Landscapes of Lent: Mountain

The First United Presbyterian Church

“Lenten Landscapes: Mountain”

Rev. Amy Morgan

March 8, 2020

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Psalm 121

I lift up my eyes to the hills-- from where will my help come?

 2 My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.

 3 He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.

 4 He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.

 5 The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade at your right hand.

 6 The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.

 7 The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.

 8 The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore.

Exodus 3:1-14

Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed.

 3 Then Moses said, "I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up."

 4 When the LORD saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am."

 5 Then he said, "Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground."

 6 He said further, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.

 7 Then the LORD said, "I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings,

 8 and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

 9 The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. 10 So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt."

 11 But Moses said to God, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?"

 12 He said, "I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain."

 13 But Moses said to God, "If I come to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?"

 14 God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." He said further, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'I AM has sent me to you.'"

What is your favorite church or place of worship you would recommend to others? This question was posed on a local Facebook page a few weeks ago. Scattered among recommendations for various churches around town were these comments: “Rocky Mountain National Park. Services 24/7/365.” “All those big pointy things to the west and south of Loveland.” “The mountains” “Dunraven trailhead up to bulwark ridge and all the attached trails.” “The mountains!!!” “The Rocky Mountains” “Anywhere in the mountains” and, totally unrelated but still my favorite: “The church of the holy golf course.”

Most of the time, when a stranger discovers that I’m a pastor, they first begin to explain to me all the reasons they don’t go to church. Then, especially here in Colorado, they echo the comments on the Facebook discussion, sharing how they connect more meaningfully with the sacred in nature, especially in the mountains. It’s a wonder any of you are in church today.

Colorado has more mountains over 14,000 feet in elevation than all the other U.S. states combined and all of Canada, too. We have the highest average elevation of anywhere in the U.S.

This is all to say, even those of us who live on the high plains have the mountains in sight. We are mountain people to some degree. The soaring peaks inspire and shape our way of life…and our spirituality. We have what I would call a mountain theology.

Last week, we explored desert theology, which is characterized by vulnerability and trust in God’s provision. Today, we are exploring scriptures that describe mountain spirituality, a theology that is shaped and formed by “those big pointy things to the west and south” of us.

With Moses, we will travel today beyond the wilderness of last week to the mountains of God, Horeb (which is later called Sinai) and Zion, home to the temple of God. We will discover how God’s presence on these mountains forms and transforms the people of Israel in relationship to a God who is revealed and worshipped in the mountains.

Psalm 121 begins with eyes being lifted up to the mountains, seeking help. This Psalm is sometimes called the “Psalm of Sojourners,” and scholars believe it was written for those making a pilgrimage of some sort, possibly to the temple on Mount Zion. In lifting his eyes to the hills, the Psalmist may be feeling intimidated by the mountain heights, or he may be looking with hope to the mountain of God’s holy habitation. Either way, it is the creator of those very hills that he is confident will help and protect him. 

The Hebrew word shamar is used six times in the brief 10 verses of this Psalm, and it is often translated as “keep.” But not in the way you would “keep” a possession. It implies care and attention, watching over and protecting. The man and woman in Genesis are charged with cultivating and keeping the garden, helping it to grow and thrive and be well.

That is what God does in this Psalm, on both a cosmic and intimate scale. The God who will shamar, keep you from ALL EVIL, who will shamar, who will keep your whole life, who will shamar, who will keep your going out and coming in from this time on and FOREVERMORE…is also the God who will not let your foot slip on the rocky mountain trail and who will watch over you sleeplessly like a mother with a newborn. God will shamar, will keep us in the present, and in the unknown future. Whatever comes around the mountain bend, God will watch out for us.

One thing I love about this Psalm is how much it is not about us. It doesn’t say God will shamar, will keep “those who keep my commandments,” or “those who fear the Lord.” It is like we are helpless toddlers, just learning to walk. When we slip, when we slumber, when we lose our grip on God…God holds us up, God is alert, God never loses a grip on us.

