PASTOR'S CORNER

REED HOPKINS

Deuteronomy 34
2 Kings 2: 6 - 14; Mark 9: 2 – 9

Sermon for Feb. 19. 2012

“A Transfigured Life”

Winter is a transformational time.  Right now we’re kind of in the doldrums.  Christmas is well behind us.  Even Valentine’s Day is over.  Presidents’ Day is coming up, but how excited does anyone ever really get about that?  This is an in-between time, between Christmas and Easter.  What can we do with it?

For me, February seems to drag on and on.  This year they even added a day to it, to make it so much longer.  This is the time of year when I’m tired of seeing bare, gray trees, and brown grass.  My car always smells like a wet dog, from having the windows closed all the time.

On the other hand, it’s daylight by the time I eat my breakfast and just about until suppertime.  Things are changing.
Winter is a cleansing time between summers.  We get rid of the old summer growth and make way for another spring.  In the winter, the scene can transform quickly from gray and brown to dazzling white.  And in winter, we get Christmas and a new year.
We have transformational events in our lives, things that can change the course of our lives.  The other day, I conducted a graveside service for Dr. Tenney, Linda Tenney and Sarah Sayre’s father.  He served in World War II, and like so many veterans of war, that experience transformed him.  World War II vets stared the most unspeakable evil in the face.  They defeated it.  But it wasn’t enough simply to stop evil.  They wanted to do good.  They came home determined to build a better world.

Dr. Tenney’s war experience led him to want to make a difference.  He came home to be a science teacher.  Then he decided, after seeing so much destruction of life, to be a healer and a rebuilder.  He studied medicine and spent his career as a public health physician.  Then he spent a long post-career as a medical examiner.  The horrible experience of war could have made him bitter and cynical, but instead it made him want to do good.

Three disciples of Jesus had a transforming experience.  Peter, James, and John were called out from among the rest to accompany Jesus up the mountain.  There, as Jesus prayed, they saw an amazing sight.  They saw his appearance changed.  He had a special glow.  And Moses and Elijah, the representative of the law and the representative of the prophets, appeared with Him.

The disciples were excited to see this.  Peter wanted to build a memorial to the event.  They were caught up in the excitement of the moment.

Then a voice rang out.  “This is my beloved Son; listen to Him!”

The disciples might have been overawed to see Elijah and Moses.  Moses was the great liberator, the great lawgiver.  Elijah was the greatest of the classical prophets.  They were giants of Israelite history.

But God revealed to them that someone even greater was in their midst.  Jesus, not Moses or Elijah, was God’s only begotten Son.  Jesus, not Moses or Elijah, was the Messiah.  Jesus, not Moses or Elijah, was the Savior who would die for the sins of the world and be raised to life.  “Listen to Him,” God said.

The law, the Ten Commandments, is a blessing from God.  The commandments guide us through life.  They give us standards to follow, to know we are pleasing God.  The prophets were blessings from God.  They reminded the people, and they remind us when we read them, of God’s will, and they called people to faithfulness.  Their words are worth reading and heeding.
But only one is the Savior.  Listen to Jesus, live by Him, and you will fulfill all that is written in the law of Moses, all that is written in the prophets.

Peter wanted to build a memorial.  But God had something more in mind.  Don’t just get caught up in the emotion, in the excitement of the moment, God said.  Don’t just make a wonderful memory of this.  Listen to Him!  Take His teachings to heart.  Live by them.  Let your life be transformed.

That was the real transfiguration.  Jesus changed in appearance, in the disciples’ eyes.  But this was meant to change the disciples, to remold their lives.   As they realized that Jesus was the Son of God and not just a good teacher, as they realized that He was “God with us,” as they began to live by His teachings and in His love, they were changed from ordinary sinners into the image of God.  Listening to the Son of God, they were transfigured into children of God.

