One Potent Preview!

Mark 9:2-10

Transfiguration Sunday 2012

 My family is all abuzz about an upcoming movie.   The Hunger Games, based on the trilogy of books by Suzanne Collins, is set to be released to theaters on March 23^rd.     We feel Rebecca and Crosby are too young to read the content of these books or see this movie … but Stefanie, Anna, and I happily devoured them and are super eager to see the movie on opening day.    So eager, in fact, that for the past few months we’ve been repeatedly gluing our eyes to previews available on the computer.  

It was especially thrilling when the first preview made its debut.   We had well-hewn visions in our heads for all the book characters, so we were keen to know how well a big Hollywood casting director would honor our imaginations.    We also brought vivid visions for the settings in the book and just had to know if this all was going to satisfactorily translate to the big screen.     Anticipation was high about how authentically the written word would be adapted to a fuller vision of the author’s work.  

I’m glad to say we aren’t disappointed.    It looks fantastically well-done and true to the written narrative.  It’s going to be epic.   Were we surprised that one of the main characters, a stylist named Cinna, is being played by rock star Lenny Kravitz?  Sure … but Cinna is a very soulful figure in the story’s very violent superficial world, and Kravitz certainly carries soul in his manner, his music and his acting (for anyone who saw the movie Precious, he played Nurse John).    Generally, everything we’ve seen in preview of this dramatic dystopian tale has served its purpose extremely well – our excitement has been built up along with our anticipation and impatience.  We cannot wait to experience the full release!

Today is Transfiguration Sunday.   For the universal Church, this means the Magi-cal season of epiphany is ending and the soul-searching, sin-wrestling season of Lent is quickly settling upon us.   We are moving from awe to ash.    We are entering is a designated time to give extra prayerful attention to the human misery such as is highlighted by The Hunger Games story.   We do so while waiting for the big, epic release of Easter.    We’ve celebrated the birth of Jesus in the world, celebrated His presence with gift giving, and now in Lent we are about to walk even more intentionally beside Jesus in his ministry to sin-sick souls.   We will do so on through the arduous end of his life and into the glorious Good News that will be released on April 8^th.  

The transfiguration account found in today’s lesson from Mark’s Gospel directly inaugurates our shift into Lent in a very potent way – by giving us a preview.

As with all good previews, we readers in the audience to this historic event are looking for authenticity as well as a build-up of excitement for the full big picture.   We are not disappointed, nor were the first disciples.   

What immediately strikes us in this stunning, dramatic preview is Jesus’ appearance.   We are told He had climbed a mountaintop with Peter, James and John.   Once there, we are then informed that the entirety of his sweaty, dirty, simple garb suddenly transformed into a vision of pure and dazzling white.    In case anyone ever asks you if the Bible mentions bleaching, point them to this text, for we are told that his clothes were brighter than any bleach on earth could accomplish!     

The purpose of this bizarre, brilliant display was to give Peter, James and John, and by extension, to give us, hope.    It’s a holy preview of the coming climax of all history … the time beyond all sinful suffering when all reality will be fully transformed by our Savior’s powerful, purifying light.   It’s a sneak peak of His ultimate purpose and eternal glory … a resplendent revelation of resurrection … an angelic adaptation of the Author of Life’s original plan.  

Up to this magnificent mountaintop point in time, God’s original plan for humanity was primarily known through the historic, poetic, wise and prophetic writings of the Old Testament.    Those first followers of Jesus had been students of this Scripture, and so they kept an ear open and kept watch for how His story developed from God’s word as they knew it best.    Given that they were under the oppressive thumb of the Roman Empire and the agitating Temple authorities, they needed every assurance that Jesus was authentically who He projected himself to be, that he was indeed the long-hoped for Messiah.    They had put their entire lives on the line for Him and the hope He represented.  

Peter, James and John received holy authentication on that day of Transfiguration.     It came not only in the form of the glorious glowing of Jesus, but also by both Moses and Elijah being present in this miraculous preview.    How exactly these two colossally important faith figures appeared in this vision will always be a holy mystery to us.     But what it meant to Peter, James and John on that mountaintop couldn’t be any clearer.   The presence of their greatness pointed the way to Jesus indeed being the only One to follow on the path to the full release of God’s plan of salvation.  It’s like they held a sign saying, “Pay attention to this preview, trust in its holy authenticity, let it fill you with hope for the journey, and the glory will come!” 

We read that this all so overwhelmed Peter (terrified him, really) that he momentarily lapsed into believing he could set up tents for Moses, Elijah and Jesus to camp out atop that mountain.    He got so lost in the moment he forgot it was all vision, all preview.    But when frightened, overwhelmed, and confused, don’t we also try to scramble for some measure of security?    Even if we some part of us knows it’s irrational?   

