Listen to Him!
Notes
Transcript
Jeff & Kristin
Jeff & Kristin
As you have probably noticed that it is Angelina leading us in worship today and we are so grateful that she has stepped in to lead maybe for the next couple of weeks we are not sure yet
Our worship leader Jeff, his wife kristin has been battling cancer for the last ten years…When we met him just about 5 months ago they knew that kristin didn’t have the amount of time that she should have but they thought it would at least be a couple of years
Well this past week they went into the ER because Kristin wasn’t doing well…They were expecting for her to go though a little procedure and then come home...
But that’s not what happened...
They put her on hospice and sent her home to say goodbye to her family...
So Kristin is at home now on Hospice
We do not know when to expect to see Jeff again...
I was with him on Friday and made it clear that his number one priority is his wife right now and that we will figure out worship
So in that thread there are two responses to this announcement today
1. Many people ask in this situation, what can I do to help? Sal Ortiz is organizing a food train and so if you want to make them a meal and drop it off that would be helpful…We are also going to put some money on a grub hub gift card so Sal is organizing all of that at a table in the back you can talk to him after church and help
2. We believe in the power of prayer. We can pray for Jeff and Kristin so lets do that right now
Intro
Intro
Have you ever been let in on some information that once you were let in on it…Almost like the entire ordeal of whatever that information was seemed like you can handle it?
Let me give you an example
When our girls were like 1 1/2 and 2 1/2 we were at the beach with them and we were playing and Desiree was reading and I remember that I came back for a snack and
she said to me: “How do you feel about adopting a special needs child?”
My initial response was like ....Hey Pump the breaks here you’re crazy, what are you talking about...
Not that it is crazy to adopt a special needs child, but at the stage of life we were in I just couldn’t imagine that being a reality
What I didn’t know is that my wife had been secretly praying about adoption and that day on the beach she had this distinct impression that God wanted us to adopt and that child would have special medical needs...
Well since I was so adamantly against us doing this at that point, Desiree didn't push me…But a couple of months later, the lord prompted her again about adoption...
So she asked me again how I felt about adoption and a few months later my heart had changed on it and I just replied to her, I’d be open to it...
Then she was like ok! We got back from our walk and in like 30seconds we were signed up for the LA County Foster to Adopt orientation, and something like 2 days later I found myself in an LA county classroom filling out paperwork
And I remember telling her…This isn’t a race..why are we just going through this so fast?
And what I didn’t know was that this was like October or November, and when the Lord had prompted her again about adoption there was more to the story that I didn't know....
Desiree said she couldn't explain it but she knew that we had to be ready and certified for foster care by the summer and that includes the medically fragile class
So she had this inner drive that I couldn’t explain but I went with it...
So we are taking all the classes, our house gets certified and all of that stuff…Then a phone number lands on my desk...
I was told this is a pastor down the street, he had three kids and he was just placed with three kids…They are overwhelmed and are looking for someone who can foster these kids...
See in LA county, there was such a shortage of homes that when foster parents got overwhelmed they sometimes had to take matters into their own hands and look for good homes for these kids...
This is not something that you are aloud to do…but it happened...
So I call this pastor and I am like..Hi I’m Dave…I am a pastor too…And I know this is strange, but I am calling about this little boy that I never met named Jacob...
And he was like…Ok I’ve been waiting for your call when can you come over
So the next day we go down there and here is this little beautiful boy named Jacob with crazy hair and the moment I picked him up I knew that he was mine...
He was a medically fragile boy that Desiree had known we were getting (He was medically fragile then, but he is a tank now)
So we began a relationship with this family…We babysat Jake all the time and eventually he was placed in our home
Now I tell you all of this because after meeting Jake & getting him placed in our home adoption through the courts was a 3 year long hellish Journey
I tell you all of this because it was as if God confronted Desiree and I about adoption and gave us just a glimmer of what it could be…And once we caught that vision, we were able to endure the years long battle with the courts
So every now and then we get some information that helps us to endure...
A disclosure by someone that helps us to see the bigger picture:
Maybe you’ve had an experience like this before....Sometimes God does stuff in our life that builds our faith so we can endure through trials and hard times
So keep that in the back of your head as we look at the text this morning
Last week:
Last week:
last week we looked at this well know story where Peter declares that Jesus is the messiah And right after Peter does this
Jesus then re-defines what it means to be the messiah
Jesus tells Peter that the messiah will suffer and die and on the third day be raised from the dead...
Peter rebukes Jesus and if you remember, Jesus says, get behind me Satan! if anyone wants to follow me they need to take up their cross and follow me...
So one one level…that was a disclosure by Jesus as to what would happen in the future…It was very plain and direct...
And remember these 12 disciples are the ones on who the entire Jesus movement would rest…
So building within them the faith and the confidence to lead in the midst of difficult times is huge....Jesus needs to prepare them
Bridge to this week
Bridge to this week
So last week there is this sort of somber tone to Jesus’ disclosure: He finally announced that he had to die!
