Transformation

You may be seated.

So, this passage... The very first words begin, "About 8 days after Jesus had said these things," which might prompt the question: What things? What did Jesus say? And if you want to actually turn in your Bible to earlier in chapter 9 right before our passage this morning beginning at verse 18. It says that once Jesus when Jesus was praying by himself, the disciples joined him and he asked them, "Who do the crowds say that I am?" They answered, "John the Baptist, others Elijah and still others that one of the ancient prophets has come back to life." He asked them. "And what about you? Who do you say that I am?" Peter answered, "The Christ sent from God." Jesus gave them strict orders not to tell this to anyone. He said, "The Human One must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, Chief priests, and the legal experts and be killed and raised on the third day." 8 days later, after Jesus said these things, we find him again on a mountaintop seeking to pray. And this passage, this moment is significant. This is the first time someone human has identified Jesus as the Messiah. And this is the first prediction that Jesus told the disciples that he must suffer and die. And be raised to life again.

That... did not fit with what the disciples expected the messiah to be like. For the Jewish people at the time, they expected a messiah to come in power to deliver them from their oppressor, from the Roman Empire. And yet Jesus is saying - after they've identified him as the Messiah - Jesus says, "I have to die."

The disciples don't understand.

But 8 days later,

Jesus again goes up on a mountain to pray.

Can you imagine what must be going through Jesus' mind? Because you know, when the disciples came up to him, Jesus was praying. And so you maybe have to ask yourself the question of: Is this the moment when God reveals to Christ the plan?

The reality that he must go to Jerusalem and face this.

Actually, I misspoke.

Jesus doesn't have to do anything, but rather Jesus chose to follow the will of God.

God chooses to act on our behalf.

And so in this moment, when Jesus is praying, I imagine that he is seeking comfort for the difficult future that he knows he has in front of him.

It says that, "As he was praying, the appearance of his face changed."

It's interesting. We call today Transfiguration Sunday. And Luke is the only one of the three gospel writers who include this account who does not use the word "Transfiguration."

Matthew and Mark both use that word, but Luke chose not to. We think maybe because he didn't want it to become associated with some pagan rituals that were around during that time. A modern-day analogy to this would be that if any of you decide to talk to your grandchildren about Transfiguration Sunday, you might have to specify that this is not the same kind of transfiguration that's in Harry Potter.

This is not the Transfiguration taught by Professor McGonagall. This is something much different.

This is...

light. This is an echo of the account in Exodus when, when Moses spends 40 days up on the mountain in the presence of God as God tells him the law. And he's taking copious notes.

But when Moses first came down the mountain and stood in front of the Israelite. He had no idea that he was shining.

When the people saw him they were afraid and so Moses put on a veil.

Actually, first Moses told the Israelites what Jesus [God] had said and when he was done speaking the words of God he put on the veil.

This is an echo of that account.

But it's also an echo that means much more.

We read that Moses and Elijah were standing with Jesus, that all three of them were shining. And that the three of them were, were talking. And that they were speaking about Jesus's "departure."

Kind of a weird word.

You could also say Jesus' "Exodus." Jesus' "death and resurrection."

Moses and Elijah both had interesting, an interesting end to their life here on Earth. It's said that, when Moses died, the Lord buried him and no one knows where his grave is. And Elijah, when his time on Earth was over, Elijah was carried off into heaven on a chariot.

In the Old Testament, in Jewish thought, Moses is very closely associated with the law. Elijah is associated with the prophets. He was the first major prophet.

And they're having a conversation with Jesus this, this conversation is going in both directions. It's almost as though Luke is making sure that we know, "Hey, don't get rid of the Old Testament. We still need it."

Then, finally, we're told Peter and those with him were almost asleep.

This tells us this, this is happening at night.

If we continue on in the gospel, we hear another account in which they did fall asleep.

But, in this particular moment, they were awake enough to notice the light shining. Mysteriously.

And then Peter, oh Peter. Peter is the one who tends to speak before he thinks.

And he, he says, "Master, it's good that we're here. We can build three shrines. We can build three dwellings and we can stay on this mountaintop forever."

If any of you have heard this passage preached before,

the pastor may have said something to the extent of we can't stay on the mountaintop forever. Sooner or later we must go back down. To the valley to do the work. But that's not the point that I want to make today. Today, I want to let the mountaintop experience be what it is. A moment of awe. A moment in which God affirms to Peter, James, and John that, yes, this is my son.

A moment in which we glimpse a vision into the kingdom of God. We glimpse the glory of God.

And I would say that it is probably this vision that gives them the courage and the strength to continue in the days ahead because this is a moment that they can hang onto. When it seems like everything is lost, in those 3 days when Jesus Is dead, the disciples can hang on to this moment. They can remember.

