Tabernacle United Church

Shining Faces

Matthew 17:1-3
Sermon delivered February 18, 2007
by Suzanne Spaulding

Have you ever had an experience that was so awesome or so special that you didn't really want to tell anyone? You were perhaps afraid that in the telling of it, it would become commonplace or somehow damaged in your memory. Or perhaps you simply didn't know how to tell someone about it. The experience was so amazing or so unbelievable that you couldn't tell anyone. I think that is what it was like for Peter, John and James. "They kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen."

The text says "eight days after these sayings..." What had just been happening with Jesus and the disciples according to Luke?

5,000 fed with 5 loaves and 2 fish.
Jesus says: Who do the crowds say that I am? Who do you say that I am?.
He tells them 'Don't tell', predicts his own suffering, death and resurrection..
'If you lose your life, you save it.'.
'Take up your cross to follow me.'

Then Jesus takes 3 disciples up on the mountain to pray. The disciples seem to not be accustomed to praying on the mountain. Luke says that they were weighted down with sleep. You know the feeling, like your arms weight a ton, you can't possibly make yourself move, "just let me rest here and close my eyes for a bit."

Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus. Now Luke doesn't tell us if they wondered at all about the changes in Jesus' face and clothes but they did notice two extra people who hadn't been there before! We have no idea how they knew who they were but they seen to have known what the conversation was about: Jesus departure and what he would accomplish in Jerusalem. (Only Luke records the topic; Mark and Matthew just say that they were talking with Jesus.)

The shining face and dazzling white clothes of Jesus have always fascinated me. As a child I often wondered about the 'fullers' that Mark mentions. The only fuller I knew about was the Fuller Brush man, which didn't add anything helpful to the picture! Matthew says that Jesus' "face shone like the sun and his garments became white as light." Mark only mentions Jesus' clothes, that "they became glistening, intensely white, as no fuller on earth could bleach them." I think that would be kind of scary if I saw that happening to someone that I knew quite well..
The Israelites thought it was scary too. In our text from Exodus today the people were afraid of Moses because his face shone when he came down from talking to God. Moses, in his kindness to them, put a veil over his face when he was "off duty" as a prophet.

Faces are pretty important, aren't they? We can often tell a lot about someone's openness or closedness by their face. Some of us show every emotion we fell on our face. If you are a photographer you want to get good pictures of people's faces. Ecclesiastes 8:1 says, "Wisdom makes one's face shine; and the hardness of one's countenance is changed.".
Other verses in the Bible mention God's face shining on us. In the Psalms, "Let your face shine upon your servant; save me in your steadfast love." (31:16) "May God be gracious to us and bless us and make His face to shine upon us." (67:2) And the Aaronic blessing from Numbers mentions "God's face shining on you and God lifting up God's countenance upon you.".
It would seem that God's face shone, literally, upon Moses and some of it "rubbed off" onto Moses. It was a little different with Jesus because of Jesus being the Messiah. One preacher I read describe it as 'Jesus caught fire within.' Maybe the flesh couldn't contain the glory anymore. And then that scary cloud overshadowed them and a voice from the cloud spoke, "This is my Son, the Chosen One, listen to him." But there is something more in the transfiguration. We know the 'facts' of the story but what was really going on?

We are approaching the season of Lent. This Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. Jesus and all the Jews were approaching the Passover. Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem, to betrayal, arrest, and crucifixion. It feels as if the world has opened up in a different way for the disciples who witnessed the transfiguration. They have glimpsed another realm. They have seen Jesus' glory, not Jesus only in the form of a man who does wonders and teaches difficult things, but his glory. Glory (according to John) that he had with God before the world existed. It's a mystery!

Sometimes poetry is the only way to try to grasp or describe great mystery. The Scottish poet, Edwin Muir, wrote this about the transfiguration. I want to share part of it with you. He is speaking from the disciples viewpoint:

The Transfiguration.
by Edwin Muir

So from the ground we felt that virtue branch.
Through all our veins till we were whole, our writs.
As fresh and pure as water from a well,.
Our hands made new to handle holy things,.
The source of all our seeing rinsed and cleansed.
Till earth and light and water entering there.
Gave back to us the clear unfallen world..
We would have thrown our clothes away for lightness,.
But that even they, though sour and travel stained,.
Seemed, like our flesh, made of immortal substance,.
And the soiled flax and wool lay light upon us.
Like friendly wonders, flower and flock entwined.
As in a morning field. Was it a vision?.
Or did we see that day the unseeable.
One glory of the everlasting world.
Perpetually at work, though never seen.
Since Eden locked the gate that's everywhere.
And nowhere? Was the change in us alone,.
And the enormous earth still left forlorn,.
And exile or a prisoner? Yet the world.
We saw that day made this unreal, for all.
Was in its place. The painted animals.
Assembled there in gentle congregations,.
Or sought apart their leafy oratories,.
Or walked in peace, the wild and tame together,.
As if, also for them, the day had come..
The shepherds' hovels shone, for underneath.
The soot we saw the stone clean at the heart.
As on the starting-day. The refuse heaps.
Were grained with that fine dust that made the world.
For he had said, 'To the pure all things are pure.'.
And when we went into the town, he with us,.
The lurkers under doorways, murderers,.
With rage tied round their feet for silence, came.
Out of themselves to us and were with us,.
And those who hide within the labyrinth.
Of their own loneliness and greatness came,.
And those entangles in their own devices,.
The silent and the garrulous liars, all.
Stepped out of their own dungeons and were free..
Reality of vision, this we have seen..
If it had lasted but another moment.
It might have held forever! But the world.
Rolled back into its place, and we are here,.
And all that radiant kingdom lies forlorn,.
As if it had never stirred; no human voice.
Is heard among its meadows, but it speaks.
To itself alone, alone it flowers and shines.
And blossoms for itself while time runs on.

