My mom tells me that when we were little she could dress my sister and me up for church in starched white petticoats and send us out to play in the yard until time to leave for church and be absolutely certain that we wouldn’t have a spot on us. We LOVED to dress up. There was no way we were going to spoil the effect. What are your kids like? Will they carefully preserve an expensive new outfit or immediately jumble it in with their everyday clothes? Some people are so careful of pretty new things that they don’t even wear them for ages; they want to keep them as perfect as they were when they got them. Do you have two sets of dishes, one for everyday and one for special occasions? Or do you use your sterling and crystal every day because it’s such a waste to hide them away? What are you like?
For a lot of us, the instinct to keep things exactly the same is very strong, especially if it’s something special. And that’s a good thing, in many ways. It’s one way we have of not taking life for granted, a way of setting a special value on precious items or moments. But we can take it too far, can’t we. Almost everything of any value needs to be used in order for us to appreciate it properly... pearls and opals lose their luster if they’re not worn, and violins grow mellower the more they’re played.
And some things simply don’t keep. Sunsets and laughter and your baby’s first step can’t be preserved, like a pre-historic beetle caught in a chunk of amber. If we’re wise, we stop and breathe in the moment. In Japan, I understand, people stop work on the day the cherry blossoms bloom, because it’s such a precious and fleeting time.
Has there ever been a time in your life that was so perfect that you just wanted to hang on to it, just stop right there and bask? How many of you have had a spiritual experience like that? Perhaps at summer camp, or on retreat, or a walk in the woods when you felt the presence of God so clearly and strongly that it seemed as if the whole world was holding its breath... Those are called mountaintop experiences. And though I can’t confirm it, I'm pretty sure that the name comes from the mountaintop experience Peter and James and John had with Jesus on that long ago day before they went up to Jerusalem that last, fateful time.
Just a few days before this Jesus had challenged his disciples to think about a question that people had been asking. “Who do the crowds say that I am?” he asked. Well, they came up with all sorts of answers: John the Baptist, and Elijah and another one of the ancient prophets like Jeremiah. But then Jesus went on to the real question. “Who do you say I am?”’ he asked them. And Peter the mouth, my favorite disciple, came right out with it. He was the one who blurted out what they had been thinking and wondering and hoping for all this time. Peter said, “You are the Messiah of God.” [Lk 9:18-20]
Immediately after that Jesus tells them that this trip to Jerusalem is going to be different. The disciples had been wandering around the countryside of Galilee and Judea with Jesus for three years, watching him draw crowds for his teaching and healing, and later on being sent out themselves to practice what they’d learned from Jesus. But now things were going to change. It’s not that things had been a bed of roses all that time, they had left their homes and families and often missed a meal or slept rough or been called names by the religious authorities. But by and large things had gone pretty well.
But now things are going to change. Now things are going to get really tough. And Jesus starts to prepare them for what lies ahead. “The Son of Man must undergo great suffering,” he told them, “and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.” But did they get it? Of course not. In fact, Peter rejects the whole idea. “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.” At which point Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” [Mt 16:22-23] And then he said to them all, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.” [Lk 9:22-23]
Why do you suppose Jesus put those two things together? Why did he make sure they knew who he was before he started to let them in on the hard part?
I think it’s because he knew they needed to have something to hang on to, he knew they couldn’t stand up under what was going to come if they weren’t completely clear on who he was. It wasn’t idle chat. He was preparing them, giving them something they would need for the days ahead.
But it wasn’t enough, was it. Even knowing who Jesus was wasn’t enough to keep them grounded when the earth shook on that dreadful day a few short weeks later. Knowing something in your head is not the same thing as knowing it in your heart, being certain all the way down to your bones.
So Jesus prepared another lesson for them.
"He took Peter, James and John up to a mountain to pray. And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him." [Lk 9:289-30]
Now the interesting thing here is that what Moses and Elijah were saying to Jesus was pretty much just what he had been telling them a few days ago, down in the valley. “They ... were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.” Remember what it was that Jesus was going to accomplish in Jerusalem? “The Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
But did they hear him? Of course not! It had been a long day, they were sleepy, and besides they always nodded off during Jesus’ personal prayer time because after all even though they were getting better at praying their minds still wandered off pretty quickly. So when they were jolted out of their drowsy inattention it was all too much for them to take in. It just didn’t make sense. Well, who can blame them, after all? If something really awesome hits your eyes and ears at the same time, which one do you focus on? The eyes win out every time.
And Jesus’ face changed right in front of them. His clothes became dazzling white. Mark says that his clothes became whiter than anyone on earth could possibly bleach them.
Now, their first reaction was one of fear. Which is not surprising either. The only experience they had with that kind of lighting effect would have been in a thunderstorm. We moderns have gotten used to special effects: light shows and fireworks are no big deal. Been there, seen that.
But to Peter and James and John it was clear that only God could pull this off. And somehow they immediately knew who it was that was standing in front of them. Moses was the greatest person in all of Israel’s history, greater even than Abraham in some ways, because he was the one who had brought them their freedom and given them their laws. And Elijah! Elijah was the greatest prophet of all, the only one who was so holy he didn’t even die but was taken directly up to heaven.