They were given a glimpse in the, into the kingdom of heaven and yet it still wasn't enough, yet Peter still denied Christ 3 times.

And it's easy to, you know, pick on Peter... but it's important to remember that at that time Jesus hasn't yet accomplished what he came to accomplish. He hadn't yet risen from the dead.

But in this moment when the cloud overshadows Peter James and John, and a voice comes from the cloud and says, "This is my son, my Chosen One. Listen to him!" All three gospels say that. Listen to him!

We keep the Old Testament, but now, when we go back to the Old Testament, when we read about the law, we interpret the law through Jesus.

Jesus shows us once and for all what God intended to accomplish through that law. How many times in the gospel whenever somebody asked Jesus a question about the law does he sum it up into two? Love God and love your neighbor.

All of the Law is contained within this.

Even Paul

speaks of love more highly than he does knowledge. Or spiritual gifts. Theology. Don't forget Paul was a Pharisee. Paul was a Pharisee who persecuted the Christians.

In his zealousness for God, for being a good Jew, Paul tracked the Christians down so that they may be arrested and killed for daring to deviate from their religious faith.

And after Jesus reveals himself to Paul, Paul knows, without a doubt, that that is not what God calls us to do.

We seem to think that God needs us to defend the gospel.

No. The gospel can stand on its own.

God calls us to love.

In Second Corinthians, Paul writes that where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

And I know that there are people who, who will use this verse to... to argue that because America is a Christian nation... Yes, we have freedom.

But it's, I think it's the other way around. I think that when we find freedom, true freedom we can say then... the Spirit of the Lord is present.

Don't get me wrong. I love our nation. I love the ideals that we stand for.

But I'm also not going to pretend that we haven't done things that were terrible.

Because America

is a nation of humans and we all mess up. We all fall short.

And even then God forgives us.

But we have to rest in that knowledge that God loves us, that God forgives us, and that if we turn to God, we can relax.

Because without that knowledge of God's unconditional love, maybe we feel an anxiety. Maybe we feel as though we have to pretend our past has not happened. We have to pretend that we haven't made some kind of mistake. We live in fear and so because like if anybody finds this out, then they they won't love me. They'll kick me out.

But God knows and God loves us.

I kind of find it reassuring that Paul writes that Moses put on the veil so that the people couldn't see but the light fading away.

Nowhere in Exodus does it say that's the reason why.

But Paul is trying to understand why his people can't seem to, to accept the Christ as the Messiah.

In... Second Corinthians is complicated. His argument is complicated. I need a deeper understanding of the law and Paul's, the way Paul understands it in order to completely understand it, but the point he's making, in this passage, he's defending his ministry. If you read earlier on he asked this rhetorical question, kind of like, "Who is qualified to be in this ministry? Who's qualified to preach?"

And he says, he doesn't pull any punches.

He says,

"We aren't like so many people who hustle the word of God to make a profit."

So Second Corinthians, the people in Corinth at this time, there are some people who are coming in and in they're preaching something else. And they're kind of making these little suggestions against Paul.

They're asking, "Does Paul have a letter of recommendation? Does Paul have a piece of paper, a degree,

that certifies he has the authority to speak on God's behalf?"

And Paul reminds them, "I don't need that letter because you are the letter.

The proof is in the fruit.

God has worked among you and you have transformed. Your lives have changed. That is proof enough."

The last thing I want to say is that Paul says, "We are being transformed into that same image of Christ, from one degree of glory to the next." That word "transformed" is used in Matthew and Mark to describe the Transfiguration. It's used in this passage, and it's used in Romans chapter 12 verse 2, "Be not conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

I was, I was happy when I when I found this little picture on the front of the bulletin. Says "Transformation and loading."

It's a process.

It is a process. Paul says that Christ doesn't automatically take away the veil so that we can understand, understand God. But rather Christ makes it possible for us when we turn to God to have the veil lifted.

But on any given day if we even for a moment give in to our fear that veil can come back.

In our humanity, we can, we can close our eyes, we can close our ears, we can close ourselves off to the reality of what's going on around us. Or we can remember this passage, this description of Jesus on the mountain, full of radiant glory.

Overwhelming the disciples with awe.

We can choose to close our eyes out of fear, or

we can choose to look at the vision of Christ,

and to remember that God is mighty.

That God will, chooses to work through us, broken as we are. And that there is nothing we can do to prevent God, God's Kingdom from coming. So, with that, I can think of no better way to end, but to invite you to sing "Shine Jesus Shine," found in the little black hymnal on page 2173.