I always thought that Winnie the Pooh was a bear ahead of his time. And in chapter 8, which I’m sure you all know is entitled “In which Christopher Robin leads an expedition to the North Pole”, everyone gathers and takes provisions and goes – almost – to the North Pole.

Christopher Robin wasn’t listening. He was looking at Pooh.

‘Pooh’ he said ‘where did you find that pole’.

Pooh looked at the pole in his hands. ‘I’ve just found it’ he said ‘I thought it would be useful, I just picked it up’.

‘Pooh’ said Christopher Robin sternly, ‘the expedition is over, you have found the North Pole.’

‘Oh!’ said Pooh.

‘Pooh’s found the North Pole’ said Christopher Robin. ‘Isn’t that lovely’.

Pooh looked down modestly.

‘Is that it’ said Eeyore,

‘Yes’ said Christopher Robin.

‘Is that what we’re looking for?’

‘Yes’ said Pooh,

‘Oh’ said Eeyore, ‘well, anyway, it didn’t rain’.

So they stuck the pole in the ground and Christopher Robin tied a message on it – ‘North Pole, dicscovered by Pooh. Pooh found it.’ And they all went home again.

And I think though I am not quite certain that Roo had a bath before he went to bed. But Pooh went back to his own house and, feeling very proud with what he had done, had a little something to revive himself.

Did A A Milne mean this as a symbol for our search for meaning in life? I’m not sure. But we are all on a journey: looking for the North Pole, looking for our purpose and our reason in life. Searching for … who knows what? Not knowing where to find it.

In America, and increasingly here people, generally women, though increasingly men as well, are searching for meaning in cosmetic surgery. Were you aware that in America $5 billion is spent on cosmetic surgery and the number of cosmetic surgical procedures has gone up over 200% in the last few years.

A search for meaning. A search for purpose. A search discerned by the rise of new age spiritualities where people are looking for a story by which to live their lives. We are all searching for meaning, using all sorts of weird and wonderful ways to discover our own spiritual place; something that help us make sense at what, at times, seems like a senseless world.

This is part of the human task, part of our vocations as human beings, to discern our place in the world: to work out where hope is to be found within what can seem like a hopeless world; to discover love in what often looks like a loveless world. And in order to get the best view we have to climb the mountain. We have to make the journey to the North Pole. We want to get the best view of what it is we are searching for, we need to climb to the top of the mountain.

The difficulty with many of these spiritual journeys and these physical journeys is that they are individualistic; we do them on our own. It becomes my personal, spiritual quest in my life; my goal to meet my God. There is nothing new in this individualistic approach to religion, I suspect Peter suffered from it as well.

One writer puts this morning’s Gospel reading like this –

Jesus, Peter, James and John climbed to the top of a mountain.They enjoyed the magnificent views. They breathed deeply the fresh air. This experience recharges their flagging spirits and resensitises their imagination. They are refreshed by God. Then, out of the blue pious Peter attempts to secure this experience in some tangible way by blurting out ‘Let’s build a chapel here, and you, Jesus, can be our private chaplain’.

Peter should have known better. Peter, the good Jew, should have known that mountains are dangerous places. It was on the mountain that Moses saw the burning bush and was sent back to Egypt. It was on the mountain that Elijah hears the thundering sound of silence and is sent to depend upon a starving widow.

Mountains are dangerous places. They are thin places where the separation between this world and the other world, between the sacred and the secular, between God and God’s creation is wafer thin. Going to the top of mountains is a dangerous thing to do, which is why the voice boomed from heaven ‘Stop prattling Peter. Listen to Him’ … or something like that.

Climbing mountains is dangerous physically, something from which some people do not return. Climbing our spiritual mountains is equally dangerous. You cannot climb to the top of a mountain and return the same. The journey up and the journey down is transforming. You don’t go to the mountain top and come down the same person that went up. You go up the mountain to encounter a personal God, but you cannot stay there. You have to come back down into the public arena.

There is a line going around the theological journals at the moment of Jim Wallace, it’s a new catch phrase that is very good; one which we would all do well to remember –

God is personal but never private.

We can have our personal encounters with God, but we live out those personal encounters in our public spheres. Our mountain top experiences mean little if they don’t impact on the way we live our lives here and now. God is not just found up there, but down here. That is what the incarnation is all about. God is found down here, woven into the fabric of our life, weaving wonderful garments of love and creativity, both individually and corporately. But we can never know what that garment will finally look like.

Two weeks ago, David opened his sermon with reference to Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. That’s been in my mind of late, and reading this Gospel passage I was reminded of King’s final sermon, given the night before he was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. He concluded his remarks that night with this:

I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountain top and I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. He’s allowed me to go up the mountain and I’ve looked over and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. And I’m happy tonight, I’m not worried about anything, I’m not fearing any man for … “mine eyes have seen the Glory of the coming of the Lord”.