This was really scary. What could it possibly mean? The first time Peter had ever seen Jesus pull off a miracle - when he told them to pull away from shore and let down their nets and they caught so many fish that their boat was in danger of sinking - “he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!’” [Lk 5:8] They didn’t take this experience for granted. They weren’t used to being allowed right into God’s presence. After all, wasn’t the high priest the only one who could go into the Holy of Holies where God’s glory was actually present? Even he might be struck dead if he wasn’t properly prepared. And of course they had all heard that “whenever Moses had talked to God on the mountain... his face shone and Aaron and all the Israelites ... were afraid to come near him.” [Ex 34:29-30]
Well, by the time they sort of gather their wits about them, Elijah and Moses were leaving, and Peter picks up his courage and offers what he thinks is the appropriate response to a divine visitation. He says, “Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Peter is babbling. The text tells us he didn’t know what he was saying, but one thing is clear. Peter wants to hang on to this moment, somehow. He wants to do something tangible to mark the occasion. The shelters he wants to build are a reference to the Feast of Tabernacles, which looks forward to the arrival of the end times when God will restore Israel by remembering the time when God had provided for his people in the desert. But he gets a few things wrong.
First, Peter puts Jesus on the same level as Moses and Elijah, when, as they all should know, God’s Messiah is far greater than any of the prophets of their past.
Second, he wants to stay right there on the mountain. He wants to capture the moment and wait right there in his ringside seat for the final curtain.
But we don’t get to do that, do we? We don’t get to hang onto our mountaintop experiences. That’s not what they’re for. Jesus gave Peter and James and John that glimpse into eternity in order to equip and strengthen for what was to come.
We don’t get our suit of dazzling white clothes - like the ones Jesus appeared in - until much later in the story. We get those at the wedding feast of the Lamb. The voice from the cloud gave the disciples their marching orders, just as we are given ours. “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” [Lk 9:35] What was it that Jesus had said, just a few days before? “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.”
That is what you will undoubtedly be doing be doing for the next six weeks. The season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday, just three short days from now. And the first time I preached on the Transfiguration, I had just gone to see Mel Gibson’s controversial film The Passion of the Christ. It reminds viewers with startling clarity something that many of us take for granted, much as we take for granted so much of what God has given us in Jesus Christ. This movie shows, in all its stark and bloody horror, what it was that Jesus endured, what it was that his disciples did not want to face, and what most of us by God’s great mercy will be spared. One of the questions that was raised in - I think it was ABC’s interview with Gibson - was whether the movie blamed the Jews or the Romans for Christ’s death. Mel’s answer was simple. “We are all to blame,” he said.
The process of repentance and reflection that Lent calls us to is an important part of what God meant when he told the disciples to listen to Jesus. For the next few weeks Christians everywhere will be preparing for the day when Jesus enters Jerusalem and approaches the cross. But that’s not all there is to being a disciple, either. Neither the top of the mountain nor the valley of death is where most of us will be tested. And Easter is another mountaintop experience, isn’t it. That day of transcendent joy when God turns night into day and death into life is the Mt. Everest of the Christian year. And we’d like to stay there, just as Peter and James and John wanted to hang onto that shining moment on the mountain. But the hard work of discipleship isn’t over when Easter comes.
That’s the trap. We have a tendency to see the shining mountaintop moments or the depths of despair as being the most spiritually significant, as if intensity of experience were all there was to spirituality. And so we tend to discount the very real heroism, the incredible spiritual courage and tenacity it takes to make the decisions that honor Christ during the ordinary times, in the drab boredom or the frantic business that our lives often tend to bounce between. Real spirituality surfaces - and matures - in the daily decision to forgive, to tell the truth, to resist a temptation or to hold our tongues, to be generous with our praise or time or possessions or credit.
The disciples had to go back down into the press of life, the hunger and the need and the sin and the pain of the world to continue doing the work Jesus had been training them to do all this time. And so do we. This time that we spend in worship, the time Jesus gave Peter and the others to see God’s glory and to hear him speak, is good in and of itself. It’s good to be here. It’s good to gather in worship and experience the presence of God. But we don’t get to stay here.
This time of worship is a gift. The Sabbath of rest that God gives us is a gift. The yearly celebration of the resurrection is a gift. All mountaintop experiences are gifts. But they are gifts to be used, not to be put in a closet and kept untouched until next Sunday. Even Jesus got dirty, traveling the dusty roads of Palestine. His clothes didn’t stay clean, and his face didn’t always shine.
The three disciples had an intense spiritual experience in which the ordinary took on splendor, when everything radiated with transcendent power and all eternity was present in a single moment. But it didn’t last. They got a glimpse of glory, a sneak preview of resurrected life, but only for a brief moment.
Like them, we too are called to come down from the mountain and walk the road of ordinary time. The clarity of the vision will fade, as such things do. But the words last. “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” [Lk 9:35] Seeing the divine is reserved for very special occasions, but hearing the divine is always available to us. That same voice which spoke from the clouds speaks to us from the pages of the Bible. The words that Jesus spoke send us out in the world. They don’t allow us to stay safe, cocooned in the spiritual security that has been the bane of American Christians. The words of Jesus send us out into the world to heal, to feed, to comfort, and to witness to what we have seen. If we try to hang onto our spiritual experiences, we will lose them. The only way to keep them is to follow Jesus out into the world.
