We could go in many different directions with the
account of the transfiguration. We could explore the role of the three
disciples who went up the mountain with Jesus. Why was it Peter, James, and
John? It’s an interesting question: What do we do with the inner circle? But
we’ll leave that question aside.
We could ask why Matthew emphasises mountains so
much. The Sermon on the Mount is a key example, and the transfiguration is
another. Just a comment: The text from Exodus 24 reminds us that Moses received
the Law on top of Mount Sinai. Matthew emphasises the mountain to remind us
that this event is important.
The Law, Torah, was God’s word. It was a written
account of God’s word for God’s people. God’s word written (J.C. Wenger’s term
for our written Scripture.) Jesus himself is also God’s word – God’s Word
living (Wenger’s term for Jesus.) John’s gospel highlights this understanding
of Jesus, saying that the Word of God is one with God and made flesh in the
person of Jesus (John 1).
Matthew uses a different term to make a similar
point. Jesus is “Emmanuel – God with us” (1: 23). In Jesus, God enters human
existence, just as God entered the lives of God’s people in Torah, the Law of
Moses.
God’s word, you must understand, is not simply “what
God says”; God’s word is active and effective. Listen to Genesis 1: “In the
beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth. The earth was formless and
empty, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the deep. God said, ‘Let
there be light,” and there was light.” God speaks, and reality changes. God’s
word is God’s action, so Jesus brings God into human existence in a way that
changes reality.
This discussion of Matthew’s emphasis on mountains
takes us closer to what I want to talk about this morning. Why did they go to
the mountain top? How does the mountain top function in our lives today?
On Top of the Mountain
When we refer to “a mountain top experience”, we
usually mean some sort of incredible amazing ecstatic experience. The mountain
top is not where we live each day. We live daily down on the prairie. The
plains of Manitoba might represent daily life – walking steadily through the
tasks and actions of each day. But every once in a while we take a trip and
climb up the Rockies – just to see the view. Wouldn’t want to live there, but
“it’s worth the trip.”
For Peter, James, and John, the transfiguration was
a real mountain top experience, literally and symbolically. They saw Moses and
Elijah transfigured with Jesus. They recognized that this was special, these
three shining with what is called the shekinah glory of God. They wanted
to stay there, but in a moment the whole
thing was done, and daily life resumed.
Have you ever had a mountain top experience like
that? I don’t mean a repetition of this event in Matthew 17, but I mean a
moment in which God came to you and you knew that this was a special time. Let
me tell you two stories.
Some Stories
The first is a story of something happening as we worship
together this morning: Asbury University is the scene of what many people are
calling a revival. Here is a description from a seminary theologian across the
street at the seminary.
Most
Wednesday mornings at Asbury University are like any other. … But this past
Wednesday [February 8, 2023] was different. After the benediction, the gospel
choir began to sing a final chorus—and then something began to happen that
defies easy description. Students did not leave. They were struck by what
seemed to be a quiet but powerful sense of transcendence, and they did not want
to go. They stayed and continued to worship. They are still there.
I teach
theology across the street at Asbury Theological Seminary, and when I heard of
what was happening, I immediately decided to go to the chapel to see for
myself. … I saw hundreds of students singing quietly. They were praising and
praying earnestly for themselves and their neighbors and our world—expressing
repentance and contrition for sin and interceding for healing, wholeness,
peace, and justice. …
They
were still worshiping when I left in the late afternoon and when I came back in
the evening. They were still worshiping when I arrived early Thursday
morning—and by midmorning hundreds were filling the auditorium again. I have
seen multiple students running toward the chapel each day.
By
Thursday evening, there was standing room only. Students had begun to arrive
from other universities: the University of Kentucky, the University of the
Cumberlands, Purdue University, Indiana Wesleyan University, Ohio Christian
University, … and many others. (From the website of Christianity Today)
This observer expressed
his concern about such “revivals”:
I come from a background …
where I’ve seen efforts to manufacture “revivals” and “movements of the Spirit”
that were sometimes not only hollow but also harmful. I do not want anything to
do with that. And truth be told, this is nothing like that. There is no
pressure or hype. There is no manipulation. There is no high-pitched emotional
fervor.
