In Transition

A sermon prepared by Rev. Tim Kutzmark
Sunday, January 21, 2007 • Unitarian Universalist Church of Reading

The Morning Reading:

“Platform Nine and Three-Quarters” by J.K. Rowling

Our reading this morning comes from the worldwide phenomenon “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” by J.K. Rowling.  In our selection, young Harry is about to depart his abusive childhood home and journey to the amazing Hogwarts, school of Witchcraft and Wizardry.  But there is a problem. 

Harry woke at five o’clock the next morning and was too excited and nervous to go back to sleep.  He got up and pulled on his jeans because he didn’t want to walk into the station in his wizard’s robes---he’d change on the train.  They reached King’s Cross [train station] at half past ten.  Uncle Vernon dumped Harry’s trunk onto a cart and wheeled it into the station for him.  “Where is this school, anyway?” [Uncle Vernon grunted.]  “I don’t know,” said Harry, realizing this for the first time.  He pulled the ticket . . . out of his pocket.  “I just take the train from platform nine and three-quarters,” he read.  His aunt and uncle stared.  “Platform what?” they asked.  “Nine and three-quarters, Harry answered.”  “Don’t talk rubbish,” said Uncle Vernon. “There is no platform nine and three-quarters.”  “It’s on my ticket,” replied Harry.  Uncle Vernon stopped dead, facing the platforms with a nasty grin.  “Well there you are, boy.  Platform nine--platform ten.  Your platform should be somewhere in the middle, but they don’t seem to have built it yet, do they?”  He was quite right, of course.  There was a big plastic number nine over one platform and a big plastic number ten over the one next to it, and in the middle, nothing at all.    (Adapted from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, pg. 89-91)

In Transition - A Sermon by Rev. Tim Kutzmark

He was quite right, of course.  There was a big plastic number nine over one platform and a big plastic number ten over the one next to it, and in the middle—and in the middle—nothing at all.

The phone rings.  It is my friend, calling from his cell phone. “Great God, I’m on my way!” he practically shouts at me, “New home, new life!  Freedom land, here I come!” That is Pete, a friend who has decided to move cross-country for a new beginning.  He has just packed all his belongings in a rented U-Haul truck.  It had been dreamed of for years.  Now, it was time to make the change.  After he says goodbye, Pete drives the U-haul out of Boston, a silly grin shining on his face.  Just past the city limits, though, something happens.  There is a problem.

Pete hadn’t known too much about how to prepare or pack for a move of this magnitude.  And, self-sufficient guy that he was, he didn’t ask for much help.  It would all just work out, somehow, he thought.  But, sometimes that which remains unspoken comes back and bites you in the butt, or in this case, in the U-Haul. 

This is what happened.  The furniture or the boxes or something shifted in the U-haul, and the truck suddenly tipped dangerously to one side, threatening to tilt over completely. The wheels on the right side of the truck barely touched the ground.   Everything was off balance.  Would one wrong move cause everything to come crashing down?  Now, this predicament wasn’t in his plan.  He was supposed to be moving on his way.  But here he is stuck in the middle between his past and his future and his furniture. 

Pete gingerly opens the door of the truck, eases himself out, and looks at the situation.  After about 10 minutes of just standing there watching his truck list to the left, Pete gets back in.  He carefully turns around and slowly drives back into town.  He parks in front of his old apartment.  The next morning, Pete opens the back doors of the truck and sells everything he owns.  Two days later, with just one suitcase to his name, he gets on a plane and flies to his new home.

My friend was making a change.  He was moving from one place to another.  He packed up, he said goodbye, and he left filled with hope and possibility.  But before he could arrive at his new home, before he could claim a new space, a new way of being, my friend had to move through a time of imbalance and uncertainty.  Pete could handle the leaving.  Pete could handle the arriving.  What he couldn’t handle was the middle place.

Have you ever felt trapped in the middle of something?  Have you ever felt stuck in the middle of change?

