfway through his rebuke (or at least what we are given of it in scripture), Jesus changes course and begins to unravel this question through parabolic language.
Why couldn’t they see?
As he so often did, Jesus probed deeper into the hardened hearts of the wicked generation standing before him.
He begins by painting a picture of an evil spirit that departs from a man and then flees to the desert in search of rest. In Jewish tradition, as is evident within numerous scriptural passages, evil spirits and demons were known to dwell in the desert.
The spirit passes through waterless places and finding no rest, it returns to the house from which it came—the man it had left. Upon returning to the man, the spirit finds the house empty, swept out, and put in order.
The evil spirit had departed for a time, but temporal removal did not alleviate the callousness of a heart unattended—the man remained oblivious, content with the vacancy, the threshold of his heart unfortified—ready to welcome a host of evil spirits when they returned.
This is not a parable merely about evil spirits—it is a parable about the threshold of the heart.
Finding Ourselves
It is not hard to find ourselves in this passage, both corporately and individually. So often we have been a generation who seeks signs in vain. I have seen this, in large part, in the American Church.
Like the Pharisees, we seek our own version of the truth as our authority instead of beholding the Truth itself—and then we demand signs from a god we have made in our own image.
We seek signs in our politics. His policy is my God’s policy. We seek them in our creeds and confessions. These are the guardrails of my Holy Spirit. We seek them in egotistical camaraderie. Her God looks like mine.
Something greater is here—the Word in front of us and all around us, reordering every inch of the cosmos—and we, like the Pharisees, so often cannot see it because we are too busy demanding answers and seeking signs from a truth we have created in our own image.
It is our lack of receptivity, our unwillingness to behold, that has made us targets for spiritual apathy and soul sickness. Our houses are swept clean. They are put in order—adorned with a rote religiosity, a deceitful contentment that is an invitation for the spirits of the age to take up residence.
Pride. Envy. Strife. Discord. Acedia. Sloth. Lust. Idolatry. Hatred. Anger. Passiveness.
The altars of our hearts our buried beneath the rubble of a fractured and disjointed Church. Our thresholds have not been guarded and our thin places have become thick.
And we wonder why the house is haunted.
Returning to Celtic Wisdom
In her book, Braving the Thin Places, Julianne Stanz says that,
“…we stand at the threshold of a thin place. We are gatekeepers to a sacred chamber of the inner world”.
This is not a foreign concept beyond the reach of scripture—Proverbs 4:23 instructs us to “watch over our hearts with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life.”
The ancient Celtic Christians had a deep understanding that the threshold of our heart is intricately connected to the threshold of both life and death.
This is what Jesus is getting at in the parable of the house and the evil spirit. What is the condition of our house?
Is it swept clean, put in order, the threshold unguarded and ready for dark company? Are we seeking signs that temporarily placate our hostile hearts, but only leave us with a heart more jaded than before?
Or, is the vacancy of our house filled with all the fullness of God? Is our threshold protected by the gatekeeping of a humble receptivity—by the genuine comprehension of the width, length, height, and depth of the love of Christ (Ephesians 3:18-19) that outlasts futile signs that may distract us for a moment, but take us no further than our self-righteous knowledge.
The light of the incarnated Christ confronts us—not in the empty externality of politics, doctrines, and preferences—but at the threshold of our very beating hearts.
Christ crossed the threshold of death that we might begin to perceive that our Edenic roots are closer than we could ever imagine.
He is untangling the cunning body of the serpent from the branches of our lives—
and behold…
Our roots are being watered by living springs…
Something greater is here and our thin place is being restored.
Thanks for reading Cadence & Canticle— I’m so glad you stopped by. May you leave this space blessed and heartened as you return to the soil and stewardship of your life. I’d love for you to join this community of fellow pilgrim-souls!
Stop by the Trysting Place right below to further engage with this offering as autumn’s days unfold.
WELCOME TO THE TRYSTING PLACE—
a contemplative space at the end of each offering for you to quiet your soul and slow down in the presence of your Creator. Settle in with all three sections or choose just one, moving through them at a pace that is right for you. This is designed to be a spacious place for your soul—a sacred rhythm for your life.
CADENCE & CURIOSITY—
an invitation to quietly contemplate and become curious about what is stirring in the depths of your heart.
Spend some time reflecting on the parable found in Matthew 12:38-45.
Remember, the threshold of your heart is directly connected to the threshold of life and death. How are you or aren’t you protecting the threshold of your heart? Invite the Holy Spirit to reveal the ways in which your threshold needs to be better fortified.
Become curious—are you a sign seeker? Be honest with yourself before God. Where, what, or who do you turn to as a means of spiritual self preservation while your heart remains unguarded.
Ask Him to give you eyes to behold the “something greater” that is here.
CADENCE & CONVERSATION—
an invitation to reflect on and share what the Lord is revealing to you in this season. Use this as a personal and private extension of reflection or use it to share your heart with other readers in this community of fellow pilgrim-souls. I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
In her book, Thin Places: An Evangelical Journey into Celtic Christianity, Tracy Balzer says,
“A truly thin place is any environment that invites transformation in us, helping us as believers in Jesus to think and see and understand as he does. Any place that creates a space and an atmosphere that inspires us to be honest before God and to listen to the deep murmurings of His Spirit is thin.”
Where have you experienced a thin place in your life? What did it feel like? Were you open to the stirrings of the Holy Spirit in that space?
Consider how you might arrange your life during this season in order to truly listen to the murmurings of the Spirit in your life. What things need to change in order for you to be honest and welcome transformation when it meets you at the threshold of your heart.
CADENCE & CUE—
The final stop in each offering—a cue to still your soul before the things that are good, true, and beautiful as you ponder how you might carry them with you into your season!
A simple Celtic blessing to take with you journey into this autumn season:
“The guarding of the God of life be upon me, The guarding of loving Christ be upon me, The guarding of the Holy Spirit be upon me, Each step of the way, To aid me and enfold me, Each day and night of my life.”
—from the Carmina Gadelica, a Celtic book of prayers, blessings, hymns, and folklores compiled from 1860 to 1909 by Alexander Carmichael.