Transfiguration Of Our Lord
Baptism is an amazing thing. I still remember my baptism. My mother held me in her arms, and our pastor poured the water over my head while intoning, “Eric Linden Deibler, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” And suddenly my face shone with a light like that of 1000 suns! And there appeared unto my left, Elvis, The King of Rock’n’Roll. And there appeared unto my right, Johnny Carson, the Then-Reigning King of Late Night Comedy. And the congregation fell upon their faces, for they were filled with fear and trepidation. And an angel of the Lord appeared and said unto them, “Fear not. Arise. For verily, thou art missing the show!” And my father said, “It is good that we are here, Eric. But can you shake a leg? The game comes on at 1:00 and I need to have my nap first.” And my mother said, “I think he needs to be changed.” And suddenly it was just like it was before. That’s a pretty vivid memory for a three-month old, isn’t it?
Of course, my baptism was nothing like that and I have absolutely no memory of it. But wouldn’t it be so much easier if baptism was like that? It would leave no doubt that what happens in a baptism is something extraordinarily spiritually meaningful and powerful! The pews would be packed because there would be no denying God’s presence in this place! Our problems would be solved!!! But God rarely works that way. I will not say never, because you never know. There are times when miraculous things happen. It’s just that, generally speaking, God chooses to work through means which are much more mundane than miraculous.
Many people assume that my spiritual life must be like what I described at the beginning of this sermon, minus the silliness. There’s the assumption that I have frequent experiences akin to Peter’s on the mountaintop. That maybe I see visions and dream dreams, or that I have actual conversations with a God who speaks to me in audible English. Maybe Jesus reveals himself to me in spectacular ways that defy both description and denial. I don't have to squint and strain to discern God's presence. God shows up in my living room in Technicolor glory, and blows mind mind, and then asks me to put on Real Housewives of Atlanta.
It's not true, of course, this hierarchy of holiness, this assumption that I am somehow closer to God and therefore privy to supremely sublime spiritual experiences on the regular, because of my job. Don’t get me wrong. The desire is there: The desire for that kind of deeply emotional experience that happens on a regular basis and affirms and validates my faith. The truth is that most of us would like to have that kind of experience. We like, we want, we crave and covet Christian mountaintops.
It would be nice, wouldn’t it. Because not only would it be affirming. It would also be easier! And not just because it would be so affirming of our faith. It would be easier because it would help us to keep everything discreet. It would make it much easier to keep everything compartmentalized and separated. It makes it easier to keep separated the sacred and the secular. The mountain from the valley. The spectacular from the mundane. As if God is somehow more present during a rousing worship set, a stirring sermon, or a silent retreat in a seaside monastery, than God is when I'm cleaning the house, cooking supper, or picking up the drycleaning on the way back from the grocery store.
The work of discerning God’s presence is harder and messier in everyday life. It means we have to look for God minus the blinding lights, the roaring thunder, and the sudden appearance of celebrities. But that doesn't mean it's impossible. The God who speaks in whispers, the God with the still, small voice is still God.
A faith that constantly pursues those mountaintop experiences is an addiction. Because we can end up spending our time pursuing that spiritual high, that we believe to be indicative of spiritual maturity or success. When we don’t experience that high, we feel empty, unloved, angry, or bored. Meanwhile, we fail to notice the ever-present God in whom we actually live and move and have our being. We become so desperate for the mountain, we miss the God of the valley, the conference room, the playground, the classroom, the grocery store, the street corner. Worshipping the extraordinary doesn’t make for a healthy faith. It just makes us spiritual thrill-seekers.
In our Gospel reading this week, Peter responds to Jesus’s Transfiguration with an affirmation, immediately followed by a proposal: “Lord, it is good for us to be here.” “If you wish, I will make three dwellings.” It is good for us to be here. But is it? Well, in some ways, yes. In some ways, Peter is absolutely right. It is good to set aside times and places for contemplation. It is good to gaze upon Jesus, whenever and however he reveals himself to us. It is good to move out of our comfort zones and confront the indescribable Otherness of the divine.
