Continuing her sermon series on Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes Pastor Michelle discusses the “inbetweenness” of transition and how it often takes an ending to make a new beginning.
Read Acts 9: 1-19 (Paul’s Conversion on the Road to Damascus) and consider the questions below in preparation for the message.
Questions for Reflection
- Disengagement. Dismantling. Disidentification. Disenchantment. Disorientation. These words connote aspects of natural experiences of ENDINGS. Think about when or around what life occurrence you experienced or acted out some or all of these things. Did you think you were ‘going crazy?’ And how did you make it through? Though we face them all the time, why are endings so difficult?
- The “betweenness” of the transition process is chrysalis-like. It’s called, “The Neutral Zone.” While no signs (or few) of life are apparent, much transformation (inner work) is percolating. To this end, find you own points of connection to Michelle’s teaching about Saint John of the Cross and his transformation process. What must die within before you can begin anew?
- “We come to beginnings only at the end. It is when the endings and the time of fallow neutrality are finished that we can launch ourselves anew, changed, and renewed..” (Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes, William Bridges). Yet identifying when we are leaving one phase to begin another is often difficult. Some ‘hints’ are external while others are internal. How do you know when you have arrived at ‘a new place?’ Describe the feeling or landscape.
- Relate the Apostle Paul’s story in today’s Acts text to the transition process Bridges describes. Name other characters in Scripture who have faced major life transitions.
- What ‘rite (s) of passage’ might you develop to help you transition through an important life process/event? What would you name it? Who might you invite to join you?
