Shepherd of the Springs
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

A voice from the cloud said, "this is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him." When the disciples heard this they fell on their faces and were terrified.

This morning we come to the end of the Epiphany Season and therefore to the Feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord. Other than the resurrection of Jesus, this certainly ranks as the second strangest event of his public ministry. What are we to make of it? It comes at a significant turning point. Up to this time Jesus has been carrying out what we might call Phase One of his ministry. He has preached to the crowds and instructed his disciples concerning the Kingdom of God which he brings to them in His person as the promised Messiah. On the one hand, He has presented them with a rather hidden, mysterious, and perplexing Kingdom through teaching and parables which they failed to understand at the time. What they did understand - as well as the crowds - was that God was certainly at work through Him. They could see this in a very straight-forward dramatic way in his many miracles and exorcisms. These were signs for all to see that God was showing up to do His work and in a most dramatic way.

But now just before he takes Peter, James and John up on the mountain, He gathers his disciples for quiz time. All right, who am I? Who do the people think I am . . . who do you think I am? And after Peter makes his great confession: You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God - a confession more from wisdom supplied by a revealing Father than some sound theological conclusion on his own part . . . After this great confession, Jesus begins to teach them about the cross, his death, and resurrection coming up the way in Jerusalem. . . where they will now be making as a final destination. Naturally the disciples, Peter foremost, don’t get it. Peter says, over my dead body! And Jesus identifies such thinking as of the Devil. At this time, all the disciples had all of the typical Messiah opinions of the day. God was going to send His personal Anointed One to rally the good God-fearing people and make a frontal attack on the evils of the world. God would finally show up and right all the wrongs of the world and his people would now become the victors not the losers they were sick and tired of being. When Jesus would work miracles to heal all sorts of horrible conditions, feed thousands, and get all the demons on the run . . . He seemed to fit this understanding perfectly.

The amazing events that Peter, James, and John witnessed on the mountain presented them and us a rather confusing picture of Jesus the Messiah. On the one hand, the Transfiguration of Jesus seemed to reinforce the picture that the disciples had and wanted to continue to have about what it meant for Jesus to be the Messiah.

Above all, it meant continuity with all the messiahs that gone before him. The appearance of Moses and Elijah with Jesus, all in a state of heavenly glory seemed to present just what the disciples would expect. Perhaps this meant that Jesus was receiving reinforcements. God is sending in two of the greatest messiahs of the Old Covenant to assist Jesus in his mission. Lets make fitting accommodations for all the glorified messiahs, Peter thinks, as he asks the Lord if it would be good to make three tabernacles - one for each of God’s representatives. . . just like God tented with his people in the Old Testament. Why if we have Moses and Elijah back, all glorified with Jesus, surely this means that glory days are ahead for the children of Israel. This is what the current hapless Jews now at the low point of their checkered history all dreamt about. But as soon as Peter offers his suggestion, Moses and Elijah disappear, a thick fog develops around a no-longer-glowing Jesus, and a voice is heard: This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased, listen to Him.

First the disciples are awestruck, thrilled, and spiritually juiced - Jesus, Moses, and Elijah - there together in all their glory. Then, when all this goes away and they hear the voice from Heaven, they are terrified. I doubt that they remembered what Jesus had said to them a few days before when he told them about his conviction that He must go to Jerusalem and there suffer many shameful things at the hands of the religious leaders there. This was not the kind of messiah they were seeing or wanting in Jesus as they witnessed his miracles, exorcisms and now the glory of God on the mountain. But the voice from heaven said, this truly is my Son, now listen to what He is telling you about what is going to happen and what must be done. These are words that they were to take to heart and we must also this morning. As we close out the Epiphany season and prepare for Lent, the voice from Heaven is reminding us that we must now join our Lord. We must now set our face to make the journey to Jerusalem and behold what the Father has ordained to take place there. The purpose for which God sent His Son into the world must now be fulfilled.

In terms of the Old Covenant of Law, it is difficult to accept that this is not a salvage operation. The sinful self in all of us should like to think that with some glorified presence of God and his power in the world and in our lives, we can get our moral selves together and measure up to what the people of God should be and do. We should like to think that power to reform and inspire, not grace to forgive is what we really need. But God has other plans. Moses and Elijah . . . David and Solomon for that matter, will not be needed. Jesus comes down off the mountain and heads to Jerusalem to bring an end of the Covenant of Law. Life for God’s people will now be under the charter of the Kingdom of God and it will be ruled by grace, not law. It will include citizens of all nations and races. And it will come by a cross and live by the cross in this world. Jesus has come to inaugurate the establishment of the reign of grace. Life with God will be found in the events of Jesus passion, death, and resurrection - not in tabernacles, not in blessings anchored in Law, not in animal sacrifices, not in exclusive membership with the children of Israel. And for now in this life, we might add as we now peer with Peter, James and John in the hazy cloud . . . not in glory.

There is a paradox as we and the disciples join Jesus for the journey to Jerusalem. God chose to reveal the true identity of His Son, His real chosen Messiah by the display of mighty acts, miracles, and unmistakable signs of glory as we see also in the transfiguration of Jesus. These are spectacular, breathtaking, and open for all to see and acknowledge. No faith is needed here at all. Remember, how Jesus acted to reveal who He was, How He said to the crowd and the paralytic: So that you may know that the Son of Man has the power to forgive sins (so that you can know that I am God in human flesh), I say (to the paralytic), rise take up your bed and walk. Everyone there saw the presence and power of God at work in this astounding miracle. But, this was not at all the central Messianic work that was given by the Father for Jesus to accomplish by which the forgiveness of sins would come to earth for all sinners. This work would involve no mighty displays of God’s power in the world. Rather, it would be redemptive; what Luther called, God’s left-handed work. This is where God is at work in, with, and indeed through the evil workings of the world and the devil. This work seems to the naked eye that God is not present; He is not doing anything, and the forces of good are losing. It looks like evil is in control, having its own way, and it is winning the day. No doubt, this is just how it sounded to the disciples when they heard Jesus announce a fate in Jerusalem where he would become the victim not the victor at the hands of the evil forces that would await Him there.

Moses did his greatest messianic work on Mount Sinai. He received the Covenant of Law from God. And Elijah did his greatest messianic work embarrassing and routing the Baal prophets on Mount Carmel. Now they have gathered with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Here we behold the glory of all three. But Jesus still has his greatest messianic work ahead of Him. He has come into the world to die for your sins. He just has not come to die on THIS hill. He only has come to this mountain to reassure his inner circle of disciples, and each of us about who He is as God’s Anointed, and that we must travel with him to Jerusalem. There Jesus will climb his appointed mountain for the saving work that the Father has given Him to accomplish. And in that event, the greatest glory of God will be manifested in the world; but not for the eyes of the camera to capture; just for the eyes of faith; eyes fashioned by the word of Christ, as heed the voice from Heaven and listen to Him in the power of the Spirit. So down off this mountain we go with Jesus and his disciples to travel to Jerusalem. . . to another mountain. In Jerusalem, He will climb the hill that is worth dying on . . . for you, for me, for the whole world.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. A-men.