The Thin Place

by Ian Doescher

Have you ever heard something called a “thin place”? A thin place is a specific location or a particular situation in which one senses that the divine realm and the human realm are very close to one another. The isle of Iona is known as just such a thin place. On the island, you can sense the presence and profundity of those who have been there before—Christians from throughout history as far back as St. Columba.

Thin places are not just geographical regions, though. Thin places can be times in your life when something happens that seems to make the line between God’s realm and our human realm almost nonexistent. Recently, I was with a couple whose five-month-old grandson recently died of SIDS. The husband of the couple said he had a sense that the child’s death was connected deeply to everything around him—an early fall leaf dropping from a tree, the laughter of his family, the shared grief of all those who have lost loved ones. He is in a thin place right now.

Thin places—particularly those that result from various life situations—can’t be planned or anticipated, but we should watch for them and take advantage of them when they come. In the thin place, we go searching for God only to find that God is already waiting to meet us.

“God said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’”--1 Kings 19:11-13