Is It Good To Be Here?
Mark 9:2-9 (Transfiguration) with II Kings 2:1-12 in b.g. (Elijah and Elisha) Feb. 19, 2012
I have been often fascinated by mountains. They are so big – and as we near them, we are dwarfed. Mountains can sometimes help us to put things in perspective.
I remember the first time that I was ever with a group of people who had never seen mountains as we entered the Rocky Mountains. I was in a school bus, as a 16 year old with a bunch of other teenagers – all from central Saskatchewan. Most of them had never seen a mountain. As we made our way that day from Calgary towards Banff – it became eerily quiet on the bus. The other kids craned their necks to see. As they craned and began to see, their mouths literally fell open. They were literally blown away by the majesty of those mountains: the cascading streams, the verdant forests, the jagged and deep canyons. Their awe continued to grow over the next few days as we camped in those mountains, as we traversed our way as far as safe hiking trails allowed. Once up high, not at the top, but getting closer to the top of that mountain we stopped to look down. Banff looked SO SMALL. The Bow River appeared to merely a winding line. The air was fresh, cool, crisp even in August.
My fascination with mountains has only grown over the years as I have traversed small parts of the Swiss Alps, and approached Mount Denali in Alaska. The ancients had a sense of this too – not just the majesty of mountains, but a sense of the holy, that mountains may be THIN, places where the separation between God and humanity somehow seems less.
In today's Gospel Mark leads us up a mountain. We are following Jesus and 3 of his closest disciples - Peter, James and John. But Mark gives us a hint even before he begins to share their experience. Mark says "Six days later". Mark wants us to make a particular connection. Going up the mountain occurs 6 days after Jesus had asked the disciples "Who do people say that I am?" They had responded with a variety of answer: John the Baptist, Elijah and some others even say, one of the prophets. But then Jesus pushes them into a question that is anything but gossip, hearsay or philosophical, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter, God bless him blurts out, "You are the MESSIAH," or as the textual footnotes say, the Christ.
Peter gets it right, doesn't he? Well, at least he had the word, the title correct. Yet, later when Jesus begins to teach Peter and the other disciples what the Messiah does and is – they are not as receptive. But I get ahead of myself.
Today is about receiving a glimpse of who Jesus is. They go up the mountain. There Jesus is somehow transfigured right before them. I suspect that words don't suffice – but words are what we have. "His clothes became dazzling white".
Then something else happens. Moses and Elijah appear with Jesus. Do you remember? Moses who led the people of Israel out of slavery into or at least very near the promised land only to die just before crossing the river and apparently buried by God and only God. Yes, that Moses, already dead for hundreds of years. Moses who in many ways symbolizes the Law of God. And Elijah, who as we heard in today's first lesson is taken up out of Elisha's sight in a whirlwind, without dying, but also hundreds of years before this particular day. Yes, there are Moses and Elijah with Jesus, conversing with him.
Who would have believed it? Who could have believed it – even then? What would you do – if someone long since dead appeared to you – I mean not just in a dream, but you actually beheld them with your own eyes? And what if some of your friends saw the same thing? What would you say? Would you be the same afterwards?
Peter, that one who always seems uncomfortable with any kind of silence, who just has to do or say something, begins to speak to Jesus. "Rabbi, it is good for us to be here – do you want us to make 3 dwellings – one for each of you?" The gospel writer Mark tells us that Peter did not know what to say because he, James and John were terrified.
Yes, that's right – not overjoyed but terrified. In the presence of the holy – in the presence of the One for whom time does not operate the way we experience time – in the presence of God the Creator who can see into our minds and hearts, who wouldn't be terrified?
In the midst of their terror a cloud that overshadows them. (there are often clouds on mountains aren't there?) Then they hear a voice. The voice speaks of Jesus in such a way that they can't miss it. In Mark's Gospel when Jesus is baptized only he hears God's voice that He is God's Son, the beloved. BUT NOW Peter, James and John hear God's voice speaking of Jesus, "This is my Son, the beloved; listen to Him!"
And suddenly), yes, suddenly they looked around, and there is NO ONE with them anymore, but only Jesus.
Then they come down the mountain. Jesus instructs them that they shouldn't tell anyone about this, until after he had been raised from the dead.
Do you like mountain top experiences? Being way up there, looking down at others below? Do you like or long for the spiritual mountain top experiences where you feel close to God, where you may actually discern a word from God or where you have a burning conviction that God is calling you to do something?
We may or we may not. Some people look for those kinds of experiences in different churches, in different experiences, through different kinds of music or different kinds of service. On occasion God's Spirit actually chooses to stir us up. Then we receive a glimpse of God or the suffering and rising One. That can be wonderful – life changing, life fulfilling, beyond words. In such moments our faces may glow, our voices may rise. We may be transformed.
But we can't stay in that moment. Jesus couldn't or wouldn't. And Jesus leads the disciples off that mountain back to the rest of reality: of bickering people, of people who are hurting, lonely, filled with anger, hatred, jealousy, fear. He leads them down that mountain so that he can continue to make his way to Jerusalem. We do know why he goes to Jerusalem, don't we? He goes to Jerusalem to die: to allow all the forces of evil, the ones outside of us and the ones inside of us do their worst to him. Jesus does this because He loves the world. His love for the world miraculously includes people, all people. He does this because we, the world, continues to need to be delivered from the power of evil, the powers of death, the powers of selfishness and greed. Jesus does this because God the Creator knows that we can't achieve such deliverance on our own. No siree bob. We need a Saviour, one who can deliver us.
And so Jesus goes to Jerusalem – where he is rejected by the religious establishment, abandoned by most of his own disciples and cruelly executed by the Roman Empire which as all Empires do refuse to tolerate anyone who does not toe the line of might is right – and that which we can see, feel, taste, touch and control or dominate is all that really matters.
He goes to flesh out the love of God in the face of all that would reject or deny the love of God and our universal need for that.
And those who would follow Him are called – to trust Jesus by seeking to follow him here and now in our lives, in our situations – to flesh out His love and compassion for all – his honesty starting with us and others – about our needs to change in mind and heart – and about his willingness through His Spirit to continually work on that change.
The mountaintops can be amazing – even if they are terrifying. But the real core of our lives are lived here with families, congregations, soup kitchens, schools, malls, those that are hungry and those that eat too much, those that are lonely and despairing. And we, we would be followers of Jesus don't need to pretend to have all the answers but we are called to live in the moment trusting Jesus and seeing where and what the Spirit would have us do.
Such living is rarely easy, but by the grace of God, it can be good. Yes, Peter had one part of that experience on the mountain right – Lord it is good to be here. May it be so among us, through us and with us, as we seek to listen and follow, the beloved Son of God, Jesus Christ. Amen.