To the contrary, it has so
far been mostly calm and serene. The mix of hope and joy and peace is
indescribably strong and indeed almost palpable—a vivid and incredibly powerful
sense of shalom. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is undeniably powerful but
also so gentle.
The second example comes from a Canadian theologian
named John Stackhouse. Stackhouse used to teach at the University of Manitoba
and is now at Crandall University in New Brunswick. Reflecting on a revival
taking place at Asbury University in Kentucky, he writes:
I thought of revival today
in the life of a single individual—my grandfather—many years ago. An alcoholic
binge drinker, forty-year-old Grandpa and a buddy drunkenly piled their car
into a tree in their little Ontario town and then staggered home of a Saturday
night. The next morning, Grandma bundled the kids off to church while her
morose and abashed husband sat in the living room, nursing his hangover.
Grandpa recalled Scripture
verses he had memorized as a child and repented of his sin, giving his life to
Jesus. Instantly, he was cured of his alcoholism and did not drink again until
his death at 96. Two weeks later, he stopped a two-pack-a-day habit of smoking
unfiltered cigarettes.
Those of us who have
wrestled with addiction know how astonishing is this testimony. But here’s what
even the Holy Spirit apparently couldn’t correct in Grandpa all at once: his
bad temper. No, it took several decades of caring for his beloved wife as her
multiple sclerosis worsened to soften and reshape this man’s soul. By the time
she died, he was a different, sanctified person. (Taken from www.johnstackhouse.com)
Stackhouse’s point is that you don’t measure a
mountain top experience by that moment. You measure it by long-term change
(what he calls “sanctification”) worked out over a lifetime. His grandfather experienced
revival in his living room as he nursed a hangover. Then he descended from the
mountain top on to the vast prairie of his wife’s long illness, and God made
him holy over a lifetime of love and care.
Some Thoughts
I could tell other stories
– including my own, but you get the point. Mountain top experiences are meant
to lead to faithful living on the prairies. A changed life lived out over a
lifetime tells you what the mountain top was worth. So, a real change of life
is necessary, not just a brief experience, but that’s not the whole story.
Jesus was preparing Peter, James, and John for the dark days that lay ahead. He
tells them not to talk about the transfiguration; they were to wait until he
had died and been raised from the dead. He was giving them something to carry
them through a darkness greater than any of us have ever known.
Many of us have walked
through times of great distress. Jesus’ gift of this experience for his
disciples is for us as well. My Uncle once told of his wife’s battle with
Hodgkin’s Disease. He woke up one night to find that she was not in bed. He got
up to look for her and found her sitting in the living room. She said to him,
“Arthur, go back to bed. You can’t do anything.” I don’t know what he did at
that moment, but I do know that God came to her in those last weeks of her
life. In one of their last conversations, she said to him, “Arthur, 52 is so
young to die, but looking back over my life, I wouldn’t change a thing.” God
had come to her and reminded her that her life was in God’s hands. God comes to
us in our darkness.
A word of caution: Some might
hear this word as a burden, as a heavy requirement: “You must feel God’s
presence!” No! We cannot manufacture God’s presence, just as we cannot and
should not try to create a revival, a mountain top experience. I am suggesting
something else entirely.
Peter, James, and John did
not know what was coming. They just followed Jesus when he took them out for a
walk. John Stackhouse’s grandfather was not expecting to meet God that morning
as he sat nursing a hangover, but God showed up! Asbury University held a
regular chapel time, and God took over.
You see what happens. If
you make having a wonderful experience a new law, it becomes a burden and obstacle.
Instead, I am suggesting something else. Relax. Let go. Anticipate. Trust God
to give you what you need.
