Mountainside Stairs
When I go hiking in the mountains, I often deliver my well-worn joke. After hiking up and down rough paths, the group arrives at a beautiful stone stairway. The smooth rocks provide a welcome reprieve. While the group bounds from one step to the other, I elegantly deliver my line: “Wow, imagine that. These rocks just happened to be arranged into perfect stairs. No wonder someone put at a trail here.” Obviously, however, the boulders did not magic themselves into such usefulness. Rather, a trail maintenance work crew labored many hours finding, digging, moving, and arranging these large rocks into a “natural” staircase.
As Christians, we often find stone stairways on our spiritual journeys. We benefit from long-gone servants who blazed a path before us. Our trails are easier because some faithful predecessors cleared the way. For example, our congregation meets in a wonderful building because long ago, some believers said: “Let’s buy some property and make a building.” I expect it was an arduous process that spanned decades, but now, our church has property and our church has a building.
The scriptures reflect on our spiritual predecessors: We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses (Hebrews 12.1a) Those ‘witnesses’ are revealed in the prior chapter. The text lists heroes and heroines of faith – those who were still living by faith when they died [and], they did not receive the things promised (11.13). These devout forerunners now serve as our “cloud of witnesses” – peoples whose lives further equip us to …
… throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith (12.1b-2a)
As we benefit from our faithful forebearers, their contribution speaks to our responsibility to our spiritual descendants: contribute to their faithful perseverance. For example, currently, we can foster a congregation of radical hospitality – a welcoming culture that recognizes the innate value of all persons. Such welcomeness can become so prevailing that in two decades, this hospitality (and its great benefits) is normalized. This amazing quality (and its great benefits) becomes so baked into the congregation that no one knows otherwise.
Consider once again, the human-made stairway on the mountainside. I have walked upon many such steps. Here is something I have never seen: a marker to remember the builders. Never. Here’s why: The builders wanted those unnatural (and very helpful) steps to seem natural. They built the stairway to blend into the landscape. Ideally, it would be utilized and yet unnoticed. As devout followers of Jesus Christ, we should leave such a legacy – not a legacy that remembers us but one that benefits ours spiritual ancestors. Let our ‘cloud of witnesses’ be an uncelebrated assistance that equips others to follow Jesus Christ with an ever-increasing devotion. May those who come after us bear a torch for Jesus Christ that burns brighter and goes farther.
