March 2, 2014 Exodus 24:12-18 & Matthew 17:1-9 Pastor Betty Kelsey Creekside COB Going Up the Mountain Mount Lyell, at 13,000 feet, is the highest peak in Yosemite National Park. Some years ago, three friends climbed to the top of the peak. Two were experienced mountaineers, Ben was not. Their base camp was less than 2,000 feet from the peak, but the climb to the top and back would take most of the day, due to a glacier just before reaching the top. On, the morning of the climb they started out chattering and cracking jokes. As the hours passed, the gap between Ben and his companions grew wider. Being competitive by nature, Ben looked for shortcuts to catch up to them. There was an outcropping of rock ahead. The fact that the other two did not choose this path didn t register in Ben s mind. He started climbing across. Thirty minutes later he was trapped in a cul-de-sac of rock atop the glacier, looking down several hundred feet of a sheer ice, pitched at about a 45 degree angle. He was only about 10 feet from the safety of a rock, but one little slip and he wouldn't stop sliding until he landed in the valley floor below! It was nearly noon, and the glacier glistened in the sun, making it hard to see. Ben was stuck -- and scared! It took an hour for his friends to find Ben. Standing on the rock he wanted to reach, one of them leaned out and used an ice ax to chip two little footsteps in the glacier. Then he gave him the following instructions: Ben, you must step out and put your foot where the first foothold is. When your foot touches it, without a moment's hesitation swing your other foot across and land it on the next step. From that point I can reach out and pull you to safety. 1
That sounded real good to Ben, but his friend continued. As you step across, lean out from the glacier a bit. Otherwise, your feet may fly out from under you, and you will start sliding down. Ben s instincts on the edge of a cliff were to lie down and hug the mountain, not to lean away from it! Ben looked at his good friend, hoping he was kidding. But he had no reason -- or logic -- not to trust the expert. So based solely on trust in his friend, Ben stifled his impulse to cling, leaned out, and stepped up the icy stairway to safety. It took less than two seconds to find out if his faith was well founded. It was. 1 The trip up the mountain for Moses, or Elijah, or Peter, James and John were not fraught with the same physical dangers, but there certainly was reason for trust. They had no idea what God was up to. God told Moses to come up to the mountain and wait for tablets of stone with laws for the people. Moses had to sit half way up for 40 days and nights, until God called him further up the mountain. Looking at God s back, Moses reached out and took the tablets of stone to carry down to the people. I wonder if that encounter was exhilarating or frightening for Moses. Would you do it? Then there s Elijah s story. He had just demonstrated that God was more powerful than Baal. Ahab and Jezebel were on a rampage to hunt him down and kill him. Elijah fled to the wilderness and hid in a cave. God said, What are you doing here, Elijah? Go to Mount Horeb and I will meet you there. Elijah went to the mountain. There was a great wind, so strong that it split the mountains and broke rocks into pieces, but the Lord wasn t in the wind. After the wind came an earthquake, but the Lord wasn t in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but God was not in the fire. Then came the sound of sheer silence. Elijah could feel the presence of God, his fear was calmed, and he received strength for his next assignment from God. As was often the case in the Gospel stories, Jesus needed to get away to the mountains to pray. This time he took Peter, James and John along with him. While he was praying, Jesus face began to 1 Ben Patterson, Waiting, Leadership, Vol. 15, Number 1. 2
radiate with light, and his cloak turned a brilliant white. Moses and Elijah suddenly appeared with Jesus. The disciples were awe-struck by the scene, and Peter offered to build a dwelling for each of the guests. But a voice came out of the clouds. This is my Son, my beloved; listen to him. The disciples were terrified and fell to the ground. But Jesus said, Get up and don t be afraid. And when they stood up, Moses and Elijah were gone; Jesus was there alone. Jesus instructed them sternly, Don t breath a word to anyone about what you have seen. In all three cases, these characters were invited by God to the mountain. They were awe-struck in the presence of God. Their eyes were opened to the glory of God, and the experience was life changing. Each of them was instructed to go down the mountain and each was given a specific assignment to do. These are fascinating stories! Going to and coming