Crossing the threshold.

Lucy peered out the wardrobe, her body wrapped warm by the surrounding furs—her face alive with the cold wintery air that greeted her nostrils. That is how I imagine eight year old Lucy from the Chronicles of Narnia as she gazes into an unknown world of wonder. There she stands, poised to cross a threshold from one world to another for the first time. There is a moment, and just a moment, when she needs to decide whether or not to enter. You need not be familiar with C.S. Lewis’ popular children’s novel. It presents a magical world, Narnia, a world of two stories. The first story is the one that thrusts itself upon young Lucy. The air is cold. It is winter; it is always winter. (Perhaps many of us can relate to that feeling after this long winter of 2014-2015.) The world is ruled by the White Witch and her nervous subjects submit to her, not quite knowing how she will turn. It is, by all measures, the real world. The world that Lucy can touch, and smell, and see, and hear, and taste. The second story offers a world that at first blush appears imaginary. The kind of imaginary world an eight year old would create. It is filled with talking animals the likes of a faun. It tells the story of the Land of Narnia before the White Witch had cast her spell, and it promises that someday winter will end, and all be healed. How, you might ask? The all-powerful lion Aslan will shatter the spell!

It is a wonderful story, and the novel draws you in as soon as you cross the threshold of the wardrobe with Lucy. It is not long before you too, want the second story to be true. There is something in all these talking animals are saying that is right. And while you and Lucy cannot see it, or touch, or taste it…it somehow seems to make sense. It is not only the story, but the animals, it is something you see in them—it is hope.

In the midst of the story with Lucy you begin to realize that she has been immediately welcomed—she belongs. In this “belonging,” she, and we with her, watch the animals “behave” and live with hope in the midst of frozen tundra. They are quite frankly, infectious. It is through being welcomed to belong and being surrounded by this behavior of hope, that quite quickly you find yourself believing—and praying—that the second story is true.

Consider another story, we read it in the Gospel…Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb…she goes and gets Peter and John and they run to the tomb. John bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed…Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying…then after speaking with the angels…she turned around and saw Jesus standing there…Jesus said to her, “Mary!”

Peter, John and Mary crossed the threshold that day…they went from one view of the world to another. Jesus will spend some number of days on earth being with a large number of people. These post-Resurrection moments will spread the news. On Pentecost, fifty days from today, God’s Holy Spirit will be poured out and the Church will be born. And people, people from all walks of life, will be invited to come and be welcomed to this life of hope—they will be invited to belong. These newcomers will watch a ragtag group of freshly minted disciples try and behave like their Risen Master. The New Testament chronicles that there will be disagreements and struggles, but through it all they will try and model their lives like Jesus. Over time this rebel group will grow amid the other world—the world of the Roman Emperor. With the exception of the Mediterranean climate, it is a world very similar to the White Witch’s world of Narnia. So these new people of hope will live a story in the face of a different story…and over time the number of people living that story, living as rebels, will grow to about 2 million people in about 200 years.

Today we celebrate this moment of crossing the threshold. We celebrate the moment in time when the stone was rolled away so that we might ourselves cross into a new world, a real world—and become people who live a story of hope. I must tell you I went to church for some 30 years before I figured this out. My church experience was not one of belonging, allowing me to see how people behaved—those people who believed that there even was such a threshold to cross. My experience was one of first believing. I was to accept all the precepts first—and then I was to behave—somehow I never got to feeling as if I belonged. In my world the second story, the story of hope got turned upside down. Maybe that happened to you? You should not be surprised, just read the Gospels. Jesus spent his public ministry pointing out to the religious of the day how they had turned God’s Story upside down…he pointed that out knowing all along he was going to shatter that world and put it right. And this, this shattering is the core of the story—the center piece—on which it, and all the world turns. That Jesus Christ has defeated sin and death. His tomb is empty. He stands and invites all to cross the threshold and live into this reality.

All of us today are somewhere in relation to this threshold. For those who have crossed it and accepted the hope—then I urge us to remember to not turn it upside down. To welcome those who are curious, to invite them to see you (and me) struggle to behave to follow Jesus, to let them understand what you believe. To those who are standing at the threshold, peering in, I say welcome! Come, sit with us for a while, feel as if you belong. And finally for those who once came into this world only to turn about and run out, to run out feeling either judged or rejected, please accept my apology—we don’t always get this “living a life of hope” the right way round—but it you might dare to cross the threshold again, I pray you will not only find hope, but find Him who calls you by name.

David Collum, Dean—The Cathedral of All Saints, Easter 2015