Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Peter didn’t know what he was saying. I can’t say I blame
him, honestly. One minute, he was alone with James and John and Jesus, the next minute,
they were joined by the two great Old Testament heroes: Moses, who led the
people from Egypt and the deliverer of the Law; Elijah, prophet who stood
against Jezebel and proclaimed the Word of the Lord. One minute, Jesus looked
ordinary and unremarkable, the next He glowed brighter than any laundromat
could bleach clothes. With an extremely, extra-ordinary, out-of-this-world,
transfigured Jesus standing before them, and the sudden arrival of two Old
Testament heroes of the faith, Peter is flabbergasted and his mouth takes off
as if it has a mind of its own.
“It is good, Lord, to be here,” Peter said to Jesus. Then
again, anything is better than down there. Down there is suffering and
crucifixion and death and dying, all at the hands of the chief priests and
elders and scribes – the religious leaders who refuse to admit and confess
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. Those people want to do you
harm, Jesus, so let’s stay up here, on the mountaintop where things are safe.
In fact, let’s stay up here as long as we can; let’s stay with some comfort.
The Zebedee boys and I can put together a couple tents, three tabernacles, for
each of you, one for Elijah, one for Moses, and one for you, Jesus. We can stay
here, happily ever after.
I said, I can’t say I blame Peter. If I were a 4th
disciple, and if I were able to at least gather my wits, I would probably be spouting
nonsense as well. You would, too, I imagine. The glory of the Lord will do that
to you.
But Peter wasn’t just awestruck. It was awe coupled with his
own desires. He wasn’t ready for Jesus to descend, to go down into the valley
of the shadow. Six days earlier, Jesus asked the disciples who do they think
Jesus was. Peter, answering for the Twelve, said, “You are the Christ.” Other
Gospel writers add, “the Son of the Living God.” His confession was true and
correct and faithful to the word and promises of God. In fact, in his Gospel,
St. Matthew records Jesus praising Peter, “You are Peter, and on this rock
[this confession] I will build my church” (Matt 16:18). Unfortunately, immediately
afterward when Jesus began speaking plainly and teaching that He would have to
suffer many things and be rejected by the chief priests and the scribes and be
killed, Peter quickly pulled Jesus to the side, and rebuked Jesus by telling Him
just what He could and could not do, and this suffering and dying talk was
simply not going to fly. No, sir. It’s as if Peter knows better than Jesus what
the Christ must do, what He will undergo, what glory looks like. No one becomes
King by dying; He becomes king by conquering everyone else. So, Jesus, stop
this cross-talk, this death-talk immediately. We have other things to do.
I have often wondered what Jesus’ voice sounded like when
He, in turn, rebuked Peter. Was it sharp and harsh? Was it soft and sad? Was it
flat with disappointment? “Get behind me, satan. You do not have in mind the
things of God but of man.”
Were Peter’s feelings still stinging, six days later? Was he
still trying to figure out a way to derail Jesus’ cross-focused plan? Was he
simply overwhelmed with Jesus standing next to Moses and Elijah? Perhaps Peter
was thinking, maybe these guys can talk some sense into the Master.
They weren’t there to talk “sense” into Jesus. We don’t know
the words that were spoken by the two. Perhaps the visit was deeply
theological: that Jesus was there to fulfill the Law on behalf of sinful man,
that He was the completion of all that had been prophesied since the days of
Abraham, that He would be the ultimate, once-for-all conclusion of the
countless sacrifices made for the people of Israel, that all of this was His
purpose as the Son of God. Perhaps it was more visceral, what it is to have
your own reject you and continue doing what they want to do, regardless the
message. Perhaps it was quite somber, having to face death at the hands of
sinful people who want nothing more than the destruction of God’s chosen one.
Perhaps it was a physical encouragement from men who, too, had themselves seen some
of the glory of God on their own mountaintop moment. Perhaps it was an
admixture of all the above, plus even more that we cannot begin to assume. Whatever
else may have been said, they were there to encourage Him as He prepared for
His downward journey toward His death.