Edwin Muir, Collected Poems 1921-1951, (London; Faber and Faber), 173.

.
I'm reminded of the Chronicles of Narnia where Lucy and her siblings go through a wardrobe and enter the land of Narnia. They seem to spend years there and yet when they return it is only the next moment in this world. Or think of Harry Potter going through the wall at 23 1/3 Paddington Station to get to another realm. The difference seems to be that the disciples didn't seek it. God graciously gave them the glimpse of Jesus' glory.

How often did they think of it afterwards and marvel? They didn't tell anyone when they left the mountain. But Peter later refers to it in his second epistle: "For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus the Christ, but we have been eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying , 'This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.' We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain."

How disappointing was it to have Moses and Elijah disappear and then to go back down the mountain to the humdrum, everyday itinerate life they lived? Did they feel like Edwin Muir expressed, "if it had lasted but another moment it might have held forever!" Perhaps they did get a glimpse into the possibilities of wholeness and healing that Jesus offers; the murderers coming to them, those tangled in their own devises and the liars all step out of their dungeons and are free. What a glimpse of grace!

In my preaching class at the Lutheran Seminary they taught us, among other things, to look for grace in the text and grace in the world. The part that my classmates and I struggled with the most was to find grace in the world. Generally it is in the text.

Today I believe that the glimpse of Jesus' glory and all its ramifications and possibilities was a great grace. But where in the world today do we find grace?

Sometimes it's pretty hard when the news is all about the surge in Iraq along with increasing sectarian violence, accompanies by congressional disapproval of the President's plan. We hear of untimely deaths of famous people and the all too evident struggles of young stars with alcohol and drug abuse. And we get a snow/ice storm midweek that snarls up traffic for days and makes travel treacherous.

Often you find grace where you least expect it.

While I was in El Salvador a few weeks ago, we visited the cancer hospital where Archbishop Oscar Romero lived among the sisters of Divina Providencia. He lived in a little back room behind the sacristy of the chapel until the sisters had a small house built for him. They knew he wouldn't accept it from them so they gave the keys to some of the cancer patients to present it to him and then he accepted it.

We went into the chapel where he was assassinated. It is a beautiful, simple, elegant chapel. The scent of lilies was strong as we walked in the side door and then sat down in the simple wooden pews. Our guide read from a book an account of Romero's final day on earth. He was celebrating a mass and had just placed the corporeal on the table for communion when a sniper, from the back of the chapel, shot him in the heart. I had read about Romero before this trip and have even seen the film. But sitting in that chapel I felt the loss of the Salvadoran people, the loss of a great champion for justice, the loss of a wonderful pastor. And yet, Romero is not lost to them, he is very much alive,.
alive in the people,.
in the church,.
in the hope of the people for positive change,.
alive in the many who still work for human rights and justice including us here at Tab.

And so, lest we become discouraged because we haven't seen any shining faces lately, or we haven't experienced that 'crack in the world' to glimpse another realm or we feel like the work is too great or too mundane or overwhelming for us to make a difference in the world; let us be encouraged and blessed by our texts and the gracious glimpse into another realm. And let us also be blessed by these words from Archbishop Romero:

A Future Not Our Own

It helps now and then to step back.
and take the long view..
The Kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,.
it is even beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny.
fraction of the magnificent enterprise.
that is God's work..
Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of saying.
that the Kingdom always lies beyond us..
No statement says all that could be said..
No prayer fully expresses our faith..
No confession brings perfection;.
No pastoral visit brings wholeness..
No program accomplishes the Church's mission..
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about..
We plant the seeds that one day will grow..
We water seeds already planted,.
knowing that they hold future promise..
We lay foundations that will need further development..
We provide yeast that produces effects.
far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything, and there is.
a sense of liberation in realizing that..
This enables us to do something, and do it very well..
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning,.
a step along the way, an opportunity for.
the Lord's grace to enter and to the rest..
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference.
between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders;.
ministers, not Messiahs..
We are prophets of a future not our own.

- Archbishop Oscar Romero.

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© 2007 by Suzanne Spaulding. All rights reserved. Please consult the author at tabernacle@tabunited.org if you wish to use the text of this sermon, in whole or in part.

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