"From The Cloud To The Crowd"
(Luke 9:28-43)
[28] Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. [29] And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. [30] Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him. [31] They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. [32] 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. [33] 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. [34] While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. [35] Then from the cloud came a voice that said, "This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!" [36] 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.
[37] On the next day, when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met him. [38] Just then a man from the crowd shouted, "Teacher, I beg you to look at my son; he is my only child. [39] Suddenly a spirit seizes him, and all at once he shrieks. It convulses him until he foams at the mouth; it mauls him and will scarcely leave him. [40] I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not." [41] Jesus answered, "You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you? Bring your son here." [42] While he was coming, the demon dashed him to the ground in convulsions. But Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, healed the boy, and gave him back to his father. [43] And all were astounded at the greatness of God.
(NRSV)
INTRODUCTION:
This is one of those beautiful passages filled with mystery and wonder. Most of the time we wonder why it's there. We're like the disciples in a story I just read. The teachers will enjoy this.
It seems Jesus took his disciples up the mountain, gathered them around, and taught them saying:
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven...
Blessed are the meek...
Blessed are they who mourn...
Blessed are the merciful...
Blessed are they who thirst for justice...
Blessed are you when persecuted...
Blessed are you when you suffer...
Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is great in heaven...
Then Simon Peter said, 'Do we have to write this down?'
And Andrew said, 'Are we supposed to know this?'
And James said, 'Will we have a test on it?'
And Philip said, 'What if we don't know it?'
And Bartholomew said, 'Do we have to turn this in?'
And John said, 'The other disciples didn't have to learn this.'
And Matthew said, 'When do we get out of here?'
And Judas said, 'What does this have to do with real life?'
Then one of the Pharisees present asked to see Jesus' lesson plans and inquired of Jesus about his terminal objectives in the cognitive domain.
And Jesus wept...
I don't mean to belittle the disciples or call them thickheaded or make it look as if I know more than anyone else. I don't. This is a difficult passage to fully understand. Like Jesus in front of the disciples, this passage changes every time I read it. And every time I read it, I get something else out of it. Jesus' transfiguration, his transformation on the mountain top, then has to be very important.
I think it's important because it reveals so much about the nature and person of Jesus. But even more so, because it reveals so much about our journey of faith and what to expect. And we can learn what that is by going with Jesus from the cloud to the crowd.
I. INTO THE CLOUD:
A. TO CONFIRM: Jesus called his three lieutenants Peter, James and John to go with him to the mountain top. What they witnessed was God's confirmation of who Jesus was and is.
But they almost missed it. Scripture says they were "weighed down with sleep." In other words, while Jesus was praying, they were dozing. But what started off as a dream shook them awake. It awakened and excited their spirits and then filled them with dreams of future ministry; dreams they didn't yet understand.
Scripture says the disciples came fully awake and realized that Jesus was talking with the two greatest leaders of Israel's history and faith: Moses and Elijah. This was probably the greatest event in the lives of these three ordinary men of faith chosen by Christ to be his disciples. They were over awed. Somebody hit the mute button on James and John. They just stood there bug eyed in awe and wonder. And Peter, poor Peter. He probably would have been better off keeping his mouth shut, but he wasn't know for that. He stuttered and stammered and tried to say something in a time when nothing needed to be said. Tongue tied, he finally spoke the first thing that filled the space between his ears and blurted out: "Let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah"
B. Now there really wasn't anything wrong with that request. All Peter was wanting to do was care for these illustrious leaders and find a way to commemorate the event. He didn't want to lose the experience or the feeling of the moment. He wanted the moment to last forever.
We're like that. It's an ordinary feeling. When something great happens, when we have a mountain top experience, we want it to last forever, too. I'll never forget preaching on the Sea of Galilee while on my second trip to Israel. As part of the tour, you take a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee. They take you out into the middle of the Lake and turn of the engines. From that spot you can see most of the places where Jesus' Galilean ministry took place. It is absolutely incredible. And there on the Sea of Galilee, the different tour groups hold a short worship service. The four groups that were gathered that day, asked me to preach. For me, that was one of those high holy moments, a mountain top experience. I would have loved to stayed there and continued to relish the feeling and the moment. But I couldn't.
Neither could Peter, James and John. They wanted to hang on to that spiritual high and capture it for all time. They couldn't but they could relive it in there minds and their hearts.
II. ON THE MOUNTAIN:
A. TO EMPOWER: They couldn't capture the moment or remain in that sense of closeness to God. But they could internalize the moment and capture the energy of the moment. That's really what it was given for. The experience was given to empower their ministry. I'm sure they relived that moment in their minds over and over again. I still get fired up just thinking about preaching on the Sea of Galilee. I can hear the waves against the side of the boat, smell the water and feel the nip in the air. Just thinking about it charges my spiritual batteries.
