Part I: Extended Time in a Narrow Space: The Value of Liminal Space

Continuous fire alarms ringing in my ear for several minutes… an alarm clock placed next to my ear at full volume… a sound that resembled a “laser buzz saw” like something straight out of a science fiction movie… and the occasional random jackhammer pounding just for fun.  These were just some of the sounds that assaulted my senses during a recent MRI exam—a new experience for me and one I won’t soon forget.  In a word the experience was: LOUD!

You get a lot of time to think when you are confined to an MRI tube for over an hour with strong magnets probing you from top to bottom.  As I lay there I realized that this MRI experience parallels real life in two important ways.  In this month’s issue I will address the value of spending extended time in confined and uncomfortable places—what is sometimes called liminal space; and in our next issue, I will discuss our daily struggle to hear the voice of God amidst the cacophony of life. 


I recently took part in a discussion group organized by a group called Lumunos called “Make a Living, Have a Life”. Our small group was composed of people from all over the country; we met by teleconference and were looking at the issue of calling—i.e., how we discover what God has created us to be and seek to live it out in the midst of our busy lives. (A small group like this is a tremendous resource to have when one is seeking to gain clarity and/or confirmation about one’s calling or God-given identity.) One of the ideas that we discussed our group was the idea of the value of spending time in liminal space as we seek to clarify our calling. 

Liminal space refers to times when we experience change and transition in our lives.  (In fact, Catholic Priest Richard Rohr suggests, in fact, that all meaningful transformation happens in liminal space.) It’s often a time in our lives where the old way we have been functioning seems to no longer “fit”, but we haven’t yet discovered or figured out the new way—at least not completely.  We may experience times of liminal space with regard to our job (also called our vocation, which may or may not be the same as our calling), our personal relationships, or even as we wrestle with bigger issues like our beliefs about the nature of God in general. Sometimes we choose to enter liminal space.  We may sense a leading from God to step out in faith toward the “next thing” on our journey even when we aren’t completely sure what that “next thing” is.  The experience of Abraham comes to mind.  God said, “Go the land I will show you,” and on that basis Abraham set off on a journey that would change his whole life, and also entered a time of tremendous change and transition that must have lasted a very long time.  Other characters in the Biblical story had similar experiences as they respond to God’s call in their lives. 

So sometimes we voluntarily choose to enter liminal space, but more often, it “chooses us.” That is to say, a set of circumstances come to us unexpectedly that force us into a time of abrupt change and transition.  Perhaps we’re laid off from a job without warning or a significant relationship abruptly ends—e.g., breakup, divorce, death.  There are many life circumstances that can send us into a time of involuntary liminal space. 

As many of you know, my wife and I had such an experience in May 2008 when we gave birth to our identical twin daughters, Rebecca May and Hope Marie.  We went to the hospital at 37 weeks (full-term for a twin pregnancy) with all indications being that our daughters would be born healthy. Two bassinets were ready to receive full-term healthy babies. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to us, Hope had suffered catastrophic brain damage in utero (that was never diagnosed despite countless doctor’s visits during pregnancy) and two days after she was born, Laurie and I had to make the painful choice to let her pass from life support to life eternal. 

On the day Hope and Becca were born, our entire family was thrust headlong into a time of involuntary liminal space. The experience has shaken both of us to our very core.  Our faith in God has remained as a foundation in our lives, and in fact I believe it is what has sustained us through many dark days. The specifics are different for each individual, but I think when you live through a tragedy like the one Laurie and I have lived through and have to struggle to “make sense” of something that simply doesn’t make sense, it forces you to fundamentally wrestle with how you relate to God.   You have to rethink almost all you thought you knew about God, and that can be very disconcerting—especially for a pastor and her spouse, who are routinely called upon to lead others into the presence of God.  Fifteen months later, I would say we’re still in that liminal space, perhaps seeing glimpses of some “new thing” that God may be building on the other side as a result of our experience, but whatever it is certainly is not fully formed yet.

As I was doing before this time of involuntary liminal space, I still seek to discover my calling and become ever more fully the person God has created me to be.  But now the experience of losing a child must be woven into the fabric of our story. Laurie and I would never have chosen to live through the experience of losing our daughter, but we hope and pray that the time we are spending in this liminal space of grief is preparing us for something as yet unrevealed to us—something good, something that will give someone else hope. Losing Hope was not good; I believe her death is and will always be, a tragedy.  However, I also believe that God can bring something good out of this tragedy; I cling to that hope as I try and rebuild my faith and move toward the future.