But this week Jesus is letting them in on more of who he is because if they ever want to endure they will need this information:
So lets look at this text:
and as we read…Just note that this story is in each of the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark & Luke) and it immediately follows Peter’s confession that Jesus is the messiah and now has to die....(sometimes gospel writers move stories around in order to show a slightly different point, but Matthew, Mark & Luke are all united on this.
Mark 9:2–13 (NIV)
After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There he was transfigured before them. His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them. And there appeared before them Elijah and Moses, who were talking with Jesus.
Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” (He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.)
Then a cloud appeared and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!”
Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus.
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. They kept the matter to themselves, discussing what “rising from the dead” meant.
And they asked him, “Why do the teachers of the law say that Elijah must come first?”
Jesus replied, “To be sure, Elijah does come first, and restores all things. Why then is it written that the Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected? But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him.”
What is happening?
What is happening?
So Jesus gives Peter, James & John get this amazing divine disclosure
They go onto a mountain with Jesus and he changes before them
Elijah and Moses show up and then a booming loud voice comes out of the cloud!
What a mountain top experience with Jesus right?
Lets deal with Mark 9: 2-4 first
After six days Jesus took Peter, James and John with him and led them up a high mountain, where they were all alone. There he was transfigured before them. His clothes became dazzling white, whiter than anyone in the world could bleach them. And there appeared before them Elijah and Moses, who were talking with Jesus.
If you really know the story of the exodus then you will totally understand what is happening here:
and it is significant that this is all the exodus because Jesus is disclosing his exodus from this world
So quick recap just incase you do not know the Biblical story line
Somewhere around 1500BC Moses leads this group of 2 million Israelites out of Egypt where they were slaves
Part of the idea of the exodus is to cut off Israel from the Egyptian gods that they had come to worship and covenant them with the one true God
So the Exodus is not only the story of Israelites who had become slaves escaping from Egypt but it is also the story of a new covenant with God in the dessert
So mark tells us that after 6 days Jesus takes his friends up a mountain....why is this significant?
Six days Exodus 24:16
and the glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai. For six days the cloud covered the mountain, and on the seventh day the Lord called to Moses from within the cloud.
Its because this is what Moses did...
And Jesus is leading another exodus
But first Jesus has to exit this earth through death...
So as you read the text for you care full readers there are all these little signs that point to moses
So first they go up to a high mountain
High Mountain
I don’t expect you to remember everything that I teach but over christmas, week 1 in our series I taught on this idea of the “Cosmic Mountain”
So Just as a quick recap…Because this is what is happening here!
The original Cosmic mountain is in Eden
Mt Eden Ezekiel 28:13-14, Joel 2:1-3, Rev 21-22,
This is the place where Heaven and earth are fully united
But in Eden…Sin happens and Heaven and Earth are split apart but we get these mountain top glimmers all over the Bible about what God is doing
Mount Moriah (Sacrifice of Isaac, David Builds an alter there, Solomon builds the temple
Mount Horeb/Siani- Burning bush, giving of the covenant, theophanies to Moses, Israel, Elijah Pattered after temple with three courts
Mount Hor- Aaron Dies, and his son is vested as a high priest (numbers 20)
Mounts Gerizim and Ebal : Blessings and curses of the covenant recited here
Mt Nebo: Moses sees the promise land and dies there
Mt Zion, Jerusalem, the chosen city of God and foreshadowing of the church
But it will be another mountain top…where Heaven and earth will meet again and the possibility of Eden is restored…
The disciples couldn’t see it now and when Jesus is on Golgatha, another cosmic mountain…The heavens will open up again
So After 6 days they went to a mountain top and Jesus transfigured before them
What does this mean?
The Greek word is Metamorphoo
It’s where we get the word Metamorphosis
So Jesus changed in appearance before the disciples ....He shined or glowed before them...
Just check out this Psalm:
The Lord wraps himself in light as with a garment;
he stretches out the heavens like a tent
God wraps himself in Light.... and Mark here is telling us that his garment is whiter than any human bleach can make it…So there is something super-natural about Jesus right now.
On top of that when Moses was face to face with God he came down from the mountain and he shined because he was so close to God
Exodus 34:29
When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the covenant law in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord.
So Just like Moses goes onto a mountain with three friends and his face glows....
Now Jesus goes onto the mountain and moses and elijah are there and Jesus is glowing
Jesus is setting the scene for his own exodus story....
So then Elijah and Moses just sort of appear out of nowhere
Elijah and Moses
They are of course, The Law and the prophets
But also two people who disappeared
The Bible says that Elijah didn’t die that he was taken to heaven and Moses went to Mt Nebo to die but God buried him...
