*This post is taken from a sermon preached at St. Thaddeus in Aiken, SC on the Feast of the Transfiguration.
'Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him. They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep; but since they had stayed awake, they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. Just as they were leaving him, Peter said to Jesus, “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. While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. Then from the cloud came a voice that said, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” When the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen.'
--Luke 9: 28-36
I've been on that mountain, Mt. Tabor. I got to study for three weeks in the Holy Land during the summer leading into my last year of seminary, which was a thing that could not have happened without the generous support of all of y'all here at St. Thaddeus, so I sincerely thank you for that opportunity. Lots of pilgrims walk all the way up the mountain in solidarity with Jesus and his inner circle of James, John, and Peter, but we were lazy, so our group drove a bus up there. And when you arrive, you're met with this huge basilica and dozens of little outdoor chapels. We celebrated mass in one of them - because we're Anglicans and aren't allowed to have a mass inside most of the holy sites in that region. And we heard this story again, the story of Jesus shining in resplendent light, conversing with Moses the Law Giver and Elijah, greatest of the prophets. We heard God speaking to the disciples, and to us, "This is my Son, my chosen: listen to him." And we couldn't help but understand where Peter was coming from. Yes, Lord, let's build three dwellings for you, Moses, and Elijah, and let's stay here. Let's stay in this moment of euphoria, of a kind of closeness to the divine that we just don't get down there in the valley, in the real world. Of course, though it's not included in our reading this morning, we know that Jesus tells Peter no, that they can't stay up there, and then they move back down the mountain, back into the valley, back onto the road to Jerusalem and the cross. While up there I said to one of the other members of our group, "If he wasn't transfigured on this mountain, he sure as heck shoulda been!" It was that kind of place. Who'd wanna leave?
And then we went inside the Basilica of the Transfiguration. As soon as you walk in your eyes are drawn to the magnificent high altar, and then you notice the chapels just to the left and right of the main entrance. Walking into each of them you find a small space with an altar and painting on the ceiling in dedication to, you guessed it, Moses on the left and Elijah on the right.
The Chapels of Moses and Elijah inside the Basilica of the Transfiguration
We didn't listen to him. We did the thing. We built the dwelling places for all three of them because, of course we did! Why do we do that? Why is it so hard to just listen to Jesus? One reason I suspect is a phenomenon that one of my clergy friends likes to call the religion of Jesus vs. the religion about Jesus. The religion of Jesus is what we might call the religion of the original 12 apostles and all those disciples that followed Jesus in his earthly ministry. This religion is grounded squarely on the the Gospels more than any other Scriptures, and is concerned with what Jesus said, how he lived his life, and the examples he gave for those who chose to follow him and for those who'd come after. The religion about Jesus, meanwhile, is the religion that grew up in the days after Jesus' death and resurrection, when folks told stories about Jesus, but he was kept in isolation. This religion became concerned with doctrine and dogmatic laws and became a mirror image of the very faith that Jesus himself often criticized. It became concerned with matters never addressed by Jesus—such as who could get married or who could be ordained—rather than matters that he addressed so often—such as economic justice for the poor, release for the prisoners, and the deconstruction of top-down power models. In short, while the religion of Jesus sees him as a living, present reality, the religion about Jesus keeps him bound to distant years in Palestine, as the hymn says. We Christians have always had a choice: to have a relationship with Jesus that is alive in the present reality and still speaking to us , or having one that just holds Jesus in pristine condition in isolation on Sundays, apart from our daily lives? One of these tends to listen to the Living Christ a bit more than the other.
One of my favorite depictions of the Transfiguration story is in the graphic novel Marked by Steve Ross. In that book Jesus is depicted as clean-shaven, somewhat androgynous person of color preaching in a dystopian, occupied land in an unspecified time. There are some great illustrations in this book, and the Transfiguration is one of the best. We see Jesus climb up a mountainside, only to step off the ledge when he gets to the top. In the air he is met by Moses and Elijah, who are depicted as Frederick Douglass and Louis Armstrong, respectively. As Jesus is talking with the law-giver and discussing a large book he has opened, the prophet plays his trumpet and Jesus begins to shine in radiant light, while Peter takes out his camera to snap a picture. But before he can do so, the camera explodes. He's pretty bummed, "I just wanted a souvenir," he says. Jesus replies, "My friend, there are some things you just can't freeze in time."
The Transfiguration, as depicted in Marked by Steve Ross
Do we want to just keep Jesus frozen in time? If we do that, what’s the point of listening to him? This Jesus thing we do is meant to be lived out loud, celebrated in here, yes, but taken out there - this is just the dress rehearsal! The Gospel, as St. Paul tells us, must not be veiled, but it must be proclaimed in both word and action, just as we promise whenever we renew our baptismal vows. The Good News must shine from us, like Jesus on the mountainside. . And it all starts with listening to him, just as the heavenly voice instructed.
And what does that look like? Many things, really, one of which is don’t build nothin Jesus tells ya not to build! Another, and perhaps the most poignant, is that we can't stay on the mountain. We can't stay in that euphoric state, we can’t freeze it, as Peter wanted to do. We have to come down. We have to move into the valleys. And we have to move toward our own Jerusalem, which isn't exactly an easy walk. The end of that journey, we are told, is a cross, but we know better, don't we? The end of the journey is the beginning. It's resurrection. It's meaning being made out of the senseless and the fulfillment of God's promise to always bring life after death.
Some of y'all might remember - though I don't blame you if you can't - that my last sermon as the youth minister at St. Thaddeus in the summer of 2009 was about how God is always calling us to something new, even though it was on a different Scripture. I couldn't stay here, no matter how much I loved this place. I had to go to seminary, had to move to Kentucky, then to North Carolina. I had to grow beyond who I was, and in doing so I even found the person God always knew that I was, even if I hadn’t yet, and moreover found the one God had chosen for me to spend my life with, through richer or poorer and in sickness and in health.
Ya gotta come down. That’s where the learning happens. For the better part of two decades, y'all have had a bunch of mountaintop experiences in this place. I still remember the energy that Father Grant brought here on that first Pentecost celebration. It was infectious. And God richly blessed y'all in that common ministry and mission. At the same time, God has called y'all to come down from that particular mountain and walk through a valley of transition that is leading to something new, something holy.
Whether we are talking about a change in church leadership or a change in our personal lives, the story of the Transfiguration reminds us that no mountaintop experience lasts forever, that we cannot contain the resplendent light of Jesus that shines both on us and through us, and that all we need to do is listen to him.
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