Exodus 34:29-35
Luke 9:28-36
“Transfiguring the World”
07 February 2106 St. Andrew’s
Military Chapel Singapore
Sometimes it’s hard to fully
appreciate the tone and tenor of a story, especially when we’ve never
experienced the exact thing someone is trying to explain. Something always gets
lost in the telling of the story, in the translating of one’s vivid experience
into words that the audience can fully grasp and comprehend. And I think that
is something that we, as listeners of these two stories, struggle with. I would
add, it is also something those that see Moses and Jesus struggle with as well
and they are there when these two stories occur.
I don’t know about everyone’s early
Biblical formation. But, in my little corner of the world, which is to say the
small town of Bluefield, WV and Westminster Presbyterian Church on the corner
of Washington and Albemarle streets where one could see the Methodist and
Baptist churches from the Presbyterian parking lot and a wonderful saint named
Mrs. Walker let me know in my Sunday School and confirmation classes that to
see God meant instant death. Yet, here we have two stories of people having
encounters with God. Not exactly face to face, but personal encounters with the
glory of God and they lived to tell the tale.
I’ve never seen anyone go up a
mountain, get lost in the clouds and then come down glowing in such a manner
that they have to cover their face for weeks because of how bright their face
is radiating. Nor have walked up on a mountain with my pastor and seen Elijah
and Moses followed by God speaking from heaven telling me to listen to
everything my pastor says. To be quite honest, if I were to experience either
of those events, I might just run as far as I can as fast as I can out of fear.
Perhaps God is protecting my fragile body by not revealing himself in that way
to me. But, what I do know is that because I haven’t seen the Glory of God in
the ways described in these two passages doesn’t mean I haven’t felt the
radiant and comforting warmth of God standing right before me.
The key to understanding these
stories together isn’t to look at them and long for the day when we’ll be
worthy enough to see God’s face. Christ’s birth, life, and death have assured us
that we are worthy for a face-to-face meeting with God. Not that any of us are
mentally or emotionally ready for that day, nor are we actively seeking that
meeting, but we are promised that meeting because of Christ. We need to take
away from these stories that God’s glory is seen as a reflection in the faces
and actions of people we encounter every day. Some days people reflect God’s
glory for us to see, some days we are the ones radiating with the reflection of
God on our faces.
What I find absolutely revolutionary
about these two stories is that Moses doesn’t realize that he is so full of
God’s glory that it is spilling out through his face in such a way that people
literally cannot handle it. The disciples are so overwhelmed they can’t process
what they saw and I think are actually a little worried to tell anyone for fear
of being hauled off to a psychiatrist by people concerned for their mental
health. And isn’t that what a life following Christ looks like, not knowing
that people see Christ radiating from you while you worry that people think
your actions following your call may get you locked up somehow?
Thomas Currie, the former dean of a
seminary in Charlotte, NC once wrote, “The unbearable brightness of Moses’s
face is the residue of God’s steadfast love for Israel, his faithfulness to
them in the face of betrayal and even death, and his gift to them of a dignity
and honor they did not choose and would never have chosen for themselves.”[1]
What a description of glory. Let me read that one more time.
When we experience glory in that
manner, we can’t help but be changed and change others. We can’t help but
radiate the love of Christ not only as a reflection of what we’ve seen but it
bursts forth from us because love like that cannot ever be contained. We are
transformed from professing our faith to living our faith in a broken world
that desperately needs that radiant glory to break forth in so many places.
In November 2008, God’s Glory showed
up on a Texas gridiron. But, because I’m not as good at telling this story,
I’ll let one of the best sportswriters to ever grace the earth, Rick Reilly,
tell the tale.
“It was Grapevine Faith vs.
Gainesville State School and everything about it was upside down. For instance,
when Gainesville came out to take the field, the Faith fans made a 40-yard
spirit line for them to run through. They even made a banner for players to
crash through at the end.
It was rivers running uphill and cats petting dogs. More
than 200 Faith fans sat on the Gainesville side and kept cheering the
Gainesville players on—by name.”
And even though Faith walloped them
33-14, the Gainesville kids were so happy that after the game they gave head
coach Mark Williams a sideline squirt-bottle shower like he’d just won state.”
But then you saw the 12 uniformed
officers escorting the 14 Gainesville players off the field and two and two
started to make four. They lined the players up in groups of five—handcuffs
ready in their back pockets—and marched them to the team bus. That’s because
Gainesville is a maximum-security correctional facility 75 miles north of
Dallas.”
Hogan had this idea. What if half
our fans—for one night only—cheered for the other team? He sent out an email
asking the Faithful to do just that. ‘Here’s the message I want you to send:’
Hogan wrote. ‘You are just as valuable as any other person on planet Earth.’
After the game, both teams gathered
in the middle of the field to pray and that’s when Isaiah surprised everybody
by asking to lead. ‘We had no idea what the kid was going to say,’ remembers
Coach Hogan. But Isaiah said this: ‘Lord, I don’t know how this happened, so I
don’t know how to say thank you , but I never would’ve known there was so many
people in the world that cared about us.’
The Gainesville coach saw Hogan,
grabbed him hard by the shoulders and said, ‘You’ll never know what your people
did for these kids tonight. You never, ever know.”
Transfiguration, plain and simple.
On a football field in Texas. Elijah, Moses, and Jesus were on that field
smiling, beaming with pride because for a moment, some disciples got it and
without knowing it radiated the Glory of God in the way and place it was
intended. And God said, “These are my children, my chosen; listen to them.”
[1] Thomas
Currie, “Theological Perspective,” in Feasting on the Word Year C Vol 1,
“Transfiguration Sunday,” 438.
No comments:
Post a Comment