Loving God, we give you thanks for those times when we get glimpses of your glory, as well as for your invitation to prayer.  Renew us this day by the power of your Spirit, enlightening our hearts and minds and drawing us to you; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

    How many of you start to go to sleep as soon as you hear the word “transfiguration”?...  The thing is that we have Transfiguration Sunday every year, and we hear the story every year, and we think that we know the story and that there is nothing new that we could possibly say about it.  However, the thing is that each gospel tells the story slightly differently.  And the gospel of Luke is the only one that tells us that the disciples were sleepy.

    They go up the mountain with Jesus, and Jesus starts to pray, and immediately the disciples want to go to sleep.  What is it about prayer that makes them so sleepy?  In fact, can you think of another time when Jesus asks them to pray with him, and instead they fall asleep?... [the garden of Gethsemane] It would seem, then, that the disciples have a hard time praying and actually staying awake.  How very human of them!  They haven’t yet learned that some pretty amazing things can happen when we pray.

    In the case of the transfiguration, Jesus is praying when his face changes and his clothes are suddenly dazzling white, and the whole glory of God is there, along with Moses and Elijah.  Moses is kind of like a representative of the Law and Elijah is kind of like a representative of the prophets, and both of them were thought to be with God.  So it makes at least some sense for them to show up when the glory of God is there.  Both of them also represent the fulfillment of some Old Testament promises (cf. Deut. 18:15-19; Mal. 4:5).  However, it is unlikely that the disciples would have understood any of this.

    In fact, they almost miss the whole thing.  The way Luke tells it, it sounds as though they just barely managed to stay awake long enough to see all of this, and once they saw what was going on, you can bet that they were fully awake.  Peter, it seems, is the type where as soon as he feels uncomfortable or doesn’t understand, he wants to get busy and do something.  He’s not sure exactly what is going on, but he wants to get in there and contribute something and start building stuff.

    However, it is an experience that isn’t meant to last several days, or even overnight.  In fact, Peter isn’t even finished his building proposal when a cloud comes and overshadows them.  This cloud surrounds them, and their immediate reaction is to be terrified.  Would you be terrified if you were on a mountain and suddenly surrounded by a cloud?... [if yes, why?] So, any idea why the disciples were terrified?... [they thought they were going to die - you couldn’t see God and live]

    However, the disciples do not die.  Instead, they hear a voice from the cloud that is obviously meant to be God’s voice.  “This is my Son, my Chosen,” God says.  “Listen to him!” (Lk. 9:35) While it would be nice to say that now they understand everything and know exactly who Jesus is, we discover only a few verses later that they still don’t understand and that they are even afraid to ask Jesus when they don’t understand (Lk. 9:45).  It is only many days later when they have finally received the Holy Spirit that everything starts to make sense to them.

    There is so much about these disciples that is not so different from us.  After all, none of us fully understand everything about Jesus.  None of us fully understand the ways of God.  Many of us probably even have trouble staying awake when we pray.  And how many of us try to do things all on our own, without taking the time to pray first?

    This is a question that comes from what happens next in the story.  Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell about a boy who is healed soon after they come down from the mountain.  He most likely had epilepsy, and it is described as a demon that throws him to the ground and causes convulsions.  However, only Matthew and Mark give reasons as to why the disciples were not able to heal the boy.  Matthew says that they didn’t have enough faith, and Mark says that they forgot to pray.  They tried to cast out a demon and heal in the name of Jesus, and they didn’t bother to pray.  No wonder they couldn’t do it!  None of us have the power to do something like that without the power of God working through us and lots and lots of prayer.

    Now I don’t know about you, but I’ve certainly had times where I am working on something, and it’s just not coming together, and I’m getting frustrated, and I can’t find the right words.  I’m talking about things that I need to do as a pastor, whether it’s getting something organized or writing something.  These are things that should be always to the glory of God, and sometimes I will suddenly realize that I didn’t begin with prayer.  Then, once I take it to God in prayer, it all comes together.

    This doesn’t just happen to pastors, though.  I can remember as a teenager trying to write a note to a friend that invited her to find out more about Jesus.  I must have started about ten different notes and none of them came out right.  However, when I finally stopped and prayed and asked God for the words, what I needed to say just poured out of me.  That is the power of prayer.

    While many of us probably think about “saying a prayer,” prayer is actually more than that.  It is stopping long enough to be quiet and to be aware of the presence of God, and not only to lay before God our requests and our thanks, but to listen.  Learning to be quiet and to listen is the most difficult thing for so many people.

    Yet, look at what happens when people pray: Jesus emanates the glory of God and gets to talk to Moses and Elijah and have his identity confirmed by the voice of God.  The disciples are praying on the Day of Pentecost when suddenly the Holy Spirit is poured out on them.  Elijah prays and there is a drought that lasts three years, and then he prays again and God sends rain.  And how many times do faith-filled people pray for healing in the name of Jesus, and it is done.

    And so, whatever you do, pray!  Pray for things that give God the glory and are faithful to Jesus Christ.  For our God continues to work wonders by the power of the Holy Spirit at work within and among us.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

Transfiguration (NL 3)                            Luke 9:28-45
February 26, 2017
St. Luke’s Zion Lutheran Church
Pastor Lynne Hutchison

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