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United Church of Paducah
4600 Buckner Lane
Paducah, KY 42001
(270) 442-3722
Worship Times
Sunday Service: 10:00a
Refreshments &
Fellowship: 11:15a
Christian Education
For All Ages:
11:20a - Noon
Nursery Services Provided Handicap Accessible
All Are Welcome!
A Congregation Of The
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From March 2, 2006
What We're Made Of
Mark 9: 2-9
The university I attended had an excellent theatre
department and cheap seats. Hamlet, West Side Story, A
Streetcar Named Desire, even experimental
productions - you name it, I was there.
Over the years of theatre-going, my focus shifted;
instead of being drawn in by the acting, I became
fascinated with the everything-but-the-actors stuff.
Sets, costumes, lighting, all of it interested
me - because strong acting aside, these were the things
that transported the audience from ordinary reality into
a whole new world.
I mention this because when we come to passages in
scripture like the one today - with Jesus and his three
disciple-friends standing mountain top - I'm as caught up
in the director's decisions, the behind-the-scenes
action, and the costuming as I am the pure thrill of the
moment itself.
So, all this to say that I find myself wondering about
today's gospel lesson. Why this place? And why this
point in Jesus' ministry? Why the transformation of
Jesus' dusty clothes into blinding white robes? What
dramatic purposes would it serve to have Elijah and
Moses appear for a mystical conversation with Jesus?
What is God doing?
What is God doing? That's our first question. The
second, equally as important, is what is our response?
It's a magnificent and mysterious moment, Jesus'
transfiguration. The church celebrates this powerful
event this time every year - right here at the end of
Epiphany and the unofficial beginning of Lent.
Even if we haven't realized it, the season of Epiphany
has been pointed this way for two full months. This
mountain-top moment is the climax of an unveiling that
started when the Magi came and bowed down to a newborn
king, a baby with holy light already shining out through
his laughing eyes. For weeks now as he has gone about
Galilee teaching and healing, his ministry growing
bigger and more challenging each day, Jesus has given us
glimmers of his truest self.
Today, at last, we see Jesus retreat to a mountain peak
where he is suddenly made brilliant with glory.
As Jesus stands shimmering, Moses appears, the prophet
Elijah, as well. The two finest representatives of
Jesus' religious tradition are here, set apart with
Jesus, the one whom God has sent to fulfill the holy
work they began.
Unprepared for such a stunning display, the disciples
are terrified and confused. A cloudy veil descends and
from inside it booms a holy voice, "This is my Son, the
Beloved; listen to him!" A command that bounces from
peak to peak and canyon to canyon.
Then the cloud lifts and the echoes die. A powerful
silence settles in. And just as suddenly, they are four
again - Jesus, James, Peter, and John - and it's clear:
there is nowhere for Jesus to go from here but down.
Down into the valleys where Jesus' fate awaits him. As
far down as an innocent man can go, really. Down into
suffering, betrayal, and a humiliating death.
Notice God's timing. Before Jesus makes his descent,
before the second half of his ministry begins, the glory
in him is revealed.
Before the scandal of his love so threatens the powerful
that the authorities plot to do him in, and then do, the
glory in Jesus is revealed.
Before the false accusations and the betrayal of
friends, before the mockery and the flogging and the
heavy weight of the cross, the glory in our Messiah is
revealed.
Just before Jesus makes the long and painful journey
down into Jerusalem, just for a few awesome moments, God
draws back the curtain of Jesus' humanness to reveal
what, until now, has been hidden beneath his flesh - a
pure and radiant glory.
It seems to me that given all Jesus will so soon
encounter, this glory may very well be his only help.
His only real assurance. Until the transfiguration,
maybe even Jesus himself doesn't quite know how full he
is of the Holy Presence.
