A DAY OF GREAT CHANGE
He stands right up here at the front of the church looking handsome and looking back at the closed doors at the end of the aisle. The music stops. There’s a pause. New beautiful music begins. The doors are pushed open…and there she is. She looks radiant, positively glowing in her pure white wedding dress. He’s shared so much time and so many experiences with her leading up to that day, but this this is different. And he melts at the sight of her.
As we listen to the words of Luke’s gospel this morning, it’s not a walk up the aisle to the altar, but a walk up a path to a mountaintop. And it is a few men seeing someone they loved in a way they hadn’t before glorious and gleaming, radiating light unlike anything they had ever seen.
Jesus brought Peter, James, and John on a private excursion where something terribly important would happen like he had done before and would do again in the not too distant future. They could not have imagined what they would see and experience. They had followed Jesus, listened to him, helped him out with things. They knew him, and they believed what Peter said in his beautiful, confident confession about Jesus about a week before this, when he called him “The Christ of God. ”
But on this day, on this mountaintop, they saw Jesus changed. Well, HE didn’t really change—the way he appeared changed. The divine glory of Jesus that was normally hidden beneath his human exterior was revealed. And what an incredible sight it was! Comparisons to just how brilliant that glory was don’t do it justice, although three gospel writers try to help us: like a flash of lightning, like the sun, clothing as white as the light, dazzling, whiter than any bleach could make them. (Matthew 17, Mark 9).
Even outside of this change in appearance, it was A DAY OF GREAT CHANGE for Jesus. This event on a northern mountain marks the end of his ministry in Galilee. Now he would set out on the road to Jerusalem for the last time.
A road that would deposit him on the doorstep of the religious leaders who wanted him dead.
A road that would deliver him to the judgment seat of the Roman governor Pontius Pilate.
A road that would end on a skull-shaped hill where his earthly life would come to a brutal end on a cross.
He knew all this. And he went because he there was no other way for the world’s sin to be paid for and because he loved us all. So, he willingly walked the road that led away from this mountain of Transfiguration. As he prepared to take this road, his Father encouraged him by sending Moses and Elijah and by confirming his support for him as he spoke from the cloud.
Look at those two who miraculously appeared there with Jesus Moses, the man buried by God himself, and Elijah, the one taken to God’s side without experiencing death! Both special prophets who had proclaimed that a Savior would come the one who had now come and was very close to completing the work of salvation they had seen through prophet’s eyes. There they stood, speaking with Jesus about what he was about to do as Peter, James, and John watched and listened.
Do you have any heroes? Not just people that are smart or funny or famous or powerful today, but people who lived long ago people you think it would be so cool to meet? An inventor? An athlete? An adventurer? An astronaut? A world leader? Could it even be a preacher—someone like the first missionaries on the Apache reservation?
Would it be impressive to meet someone like Benjamin Franklin? Would it be neat to talk to the famous pilot Amelia Earhart? Would you love to watch Satchel Paige pitch or Babe Ruth swing for the fences? Would you appreciate looking into the eyes of Albert Einstein, and being almost able to see the gears of his mind turning? People like these are seen as heroes by many. Do you know who the heroes of the past were to guys like Peter, James and John? Moses and Elijah! These were two of the most famous people ever two of the most respected icons among God’s people! You just didn’t get much bigger than Moses and Elijah!
Imagine waking up from a mountainside nap and being jolted awake to high alert by the sight of Jesus’ brilliant glory and these two heroes of faith, people they knew from the Scriptures, standing right there! If you’ve ever been awestruck or speechless when meeting someone famous, then maybe you at least have a tiny idea of how these disciples must have felt as it became a DAY OF GREAT CHANGE for them too. You don’t witness a miracle without it altering the way you see things going forward! You don’t get a glimpse of Godly glory and not have it affect your faith!
Just look at Peter’s attempt to extend this miraculous moment by popping up some shelters. He’s like a little kid who’s having so much fun at their friend’s house when two families get together. You kids know how to work on your parents, right? “Pleeeeease, can we stay a little longer?” And when mom says, “No, we have to go, ” then it’s, “Just a half hour? We’ll be really good, we promise!” There’s nothing wrong with wanting to stay longer with friends, but there was a problem with Peter wanting to linger there.