Celebrated change theorist William Bridges believes that what we typically call change is actually made up of two very different experiences.  There is change, and then there is transition.  There is change, and there is transition.

Change, William Bridges teaches, is a situational shift.  Change is an external shift.  For instance, my friend Pete physically moved from Boston to California.  This is a change.  Or, divorce papers are signed and ex-spouses go their separate ways: another change.  A husband dies.  A child graduates and leaves for college.  You start a new job.  You buy a new house.  You’re told you have cancer.  You retire.  You decide to leave the religion you grew up with.  Your growing church community closes down its sanctuary and shifts to a new location and a new routine.  Change is the external shift that is being made.

Most people, William Bridges says, do not resist change.  What they resist is transition. (The Way of Transition, William Bridges, p. 2)

If change is a fact, transition is an experience.  Transition is the internal result of change.  Transition is the internal shift caused by change. Says William Bridges: “Transition is the state that change puts people into, a psychological [and emotional] reorientation that people have to go through before the change can work.” (“Leading Transition: A Model for Change” by William Bridges and Susan Mitchell, Leader to Leader, Volume 16, spring 2000)

Whereas change can happen quickly, transition takes time.  You can have made the change, but still be in the beginning of the transition.

For instance, my friend Pete has moved into his apartment in California.  That is the change.   But now he is shaken by the loss of the friends he left behind.  How can he figure out how to build a new life in a place where he knows no one?  A divorced woman aches to find a new lover, but feels she should stay home and give time to her son.  “How do I do this?” she wonders.  A widower keeps referring to ‘our car’ and ‘our house’ a year after his wife’s death.  The college freshman cries herself to sleep every night.  “Why do I miss Mom and Dad when all I wanted was to get as far away from them as possible?”  You still haven’t figured out the office politics after a year on the job.  Retirement is much more busy than you expected.  You’re hoping that Unitarian Universalism might be the religion you’ve been looking for, but you still can’t explain exactly what UUs believe.

Transition is the internal journey caused by change.

According to William Bridges, that internal journey of transition has three parts.

First, “transition always starts with an ending.”  (“Don’t Forget to Manage the Transition Too,” from William Bridges and Associates web site)  Bridges writes: “In the ending, we lose or let go of our old outlook, our old reality, our old attitude, our old values, our old self-image.  We may resist this ending for a while.  We may try to talk ourselves out of what we are feeling, and when we do give in, we may be swept by feelings of sadness and anger.” (The Way of Transition, William Bridges, p. 5)

The second step in transition is what I’ve called the middle place, and what William Bridges calls the neutral zone.  As Bridges describes it, this is “the . . . zone between the old and new . . . This confusing state is a time when our lives feel as though they have broken apart or gone dead.”  (The Way of Transition, William Bridges, p. 5-6)  The middle place is the place of imbalance and questions.  In this middle place, “we get mixed signals, some from our old way of being and some from a way of being that is still unclear to us.  Nothing feels solid.”  (The Way of Transition, William Bridges, p. 5-6)  It is the place where we think something has gone wrong. 

Finally, comes the third step in transition: the new beginning.  Here, Bridges writes: “We take hold of and identify with some new outlook and new reality, as well as new attitudes and a new self-image.  When we have done this, we feel that we are finally starting a new chapter in our lives.  We have . . . a new sense of purpose and possibility.”  (The Way of Transition, William Bridges, p. 6)

This is the three-part path of transition: ending and letting go; the middle place filled with imbalance and uncertainty; and finally, claiming a new beginning and new reality. 

What I love about this model, this perspective, is that it is so true to our life. It honors the discomfort, the helplessness, the unknowing quality, of that in-between place.  It tells us that it is ok to feel confused and unsteady.  It also demands patience.  It tells us it won’t all happen at once.  It tells us that it will take time to figure it all out.  It tells us it will take time for us to grow into what is becoming.

This is the path of a spiritual journey.  This is the path of the spiritual journey we will together take as we prepare to leave this auditorium, this school, this temporary nomadic way of being.  This is the path of the journey we will together take, in about two months, as we move back to our enlarged church sanctuary.