What should we do? What we
are already doing: read your Bible; pray; sing hymns or worship songs; join in
a care group; go to work; play and laugh with your family. Do so expecting God
to come in.
A further word: It may be
that the present darkness is so deep that you can’t hear or see God in any way.
C.S. Lewis writes of the sense that the doors of Heaven are closed against us,
“bolted and double-bolted” as we hammer on the gates of Heaven (in A Grief
Observed). He notes that his own loss was so devastating that he was like a
drowning man who can’t be saved until he stops fighting. He recalls also that
God’s renewed presence was simple and undramatic. It just happened.
That’s what I want us to
grasp. Wait for the Lord. Wait expectantly. Wait with anticipation. Don’t try
to manufacture something. God knows what we need and will give us what we need.
We walk through the prairies knowing that the mountain top is only a moment
away, always in God’s timing.
There is no promise here
to make life easy. Only the promise of God’s grace to carry us through. Peter,
Paul, and Mary used to sing a song about an escaping slave. It goes like this:
One night as I lay on my pillow, Moonlight as bright as the
dawn/ I saw a man come a walking, He had a long chain on./ I heard his chains a
clankin’, They made a mournful sound,/ Welded around his body, Draggin’ along
the ground.
He had a long chain on ...
He stood beside my window, He looked at me and he said/ “I
am so tired and hungry. Give me a bite of your bread”/ He didn’t look like a
robber, He didn’t look like a thief/ His voice was as soft as the moonlight, A
face full of sorrow and grief.
He had a long chain on ...
I went into my kitchen, Fetched him a bowl full of meat/ A
drink and a pan of cold biscuits, That’s what I gave him to eat/ Though he was tired
and hungry A bright light came over his face/ He bowed his head in the
moonlight, He said a beautiful grace.
He had a long chain on ...
I got my hammer and chisel, Offered to set him free/ He
looked at me and said softly, “I guess we had best let it be.”/ When he had
finished his supper, He thanked me again and again./ Though it’s been years
since I’ve seen him, Still hear him draggin’ his chain.
He had a long chain on ...
We see God’s presence as a
bright light came over the escaping slave and he prays “a beautiful grace”, and
we see God’s presence as he continues to carry the chain, “I guess we had best
let it be.” God does not simply remove the pain, but he walks with us all the
way to the cross and into the resurrection that follows. And he gives us grace
and an awareness of his overwhelming wonderful presence to carry us through as
well. Whether we are students at Asbury, afraid of the hate and polarization
engulfing their country. Or an alcoholic weeping in his living room as his
family goes to church. Or you or me. God invites us each one to follow him and
experience his love and care and grace and peace. Amen.
Steinbach Mennonite
Church
19 February 2023
Texts
Exodus 24:12-18 NRSV
12 The Lord said to Moses, “Come up to me
on the mountain and wait there; I will give you the tablets of stone, with the
law and the commandment, which I have written for their instruction.” 13 So
Moses set out with his assistant Joshua, and Moses went up onto the mountain of
God. 14 To the elders he had said, “Wait here for us,
until we come back to you. Look, Aaron and Hur are with you; whoever has a
dispute may go to them.”
15 Then
Moses went up on the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. 16 The
glory of the Lord settled
on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days; on the seventh day he called
to Moses out of the cloud. 17 Now the appearance of the
glory of the Lord was
like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the
Israelites. 18 Moses entered the cloud and went up on the
mountain. Moses was on the mountain for forty days and forty nights.
Matthew 17:1-9 NRSV
17 Six
days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led
them up a high mountain, by themselves. 2 And he was
transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes
became bright as light. 3 Suddenly there appeared to them
Moses and Elijah, talking with him. 4 Then Peter said to
Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will set up
three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” 5 While
he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice
from the cloud said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased;
listen to him!” 6 When the disciples heard this, they fell
to the ground and were overcome by fear. 7 But Jesus came
and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” 8 And
when they raised their eyes, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.
9 As they
were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision
until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”
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