           

Peter had most likely found himself clinging to the security of a ritual from of one the Jewish Festivals, called the Feast of the Tabernacles.  This was when men and their sons spent time in temporary huts as a way of remembering the time Israel spent in the wilderness before being delivered to a promised land.     Perhaps this was Peter’s way of hoping and coping with the fact that the mountaintop experience wasn’t going to last … that it was going to be a wild, perilous journey with Jesus before one day being delivered into glory after Him.  

           

One of the tough truths about previews is that they are short.    My longed-for time in the futuristic world of The Hunger Games has so far been limited to two minutes and thirty-six seconds.     The preview of Christ’s final full release also unfolds swiftly.   Mark doesn’t give us to time to linger in it.    It quickly progresses from brilliant brightness to the frightening yet authenticating presence of Moses and Elijah.    And then, just when everything Peter, James and John ever hoped for was in view, it all got swiftly covered up by a great cloud.   

           

Fortunately, this cloud was likely not at all ominous to them.  It was another big and necessary part of the preview, for just as in Old Testament times, it was a reassuring manifestation of the Almighty that appeared in a time of confusion and fear.    Through the cloud, and in faith, they somehow heard holy words identifying Jesus as God’s Son, as the Beloved (the chosen one), whom they must listen to.  And then, just as suddenly as Jesus was transfigured and they were in the company of faithful legends, they were suddenly alone again with Jesus.  

           

The preview ends with Jesus descending from the mystical mountaintop experience.   He knew well it was not yet His time to stay aglow in glory.   Vital life-giving teaching, holy healing, and radical faith revolution had to take place during the time between preview and full release.    So He descended back into the ash-shaded world.    He came down, as one Bible commentator has nicely stated it, “into the mundane nature of everyday life … into the nitty-gritty details of misunderstanding, squabbling, disbelieving disciples … into the religious and political quarrels of the day … into the jealousies and rivals both petty and gigantic that color our relationships … down into the poverty and pain that are part and parcel of our life in this world.”[i]    Jesus came down to finish offering the preview to the Greatest Story Ever Told.

           

His disciples descended by his side.    After all of that overwhelming, mysterious revelation, however, they did so with a fresh and powerfully sustaining hope.   The unforgettable memory of the transfiguration would serve to sustain them as they learned from Jesus, obeyed his commandments, endured their own suffering in His name, and awaited the full release of resurrected life. 

           

Where are we today?  We can’t stay atop the mystical mountain with Jesus either.    We who have been baptized in His name and who commune together around His supper, have to watch for and trust in and serve Jesus down here.    By grace and through our faith, we’ll one day experience His full glory, be bathed in that greater-than-bleached blessed life.    Until then, may our faith journeys be guided by and find great hope in His potent mountaintop-projected preview.     Amen.

           

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[i] David Lose @ www.workingpreacher.org

I Cannot Walk In These

1 Samuel 17:31-40

          

            The tribal chief of a large unchartered territory in central Africa did not greet the man standing before him by saying, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”    He instead stood there silently and expectantly, waiting for the nineteenth century Scottish medical missionary, explorer and evangelist to follow the local custom.    There would be no access to the vast territory until the chief was allowed to survey, choose and keep something from Dr. Livingstone’s personal belongings.    He would then give something of his own to the missionary in return.

            So clothing, books, a watch, and several other items from the doctor’s sparse possessions were spread out before the chief.    He also made available something he truly needed – a goat whose milk helped sooth the doc’s chronic stomach condition.    You can guess exactly what the chief wanted to keep.   Despite his dismay, and for the sake of the Gospel, Livingstone gave up the goat.    He then waited with high expectation that he’d be given something equally valuable in return.

            The chief gave him … a stick.   Well, more precisely, a walking stick.   The doctor’s bubble of expectation evaporated in bitter disappointment.  He couldn’t grasp how a walking stick could do anything for him compared to the goat that kept him well.    He felt angry – at the bum exchange and even at God.   But then a local tribesman offered a word of explanation.    The chief’s gift was not some wooden crutch whatsoever.  It was his very own scepter, the very item that made it possible to enter into every village in his vast territory.   Dr. Livingstone had presumed wrong.   He had not been cheated by the chief or by God.   He and his mission of expanding the Gospel had instead been very greatly honored and blessed.   

            When our expectations of others and of certain plans burst, a couple things can typically happen.   We can sink into resentful disappointment and despair over what we do not have.   We can trap ourselves inside a narrative about being cheated.   And most perplexing and unhealthy of all, we can fail to acknowledge and appreciate the significance of good and helpful things that have been provided for our benefit.     

