Readings: Psalm
99 Luke 9:28-43a
We pray; May the
words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your
sight, o God, our rock and our sustainer.
Amen
How good Lord to
be here!
Your glory fills
the night:
your face and
garments, like the sun,
shine with
unborrowed light.
How good, Lord, to
be here,
your beauty to
behold,
where Moses and
Elijah stand,
your messengers of
old.
How good Lord to
be here! Today, transfiguration Sunday,
we take some time to affirm that it is good to be here, to rest in that
mountain top moment, to recognise Christ in all his unexpected glory before
God.
And I use
unexpected in this sense: that the
disciples were not ready for this ‘thing’ that happened to Jesus on the
mountain top. They were adjusting to his unexpected ways right enough – his
encounters with the marginal, his upside down way of looking at the world, his
challenge of Hebrew law and priesthood……
But this was right out there: a seeming transformation of the figure of
Jesus, Moses and Elijah turning up, God’s voice in the cloud (and it appeared
to be directed to them- ‘listen to him’). Small wonder they stumbled and
fumbled their way through the encounter in a way that I am sure many of us can
identify with. Those cringe moments when
we look back and wonder how we could have been so crass. It was most certainly
unexpected, terrifying even – but how good to be there – to see God’s glory
shining through this man called Jesus.
Some of you here
have climbed mountains – others of us have climbed less difficult hills but
still understand that moment of reaching the top – usually completely out of
breath, often having wanted to give up several times on the way, reluctant to
leave once we were there because it took a great effort and the sense of
arrival, the vista, the feel of being a little closer to heaven takes root in
your heart - and you don’t want to lose it – ever!
I remember one
such climb I made in Scotland – up Schiehallion in Perthshire – called a Monroe
because it is over 3,000 ft – I was young but not particularly fit and managed
to strain a muscle on the way up which got progressively worse. In the end I got this close to the top but
not quite – didn’t stop me buying the teeshirt two years ago that said I
climbed Schiehallion!
But it was an
awesome climb and the sense of simply being on that mountain has stayed with me
forever. How good it was to be there!
There is a story
UK writer Tom Gordon tells of a bunch of blokes in the pub one night who
decided that it would be great to do something to raise money for charity – and
you guessed it – they decided to climb a mountain; Ben Nevis no less. One of them raised quite a lot of money –
perhaps because people had little faith that he would even get from the car to
the start of the track, he was so unfit and totally unprepared. They were wrong – he made it part of the way
up with a lot of help from his friends – but in the end they left him and his
moaning to make his own way to the top.
About to go back, having given up, thinking about whether he should hand
back the money or pretend he had made it to the top – a young woman who had
been up and down the mountain many times stopped to encourage him – and told he
was just 10 mins from the top, then walked beside him. He arrived on this mountain top to much back
slapping and accolade. How good it was
to be there! And he, like the disciples,
didn’t want to go down – he wanted to savour the moment, the sense of
achievement. But again the young woman
had the right words: ‘It’s hard to leave once you’ve made it….but we’ll have to
get going…the weather will close in shortly. ….but I’ll tell you this. You will never, ever forget today….. never
lose this success, no matter what happens.’
It will always have been good to be here!
I wonder how that
time on the mountain top with Jesus transformed the lives of Peter, John and
James in the days and years to come. We
can only imagine why they kept silent on what they had seen – maybe struck
speechless from awe and wonder, unable to process it, or perhaps unsure that
they had the words to describe this moment or afraid that people would label
them crazies? Whatever, one thing we can
be pretty sure of - life would never be quite the same again.
For that
experience of the transfiguration of Jesus on the mountain was also the
transformation of the lives of the disciples - one that was received on the
mountain but played out on the plain below.
They had seen Jesus in a different light – and were themselves able to
glimpse the unimagined possibility of the mystery and power and presence of God
to change this world through this man Jesus.
It made a
difference to what they believed was possible, it expanded Peter and James and
John’s thinking into visions of unlimited hope for life at ground level. It may
not have taken hold immediately but it was a significant place on their journey
of faith. For all their continuing muckups and misunderstandings, failures to
grasp truths and continuing bullheadedness, they understood beyond a doubt that
this man was who they were to be with, to follow - and his words were the ones they needed to
listen to.
So, silent they
may have been, but how good it was to be there.
But, like the
blueprint for life itself, the reality of the plain did hit almost immediately. Failure to heal, distraught parents, Jesus to
the rescue.
Life on the plain
is messy – it’s called reality. It
involves failure and suffering, emotion and uncertainty, blinding pain as well
as joy. When we try to fix things, they
go awry. When we are tired, we find ourselves scrabbling for direction. When we are happy we find others who do their
best to bring us down.
And it seems to me
that the question we ask of ourselves, in the midst of the reality of daily
life, where do we hold the place of transfiguration, of the realisation of the
glory and light and hope of Jesus Christ, that time or times when we know
beyond a doubt, with a dumbstruck awe, the reality of God in our lives?
Or to put it
another way – are we able to say; it is good to be here, not just on the
mountain top but also on the plain? It
is good to be part of this community of faith.
It is good to be shaken and stirred, uncertain and expectant. It is good to know that even in our darkest
moments, the glory that is God shines for us. It is good that we learn and grow
in faith as the people of God. It is
good that together we gather around the table, sharing in the feast that Jesus
invites us to – no matter who or where we are – we are welcomed into the
oneness of Christ Jesus.
We pray: Lord, it
is good to be here. Here where we are
blinded by your revelation, your truth, your glory. Here where, through new eyes, new
understandings we discover a new reality, the place where all things are
possible when we listen to the one who was transfigured on the mountain, and who changes our lives forever because we
too have seen his glory. In the name of
the resurrected Christ we pray.
Amen.
Margaret Garland
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