You see, as recently as a week before this, Jesus had told the disciples that he must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and experts in the law then be killed and be raised on the third day (Luke 9:22). But Peter was so caught up in the glory of the moment that he blurts something out while Moses and Elijah are trying to leave. He tries to get them to stay even though they were only there to speak to Jesus about his way to the cross, his death and resurrection and his ascension from this world the path he needed to start down.
Do you see what was happening? Jesus had recently told Peter and the others that his suffering and death were coming…now he’s talking with Moses and Elijah about his leaving this world…and Peter’s concern is hanging out longer. He’s obviously not on the same spiritual wavelength as Jesus! Unfortunately, this was a bit of a theme with Peter. He had previously contradicted Jesus and told him that he would never be put to death. And we’ll see it again in the Garden of Gethsemane when he tries to stop Jesus’ arrest that would ultimately lead to that death Peter didn’t exactly get it and kind of fought it all the way along. While he’s still talking nonsense, the Father’s voice interrupted: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!” You have to believe that the day Jesus’ glory was on display and the Father spoke directly to them was a DAY OF GREAT CHANGE for all three of those men!
Even when faced with the glory of Jesus when muted by his humanity and when revealed with glory—Peter focused on the earthly:
You won’t die, Jesus!
Let’s stay on this mountain rather than you setting off toward suffering and death.
You will not arrest my Lord!
Like Peter, we can become blind to the important things and distracted by the unimportant things. There is a temptation like this that we may fall victim to during the season of Lent, which begins on Wednesday. During these next weeks leading up to Easter as we consider the suffering and death of Jesus, a focus on the earthly would have us feeling sorry for Jesus. We might become a little too obsessed with his physical sufferings and pity him.
But that misses the spiritual point of all that Jesus did though, doesn’t it? It misses the willingness and determination and love that drove him to die for us. Like Peter, we don’t know what we’re thinking or saying when we’re distracted by the earthly things.
God has interrupted our nonsense too. We hear him break through the clouds of heaven and speak to us through his Word, and he says to us also: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!”
Listen to him when he says that his love for you moved him to walk with determination down that mountain for the last few months of his journey to the cross
Listen to him say that he finished the work of paying for your sins when his breath stopped on the cross.
Listen to him when he says, because I live, you also will live eternally.
Listen to him when he says that until then, he is with you every bit as much as he was with those three men on a mountain.
The day when you and I first heard those things from Jesus and his Word and believed them was a DAY OF GREAT CHANGE for us—whether as a baby, a young person, or an adult. It was your baptism day or the day you wandered into church and trusted what you heard or the day the Holy Spirit opened up your heart as you read a Bible. There was a day maybe you can pinpoint a day, and maybe more likely, you can’t. That doesn’t really matter. What matters is that God changed you when the glory of Christ, which had been hidden from you, was revealed to you. And that means you have another DAY OF GREAT CHANGE coming.
The day that Jesus, our Savior, returns will be A DAY OF GREAT CHANGE for us because the life we know in this sinful world will change to a sinless eternal life in heaven with Moses and Elijah and Peter and James and John and your grandma and your brother and your daughter and your spouse and all other believers but most importantly with your Savior. Even our sin-ravaged bodies will change to perfect, glorious ones fit to dwell with the perfect God.
The change in Jesus’ appearance on the Mount of Transfiguration gives a glimpse of his glory as true God and true man.
His talk with Moses and Elijah about his departure from this world after defeating sin, death, and Satan reminds us of how Jesus saved us.
And the voice of the Father pushes us to stay focused on Jesus and not be distracted by earthly things.
Those are things that changed the disciples, and they change us too.
That moment on the mountain was a brief time for the disciples to see Jesus’ glory, but it was not the time for it to be shown to the world. Peter, James, and John told no one what they had seen it remained hidden from others…for a time. It would be revealed once Jesus did go to Jerusalem and he did suffer and die and then defeat death. And then they couldn’t help but tell people!
During these next weeks of Lent, we have the opportunity to walk down from the mountain with Jesus and walk with him to Jerusalem—to the cross. And then to celebrate his resurrection the most brilliant and impactful revelation of his glory. I pray that you’ll take that journey so that you can focus on the important things the things that have changed you and your life. Amen.
Now the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.