I came across Sufjan Stevens music in the process of preparing my homily. He wrote and performed this wonderful tune "Transfiguration". It's worth listening to.
Transfiguration
Sunday 2013
Homily
Some years ago I took a road trip with my brother and
brother in law and a few of the kids to Montana to fish the Madison and
Gallatin rivers. We had a wonderful time. One day we moved our camp from just
south of Ennis Montana down river to Quake Lake. On the way we decided to take
a short cut.
We’re used to short cuts here in Minnesota and take them
all the time... We never get lost.
We were using a map to navigate through the mountains in
that part of the state but had left the main highway. We followed a substantial
road up and passed a few side roads that were not on our map. The road began to
narrow at some point so we stopped to discuss our situation.
I’m the cautious one and voted we back track and chose
another route. My brother and brother in law thought otherwise so we went on. “It
must go somewhere” is what my brother said. I wasn’t too sure.
Up and up we drove and the road became narrower and
narrower until grass grew up between our wheels and the branches swept the
sides of our vans. Then the road more or less became a rocky pathway. My
brother in law, who was riding shotgun in my van, said to me, “Maybe we should
turn around”. I stopped... a few moments later it started to thunder and
rain... and then hail. It stopped we got out of the vehicles walked up the “road”
about 40 yards to where it turned around. This was not a great mountaintop
experience... though it became a pretty good story later on.
Today we hear of two extraordinary mountain top
experiences.
In the first Moses ascends Mount Sinai and speaks face to
face with God and brings back the Law. This is THE event... this is where and
when Judaism is born... under the cloud and smoke of the mountain of God...
Moses is the lawgiver who comes with his face shining... but it’s a grim passage
set in a grim story.
The story of Jesus on the mount is not an epic story. It’s
really wonderful and yet... it just seems out of place... a little too
contrived or something. It comes out of the blue... then it just ends...
seemingly, with no lingering effects. In this passage in Luke we’re told that
the disciples are resolved to tell no one about what they’ve just experienced.
In another Gospel Jesus tells them to say nothing until he is raised from the
dead.
Peter gets a bum rap for his comments. They sound funny…
as if he were putting his foot in his mouth… he was frightened and he didn’t
know what else to say so he mumbles this weird incoherent business about
building some shelters for Jesus and the other two men who’ve appeared with
him. Peter was a devout Jewish man of the first century. He may not have been
educated but he was literate and fluent in regards to his tradition, and the
majesty and excitement of the moment were not lost on him. He wanted to build
three booths... three tabernacles… probably thinking of the feast of
tabernacles… a major feast commemorating the wilderness and the giving of the
law and the Covenant. So Peter’s words may have been harkening back to what we
heard in our first reading. He may have been thinking… this is it! He may have
envisioned what the writer of the letter of Hebrews would write, “You have
not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and
gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose
words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them. (For
they could not endure the order that was given, ‘If even an animal touches the
mountain, it shall be stoned to death.’ Indeed, so terrifying was
the sight that Moses said, ‘I tremble with fear.’) But you have come
to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to
innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the
firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the
spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new
covenant…”
So I think Peter saw this as THE event. Here’s the
kingdom! Clearly Jesus is being glorified… It is good that we’re here!
Poor Peter… he just hadn’t yet understood what was to come…
or what would be involved after this mountain top experience. He didn’t or
wouldn’t see the path that Jesus was on… or what it would cost. Peter is so
much like us.
So what does this story mean for us?
Mountain top experiences are a part of our Human and our
Christian mythos (mith-os). Actual, and figurative the “mountain top” is part
of our language. We think of holy men and women who spent their lives in
passionate devotion on the mountaintop, political heroes who spoke of the
mountaintop, and adventures who were driven to reach the mountaintop. There is
something in us which longs for the “mountain top”.
But mountaintop is about transformation. It’s about
change, and in the context of our faith and hope, about becoming our true
selves in God. From the beginning of belief we are on a path of transformation.
It must somehow become an each and every day experience not just an occasional
epiphany or a temporary transfiguration.
Moses and Jesus went up to pray... to converse with God...
to touch God... and were transformed. They were changed. A life of faith is a
life where we change “from one degree of glory to another”.
I’ve heard many times that change is good. In my
experience I guess I would have to agree, but change is mostly not easy. This
kind of transformation is intentional. It doesn’t happen by accident but
happens through deliberate and meaningful living. It’s about turning to God and
also to our neighbor. As we turn to God and serve our neighbor we are
transfigured with Christ.
“See what love the Father has given us that we should
be called children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does
not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now;
what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is
revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have
this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.”
I love this passage from 1 John where the author writes, “...when
he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.” God grant
us eyes to see and ears to hear.
Amen.
