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Liminal Living

Liminal Living

Auteur(s): Dr. Thomas J Rundel
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 Welcome to the Liminal Living Podcast, where we dive deep into the realm of liminal spaces—those transitional phases where uncertainty is our companion. I'm your host and curator of conversations, Dr. Tom Rundel, and it's my pleasure to serve as your guide through these uncharted territories. With a doctoral background in spirituality and leadership from Portland Seminary, my research has centered on the spirituality found in the narratives of liminality in the Bible, but I have expanded my research to include other faith traditions and cognitive science. Since our launch in 2023, we've been dedicated to exploring the nuances of dark nights and deconstructions, but our journey expanded to include insights from a diverse array of modern-day thinkers and artists. Through a blend of stories, practices, and perspectives, we provide valuable guidance for fellow travelers navigating their own liminal spaces. So, join us as we embark on this journey and embrace the uncertainty in order to uncover the hidden wisdom that lies within the liminal spaces of life.All rights reserved Christianisme Pastorale et évangélisme Philosophie Sciences sociales Spiritualité
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  • 164: Grand Theft Donkey: Palm Sunday Reflections

    164: Grand Theft Donkey: Palm Sunday Reflections
    Apr 1 2026
    Episode Notes: Summary of Arguments 1. Palm Sunday is a political confrontation, not a celebration. Tom establishes the historical and cultural context: Jerusalem at Passover swelled from 30,000 to upward of 500,000 people. Rome, aware of the uprising potential, flooded the city with military forces. On the same day Jesus processed in from the east on a donkey, Roman Governor Pontius Pilate rode in from the west on a war horse with full military escort — a deliberate display of imperial power. The crowd's response to Jesus was not festive; it was insurrectionary. 2. Every symbol in the passage is a declaration of war — or its subversion. The donkey, the cloaks, and the palm branches are not incidental details. Each one carries a loaded history. Riding a colt into the city was a messianic claim rooted in Zechariah 9:9 and the traditions of David and Solomon. The cloaks replicated the crowd's welcome of Jehu in 2 Kings 9, signaling a regime change. The palm branches were the national symbol of the Maccabean liberation, and "Hosanna" was the literal battle cry used to charge against the Syrians. The crowd was not worshipping — they were rallying. 3. Jesus seized the expectations of the people and then refused to fulfill them violently. He accepted the messianic symbols deliberately, but rode on a colt described in Hebrew as anah — poor, afflicted, oppressed. His kingship is subversive from the outset. He is not another Judas Maccabeus. He is not another Judas the Galilean. He is something the crowd had no category for: a Messiah who refuses to win through violence. 4. The neuroscience of the crowd explains the shift from "Hosanna" to "Crucify him." When political and religious symbols enter the picture, the brain's logic centers shut down and emotion centers light up. The crowd was not being fickle — they were being human. Their hopes were enormous, their suffering was real, and Jesus walked past all of it toward a cross. They felt profoundly betrayed. That betrayal is the hinge of Holy Week. 5. The pastoral challenge: give up faith in violence. The enduring message of Palm Sunday is that humans are tempted to believe one more act of force will finally set the world right. It never does. Seeds of violence grow more violence. Jesus entered as the king the world needed and refused to become the king the world wanted — and that distinction is everything. The episode closes with a call to lay down our own palm branches: the version of Jesus we've constructed to serve our preferred vision of power. Key Takeaways Palm Sunday is set against a backdrop of colonial oppression, military buildup, and a population at its breaking point — not a festive parade.Pontius Pilate's military procession and Jesus's entry happened simultaneously from opposite sides of the city — a deliberate counter-narrative.Jesus riding a colt was a deliberate, public claim to be the Davidic Messiah, fulfilling Zechariah 9:9.The Hebrew word for "humble" (anah) in Zechariah means poor, afflicted, and oppressed — God's definition of leadership is inverted from the world's.Spreading cloaks was not hospitality — it was a political act modeled on the crowning of Jehu in 2 Kings 9, a declaration that regime change had come.Palm branches were the national symbol of Maccabean independence; waving them was like raising a liberation flag."Hosanna" was a war cry meaning God save us now — the prayer of colonized people at their breaking point, not a gentle hymn.Neuroscience confirms what the crowd shows us: when political and religious symbols collide, logic shuts off and emotion takes over — in every age.The crowd's turn from "Hosanna" to "Crucify him" was not arbitrary — it was the grief of profound betrayal by someone who carried all their hope.Jesus entered as the king the world needed and refused to become the king the world wanted — and every demand that Jesus endorse our vision of power repeats the crowd's mistake. SponsorsQuoir Square 2 Class: https://www.bk2sq1.com/square-2-next-steps-into-reconstruction (Promo code: Liminal for 10% off)Kineo Center: https://www.thekineocenter.com/cohort (mention "Liminal" in Application for $100 off) Monk Manual: https://monkmanual.com/LIMINAL (10% off all merchandise) ConnectFind us on the web: https://liminalliving.simplecast.com/Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liminallivingFollow us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCseqDsKpQv2r7AbFfrWF0owFollow us on Patheos: patheos.com/editorial/podcasts/liminal-living Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
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    36 min
  • 163: Tom Rundel: Power Has No God: The Raising of Lazarus