Memories are precious things.  Think back to your church days as a child.  Do those memories make you feel warm inside?  Think about all the hymns you have always loved.  How does it make you feel to sing them?  When you were younger, did those hymns make you want to love Jesus more and serve Him more?  When you hear them or sing them now, are they just warm, fuzzy memories, or do they once again make you want to love Jesus like you did way back then, and serve Him all the more?
Nothing does that for me like my favorite Christmas hymns.  I have old favorites that I’ve loved all my life, and they bring back those warm, glowing Christmases of the past.  I’ve also acquired some new favorites over the years, usually really old ones that I haven’t heard before.  I don’t just stagnate in my musical tastes; I move on.  All those Christmas hymns, my childhood favorites and my more recent favorites, make me want to recommit myself to serving Christ and move forward in faith and life.

Well, here I am dwelling on Christmas again, two months after the fact.  I guess I have a hard time letting go of it.  It’s hard to put a beautiful experience behind.

Think of our Deuteronomy passage.  Moses had led the people of Israel for forty years.  All the older generation had died off.  There was almost nobody else left of the original Israelites, the ones who remembered slavery in Egypt.  Nobody could remember a time when Moses hadn’t led them.

Moses talked to God.  Moses brought the word of God to the people.  Moses had brought them out of Egypt, he had invoked God’s blessings on Israel, he had pleaded with God to forgive them again and again, he had prayed to God to bring Israel food and water, and it worked.

So how could they let go of Moses?  How could the people of Israel go on?  The writer who finished up Deuteronomy said, “there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses.”  There could never be anyone to fill Moses’ shoes.  Or could there?  When Deuteronomy runs its course, look for the sequel: Joshua.

Even without Moses, the children of Israel moved into the promised land and built a great nation.

Then there came Elijah.  The prophet who stood up to King Ahab and Queen Jezebel.  The one who challenged the prophets of Ba’al, who called down fire from heaven to burn up the water-drenched sacrifice and even burn up the water in the ditch.  The man who prayed for drought, and the rain stopped; who prayed for rain, and the clouds burst forth.  The man who brought a widow’s son back to life.  Could there ever be another Elijah?

Elisha didn’t think so.  He dreaded parting with his master.  He knew no one could hope to approach the greatness of Elijah, but he begged for just a share of the spirit which inhabited Elijah.

Elisha watched as his master was taken up into heaven.  He cried out as Elijah ascended.  Then it was quiet.  Nothing but Elijah’s hairy mantle left.  Elijah picked it up and cried out in despair, “Where is God now?  Where is the God of Elijah?”

And the answer came.  The river parted to let Elisha cross.  Elisha was called to leave that holy spot, that spot where he last saw his master.  He was called back into the world, back into daily life, to be as great a prophet as Elijah.

The Israelites could move on without Moses.  Elisha could move on without Elijah.  Because it wasn’t really Moses who delivered Israel.  It wasn’t Elijah who made all the wonders possible in Israel.  It was God.  People come and go, but God abides.

After that holy mountain-top experience, an experience Peter wanted to memorialize forever, the disciples were called to follow Jesus back down the mountain, back to the other disciples, back into the world teeming with people who hungered and thirsted for the truth of God.  The way for Peter, James, and John to memorialize the event was not to build a monument.  Not to stay on the mountaintop and try to make the vision last.  The way to memorialize it was to do as God said: Listen to the Son of God.  Follow Him into the everyday world.  Live a transfigured life.  Share the vision you have of God with others, so you can help to transfigure this world.

 
Dr. Tenney and other veterans returned from World War II determined to build a better world.  As God’s people, we are called to go to the mountaintop, to pray and worship and experience the presence of Christ.  We are called to let worship be a transfiguring experience, lifting us up and changing us.  And we are called to live a transfigured life.  We are called to be the presence of Christ in this world, changing this world into a better place.

So in this in-between time, as Christmas becomes a dim memory and we get ourselves ready for the Lenten fast, in this quieter time of the year, let God transform you.  Pray for vision.  See God present in Christ, and let Christ be present in you.  Live a transfigured life.