Surely Jesus has gotten hints of that glory inside him
before. Times when his love met the suffering in others,
times when he looked squarely into the eyes of pain and
did not pull away. Jesus had seen quick flashes of that
glory, sparks of it, when he touched someone who had
sought him out. In an instant, a glint of glory would
pass between the healer and the healed.
Other times, the glory in Jesus would flash like
lightning in heated exchanges with the Pharisees and
scribes.
But it had never come like this, God's glory. And
certainly not when Jesus was doing nothing more than
just catching his breath after an uphill climb.
Notice how impeccable God's timing is. Just as Jesus'
ministry begins to turn squarely toward the cross, God
provides this moment so Jesus can know exactly what he
is made of. When the going gets tough - and it will - this
mountain-top memory will keep Jesus from turning back,
giving up, or caving in.
God's timing is impeccable. How else will Jesus proceed
one foot in front of the other all the way to the cross
if not for the new-found discovery of this glory, so
bright and strong and unconquerable? How else will a
man, even God's own son, continue on into the darkest
corners of the human experience except with the
knowledge that he was not just flesh and bone but made
of pure radiant light?
How else will Jesus be able to fulfill the law and the
prophets, how else will he follow through on his
father's will, how else can he save us if he does know
ahead of time what he was really made of - glory.
Because God showed Jesus there on the mountaintop
precisely what Jesus was made of, Jesus can go on from
there, go on even to death.
Which is what enables us to go on when we come upon our
own great difficulties. We hold fast to the memory that
our glorious Jesus never abandoned his profound calling.
We cling to the scriptures and the hymns that affirm
Jesus' faithfulness to us despite the suffering he
endured. Indeed, we worship this Jesus who, in his
earthly walk, so relied upon the Holy Presence, the
glory burning inside him, that he did not run from death
but instead faced it squarely.
This is the Jesus we look to. This is the Jesus who
makes it possible for us to go down into the hard places
and up onto the crosses in life. This is the Jesus we
pray will share his light when we come into our own dark
days and shadowed times.
Certainly that shining came to me when I was undergoing
cancer treatments. For months, I moved within a
tremendous bubble of light, Christ's light, that came as
a response to countless prayers. Never have I felt so
sure that no harm could possibly come, even if I were to
die.
Christ will share his light, will shine it on us in
times of need. But that light does not belong to him
alone; it dwells in each of us. You see there is, Thomas
Merton the Trappist monk wrote, there is in all visible
things - a hidden wholeness. A hidden wholeness.
A wholeness that God revealed in Jesus that day on the
mountain top. A wholeness that lies hidden in most of us
most of the time. But which is the stuff of glory. The
stuff we are made of, even though we often spend our
lives with little notion it is there.
In times of celebration we see it. Last week-end, with
RJ's ordination and then our Sunday worship experience
together - God's radiant glory shone out everywhere.
We get glimpses of that glory when babies are born. At
weddings. At graduations. Whenever we experience joy,
whenever we celebrate, we are apt to see God's glory
shine out because in those times the eyes of our hearts
are more receptive to such sightings.
But God's glory can also break through in times of
suffering. An illness, a loss, an unfortunate turn of
events - sometimes we are cracked open so wide that God's
glory spills out, like the sun's commanding brilliance
on a cloud-ridden day.
I have seen this happen many times sitting with someone
who is dying or when I am with a person facing fearsome
circumstances. A quiet shift occurs and suddenly, there
it is. Glory. Glory shining out. There that glory is,
underneath it all, plain to see if you are paying
attention.
Just on the verge of being invited to go with Jesus on
his journey to Jerusalem, just as we are about to be
included on that downward trek through Lent, God draws
back the curtains and shows us the glory Jesus is made
of.
Which is one kind of awesome. Go with him this Lent, and
you're likely to discover a second kind of awesome, one
inside you, even if you never suspected it before.
Amen.
© Rev. Karen Winkel
United Church of Paducah (UCC)
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"Never place a period where God has placed a comma." - Gracie
Allen
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