            This all also applies to our faithful expectations.      We can easily get to griping about God failing to provide us something we felt sure we had need of, something we expected to be blessed with.    When caught up in this griping, we can then sadly lose sight of the good things and greater (though perhaps yet unknown) purposes of what God has given us already.

            Our scripture lesson today has to do with expectations.   It is from the familiar story of David, divinely anointed king of Israel in his youth, and the Philistine giant warrior, Goliath of Gath.    The Veggie Tales animated kids version of this story is the most entertaining … you just can’t beat the site and sound of Goliath as a giant pickle and David as an asparagus sprout!

            This is a heroic story.   We love it when our expectations are surprised and reversed as the little guy, the underdog, rises up to successfully beat the odds.    It gives us hope for the times we feel small and up against a wall.    And David – who according the Bible’s description was a beautiful-eyed, handsome, lyre-instrument playing shepherd boy – sure was in this jam when he chose to go up against the enormously sized and life-long trained enemy warrior.    

            What I find most inspiring and heroic, however, isn’t his remarkable and commonly recalled victory via a very accurate sling-shot of a wadi stone.   This was the method, but the integrity of the means is what most matters.   David glorified God and helped advance God’s good dominion simply by being true to himself.    He was true to who God created him to be and to God’s calling in his life.   He didn’t size up the task and then start some sort of radical, Rocky eating raw eggs and running up and down the Philly Art Museum routine to transform himself for the epic battle.   He didn’t puff himself up with pride and bravado intent on proving himself to his three older brothers.   He didn’t present himself as anyone or anything other than the faithful sheep corralling kid from Bethlehem, the youngest and least likely to fight son of Jesse.  

            How wonderful to have young David’s faith – to have such confidence and courage in yourself, in your God-given and blessed abilities, and in your steadfast belief that the power of God is your true strength and shield, the protector of your family and your people.    

             This inspiring portrait of young David is reinforced by what I find to be one of the most comical scenes in all of Scripture.  Again, he didn’t suffer the weight of expectations.  Until, that is, Israel’s King Saul placed some upon him.  Literally.     And these expectations did not fit.  It happened right after David argued before the king that his volunteering to take on Goliath wasn’t as crazy as it sounded.    His shepherding of sheep in Bethlehem fields also meant he had to fight off wild beasts.    He hadn’t just been lazing about strumming the lyre all night and day.   “Whenever a lion or bear came and took a lamb from the flock,” he explained, “I went after it and struck it down, rescuing the lamb … the Lord, who saved me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, will save me from the hand of this Philistine.”   For David, volunteering to do combat with this enormous enemy threat was really just an extension of his regular shepherding duties under the care of the Almighty.    

            His words were enough to convince the king to send him.    Saul stated his expectation that the Lord would be with David and then the king did something else in line with his expectations.  To fight Goliath, he expected David to wear the right protective gear.    So this is what he placed upon the lamb defending lad.    

            Here’s where it becomes a comical read to me.  Just picture a strong but smallish boy standing there outfitted in the adult-sized armor of a king.  Picture him with an oversized bronze helmet on his head, with a sword probably at long as he was tall strapped to him, and draped in chain mail.   It’d be a little like outfitting me with Brandon Jacobs uniform (you had to know I’d slip in some Super Bowl winning Giants reference in a story about a Giant).    David knew right away how ridiculous it was to try and be somebody else in this situation.   So he cast off the king’s expectations and bluntly declared, “I cannot walk in these.”   He then removed it all and walked ahead in his own skin and simple shepherding garb.   He knew he didn’t need all that added protection and garb of expectation … since his faithful expectation of God’s protection was more than enough!

            Everything that happened after that is what is most remembered in this historic, heroic story.    Sling. Thump. Surprise. Triumph.  The radical rite of passage for Israel’s divinely anointed future King complete.     Exciting stuff.   But may we never overlook the heart of the matter that prepared his heart and mind to faithfully lead the flock of Israel.   David’s crucial decision to go forth to the glory of God just by being his blessed self and by faithfully trusting in the good and helpful things God had provided for him means everything to this story.    

            How much time have you spent time getting to know who God intends you to be?   How intentional have you been about making time to assess your God-given giftedness and how this can help advance the Gospel even if others don’t expect it of you?   Every time you say the Lord’s prayer, do you deeply trust you will be delivered from evil?    Do you, and do we have together, faith enough to see simple things such as walking sticks and sling shots, shared prayers and modest budgets, kind words and helpful hands … as more than what we could ever possibly expect them to be in service to our Lord?   Amen.