Rev. Eric Anderson What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Mountaintop

Jesus and three of his disciples had a mountaintop experience of God’s presence and love. Can we bring our mountaintop experiences into our troubled times?

Here’s a transcript:

This Sunday is the last one before the beginning of Lent. That makes it Transfiguration Sunday, so I’m thinking about the seventeenth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel (Matthew 17:1-9), Matthew’s account of Jesus’ Transfiguration.

Jesus went up a mountain with his three closest friends: Peter, James, and John. While they were there, Jesus began to glow with some kind of inner light. Two other figures joined them on the mountain that they recognized as Moses and Elijah. Simon Peter offered to build some shelter and prolong the moment. A voice from a cloud, however, said that “This is my beloved son: Listen to him.” A moment later, the cloud was gone, the light was gone, Moses and Elijah were gone, and Jesus was saying to Peter, James, and John, “Get up, and do not be afraid.”

The Transfiguration of Jesus is a mystery. It has been a mystery since those first three disciples experienced it (alongside Jesus, of course). It was a mystery to them as they continued to follow him through Galilee and on to Jerusalem. I’m sure it was a mystery to those that they first told about it after Jesus’ resurrection. It was a mystery to Matthew, Mark, and Luke as they recorded it in their Gospels. And it’s been a mystery to all the rest of us over the centuries who have read it and sought to understand it — especially to those of us who have to preach about it.

We usually call significant religious experiences “mountain top experiences” based, in part, on this example from the Scriptures (there are other examples in the Scriptures as well). Mountains tend to be places where people have significant religious experiences, but they can have them in other places.

The point is that great epiphanies, great revelations of the heart and mind of God, are rare. We, most of the time live with the guidance we receive from Scripture, or from what we’ve been taught, from the example of other people around us. It’s not that common for a voice to sound from a cloud and say, “This is my beloved son: Listen to him.”

But most of us have something like that in our lives, some moment faith touched us more deeply than it had before, some kind of mountaintop experience unique to each one of us.

Hold on to the mountain top experience. Remember to bring its assurance down into the valley, not because the mountaintop experience makes you right about everything else, but because the mountaintop experience reminds you of the ever-present grace and love of God.

The first thing that Jesus said to his friends after that overwhelming experience was, “Do not be afraid.” Friends, I think that is what mountaintop experiences are for. When we’re down in the valleys and things are not going well, we can recall what we experienced that went so deep.

And in that memory we do not need to be afraid.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

Rev. Eric Anderson What I'm Thinking

What I’m Thinking: Epiphany

The story of the visit of the wise men spends more time with Herod than with Jesus – but they knew which was the better find.

Here’s a transcript:

As I begin this first installment of What I’m Thinking for 2024: Hau’oli makahiki hou! Happy New Year to one and all.

I’m thinking about the Gospel reading for this coming Saturday, January 6th, which is found in the second chapter of Matthew (Matthew 2:1-12), and I’m taking the freedom to use that reading for Sunday. Saturday, you see, is Epiphany. It’s one of the most ancient celebrations of the Christian Church.

Epiphany means “revelation” or “manifestation” and in its origins it celebrates the incarnation of God in Jesus of Nazareth. Over the centuries, and especially in relation to the Christmas holiday, it has come to be the day on which we celebrate the arrival of the Magi after the birth of Jesus. Accordingly, I’m thinking about the second chapter of Matthew, the arrival of the magi.

Again, over the centuries so many ideas and beliefs have been attached to this story. Because there were three gifts, the assumption has come to mean that there were three Magi. It doesn’t say how many there were or weren’t. Magi, which in its origin means wise man or scholar or even astrologer, even magician (the root is the same for the English word magician), well those got transfigured into monarchs, into the “We Three Kings of Orient Are.”

And of course we tend to skip over what actually occupies most of this story, which is their interaction with King Herod, ruler of Galilee and Judea at the time.

They believed from the star that they saw that a new king had been born for the Jewish people, so they went to the place where the king was. The king, however, knew nothing about it, but he did know enough about the beliefs in a promised Messiah to ask where the Messiah was likely to be born. Then he sent the magi there to Bethlehem with the instruction that they come back and tell him so that he also could go to bring gifts, to pay homage. In reality, of course, when the Messiah comes, that places the rule of existing monarchs and emperors and all the rest of them at risk. He wanted to know where this Messiah was in order to eliminate a threat.

As a result, the wise men were warned in a dream not to return to Herod and they went back to their homes by another way.

The funny thing about this story is that it spends most of its time in Jerusalem with Herod and the Magi, and then Herod and his own scholars, and then Herod and the Magi again. That’s the bulk of the words. Yet the main event is the incarnation of God in Jesus. The main event is the child that they saw with his mother Mary. The main event is their recognition of God’s profound gift not just to Israel but to the world.

Herod wouldn’t see it. The Magi almost didn’t see it — if they had been content to simply accept Herod’s assurances that there was no new king born for Israel — but the Magi did follow the clues that were there: the star, the prophecy, the star again, and they found not just what they were searching for but something that was even greater than they could imagine.

As we approach this Epiphany, as we approach this recognition of God’s profound gift to the people of the earth, let us follow the example of those ancient wise people: continue our search for the manifestation of God here in the world, to continue our search, bring our gifts, and return to our homes with profound joy.

That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.