Lately, we’ve been talking a lot about new beginnings.  We’ve been talking a lot about the excitement of our building project, the gifts of growth and so many new faces.  So many years have been spent dreaming and visioning, planning, and plotting.  Now, the renovations and construction are nearly finished.  The final details are all being worked out.  What color paint will we use in the ladies room?  What kind of cabinets will we buy for the new kitchen?  Should we have clear or frosted panels on the moving glass wall between the foyer and the new community hall?   How many more chairs do we have to buy, and will they have padding?  The physical move, the change is almost upon us.  But we are already “in transition.”

If we look closely, there are questions and uncertainties that fill this, our time in the middle place.  These will be the questions and fears that will walk back with us into our expanded church campus.  To not name our questions and fears, to not talk about them, might make our transition harder.  We might end up like my friend Pete, caught by surprise when suddenly everything shifts off balance.  We might find ourselves like young Harry Potter, ready to go, but not sure how to really get there.  We might be unprepared for the middles still to come.

What are the questions that change has placed in our hearts and minds?  I imagine some of those questions, some of those fears, might sound like this:

• Why did the sanctuary have to be changed?  Rev. Dick Woodman dedicated my children there.  Rev. Jane officiated my husband’s memorial service from that side pulpit.  I thought the sanctuary would be the one place that would always remain the same.
  
• In the new building, will we still feel like the same congregation?
• I used to know everyone.  Now I look around and I am not sure who half the people are.  And I don’t think they know who I am.
• Eight new members joined last month, six first time visitors came last week.  What will happen as we grow from 280 members to 320 and then maybe 380?  Are we going to have to get more organized?
• I’m new here.  I love the energy.  I love being at Parker Middle School.  Quit talking about change all the time and just be a church!
• What if the new building doesn’t look like we imagined?
• Don’t you dare change the color of the cushions on the pews.
• What if we don’t raise enough money and can’t pay for the building?  Will the bank foreclose on a church?
• What if the new Community Hall is already too small?
• What if we still need to go to two services to fit everyone in the sanctuary.  Will that split our community?
• What if not enough new people join us?  We built it for new faces.  Will we have done all this for nothing?
• I hear you’re about to hire a new part time Member Services Coordinator.  What the heck is a Member Services Coordinator?  This church was fine for fifty years without one.  Can’t Tim just work a little harder?
• With more families joining, and all the new kids, how will we ever find enough volunteers to teach the Church school classes?
• What about us older folks?  This is our church, too!
• I’m not sure there a place for singles in this family church.
• No matter what location we are in, I wish the services would stop being so busy and noisy.  I come to church to slow down, for quiet, and reflection.  Shhhh!
• What if our newer members don’t want to volunteer or become church leaders, and no more people become involved?  I think some of us are about to burn out!
• What’s with all this fundraising?  I’ve just joined the church and all anybody seems to do is ask me for money.  Is that what this place is really all about?
• I’m worried that once we’re done with all the building, we won’t have any direction.
• What is the mission that guides us beyond bricks and mortar?
• What if the toilets back up all the time like they do in Loring House?
• And, perhaps the most important question of all: When we get back into the sanctuary, will Tim finally figure out how to keep the services to under one hour?

Our arrival in our expanded sanctuary is about 65 days away.  The new community hall and office spaces are about five months from completion.  That’s time enough to consciously talk about our questions.  That’s time enough to consciously step into our transition.  We don’t need to walk it alone.  We have each other.  We have strong leadership.  Our Governing Board is hard at work setting up new structures to manage life in the new building.  Our Program Council is working as a team.  Our staff is skilled, and walking with us every step of the way.  The Rev. Terasa Cooley, our knowledgeable District Executive, will come here to work with us all on Sunday, February 18th at a special worship service and after church workshop on church growth and transition.

Change is coming, but our transition time is already here.  Let us claim it, let us embrace it, and let us use it together.  Then, we can truly say: “Great God, we’re on our way!”