H AVE YOU EVER SEEN something so amazing that it makes you wonder if it is really real. Did you have a hard time “believing your eyes” or believing your experience?
■ Growing up … once I saw in the night sky in Michigan — the Northern Lights — rare but amazing.
■ Once, driving the Pennsylvania turnpike at a high elevation early in the morning, I realized I was driving through clouds — not fog, but clouds. It was otherworldly.
■ Once, on the first day our new church was built, and ready for us to gather to worship, we arrived in the parking lot, finding a double rainbow in the sky, right over the church.
■ Once, I stood near the top of Pikes Peak in the Rockies…it was a very windy day and you had to literally lie your body into the wind to keep from being knocked down
■ The same thing happened on a wintry day on the shores of Lake Michigan — a need to lie into the wind, in order to stay upright. The power of the wind was breathtaking in several ways.
■ Once I saw a young teen perform for the Highland Games with her own dance arrangement for the song, “Lord of the Dance.” It was so beautiful, so spiritual, it brought you to tears — right there on the football field of that competition.
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ANY NUMBER of phenomena occur in life that are so special they seem unreal.
Today’s Scriptures suggest that throughout time, the encounter with the divine became one of those hard-to-believe moments. God is light — wonderful, delightful, revealing, full tilt amazing light. God is light — but in the Scriptures of today, regular folks who encounter the light treat it oddly.
In each of today’s Scriptures, as folks encountered the light of God — in Moses, in Jesus Christ — they missed the meaning or went for the practical. They were overwhelmed by the presence of the holiness and glory of God. They wanted to put barriers between themselves and God’s presence. They seemed to try to bring God down to their size — to make this experience of God less than it was.
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THE PROMISE OF GOD is that we can be transformed. Jesus lived, died, rose again, not so Christians could safely sit in their church. Jesus came so we might glow with the light and joy of God’s love — might reflect that love to all we meet, wherever we meet.
Yet, it can be difficult for some of us to behold the light, to trust the light, to reflect that light. We, too often, hide from the light of Christ and wonder why our world is dark.
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THE THREE STOOGES were never my favorite comedians, but one of their routines came to mind as I prepared for today. Curly is frantic: “Help me! Help me! It’s dark! I can’t see!” There is a bit of aimless running about, in the way only the Three Stooges could do. They are calling to each other, “He can’t see! He can’t see!” until they come upon a solution. “Curly! Open your eyes!” And he does. He can see. What a miracle.
I think it is easy for us to do something like this. I recall a time a man with serious health issues was on the prayer list — his neighbors faithfully praying for him. What had been thought incurable and terminal, was indeed cured! He had life, hope, a future after all. But, like Curly, he had his eyes closed. He could not see God in that….. He thought there may have been a medical mistake in the first place.
We can too easily hop on the pessimistic, complaining, distrustful bandwagon of others’ world view and sputter grumbling through our life. The news and social media help us with that these days. We, like the people of Israel, like the disciples, like the people of Corinth, like Curly, too often hide from the light of Christ and wonder why our world is dark.
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WE CAN WORK HARD to avoid evidence of God with us. We are such earthy, practical folks, it seems mysterious to behold the light of Christ in those we know-- and to name it as the light of Christ! We just want to call it something simple, something logical, something rational. But God defies all our simple, rational explanation. That is why God is God.
I wonder:
■ What barriers do we erect to keep the evidence of God’s transforming power at a distance?
■ What needs to happen so we can celebrate God’s glory and presence with us instead of avoiding it?
■ What is it like to be so close to God that you glow with light became of having been with God?
■ Do we dare to go to the mountain, to be with God, and know that when we return, glowing with the light of Christ in us, others will be impacted?
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MOSES, HAVING BEEN in God’s presence, was impacted by God’s holiness. He came down from the mountain, glowing, holding the second copy of the Ten Commandments — God’s word, for them, on how to live in right relationship with God and others. The people following Moses, were afraid….they wanted to distance themselves from it. How much easier to live, pretending that life is no more than what we make of it. Nonetheless, Moses’s face aglow, defied their limited view of life and future.
Fred Craddock asks: ‘Is it still possible that any one who approaches God, who encounters the Holy One, will be so transformed that others can see the effect of that encounter?” [Craddock, Preaching Through the Year: Year C, pg 122] Paul said this (read 2 Corinthians 2:18). We are all transformed — become mirror images of God’s love.
In Luke we learn that Peter, James, and John, nearly sleep through the most amazing encounter between Jesus and God. They awake to see Jesus “aglow” — transfigured — and …. And… and…. Offer to build a special house for him??? What?
God surrounds them in a cloud, gets their attention and says hello.
“This is my Son. My chosen. Listen to him.”
God tells them. Quit chattering. Quit planning. Quit trying to figure it out. Look. Listen. Behold who Jesus is. Then silence and they were finally ready to recognize what was before them. The barrier was dropped. They opened their eyes. They could see. They could begin to reflect God’s love to others. And we are here today because of it!
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A SONG I FIRST HEARD on my walk to Emmaus had these words:
Have you seen Jesus my Lord?
He’s here in plain view.
Take a look, open your eyes.
He’ll show life to you.
Lisa is coming to sing … you are invited to join in the chorus.
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AT TIMES, we find the biblical accounts reflecting a sense that the followers of Jesus didn’t seem to “get it.” But I think we are like them at times. I have heard people say:
■ “I never heard God talk to me.”
■ “I never experienced the presence of God in such a powerful way.”
Yet, I am convinced, many have been in God’s presence but were like Curly — with eyes scrunched closed — and could not see as they would not dare to look.
Let’s open our eyes, expecting to see Jesus. On the heels of this strange two years of the pandemic, we all, more than ever, must dare to go to the mountain, to encounter our awesome God, and return to our lives — transformed, aglow with the incredible light of Christ.
