A MOUNTAIN-TOP EXPERIENCE
A sermon for Transfiguration Sunday based on Luke 9:28-36,( 37-43)
By Rev. Dr. David Rogne

The little group of itinerant preachers had been trying for weeks to get a few days off for some "R and R."  It wasn't just a couple of rounds of golf they needed, either, or a few days at some desert spa.  They had been going day after day with no letup from the crowds.  They needed some time to sit down and absorb what they had been seeing and hearing for the past three years.  And the young rabbi who was leading them needed a rest too.  They had been moving from one town to the next, always seeking a place where they could just sit and talk.  A nice picnic bench at the edge of town would do.  This was no convention-center crowd come to town to stay at the Hilton, all expenses paid.  Just a place to take off the sandals, rinse the drip-dries, soak the feet.  But always news traveled ahead of them and towns-people were waiting, eager to show the young rabbi their swollen eyes, aching teeth, crippled joints, withered limbs, and loved ones for whom the doctors had given up hope.  And always, out of compassion, the young rabbi would minister to them and tell them of a loving heavenly father.  The small band kept moving north through Galilee and Tyre and Sidon, coming to the mountainous region around Caesarea Philippi, where the villages were smaller and the air was cooler.

When they finally found the time to sit and relax a bit, the young rabbi felt the time had come to see what his little band of disciples had learned from their three years together.  "Who do people say that I am?" he asked them.  "Well, there is no one answer to that," they said.  "Some say you are John the Baptist, raised from the dead; some say you are Elijah; some say you are one of the other prophets."  But the young rabbi was not satisfied with these answers.  He wanted to know what they thought.  It was Peter, the big fisherman, who blurted out what the others were thinking:  "You are the Christ"--the long-awaited Jewish Messiah.  The young rabbi seemed pleased with the answer.  He didn't deny it.  Yet he urged caution.  "Don't tell anyone that," he said.  The men thought they understood.  This would be their secret until Jesus had rounded up the necessary troops to take over the government.

But things weren't moving in that direction.  For the next several days, Jesus, their leader, continued to tell them that he was going to suffer, to be rejected by the religious establishment, and be killed.  It was obvious that he didn't understand the psychodynamics of motivating a group.  He needed some instruction in how to win friends and influence people.  You don't attract followers by talking about negative things.  He should have read The Power of Positive Thinking.  And Peter was just the person to tell him so.  After all, hadn't Peter been the one to state what they all knew, that Jesus was the Christ?  So the big burly fisherman took his friend aside and proceeded to set him straight:  "We've already agreed that you are the Messiah, Jesus, but you can't be Messiah and suffer.  So let's not hear any more of that."  The other disciples were standing close by as though to affirm what Peter was saying.  How the young rabbi wished that what they were saying were true!  But he had felt the icy stares of the religious leaders; he had seen the jealousy, the anger, the hatred of which they were capable.  How nice it would be if these disciples were right--that one could be God's Messiah, carry out God's purpose in the world, and not have to suffer for it.  The temptation was so appealing that he felt it was necessary to lash out at the one who suggested the easy way:  "Get away from me, Satan," he said.  "You are looking at this only from the human point of view, not from God's."

The big fisherman was cut to the quick.  He couldn't understand that Jesus had had a similar encounter with temptation at the beginning of his ministry.  At that time the tempter had urged him to take the easy way, and he had resisted.  Now the tempter was speaking again, this time through the voice of a friend.  This voice was sweeter than the first time.  It was the voice of a caring companion urging him to spare himself, telling him that suffering was not necessary for those who do God's work.  He knew it was otherwise.  Both the big fisherman and the young rabbi would need strengthening for what lay ahead of each of them.

Six days after Peter's confession at Caesarea Philippi, Jesus took the three friends who were closest to him, Peter, James, and John, on a hike up the slopes of Mt. Hermon, the highest mountain in the region.  The stage was being set for an experience that would change them all.  As they came to a flat place near the summit, they paused to catch their breath.  At that moment, Jesus’ appearance began to change before their very eyes.  His face appeared to be radiant; his clothes became glistening white.  Was the altitude getting to them?  Was Jesus standing in a shaft of peculiarly refracted light?  This was no Coppertone tan commercial.  This was no endorsement for Mr. Clean.  The light didn't so much shine on him as from him.  Could this have been what the Israelites had seen when Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from Sinai and his face shone so that he had to cover it?  Could these three disciples be witnesses to a revelation from God, just as Moses had taken three leaders of Israel with him up the holy mountain so many years before?  Could this mountain be the place where God and humanity would come together, as it happened when God and Moses spoke?  The disciples held their breath in awe.  They did not dare intrude upon this holy scene.