    163: Tom Rundel: Power Has No God: The Raising of Lazarus
    Mar 25 2026
    Jesus is a wanted man. He’s been run out of Jerusalem twice, nearly stoned to death, and is hiding in the wilderness when word arrives: your friend Lazarus is dying. What he does next—and how long he waits before doing it—will raise more questions than it answers. In this message from John 11, Tom Rundel explores the theology of delay, the geography of exile, and the difference between the kind of love that shows up when it’s convenient and the kind that enters a tomb. Grounded in the Greek text, Black theology, liberation thought, and honest pastoral experience, this sermon asks: Where does God actually live? And who is supposed to do the unbinding? Key Take Aways God refuses the abstraction. The God of Israel knows proper names and local addresses. When the text moves from 'a certain man was ill' to naming Lazarus and his town and his family, it is making a theological claim: the God of Scripture sees specific people in specific places, not categories of suffering.Bethany is not incidental—it is the gospel. The town where Jesus performs his greatest miracle is the town built to house people politely exiled from the seat of power. God doesn't anointed in Jerusalem's temple. God is anointed in the group home for the sick and the marginalized. This is not the consolation prize of the gospel. It is the gospel.Phileo love has a ceiling. Tribal love—built on shared connection, affinity, and mutual benefit—withdraws when you become inconvenient, too loud in your grief, too different in your evolution. When Lazarus became sick and dependent and unable to reciprocate, Phileo couldn't hold him. It never can.Agape is different in kind, not just degree. Agape love is not built on what you share with the other person. It is built on the character of the person who loves. It moves toward the other at personal cost. It transforms the identity of the one who receives it. According to philosopher John Vervecky, this is Christianity’s singular contribution to the evolution of human moral consciousness.The delay is not a bug in the story. Jesus knew. Jesus loved. Jesus stayed. And Lazarus died anyway. The text doesn't resolve this—it sits inside it. The invitation is not to find a theological answer to the delay but to examine what kind of love we actually want: a controlling love that prevents suffering, or a humble love that enters grief and stands at the tomb.'Jesus wept' is not a footnote. It is the theological center. Embodied compassion precedes resurrection. God does not manage the moment from a safe distance. God enters inside it. And when Jesus says 'I am the resurrection and the life,' the 'I am' is the divine name—not a future promise but a present-tense encounter.We build our own Bethanys—communal and interior. Communities build systems that push the sick, the poor, the doubting, and the different to the margins and call it order. Individuals exile parts of themselves they fear won't be accepted. The story of Lazarus says: may it not be that way.The miracle belongs to God. The unbinding belongs to us. Jesus raises Lazarus. Then he hands the work to the community: 'Unbind him and let him go.' The church is not the source of resurrection life. It is the community that removes the grave clothes—of injustice, exclusion, shame, and old systems of merit—from the people God has already made alive.The kingdom doesn't arrive in halls of power. Every time Jesus escapes Jerusalem and lands somewhere else, the pattern is the same: the place of power cannot receive what love is doing. The kingdom rises from the margins—from Bethany’s humble streets, not Jerusalem’s religious machinery.What looks like the space between death and resurrection is actually the condition for growth. The old framework has collapsed. The new one has not yet arrived. Most of our faith operates in that threshold. It is not an obstacle to growth. It is the condition of it. SponsorsQuoir Square 2 Class: https://www.bk2sq1.com/square-2-next-steps-into-reconstruction (Promo code: Liminal for 10% off)Kineo Center: https://www.thekineocenter.com/cohort (mention "Liminal" in Application for $100 off) Monk Manual: https://monkmanual.com/LIMINAL (10% off all merchandise) ConnectFind us on the web: https://liminalliving.simplecast.com/Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liminallivingFollow us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCseqDsKpQv2r7AbFfrWF0owFollow us on Patheos: patheos.com/editorial/podcasts/liminal-living Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
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    38 min
  • 162: Tom Rundel: Jesus Performs and Unauthorized Miracle

    162: Tom Rundel: Jesus Performs and Unauthorized Miracle
    Mar 18 2026

    Episode Summary

    Jesus heals a man born blind using mud and spit — a deliberate echo of Genesis 2 and a declaration that the sacred arrives through the physical, not despite it. But the miracle is almost beside the point. The real story is what happens next: a twenty-verse interrogation by the Pharisees who cannot allow this healing to mean what it means, because it would unravel the world they've built.

    The disciples' first question — "Who sinned?" — reveals a theology of retribution that places the cause of suffering in the body of the sufferer rather than in the structures that produced it. Jesus dismantles the question entirely: Neither this man nor his parents sinned. With one word — neither — he breaks open the either/or logic that has defined this man's entire life.

    We also examine what it means that the man's parents are too afraid to speak, that the formerly blind man ends up being the freest person in the room, and why Jesus' final words to the Pharisees are among the most quietly devastating in all of Scripture: "Since you say you can see, your sin remains."

    Lent is the season that teaches us how to see — not just what to see. This episode is an invitation to ask: what are we most certain about, and could that certainty be the very thing obscuring our sight?

    Key Themes

    • The theology of retribution and why the church must repent of it
    • Incarnation: why Jesus healed with mud, not just a word
    • The Pool of Siloam and its prophetic significance
    • Power, narrative control, and how systems respond to unauthorized transformation
    • Perceptual confirmation bias as a spiritual condition
    • The freedom of those who have nothing left to lose

    Sponsors
    Quoir Square 2 Class: https://www.bk2sq1.com/square-2-next-steps-into-reconstruction (Promo code: Liminal for 10% off)

    Kineo Center: https://www.thekineocenter.com/cohort (mention "Liminal" in Application for $100 off)

    Monk Manual: https://monkmanual.com/LIMINAL (10% off all merchandise)

    Connect
    Find us on the web: https://liminalliving.simplecast.com/

    Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liminalliving

    Follow us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCseqDsKpQv2r7AbFfrWF0ow

    Follow us on Patheos: patheos.com/editorial/podcasts/liminal-living


    Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
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    36 min
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