from the mountain took a lot of trust in divine direction. Frederick Buechner tells the story of his daughter s struggle with anorexia, a secret the family tried to hide. There came a day when Buechner, himself, was in the pits of despair, worried that his daughter would never get well again. But then, in a dark night, came a message of hope, from an unusual quarter. Buechner writes: I remember sitting parked by the roadside once, terribly depressed and afraid about my daughter s illness and what was going on in our family, when out of nowhere a car came along down the highway with a license plate that bore on it the one word out of all the words in the dictionary I needed most to see exactly then. The word was TRUST. What do you call a moment like that? Something to laugh off as a joke of life? Or the word of God? I believe that there was some of both, but for me it was an epiphany. The owner of the car turned out to be, as I suspected, a trust officer in a bank. Not long ago he read an account of my story, found out where I lived, and one afternoon showed up with the license plate itself! It sits propped up on a bookshelf in my house to this day. It is rusty around the edges and a little battered, and it is also as holy a relic as I have ever seen. 3
When have you come to an unmistakable understanding of God s glory? What symbols or signs do you hold precious because they represent a revelation of God to you? Before I left for Holland, my pastor gave me a small stylized bronze figurine of Christ with his arms raised to heaven. I had often admired the figurine in his office. Little did I know how significant that figurine would become in the days ahead. Three months after arriving in Holland, my father died. Without family to share the grief with, that figurine became a comforting word from God that said, Lo, I am with you always. I put the figurine on my window ledge, with the church across the street as its backdrop. I wish I could show you the figurine, but I lost it! I keep hoping someday it will show up, because I can t find anything like it on the internet. I m curious if you have personal stories of a time you met God in a significant way? Is there a symbol or situation or place that became a God-instance for you, like that figurine became for me or the license plate did for Buechner? I invite you to just name those symbols or places out loud, just a word or phrase. Anyone game? [I expect someone to say Camp Mack!] Sometimes we d like to hurry our transfiguration -- transformation -- along. We think because we go to church that we should know all about God. But the little epiphanies of discovery come one experience at a time. One understanding builds on another. Revelation that comes slowly builds a stronger faith. There is a story about an amateur naturalist who saw a butterfly struggling to get out of its silky cocoon. Its chrysalis had almost completed its transformation from caterpillar to butterfly, and was just about ready to break out of that cocoon. The amateur watched closely, fascinated by this miracle. Then he did an unwise thing. He took out his pocket knife and cut through the fibrous covering so the butterfly could get out. The butterfly emerged without a struggle and flew around, but it was very weak. What the amateur didn t know was that the very struggle to leave the cocoon was an important part of the butterfly s developing its strength. 4
Jesus had a reason for taking Peter, James and John along up the mountain. Jesus had just asked the disciples, Who do you say that I am? Then he had told them he would soon die. The disciples were stunned! It was inconceivable that this messenger of God -- the Messiah -- should be killed! But just as Elijah s and Moses experiences bolstered their trust in God, so was the disciples faith strengthened. It prepared them for times ahead when they would provide leadership in the early church. Against the pushback of the Romans, they knew whose they were and who they followed. John wrote about the transfiguration experience in his gospel, We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only (John 1:14). Peter also wrote, We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to Him from the Majestic Glory, saying, This is my Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with Him on the sacred mountain (2 Peter 1:16-18). Note that the transfiguration of Jesus took place during prayer, not during Jesus public miracles or a teaching session. The time and place were right for this revelation of Jesus as God s Son. It wasn t a cognitive head recognition, rather an experiential heart recognition. It was life-changing and faith-strengthening. So be brave. Trust the steps God carved for you, and lean back in faith. Grab hold, and let God get you up the mountain. 5