A Thin Place
Our friend from England, David Blackledge,
was visiting us here in Texas and he told us about a place called
Iona in the northwest of Scotland where he takes annual retreats.
He told us that others describe Iona as A Thin Place.
What he meant was that when pilgrims or tourists arrive on the
island of Iona they often report an easy, often unexpected experience
of the presence of God. A thin place is where the separation
between earth and heaven is thin.
His description made me want to go to Iona. I think I read about Iona in a book
I recommended in a past Tea Time, The Path of Celtic Prayer by
Calvin Miller. But it also got me thinking of my own experiences in what I would
also describe as thin places. When I am at a certain retreat center I feel that
the prayers of others through the years have prepared the way for my own prayer
experience to be sweeter. I don’t know how my place of retreat compares
to Iona, but hopefully some day I will be able to find out.
We all have our personal thin places. I have a place in my home where I regularly
sit and pray and take in God’s words for me. I don’t do Bible study
there, only prayer and meditation. That is a thin place for me, but not likely
one for others who sit on that same couch.
Genesis 28 describes how Jacob marked his thin place—where he heard God
talk to him—with a pillar out of the stone on which he laid his head the
night of the dream when God told him his purpose. He also gave that place a new
name—Bethel which means house of God,--and a new purpose as a
place of worship.
Sunday, May 11, was Mother’s Day, but it is also Pentecost Sunday. We can
note the thin place in which the events of Pentecost took place. Think of all
the meetings that were held in significant places in Scripture. After the Ascension
the disciples found a place, probably near the temple, where the disciples met
together for prayer. On Pentecost Sunday the place where they were praying became
the thinnest of all places when the Holy Spirit came upon them there. It was
in that place that they heard something like the wind, and saw something like
tongues of fire, and they began to speak in languages they didn’t know
to people gathered in Jerusalem.
Thin places create transformation. After Pentecost, John and Peter were arrested,
released, and returned to a place where the believers met together. They told
their experience and the people raised their voices in prayer and praise to God.
Acts 4:31 says:
“After they prayed, the place where
they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with
the Holy Sprit and spoke the word of God boldly.”
Thin places are real and important in our
lives. They mark significant times of transformation and change
us deeply. Do you remember a thin place?
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