On The Threshold of a Dream ...

In the Beginning (Graeme Edge) -


I think...
I think I am.
Therefore I am!
I think...

Lovely to see you again my friend (Justin Hayward) -

Now that you're here, you're going to stay, cause it's...
Lovely to see you again my friend
Walk along with me to the next bend

Turn up the volume!

I once heard a great preacher (H. Joe Tyson) express that the Christian life is an endless series of three major movements:  Reflection, Vision, Action … Reflection, Vision, Action … Reflection, Vision, Action. Of course every individual is very complex, and this sequence, or thread, can be operating in different phases in many various aspects of our lives all at once. I’m pretty sure each of us has hundreds of these threads running simultaneously.

Sometimes several of these strands line up together when a significant event occurs such as a wedding or a graduation. Such “rite of passage” events are markers in our lives. Life on either side of the marker is very different. It’s as if the life you lead coming up to the marker has a little death, but leads to new horizons spreading before you as you embark on the new life just on the other side of the marker.

Spiritual events can be markers too. Accepting Christ as our Lord and Savior is an obvious one. As we lead our Christian lives there may be other times when we sense the presence of God in special ways such that we are no longer the same. An experience at summer camp, ASP, the Creation Festival, a retreat, an Emmaus Walk or Chrysallis experience, a seminar, a word said during a sermon, an inspirational reading, or perhaps God speaks to us in a way we’ve never noticed before through God’s word.

The first set of markers are somewhat predictable. Graduation, a wedding, your first full time job, have fixed dates we know when they are coming. Conversely, significant spiritual events are not predictable. Who can know when a person will respond to the urging of the Holy Spirit?

As this summer begins, we have a lot of graduations and weddings to celebrate! Hallelujah! These major rites of passage provide natural times for reflection and vision, as we anticipate and prepare for our next actions to follow.

I am very excited about the graduates and newlyweds that I know and I’m sure they are enjoying wonderful, and sometimes appropriately teary, times of reflection. I am also very excited for the spiritual rites of passage that we cannot see but I believe will be happening in the lives of many of our youth as they spend time at summer activities where I know the Holy Spirit will be hard at work in their lives.

In my ministerial life, the beginning of summer is a very exciting time for me to be reflecting on the lives of our youth, allowing the Holy Spirit to direct my vision as I prepare for the very active spiritual events of the Creation festival and ASP. On a different “thread”, I also must be appropriately open to the work of the Holy Spirit in my own life. As I move into the action season I can all too easily fall into the mindset of a busy, consumed, work-a-holic, and I could completely miss the “movement of the spirit”.

I pray God invites every one of us to appropriately slow down our minds, to allow a space for the Holy Spirit to take residence, to grow, and to transform our minds.

So graduates, newlyweds, church camp lovers, Creation enthusiasts, ASP team, lovers of the Holy Spirit, may we ALL reflect, and dream, as we prepare for action. But let us dream big dreams, colossal dreams, appropriate for our awesome God to fill. Let it be with you as Luke puts it in God’s words in Acts 2:17, “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.”

I am a product of the Hard Rock Music Generation of the 60’s. Please excuse the slightly new age sound of these lyrics. I read them as a Christian and I read what I want to read. To the pure, all things are pure. Intended or not, I see God in these lyrics. So, as the Moody Blues put it in April 1969, I think we are at every moment, but most especially at the beginning of this summer, “On The Threshold of a Dream” …

What dream is at YOUR feet? Reflect, Vision, and then take Action!  Put your foot “On The Threshold of a Dream” …

The Dream (Graeme Edge) -

Just as new life will come from death
Love will come at leisure
Love of love, love of life
And giving without measure

Gives in return a wondrous yearn
Of a promise almost seen
Live hand-in-hand
And together we'll stand

On the threshold of a dream....



Happy Hiking and God Bless,

- allen