Until the Transfiguration happens, Peter and his fellow disciples experience Jesus as a teacher, a storyteller, a healer, and a traveling companion. His face, his manners, his voice, his mission — all are familiar to them. Familiar, endearing, and safe. Then one day, high up on a mountain, the unimaginable happens. Before their very eyes, Jesus changes, becoming at once both fully himself and fully unrecognizable. The man they think they know is suddenly more, suddenly Other. And the path that lies ahead of him — a path that must end on another high place, a hill called Golgotha — upends everything the disciples think they understand about Jesus.
Whenever we think we have God figured out, it’s good to be reminded that we’re wrong. Whenever we try to stuff Jesus into a theological, cultural, or political box for our own convenience, it’s good to have that box blown open. Whenever we grow complacent, self-righteous, or lazy in our lives of faith, it’s good to be brought to our knees by a God whose thoughts are not our thoughts, and whose ways are not our ways.
There are very good reasons to encounter Jesus on the mountaintop. On the other hand, it’s not good to fixate on the sublime so much that we desecrate the mundane. Most of life is unspectacular. By which I mean, most of life doesn’t dazzle us with non-stop special effects. But all of life — all of life — contains the sacred. The challenge is learning to see God in places darker, murkier, and more obscure than a mountaintop.
As soon as Peter affirms his experience, he tries to hoard it. What I hear in his plan to “make dwellings” is an understandable but ultimately misguided attempt to contain, domesticate, protect, and possess the sublime. To harness the holy. To make the fleeting permanent. To keep Jesus shiny, beautiful, and safe up on a mountain. After all, everything is so good up there. So clear. So bright. So unmistakably spiritual. Why not stay forever? Well, because God says no.
Even before Peter is finished speaking, God covers him in a thick cloud, and tells him to listen to Jesus — NOT to his own misconceptions about the life of faith. It’s Jesus’s way — the way of the valley, the way of the cross, the way of humility, surrender, and sacrifice — that Peter must learn to follow. In Matthew’s version of the Transfiguration event, the disciples are overcome with fear when God speaks to them out of the cloud. They cower in silence and fall to the ground. But then comes the best part of the story: “Jesus came and touched them, saying, ‘Get up and do not be afraid.’ And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.” Jesus comes and touches his friends, and in that simple, ordinary human encounter of skin on skin, the disciples catch their breath, shed their fear, and return to themselves. Finally, they see the divine in a form they can bear. As it turns out, Peter, for all his eagerness and bluster, isn’t made for unending Transfigurations. He can’t handle too much of the spectacular. None of us can. Too much of that kind of thing, and we end up spiritually and emotionally exhausted. All he can actually take of God’s glory is a tender human hand on his shoulder, and a reassuringly human voice in his ear.
Here’s the thing: We still yearn for mountaintop experiences, and that’s okay. They’ll come and go according to God’s will and timing, not according to our desire to micromanage God. In that sense, sublime spiritual experiences are easy; they require very little from us. We can’t control them.
What’s hard is consenting to follow Jesus back down the mountain. What’s challenging is learning to cultivate awe and wonder in the face of the mundane. What’s essential is finding Jesus in the rhythms and routines of the everyday. In the loving touch of a friend. In the human voices that say, “Don’t be afraid.” In the unspectacular business of discipleship, prayer, service, and solitude. In the unending challenge to love our neighbor as ourselves.
In that regard, Transfiguration Sunday is the perfect Sunday to celebrate Declan’s baptism because it gives us the perfect illustration of finding that which is spiritually spectacular in the midst of the ordinary. I mean what’s more ordinary than water. Most of us don’t even give it a second thought, until we get our water bill. And if you’re on a well, you may not even think about it at all. The words we speak are just as prevalent, ever-present, and seldom deserving of deeper contemplation. And yet when those two very ordinary things are brought together in the context of this worship service, where God promises to be present with us… Something truly spectacular happens. Because at the same moment that I pour the water his head and say the words, “Declan Elliot Cannaday, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”. Those words will reverberate with the echoes of God’s words to Peter and the others on that mountaintop so long ago: “This is my son, the Beloved. With him, I am well pleased.”
We can predict neither how God will speak, nor in what form Jesus might appear. But we can trust in this: whether on the brightest mountain, or in the darkest valley, Jesus abides. Even as he blazes with holy light, his hand remains warm and solid on our shoulders. Even when we're on our knees in the wilderness, he whispers, “Do not be afraid.” So, listen to the ordinary. Keep listening. It is good for us to be here. AMEN