The San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado are among the least known and least visited of the Colorado Rockies, yet they are thought by many, especially those who live here, to be the most beautiful and serene. It is against this backdrop that Candy Beebe and Julie Stephens present Mountain Devotional.
In a time that American Christianity seems focused on large churches seating thousands, the authors take us along on quiet adventures far from crowds and traffic and even roads. Centered in the USGA-designated most remote country in the lower 48 they lead us toward a sense of prayer and peace that Jesus must have felt when he climbed, often alone, toward a special experience of the Holy.
While Jesus was hardly a 'mountain man' in the modern sense, his attraction to them almost reminds one of John Muir's well-known quotes, "The mountains are calling and I must go." What called Jesus to these special places? And may it, if we listen closely, call us as well?
Often, Jesus led his disciples to a mountain. At the conclusion of his earthly ministry they went on their own to a mountain "...to which Jesus had directed them." There they encountered him.
In this devotional, though they may at first seem to be simply about a bear or rocks or birds or sky, we too may encounter the Lord himself. That is the purpose, after all, of Mountain Devotional.
Ed Nettleton
Lake City, Colorado
May 2013
