“A Mountaintop Experience”

Luke 9:28-43a

February 19^th and 22^nd, 2004

Saint Paul UMC

Rev. John A. Fleming

I would like to invite you to be a part of a vacation that I went on now some four or five years ago now. This was back in the days before Annie Grace and back in the days when every other year I got to choose where the Fleming Family Vacation would be. It is different now; with Annie Grace in the world, vacations are different now. Shortly after we moved here, Susie heard about a family in this church where one entire side of the family vacations together. She thinks that it is a great idea and so this summer, for the second year in a row, we will spend a week in Gulf Shores with Susie’s parents.

Back in the days when I had a voice in where we went, I chose one of two places. I either chose a week in Atlanta, full of sightseeing, but mostly attending Atlanta Braves baseball games, or I chose the mountains. There is something about the mountains and being near them that I just love. I love seeing the sun rise and set against the backdrop of the mountains. I do not like to ski, but I love the mountains. To be honest with you, I had a bad experience on a youth ski trip now some ten years ago, though being with fifty or so youth was not what made the experience bad for me. What made it terrible for me was that for three days, I fell down the mountain. On the first morning, I went to ski school. I had never been skiing before. I paid for a day’s lesson. The young instructor was compassionate and patient. I was twenty-five years old or so. Most of my classmates were nine or ten years old. Our class took a break for lunch and when it was time to come back, I was the only one who still needed lessons. But I want you to know that after a couple of more hours of lessons, I was able to conquer the bunny slope. For the next two days, my wife to be, a counselor on this trip, watched me as I fell down a mountain or two in Crested Butte, Colorado.

So I am not a big fan of skiing, but I love the mountains. This vacation, this week in Breckenridge, Colorado that I am asking you to be a part of this morning, is in the mountains. Susie and I flew near there with her mother. Now I know that spending a week with your mother-in-law does not sound like a vacation, but Susie’s mother is great. We went to Colorado to see Susie’s brother, who was trying to find himself while working in a resort town, driving a bus from ski lift to ski lift. The week was one of not worrying about what was happening at the church where I worked. It was a week of sleeping late and eating breakfast at this great bakery every morning. In the middle of the week, we rode halfway up the mountain in a Hummer and were guided on a snowmobile ride. I do not mind telling you that as much as I dislike skiing, I loved driving that snowmobile. I think that that must have been the way that God intended it, riding on snow with an engine in front of you! Near the end of the week, maybe even the day before we left, we rode a ski lift and then a tram to the top of a mountain. There was a great restaurant up there. A church whose stained glass windows were amazing and whose roof was full of snow was also up there. And the view from the top of the mountain, took my breath away. It was almost the time for us to catch one of the last trams down the mountain when it hit me. I did not want to come home. I wanted to stay up there with Susie’s brother and find myself. I knew that I could not do that. First of all, because I could not afford to live in our condo for more than a week. And second, there were some people at the foot of the mountain (not physically, but literally, back in Arkansas) who needed me to come home to be one of their pastors. Now you will know this, these mountain top experiences, help us do the things that God needs for us to do and to live the life that God expects us to live.

You may already know this, but mountain top experiences do not always happen on mountaintops. Sometimes they happen on beaches at a time when we are struggling and trying to decide what we are going to do with the rest of our lives. It has been almost two years since I shared any of my call to the ministry with you. I will tell you the entire story in another sermon, but part of my call had to do with a youth retreat, my first one, that I led to Panama City, Florida..

Fast forward with me to the last night of that retreat. There on the beach are the youth and the counselors that I took on that retreat. We have just worshiped and I have just asked them to spend a little time on the beach thinking about where God was leading them in their lives. I am there, with my knees near my chest, doing just that, and doing it by praying. Friends, I had felt the tug of God in my life and doing what I am now doing for some time. But I was like Moses. I needed a burning bush and God’s voice coming out of it. I asked for such a sign. When I lifted my head in prayer, looking out over the ocean waters, on that clear, star filled night, a shooting star streaked across the sky. Now I do not know if the star was intended for me, but there, on the beach, I had a mountaintop experience. The memory of it, my ability to go back and visit it from time to time is better than any vacation or any retreat or any book or any seminar that I have ever been to.

Could it be that that is a pretty good description of what is happening in our scripture lesson for this morning, this story of what happened inside Peter, James, and John, eight days after Jesus had said some of the hardest things to his disciples that he had said? Eight days before the four of them made their way to the mountain, Jesus had told his disciples about his upcoming arrest, death, and resurrection. On the heels of it, he had told them, that following him meant denying themselves, taking up their crosses, losing themselves, and following him. You see, friends, we are at a turning point in this gospel. In less than nine verses rom the ending of the lesson that we read, Jesus takes his first step towards Jerusalem and the cross. Luke puts it this way, “He set his face to go to Jerusalem.”