Now two men appeared and spoke with Jesus of his coming exodus, which was to take place in Jerusalem.  Could that one be Moses, who brought the law to Israel, and brought people the word of God--that Moses who had his own mountain-top experience--that Moses who no one could be sure had died?  And were they speaking of a new Exodus--a new journey through the dangerous wilderness that would bring people at last to some promised land?  And could that other one be Elijah, the greatest of prophets, who also spoke the word of God--that Elijah who discovered God on a mountain top, not in the wind, or the thunder, or the fire, but in that still small voice that speaks to each of us--that Elijah who did not die, but who was taken up by God in a chariot of fire?  Could it be that these two were passing on their mantles to Jesus, assuring Jesus that he was on the right track?  Could they be lending their testimony to Jesus’ ministry, as though the law and the prophets were culminating in what he had to say?  These thoughts and others ran through the disciples' minds as they knelt there, benumbed by fear.

And as these things were happening before them, a brilliant cloud enveloped them, and a voice came out of the cloud saying, "This is my beloved Son:  listen to him."  Was that the cloud that covered Sinai when Moses spoke with God?  Was it the same cloud in which God came into the tabernacle in the wilderness?  Was it such a pillar of cloud that had led the people of Israel on their march to the Promised Land?  And that voice--was it a clap of distant thunder, or was it something speaking from within each of them?  Whatever it was, it was for them the voice of majesty setting the divine seal of approval on the ministry of Jesus.

This had been a high moment for all involved.  The young rabbi was now convinced that he had correctly understood his mission:  To proclaim God's love and be loyal to his calling, whatever it might cost.  And for their part, the disciples were convinced that they had captured a glimpse of Jesus’ destiny, and consequently, of their own.  The veil had momentarily been lifted to allow them to see the shining future which would follow the sweat and blood and tears that were ahead of them.  It was the kind of vision everyone needs, more than once if possible, but at least once, so that they can make it through the dark days of trouble.

But there was more to be gotten from this experience.  The disciples had witnessed this glorious event in silence.  Now Peter wanted to keep this moment for all time.  He wanted to remain in the rarified atmosphere of this mountain-top experience and stop the clock.  He had seen Paree; he didn't want to return to the farm.  When he found his voice, he said to Jesus, "Master, it's a good thing that we are here; let us make three booths, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.  Let's stay right here, Jesus.  We've seen how glorious life can be.  Let's preserve this glorious moment and forget all that grim conversation about a cross."

No sooner had Peter said the words, than the scene disappeared.  Peter looked around, rubbed his eyes, and no longer saw the heavenly visitors, only Jesus.  Brigadoon had disappeared.  Which was reality:  the young rabbi who now stood before him in modest apparel, or the sight he had just beheld?  And why had they been treated to this glorious vision if it were to vanish as quickly as it had come?  What difference did it make?  Apparently each of them received a message, and in one respect, the message was the same:  Jesus had a glorious future.  Jesus was much cheered by the prospect, and he would soon set his face toward Jerusalem, where he would indeed be exalted--lifted up--but not in the manner his disciples had in mind.  For the disciples, the message seemed to be that devoutly religious people receive special treatment.  They are exempt from suffering.  Therefore, they thought, let us stay on the mountain top.  Let this high experience last forever.

But it was not to be.  Jesus did not even answer the suggestion to build booths as the ancient Israelites had done, and to remain in this place.  His Exodus was about to unfold, and he was prepared to lead his pilgrim band to the Promised Land.  But it would not be from glory to glory as the disciples expected.  Moses, in his time, had seen the Promised Land from his high mountain, but Joshua and the people of Israel still had the hard work of settling there.  Elijah had heard the still small voice of the Lord on his mountain top, but he had to return to the valley to anoint kings and to choose a successor.  Jesus, too, had to descend into the valley, for that is where the work of God waited to be done.

No sooner had they come down from the mountain than they found a crowd waiting for them, for there was a man with an epileptic son, and the crowd besought Jesus to heal him.  Is that where this experience was leading?  Back to business as usual?  Was this experience destined to become, like so many religious experiences, only a dimly-remembered high moment?  No.  It was more than that.  They had been to the mountain top.  Never mind that the vision was a brief one.  They had seen what God had in mind for God's children.  Life would never again be the same.

Some of us may have had such an experience:  a time when God seemed very real; a time when Christ was very near; a time when, no matter how brief the experience, everything seemed to fit; a time when doubt vanished and we felt we were in harmony with the universe.  But, alas, it did not last.  It was not intended to last.  It was a vision of the future; a brief glimpse of how God intends life to be.  But we are soon called back from that vision to the realities of the present.  For now, Christ's way must pass through the valley, and like those disciples, we are called to go with him, embracing the hurting, caressing the sick, lifting the weak, giving hope to the hopeless.  And to our amazement, far from discovering that in such work the vision fades, we shall discover that along such a path the vision is becoming a reality