At the base of the Mount of Transfiguration stood another
mountain. More a hill, really; a hill named Golgatha, or Calvary – the place of
the skull. It was a place of death of the worst sort, crucifixion, reserved for
murderers, insurrectionists, and the vilest of criminals. That was Jesus’
ministry destination. He was to be the perfect sacrifice for the sins of the
world.
The group is suddenly swallowed by a cloud. Throughout the
Scriptures, clouds are symbols of and even manifestations of the glory of God.
Where moments earlier, Jesus face shown with the radiance of His glory, they
are now overwhelmed by an even greater glory. If there is any doubt of what is
taking place, the voice of the Father in heaven shatters the moment. “This is
my beloved son. Listen to Him.”
Those words echo Jesus’ baptism where the Father spoke to
Jesus, “You are my beloved Son.” Jesus’ transfiguring, Moses and Elijah
appearing, the Father speaking: these re-focus the entire purpose of Jesus life
and ministry. Jesus did not come to gloriously dwell in a tent built on top of
a mountaintop. His purpose in ministry wasn’t to hide up in the clouds with two
heroes of old and three disciples in training and live in blissful abandon.
Jesus must go down the Mount of Transfiguration and then up the mountain of
Zion, where Jerusalem sits, the city that murders the prophets. There the cross
is waiting for Him. The cross: that was where Jesus would demonstrate His glory
for the entire world – not in radiant splendor, but in deepest of shame and
humility, stripped and beaten and hung, naked, crucified by Rome as a warning
for passers by of what happens when someone dare crosses the emperor; dying in
substitute to satisfy the Father’s judgement for the sins of the world.
We are about to enter the season of Lent. It is a somber
season, intended to be one of penitential reflection as we consider our own
mortality and our own sinfulness. We will hear Jesus speak of His coming
passion. We will see tensions rise between Him and His enemies and they will
plot to kill him. We will ponder this incredible story of love once again, the
perfectly sinless Son of God who becomes our substitute. The hymns become
heavier, both in tone and in the theology they carry, and we will set aside the
use of the word alleluia. Alleluia is a word of praise and celebration; Lent is
not a time for that word, so we will “bury” it until Easter morning when we
will mark it’s own resurrection with the Easter cry “Christ is risen, He is
risen indeed, Alleluia!”
But we are not there, yet. We are heading down into the
valley of the shadow. With Jesus we will descend the Mount of Transfiguration.
We will journey with Jesus to the cross. But more than that, know that Jesus
journeys with you as you carry your own cross this Lententide.
Your cross is where you struggle in life because of faith.
Your cross might be a coworker or neighbor who mocks you endlessly for openly
sharing your faith. It might be a classmate who laughs at you because you treat
your body as a gift of God and not a laboratory for pharmaceuticals or for sex.
It might be confessing Christ against those who openly use His name as nothing
more than an expletive or a verbal space filler. It might be not understanding
why God doesn’t seem to answer your prayers for help and aid. It might be
memories of your own troubled past that you know are forgiven by Jesus, but
they just won’t go away. It might be a body that is failing or a mind that is
hurting or a conscience that is burdened. We’ll wrestle with Lenten
cross-bearing during the Wednesday evening services using the book of Job.
Job…now there’s someone who knows what it is to be at the base of the mountain
and looking back up, longingly, at the highs that were left behind. It’s
tempting to do just that – but, instead, we continue to move forward, with the
cross Christ gives us, following always in His own footsteps.
After the voice spoke, the cloud left. When Peter, James and
John looked, all they saw was Jesus only. To see Jesus only. In these grey and
latter days, may we see Jesus only! Jesus, crucified; Jesus risen; Jesus,
ascended and glorified; Jesus who promises to be with us as we journey under
the cross in this world, and who will return to raise us to our own glorious
transfiguration from these lowly bodies to a glorious, resurrected body. Raised in glory, our bodies – whole and complete,
holy and glorified – will also shine like Christ’s, never to die again. With
Moses and Elijah and all the faithful, we will enjoy the blessed joy of
eternity in the presence of the Father who declares you His beloved and that
with you He is pleased.
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