The Transfiguration of Our Lord
February 11, 2018
“Better Things to Come”
Matthew 17:1-9
Rev. John R. Larson
Ascension Lutheran Church Littleton, Colorado
Last Sunday many people saw an amazing story unfold in the Super Bowl. A back-up quarterback, who got his share of boos from the Philadelphia Eagle fans at the end of the regular season when he wasn’t playing very well, was the Most Valuable Player of the Super Bowl. Nick Foles, this quarterback, was greatly distressed about his career a few years ago. After one season of sitting the bench and being cut by one more team (A few times a team said they didn’t want him) he didn’t pick up a football for 8 months and considered quitting and getting on with life. But, now, I think he is going to stick around for a few more years!! And after he is done playing football for millions of dollars, he said he wants to be a pastor – where the real money is!!
When I consider what Peter experienced on the Mount of Transfiguration I believe he would have joined Nick Foles in his sentiments, “I have a feeling that my career just peaked!!” Jesus takes Peter along with James and John to a mountain. (It always seems that great things happen on mountains!!) And then Jesus is changed. His face shone like the sun and His clothes became brilliantly white. And then Moses and Elijah, the two biggest Old Testament folks, showed up as well. And then, just like at the Baptism of Jesus, a voice from heaven rumbles, “This is My Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased. Listen to Him!!” (Matthew 17:5b)
I think his career peaked. And he knew it. He was ready to stay right there. This was amazing. This was like Old Testament stuff – Mt. Sinai. This was like when the people of Israel were wandering in the desert and God made His presence known with the pillar of fire at night and the cloud of His presence during the day. And it was happening right in front of Peter. And so he wanted to stay. Can you blame him? “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, let us put up three shelters – one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” (Matthew 17:4) He didn’t even care that he didn’t have a place to stay. He was willing to let himself, James and John sleep under the stars.
This wasn’t the first time that Peter experienced something great and didn’t want to take another step ahead. Six days before this, Jesus and His followers were in Caesarea Philippi and the debate arose as to who Jesus was. Was He like John the Baptist or Jeremiah or like the Old Testament preachers? So Jesus asked them who He was. Peter, always the first to talk, even sometimes before thinking, said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:16) And Peter is praised by Jesus for such a confession. “On this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” (Matthew 16:18) And then Jesus fills them all in about the work that He, the Christ, the Savior, the Redeemer, had to do. He was going to suffer and be rejected and then be killed and raised to life on the third day. And Peter would have none of that talk. Peter took Jesus aside and hollered at Him, “Never, Lord!! This will never happen to you.” (Matthew 16:22b)
Peter was entrenched in how things were then, at that moment. But Jesus could only tell him that there were better things yet to come. Yes, He was the Christ but the Christ had great work to do. The ransom for the sins of the whole world had to be made!! Such work didn’t end on the Mount of Transfiguration but it needed to continue on to Calvary and to an atoning death. Three tents?? Stay put?? How silly!!
Transfiguration Sunday, this day so close to Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent tells us that there are better things to come. For everyone stuck in life and going nowhere, for everyone comfortable in the routine of life and going nowhere, for everyone who struggles with sin and its curse on life, and going nowhere, we see Jesus offering better things to come for our life.
On that transfiguration mountain the better things to come came first by looking at Jesus. They looked at Him when His majesty was evident and as He changed His appearance. The deity on the inside showed on the outside. And then after this whole thing with Moses and Elijah showing up and just as suddenly leaving, it says in our reading, “When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus.” (Matthew 17:8) Better things to come, come by looking at Jesus!! I think Matthew is driving home a point in his choice of words when everything is gone and everyone is gone and Jesus is at the center of the mountain and they can only see Him.
Bo Giertz, served as a Lutheran Bishop in the Church in Sweden and wrote a book called The Hammer of God. In it he writes, “It is a blessed thing when a believing soul looks in the Word for Jesus only. That I have not done. I have looked for persistence, for amendment of life. I have taken stock of my deeds, but I have lost sight of Jesus in all this mess. Like hammer blows aimed with unerring precision against the head of a nail, the words ‘Jesus only’, recurred again and again and sank ever deeper into the consciousness. Jesus Only, the foundation of faith, and man sees nothing else, believes in nothing else and builds his hope on nothing else.”
Another of the senses, hearing, is critical if we are going to know the better things that God has in store for us. God spoke loudly from heaven, “This is My Son, whom I love; with Him I am well pleased. Listen to Him.” Peter had selective hearing. He couldn’t hear about the Christ who would be mistreated and suffer and die. But the things that God had planned for forgiveness and life would come though such words and actions. When our souls are bothered by sin, when our life is struggling with difficulties, when our body knows that it is nearing its end we must listen to His words. In John 6 many people were fleeing Christ. He had called for their faith when He said, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.” (John 6:53) Peter, then in one of His great moments, when Jesus asked if the Twelve were also going to leave said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68) Better things to come, come to us when we look clearly only at Jesus for our life and when we desire to listen to His gracious words.
Michael Yaconelli, in his book Messy Spirituality tells about a time when he and his wife had a housekeeper. Every week the housekeeper would come to dust, vacuum, and clean every out-of-the-way corner of their house. Maybe you have been lucky enough to have one of those. Or you have been blessed with children whose job is to do all that and more!! Yaconelli said that he hated the day when the housekeeper came because they would spend the entire morning cleaning the house before the housekeeper arrived. They didn’t want the housekeeper to think that they actually were messy people!!
Waiting for better things to come means that we can’t wait for God to come and do His work in us. We can’t wait for Him to do his cleaning, His washing, His work. When Peter, James and John had seen the Transfiguration, heard God’s voice and realized that God sent dead people from the past to be with them on that day, “They fell face down to the ground, terrified.” (Matthew 17:6) And Jesus in great compassion and mighty power came over to them and touched them and told them not to be afraid and to get up. (See Matthew 17:7) They didn’t have to get things all better before He did His work. They didn’t have to clean up and be strong before He offered His cleansing and strength.
Better things to come in our life is when we come to Jesus as terrified and afraid and humbled and in need as we can be, and for us to see that He would delight in coming to us and giving us His hand of healing and allowing us to stand and to live life in His gracious strength.
Peter didn’t realize it when he was on the mountain that day, when he wanted to stay in that moment, but Jesus had better things in mind. In a few days we begin Lent with humbling ashes on our forehead and we are thrilled that into our sin-filled lives our Jesus has better things in mind for us. Through a forgiving death we are made pure in God’s sight, we are forgiven and God brings to us peace. The better things to come are His atoning death and glorious resurrection. The better things to come are for us to look to Jesus with confidence, to be thrilled that God still speaks a sure and certain word to our souls and that He would pick us up and tell us to get up and not to be afraid. Jesus has better things to come for us then and now!! Amen!!
(Today’s sermon first came to Ascension on March 6, 2011)