This is the God people of the mountains know. A God who is with us in all our journeys, who guides and protects and keeps us along the rocky mountain trails of life, through all its twists and turns, in all its beauty and danger. When we are intimidated by those majestic mountains, both literal and figurative ones, we remember that the creator of those inspiring wonders is watching out for us, now and always and forever, in big, cosmic ways, and in small, imperceptible ways, too. 

This was not the God that Moses knew, however. Growing up along the low Nile delta, shepherding his father-in-law’s flock in the wide wilderness pastures, Moses knew that his people were lowly and oppressed. He knew they were enslaved by an unjust empire whose power seemed to have no boundaries.

After a deadly run-in with the powers that be, Moses sojourns into the wilderness. He marries and becomes a shepherd. He seems settled.

But in the course of his settled life, on a day that likely seemed as average as any, he sets out on an accidental journey that will transform not just his life, but the lives of his people, the lives of the Egyptians, and the course of history. In J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, Bilbo Baggins says to his nephew, Frodo, “It's a dangerous business…going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.”

When Moses steps out his front door on this particular day, he is swept off to the mountains, to Mount Horeb. Perhaps, like John Muir, he felt the mountains were calling and he must go. Or perhaps he is simply curious.

Moses shows up in this story with the courage to be curious. Wandering beyond the boundaries, turning aside to see, daring to ask questions of God, even as he is terrified of the encounter. Moses goes to the mountain with his eyes and ears open, ready to see and to hear. He stays curious, even in the terror of the divine presence. Hebrew words for seeing appear 10 times in this passage, and dialogue with the divine is at the center of this encounter.  For Moses, seeing and hearing leads to knowledge of the God. For God, seeing and hearing the oppression of the Israelites leads to knowing and responding to their suffering.

This is mountain theology. Courage and curiosity. Keeping your eyes and ears open. Showing up and staying curious, even when you’re afraid. Because your God is bigger than the mountains – because your God made those mountains - and your God will shamar, will keep you as you traverse those mountains, daring to journey outside our comfortable, safe boundaries, daring to ask questions.

This is the theology that has been embodied by this congregation from the beginning. From those first, founding members, folks who had made the long, dangerous journey from the east, curious about the west. They sojourned through the wilderness, and when they lifted their eyes to the hills, they built a church where they could worship the God who helped and kept them. When God called to them, they showed up, saying, “Here I am.” They taught Sunday school classes where they asked questions like, “who am I?” and “Who is God?” and “How can I?” Over the last 145 years, this church has been courageous and curious.

And we still are today. We keep our eyes and ears open to see and hear the suffering of those around us and to respond to it. We ask daring questions. About who we are as human beings, as Christians, as a community. We ask how God can use us. We ask who God is and what God is doing today in the world around us.

Donna Booth told me in my interview that “this is the church that shows up.” We say, “Here I am,” when we hear the call of those who are living without shelter, without food, without friendship, without faith and hope and love. We are curious about what is keeping people in poverty, keeping people living on the streets, keeping people living paycheck to paycheck. And we are on the lookout for God’s plan to help, which might very well involve us doing something daring and uncomfortable and even dangerous.

We are mountain theology, mountain spirituality people. We are driven by our curiosity and courage beyond the boundaries of church buildings, of the status quo, into places of wonder, mystery, and encounter with the holy. We have been shaped and formed and transformed by those “big pointy things to the west and south” of us, so that whether we are hiking Dunraven trail up to bulwark ridge, or worshipping at the church of the holy golf course, whether we are serving at the Community Kitchen or worshipping in this building constructed by sojourners and pilgrims and pioneers, we are curious and courageous, we are seeing and hearing, we are confident and well kept. We are God’s mountain people, and we have a way of seeing and knowing God and ourselves and each other that is unique and faithful.

So I would like to tell all those folks on Facebook, and all those folks who tell me they worship God in the mountains, that they can find a whole community of folks who understand their theology right here. Go to the mountains. Maybe they are calling. Or maybe you are just curious. But the God who is in the mountains is the God we worship right here, the God we talk to right here, the God who equips us for ministry right here, and the God who sends us out into the world to transform it.  

To that God be all glory forever and ever. Amen.