Elijah and Moses are symbols of the law and the prophets but they are also these divine reminders that those who are God’s treasures do not die as we think of....ceasing to exist…But that they live with God in an eternal kind of life in heaven
There is great scriptural commentator from the 3rd Century Ad named St Ephrem the Syrian and this is what he said about the transfiguration
“At the transfiguration, “the prophets rejoiced because they had seen Christ’s humanity which they had not known, and the apostles rejoiced because they had seen the glory of his divinity which they had not known.”
-St Ephrem the Syrian
Three Shelters?
So then Peter sees what is happening and offers to build Three Shelters...
Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” (He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.)
So we often think of Peter as just being foolish
But in Jewish Eschatology (which is the Jewish end times)
one of the deepest hopes of the Jewish people is that God would come and tabernacle with his people again
Every year they celebrated the feast of the tabernacles because of this eschatological hope , that the messiah would come and celebrate with them!
So Peter didn’t offer this because he was foolish…He offered it because he is a good Jew with the burning desire that God would dwell with humanity again as he did in days of old...
Before Peter’s very eyes God’s dwelling with humanity is present, for Jesus is the new tabernacle of God dwelling with humanity
The way John explains it…The word became flesh and tabernacled among us!
A cloud and the Voice:
So then there is a cloud: and remember everything that is happening here also happened in the book of Exodus...
So we can literally look back to exodus and ask where are there clouds?
If you remember back to that book, God’s glory rests on mountains as God’s glory and the Israelites literally follow the cloud of God’s glory around the dessert for 40 years…where that cloud goes they go...
And then there is this voice that comes from the cloud that just deafens all other voices
This is my son, whom I love, Listen to him!
And I want to kind of pause here and settle here for a second because this is at the heart of the disclosure....Maybe you’ve been here this monring and your thinking…So what there is so much to the book of Mark why are we stopping and talking about this
This is almost like Jesus Baptism in Mark 1…But in that God says, Jesus you are my son whom I love, with you I am well pleased…Almost confirming just to Jesus the identity of Jesus
But now God the father is confirming the identity of Jesus to the disciples
And remember Moses and Elijah are still there but Jesus is distinct among them
Jesus alone is God’s son
But it Isn’t just about the sonship of Jesus, which is massive and impotrant
It is that the relationship is based on Love
It seems so simple and obvious that we might miss just how profound this is.
The trinity, The father, Son and Spirit live in a relationship of love
That is the basis and the foundation of our relationship with God
I think Jesus wanted his disciples to se that and experience that
That out of the love of the Father Jesus loves us
and it’t not a relationship that is based onMerit
See in the business world if your not performing…it doesn't matter how much you are loved…your out!
Sometimes when marriages go to an unhealthy place they are based on I do for you so you do for me
Relationships often break because of selfishness right?
Because people take and take and take out of the relationship but they never give and that is exhausting...
But because Jesus is settled in his father’s love…He can base his relationship with humanity on love
This is such a crucial point...
Because I feel like you can go to church for years and slowly base your relationship with Jesus on Merit
I tithe every week
I attend church
I am part of a life group
I serve at church
God owe’s me
But what is core to the church…Is the declaration that God makes about Jesus…This is my son…I love him!
It is literally the whole thing...
I have seen where people have de-constructed their faith
Left following Jesus because they have been hurt by the church
I have seen where big name christian pastors have all walked away from following Jesus
I have seen where people have casually just stopped attending church and then slowly over years Jesus takes a back seat in their life
And it all has to do with a fracture of love! This loss of the basis of the relationship
In Revelation 2, Jesus tells the church in Ephesus to Stop everything they are doing and return to their first love!
This moment on the mount of transfiguration is this amazing time where Jesus will prepare the disciples to endure all that they are going to endure because the relationship is based on love
The Love of the father is extended through the son to you...
And Jesus prayed that we would understand this love:
“Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”
The prayer of Jesus is that the love that the father has dwells in you
I can not think of a more profound prayer
See it is through experiencing the love of God that Jesus can actually dwell in our lives
This whole enterprise of church and meeting here every week
It is about spurring you on in your faith
Its about helping people find and follow Jesus
But primarily it is about a living relationship of love with your creator....
So God said on that mountain: This is my son, whom I love, listen to him
Moses one day said this:
The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him.
The way forward is through listening to Jesus...
How do you do that?
You regularly get into his word...
You are being discipled 24/7 by counter narratives to Jesus’ kingdom
Regular time in the word of God helps you to listen to him!
Listening to him is the only thing that will help you get though difficult times..
A divine disclosure:
Just as I feel like the Lord gave Desiree and I special insight about our own adoption journey so we can face the trials
Jesus gave a few disciples a deeper insight a closer revelation to who he is
So they could endure
So they could have confidence that they were loved by God
Just as God is preparing Peter James and John to walk through the next door, he is preparing you to walk through that next door too
You don’t need to earn his love
The same love that the father lavishes on the son, he lavishes on you
So listen to him
lets pray