It 's the same thing for the disciples. I'm sure they relived that moment after the resurrection when it all made sense. I'm sure they relived it when they were reminiscing. Or, if one of them was down, feeling low, ready to give up; the others would remind him of the events of that day and ask, "How can you doubt? You saw and heard what Moses and Elijah said. And remember the voice?" They'd go back to that time and be empowered to go on.
But they couldn't stay. They had to move on. The booths or the tabernacles or whatever they would have built there would have been too small to hold the experience. You can't nail down or close in and contain the holy like that. It's too big and too Holy to be closed in or nailed down. And so they had to carry the experience in the only two places large enough to contain they mysteries of God, the heart and the mind, where it would empower their ministry.
III. INTO THE CROWD:
A. Another reason why they couldn't stay there is that they eventually had to go back to work, back down into the crowds. Jesus didn't come into the world to spend all of his time in seclusion or on the mountain top. Jesus came to proclaim the Good News and to give himself so that we might have life and know the forgiveness of a loving God. And he couldn't make that known in the cloud. He could only make it known in the crowds of people.
B. I heard a story a couple of weeks ago while I was serving on the Walk to Emmaus team with all the guys from our Church. It seems this preacher moved to a new Church. This particular church didn't have a lawn mower so he was looking for someone to either mow the lawn or sell him a used lawnmower. One day he saw a young man going by pushing a lawnmower. So the preacher asked him, "Hey, looking for a job?" The young man said, "Sure." It turned out that he was mowing yards and trying to earn enough money to buy a bicycle. This preacher was kind of young and didn't mind mowing the yard so he told the young man, "Look, I've got a 10 speed bicycle that I never ride any more. What do you say we trade the bicycle for the lawnmower."
Well, the young man was ecstatic. They swapped and the young man took off on the bicycle. He rode around the block and came back to see the preacher standing in the same place wiping sweat off his brow. The preacher waved the boy over and said, "Hey, I've pulled on the rope a half a dozen times and this lawn mower just won't start."
The young man said, "Preacher, I hate to tell you this but it's a special kind of lawnmower. You have to cuss it to get it to start."
The preacher looked at him and said, "Well, I've been in the ministry so long I don't think I can remember how to cuss."
The young man grinned and said, "Pull on the rope some more and it will come back to you."
The point is this, we're all part of the crowd that has pulled on the rope too many times. We've been to mountain but we've also been in the middle of the crowds. Like Peter, we want to stay on the mountain top. But we can't. Our work is in the crowds. It takes the mountain top experiences, our own and those of the disciples, to remind us of who we are, who Jesus is, and our relationship. It takes the mountain top experiences to empower our faith. But we are empowered, not to remain on the mountain, but to bear the light of Christ into the darkness of the crowds.
We're not the light, just the bearers of the light. And the crowds need the light we bear so much. The Light we bear and the Good News we share have the power to transform lives, to transform the world one life at a time.
In Port Arthur, Texas, there is a special school for very sick children, most of whom have few if any motor skills. One very sick boy lived at that school, dying little by little. AS tragic as that is, that's not the point of the story. Unfortunately children get grievously ill everyday. This little boy, though, had the good fortune to be living in the same community with some faithful believers who took the transfiguration story as their own. God's glory lived in them. They brought the cloud to the crowd. They carried it with them wherever they went.
A group of these folks joined together to go to this little boy everyday and read to him. Knowing that he was slowly dying, unable to move or read for himself, their act of kindness and ministry was the only activity that comforted him.
The social workers were amazed. Just being read to by three different women, one every day, transformed that boy. He was transformed from being depressed and despondent into a responsive bright young man. And even though his spark of life would soon leave him, it got brighter and brighter not dimmer.
The boy died but his life had been forever changed. It had been transformed and transfigured by the ministry of these caring Christians. They had brought the cloud to the crowd and they to had been changed. (1)
We're called not to try and stay on the mountain when we have a mountain top experience. We're called to bear the light of the one we meet in the cloud and to let the experience transform us and empower us to go from the cloud to the crowd.
CONCLUSION:
May we shake off our slumber and accept God's empowerment. Let us go from the cloud to the crowd. Let us go up to the mountain and be transformed. But then let us come back down to the crowd and take the light of Christ into the world.
This is the Word of the Lord for this day.
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1. The Clergy Journal, (Logos Productions Inc, Inver Grove Heights, MN) Vol LXXIII, Number 7, pp. 88.