Feast of the Transfiguration
A Sermon by Marianne B. Evett
All Saints Parish
Brookline, Massachusetts
August 4-5, 2007
Just about two months ago, my husband David and I were driving a rental car around New Zealand's South Island. Going from Wanaka to Queenstown, we had a choice of two routes: the standard route around a lake, through orchards and vineyards, and another, shorter way over the Crown mountain range, which our guidebook said had "spectacular views." So we took that one. Mile after mile we drove, through bare, tawny hills like sleeping lions, unable to see much in any direction but aware that we were climbing higher and higher. Then, after a steep ascent we came over a rise to the top.
It was a shock - but a shock caused by breathtaking beauty. I was so stunned by the view that I could not speak. We were high up, and in the clear air and dazzling sunlight, we could see very far, looking out over a landscape of immense variety, yet of unusual harmony and proportion - a high green hill just opposite, its rounded ridges spread like fingers on a hand; more valleys, farms, a little village, a winding river, a lake shining like a mirror, and all around the rim, ranges of snow-capped mountains glinting in the sun. All I could do was say an almost silent "Oh!" and "Thank you!" I wanted to kneel down in awe and thanksgiving for this vision of creation.
Of course, the moment had to end. Dave took pictures, trying to capture the extraordinary view. I tried to burn it on my memory, so that I could take it with me. But the sun was getting lower; we needed to get on. We got in the car and wound our way down the mountain.
I thought of this vision of God's glory when I realized that the week-end on which I'd been asked to preach celebrated the Feast of the Transfiguration. The Transfiguration, I confess, is a little scary to think about - a strange mystical experience that proclaims the majesty and mission of Jesus. Did it really happen? It seems remote, a theological lesson, a subject for an allegorical painting. I didn't at first have any notion of how to deal with it - or of how it relates to my life.
So I decided to look at the Transfiguration from the point of view of the disciples who were there. First of all, in the Epistle for today, Peter assures us that yes, it did really happen: "we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty," he says. "For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, 'This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.' We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain."
I've always had a special fondness for Peter, who of all the disciples seems the most like us - hasty, quick-tempered, speaking before he thinks, yet anxious to please, to do the right thing. Just a week before this moment on the mountain, the Gospels tell us, Peter had made what is called the Great Confession, answering Jesus' question, "Who do you say that I am?" with all his passionate urgency: "The Messiah of God." The right answer. Jesus then went on to explain to the disciples what that answer meant - that as the Messiah he must undergo great suffering and rejection, that he would be killed and would be raised on the third day. And that those who would follow him would also need to take up their cross. And we suppose that mostly the disciples nodded and said "Uh-huh. Right." And didn't really get it.
Even Peter. As we heard in today's Gospel, Jesus takes Peter, James and John up on the mountain to pray. As Jesus prays, his face and his clothes become dazzling white, transfigured, and the disciples see Moses and Elijah, also in glory, talking to him about what is to come in Jerusalem. The disciples feel very sleepy, but they continue to watch this extraordinary vision, and suddenly, with his usual impetuousity, Peter blurts out "Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah." "Not knowing what he said."
What happened next is that the cloud comes down - always a sign that God is around - terrifying the disciples; and the voice of God says "This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him." And Moses and Elijah are gone.
"Not knowing what he said." The implication, from that voice in the Cloud, is that Peter hasn't been listening to Jesus. He saw Moses and Elijah, the manifestations of the Law and the Prophets, the preeminent forerunners of the Messiah in Jewish teachings - and they were real - right there in front of him, glorified, with a glorified true Messiah Jesus shining between them. He wanted to hang onto that vision, memorialize it in some way. If he'd only had a camera!
Instead, he said "Let us make three dwellings," - some translations say "three tabernacles," but actually he had in mind the tents set up for Sukkot, the Jewish Festival of Booths - tent-like dwellings that remind the Jews of the long wandering in the wilderness. They are not permanent but are holy, part of a ritual repeated yearly.
Of course, it wasn't the time to make a ritual out of this experience, not time to try to preserve it. It was time to go down off the mountain and take this moment of revelation into the hard times ahead in Jerusalem - Gesthemene, Calvary. That was what Jesus had been saying, if Peter had listened. Not the transcendence - first the cross.
We all have mountain top experiences. They are moments when, suddenly, without warning, you are completely caught up in something full of wonder and awe. It can be a fresh, new view of the world or the face of a bride coming down the aisle to meet her almost-husband. Or a child's face on Christmas morning. Or hearing the slow movement of Beethoven's 15th Quartet. They are moments when we glimpse the transcendent glory that belongs to God. And we need to be open to them. Moses, in the reading from the Old Testament, comes down from the mountain where he has been receiving laws from God, and his face shines so brightly that the Israelites are afraid of him. He has to put a veil on to lead his everyday life. But, when he goes back to talk with God, he takes the veil off. Meeting God is to drop all barriers. It's just you, bare-faced and without any pretensions, excuses, subterfuges, anything that might come between you and the totality of the experience. What we need to do is drop the veil, open ourselves to see.
And we cannot stay in the transfigured moment. The pictures Dave took from that New Zealand peak can't show the sweep and depth of the view. I can't remember every detail - was there a church in the valley? I can't be sure. Yet I have held the memory as a transcendent moment to sustain me since I returned home. And Peter did not forget the experience on the mountain top. It continued to sustain him throughout his life, sustain his conviction that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah. Writing in Rome, where he faces persecution and death, he tells the story again and says: "So we have the prophetic message more fully confirmed. You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts."
The idea, I think, is first to be open to transfiguring experiences, and then, like Peter, to let them overflow into our lives. There's a quote from the mystical poet William Blake - "The cistern contains; the fountain overflows." The cistern keeps its waters pent up; the fountain lofts them into the air, a beautiful arc sending refreshing joy and light into the world. We can choose which we are - cisterns or fountains in life.
Moses had his own view from the mountain top - though he was not allowed to enter the Promised Land, God led him up the mountain and showed him all the lands that the Israelites would settle, a glorious view of fulfillment before his death. Martin Luther King prophetically echoed Moses in the speech he gave the night before he was assassinated:
"We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop ... And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."
Coming down from the mountain top can bring you into darkness, whether it's coping with the stiff-necked Israelites, or going to Jerusalem and the inevitable suffering waiting there, or braving hatred and evil in America - or simply continuing to live and face the problems of everyday life. Most of us are not called upon to be martyrs or prophets. But we are called to be open to the awe and wonder that can bring us to our knees or fill us with tears of joy. You may not be able to make all the glories of the vision last, but in whatever trials that lie ahead, it will sustain you with its promise, "A lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts."