From The Bishop: Mountain-Top Experiences 

The music at last Saturday’s consecration was so inspiring. Dr. Fred Teardo, Director of Music at the Cathedral Church of the Advent, led the Cathedral Choir with grace and passion. The anthem was Paul Mealor’s setting of the Beatitudes, and it was deeply moving. We also sang Sanctuary (“Lord, prepare me…”), a song that generations of children have sung during Compline at Camp McDowell. 

The readers proclaimed the lessons from Isaiah and Hebrews with grace and conviction. Every person who served in the liturgy offered their gifts faithfully. Throughout the service, you could sense the Holy Spirit drawing the Diocese of Alabama together in prayer, praise, and Holy Communion. 

For me personally, it was a mountaintop experience with Christ and the Holy Spirit—one that I will carry with me always. 

At the same time, I know that Jesus Christ never allows us to remain on the mountain. Immediately following the Transfiguration, Luke the Evangelist tells us: 

“On the next day, when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met him. Just then a man from the crowd shouted, ‘Teacher, I beg you to look at my son; he is my only child. Suddenly a spirit seizes him, and all at once he shrieks. It convulses him until he foams at the mouth; it mauls him and will scarcely leave him. I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.'” (Luke 9:37–40) 

Jesus always leads us down from the mountain into the valleys and ordinary places where people live, struggle, hope, and pray. Sometimes these are not the places we would choose for ourselves, and we may not always understand why we have been led there. Yet it is there, in the ordinary rhythms of life and ministry, that Christ continues his work through us, often in ways we cannot see. 

As summer unfolds, I pray that each of us will find times of rest and renewal in the presence of Christ and with those we love. May these moments of grace renew us for the journey ahead, so that when our Lord calls us down from the mountain, we may follow him. 

Take care, 

The Right Reverend Richard Lawson