Come Down from the Mountain

Last Epiphany
Luke 9:28-36
St. Andrews Church

        I have a confession to you before I start--you need to know that I am usually quite hard on the disciples.   They amuse me; they never quite seem to get it, and yet when I'm hard on them, I also know it's because I'm looking through a 21st century lens.  I already know if not the rest of the story, the story of the final and complete Kingdom of God, I do at least know the rest of the story through the death and resurrection of Jesus as well as the institution of the church.  Parts of the story they don't know.  Parts of the story they have yet to experience but about which they are being told. And so, I am often amused by if not embarassed for them.  You know that gland on the side of your neck that seems to throb when someone is doing something incredibly embarasssing and you see it by they have no idea?
        But today that's not exactly how I feel for them.  Today I think to myself, "I get it.  You're on a mountain top having an amazing experience of God, and you want to freeze it. You want to put it in a box and keep it safe and secure and not let anyone or anything distract you from it."  In fact, I want to do that, say that. I want to help them keep the experience intact and exact, but again through my 21 st century lens, I already know that's not what happens. That's not what can happen, they will come back down, they have to come back down the mountain.  This intense moment of being in the presence of God will end; it has to end.   Let's go back for a moment; let me explain to you why I feel so deeply for them; allow me tell you why I can understand their wanting to stay right where they are, why I want to stay there,  and then travel with me from what I want and what I believe the disciples want to what I believe God is actually asking of us.
        Indulge me for a moment-to really understand what is happening in this Gospel, I think it is important to know what has just happened.  We need to know about the conversation that took place 8 days ago.    It wasn't one of those moments we may cringe at for the disciples lack of getting it.  It wasn't one of those "pick me please as the best" moments one of those moments when they are fighting over who will sit next to Jesus in heaven moments, moments where we shake our heads at them.  No, this was a conversation in which Jesus asks his disciples who do people say I am, and then after that he asks who do you say I am.  And Peter, he answers; he confesses, “I say you are the Messiah.”  He has laid his faith on the line--professes his faith, and then Jesus tells him what that is going to mean for him.  Jesus tells them that he, Jesus, is going to "undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised." And he tells them that people who follow him are lso going to suffer, they are going to die.  That's the back knowledge--that is the exchange they have just had.  The words they have just heard; and then Jesus, Peter, John and James go up on the mountain to pray.   
        Jesus, Peter, James, and John go up on the mountain to pray and despite being weighed down with sleep, these three disciples witness the transfiguration of Jesus.  They see his glory; they hear the voice of God saying, affirming what Peter confessed before heading up the mountain, "This is my Son, my Chosen, listen to him." And I don't blame them for wanting to freeze this moment.  I understand their desire to build three booths for Moses, Elijah and Jesus and to just stay there in the intense moment and presence of God.  Somewhere in the back of their minds, I wonder if they are thinking about what Jesus had just told them about suffering and dying, and I wonder if they are thinking, "Hey I've got a good idea.  Let's just stay here and skip all that stuff.   Let's just stay here and bask in the glory of God.  This feels good.  Let’s just skip all that suffering and dying.”
        Have you ever thought like that? Have you ever in a deep moment of prayer or in a walk on the beach or watching a sunset or at the birth of a child or in some other moment or place felt the immense, powerful, extraordinary presence of God and just wanted to stay there?  I suspect some of the youth here today may have had this experience at All Saints.  I know my children have--they have felt so close to God there that they haven't wanted to come home. (One of them told me last night that's why she's so grumpy when she comes home, what we call the "renetry phase."  “It’s because,” she said, “I don’t want to leave.” When and if we have these moments, we want to bottle them, and keep them forever.  I once asked one of my children what it was he  loved so much about All Saints, and the response was, "I just really feel close to God there."  All Saints for many is a mountain top experience.  
        Unfortunately what many of us including our youth know is that life isn't made up of only mountain top experiences.   We have to come down from the mountain, we have to return to our ordinary lives and sometimes we even have to go through some valleys, some deep and painful valleys.  Sometimes we may not even feel the presence of God at all as we move through our days.  Perhaps there are times when we doubt that God exists or wonder if God cares.  So I get it; I understand why the disciples wanted to just stay there.  They knew what was waiting at the bottom of the mountain and they didn’t want it.  They wanted to stay.  And yet, they can't, we can't.  We must come down the mountain and live our faiths in our ordinary and sometimes broken lives, in this ordinary and broken world.  Living in the presence of God is not just mountain top experiences; it is not just professing our belief in Christ.  It is also living our belief, living our faith.  Thomas Groome a Christian educator in the Roman Catholic Church says, "lived Christian faith involves believing, trusting, and doing God's will."[1]
        I don't know about you, but I sometimes struggle with that.  How do I live my faith, how do I stay in the presence of God in the midst of dirty laundry, never ending carpools, and frantically moving from one thing to another.  Perhaps you wonder how to live out your faith, stay in the presence of God in long days of solitude or in your work or school or play.  I believe it takes intentionality.  Remember Jesus and the disciples went up the mountain to pray.  They intentionally sought a connection to God.  What I need to hear as well is that their prayers were not perfect; they didn't pay perfect attention and do it "right".  They didn't have the perfect formula, the perfect way, and they didn't even pay 100% attention.  No they were weighed down with sleep.  They were distracted by their exhaustion, and yet despite that, God showed up.
        God does show up in our ordinary every day messy chaotic broken lives.  Although what we want, what we deeply desire are the mountain top experiences, what we typically get are still small voices, small whispers that if we don't pay attention enough we miss.  Sometimes we have to look for God a little bit harder than the disciples did on that mountain.  And sometimes God shows up in places and in people we would never expect.  I challenge that sometimes God shows up in places and people we don't want God to be.  Maintaining a prayer life no matter how fragmented that may be, does help.  The power of prayer is that it mediates the presence of God.  Prayer moves us deeper and deeper into connection with God and it is from that connection that we are better able to see and hear God in the world.   But we have to look, to pay attention, to be open to the myriad ways God shows up in the world.  
        We can also help each other.  Gathering to worship, gathering to be together as a community is in and of itself a prayer.  It is a desire to find and feel the presence of God in the midst of us all.  Gathering at the altar rail for communion is also an intentional seeking of the presence of God.  We bring to the rail our brokenness, and our vulnerabilities, and we also bring our hopes and joys and dreams not just for ourselves but for the world.  We kneel next to each other; we kneel next to those we like and even sometimes next to those we don't.  We kneel next to those with whom we agree politically and theologically and even sometimes next to those we don't.  But in coming to the altar together, we are seeking to feel the presence of God; we are deliberately searching for God, and we are asking for renewal, for strength to return to our ordinary messy lives outside of the church--we are asking for strength to leave the mountain and to not only still encounter God in the world but also to bring God to the world.  It isn't easy; it takes practice and patience and forgiveness of ourselves and others.  It takes strength and humility; intentionality and desire.  
        I invite you to bring all these things and more.  Bring yourselves, your hopes, your dreams, your hurts and your fears and come and be fed.  Come to the altar, bask in the presence of God, and partake, dwell in Christ and have him dwell in you.  Come and partake of food for the journey.  Amen

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[1] Thomas H. Groome, Sharing Faith:  A Comprehensive Approach to Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry, the Way of Shared Praxis (New York:  Harper Collins Publishers, 1991), 18.