Let us not get ahead of ourselves. Let us go back to the trek up the mountain, eight days after Jesus had said these hard things to the disciples. I want to remind you that being up on a mountain is important in Luke’s Gospel. I missed saying that to you last Sunday because of the snow. But in this gospel, Jesus goes up on mountain tops to be near God and to pray, and He goes down the trail to the valley to where the people are, to be with them. I do not mind telling you that on one hand I envy Peter and James and John for being up there with Jesus and seeing what they saw. But on the other hand, I would not have wanted to make the trek. We believe that this mountain was probably Mount Hermon in southern Galilee, though it could have been Mount Tabor. Whichever one it was, most commentators believe that the climb was a ten thousand foot one.

It is typical of Luke to have Jesus up there praying. This story is in three gospels, but this one is the only one that has Jesus and his disciples praying. Can you imagine the scene? Peter, James, and John, and Jesus, are all up on the mountain praying. My guess is that they would have prayed with their eyes closed. Most often when we pray that is how we do it. Peter, James, and John, with their heads bowed, Luke tells us, were weighed down with sleep. That has happened to you before, hasn’t it? Would you confess to your preacher that there has been a time in your life when you were praying and dozed off? Well, I will confess it to you. It was not the last time, but I remember a time in seminary when I did that. My roommate and I had nightly devotionals. It was his turn to do it, and I laid back on my bed to listen. I did not mean to. I heard the first words that my roommate said and the scripture lesson that he used. But the next thing that I remember was waking up, with the lights in our room turned off. I was caught. When you are caught, sometimes you say things to get out of being so. So I said, “Amen.” To this day, when I see my old roommate, he reminds me of the time that I fell asleep on God.

Peter, James, and John, must have thought that they were dreaming when they suddenly awoke and saw what they saw. Luke tells us that the appearance of Jesus’ face changed and that his clothes became dazzling white. And there, standing with Jesus were Elijah and Moses, and the three were talking about Jesus’ departure. Luke, by the way, is the only one who tells us what the conversation was about. The word that Luke uses here to describe the departure is the word that we have all come to know as “exodus.” That is important. There is so much symbolism here in this story, so many illusions to Old Testament passages that if we are not careful, we would miss. It would remind us of Moses being up on Mount Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments, coming down the trail and not realizing that his face was shining. It could remind us of God leading the people to the promised land with a cloud during the day and a pillar of fire at night.

That is not where I want us to focus this morning. I want us to look back at those disciples. Did they understand what was happening? How could they? And how about us, do we understand what happened on the mountaintop? Oh, how I would love to be able to understand the power of a moment when the power of the moment actually happens! It is, most often, only when we look back at something powerful or maybe not so powerful that we see what God was trying to show us in the moment. In the church, we call these moments epiphanies and in between the time of Christmas and today, our Sunday scripture lessons have been stories of epiphanies, manifestations of God’s presence with us. They begin with the wise men following a star and then end up here on this mountain. More times than not, we do not understand epiphanies in the moments that they happen. Peter, James, and John certainly did not understand their mountaintop experience. If they had, Peter never would have tried to form a building committee and suggest that they construct structures to stay up on that mountain for the rest of their days. Luke even tells us that Peter did not know what he was saying. How could he know?

Well, it was God’s voice that interrupted the suggestion. Luke tells us that a cloud overshadowed them and that as they entered the cloud, they were terrified. I would have been, too. Out of the cloud came what I think was God’s booming voice. It was not the first time that God’s voice had thundered from the heavens. Back in the chilly waters of the Jordan, as Jesus came out of the baptismal waters God’s voice had spoken to Jesus. God had said, “You are my Son, whom I love. With you I am well pleased.” Now the voice has changed tenses and the one that God is speaking to is not Jesus, it is the disciples. Since we are disciples, God’s words are for us, too. God says, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him.” Luke ends the lesson by telling us that the disciples kept silent in those days and told no one what they had seen on the mountain.

Which is good, I guess, because it would have been hard for anyone to believe or even understand what happened up there. Two thousand years later, preachers like me are still trying to explain what happened up there. We have tried. I try every year. This year I do not think that I will attempt it. Instead, I think that I will just invite you to think back to a time, a happening in your life that at the time didn’t seem all that important, but now, for some reason, does seem so.

It could have been a shooting star, but it probably was not one. Most likely it was a little less than that. In fact, it probably was something that, if it were not for me now bringing it up, you might have missed. The moment may have been a phone call from a friend when you were hurting. It might have been a doctor’s prayer just before surgery. It could have been the Christmas Eve service when you heard a word of hope. There is a chance that it could have been a visit from a friend. It is anything that has caused you to say, “It is good to be here. Let’s stay awhile.” Just hear this simple thing from me this morning. If it were not for these things, these epiphanies, these presences of God, well, life down in the valley sure would be hard. Did you notice what Jesus and his disciples encountered at the foot of the mountain? There was more trouble and more people needing His help. Those people need us. Let us pray.