You may have gone on a vacation somewhere, or gone to visit a famous museum or amusement park, or seen a Broadway play…and you enjoyed it so much—it was such a great experience—that you just had to buy a souvenir, and you just had to take a bunch of pictures, because you wanted to somehow bottle up that experience and bring it home with you, and maybe share it with those who didn’t get to go.
And so you come home with your Hamilton t-shirt, or your Mickey Mouse, or your autographed baseball from Wrigley Field (or, Busch stadium–whatever); and you post your pictures on facebook or instagram.
But you know… nothing makes you quite as happy as being there.
And it’s not even just the fact that you were there; it’s who you were there with. And it’s the taste of the food you ate, and the smells you smelled, and the emotions you felt.
It’s the whole experience.
How do you bottle that up and bring that home?
You can’t, really.
Peter, James, and John experienced something truly amazing up there on the mountain. They experienced Jesus, transfigured.
Our scripture reading is the Bible’s attempt to share that experience with all of us, who weren’t there. The story in scripture is like a little 2-minute video shot on a cellphone of an event that must have been so much more impressive in person.
When Jesus was transfigured, his clothes became dazzling white, making visible the divine presence within him. And in that glow that surrounded him, Elijah and Moses could be seen, and they were talking with Jesus. And a cloud appeared, and a voice emanated out of the cloud, and said: “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him.”
And Peter, James, and John, they had sensed this divine presence within Jesus before, and they believed it was there…but they hadn’t fully experienced that divine presence; it hadn’t yet been revealed to them in all its glory, until the transfiguration.
The transfiguration was an unmasking; a revealing. And these three disciples got to see and experience what they had only sensed previously.
The Spirit of God is all around us, like the wind; the spirit dwells within us, like our breath.
But to actually see it in a way that mortal human eyes are normally unable to see; to actually experience it fully… now that’s an experience you want to take home with you! You want to bottle it up, and take it home with you, and share it with those who weren’t able to be there with you.
So: Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, teacher, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”
Peter didn’t really seem to know why he said that. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to think. He was overcome and terrified and overjoyed. The other two disciples, James and John, were rendered speechless, but not Peter. Never Peter. Peter is never at a loss for words.
But sometimes, he has no idea what he’s saying, or why he’s saying it.
But here’s a guess: Peter wanted to erect three dwellings, three booths, three mini-tabernacles, as a way to contain the glory, to bottle it up. Kind of like the ark of the covenant, these three dwellings would be where God’s glory, in the form of Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, could dwell.
And maybe Peter, James, and John could carry these dwellings down the mountain, or the people could come up to them, and peek inside; or, if that was too much, they could just stand outside the dwellings, and know that, within them, the glory of God dwells.
That’s my guess; I don’t really know what Peter was thinking. But I think he thought he could somehow bottle up this whole experience, and maybe use it for his show-and-tell presentation to the rest of the disciples, the ones who weren’t there.
But then, suddenly, the cloud went away, and when Peter looked, Moses and Elijah were gone, and Jesus’ radiance had dimmed back to normal.
Apparently what the disciples experienced there on the mountain with Jesus was not something that could be bottled up and carried back home.
And I wonder if, in that moment, Peter was thinking that things would be a lot easier if God could be contained, if God could be put in a container and carried around.
A God like that would be so much easier to understand. When you had the time, you could take that God out, examine that God, then put God back.
A God like that would also be easier to control. We want to control what people think about God. We want to shape God in our own image, the image of what we think God should be like. We want God to be small enough to fit in a container.
If God were able to be contained in some sort of container, it would be easy (if one wanted to) to share only those parts of that God that you felt like sharing. If there were things about that God you liked, you could open up the container to reveal them; but if there were things about that God you didn’t like, maybe you could keep those things hidden in your container.
People do that, or at least try to. I think all of us do it, to some extent. We latch on to those aspects of God we like, those aspects of God we feel comfortable with; and we hide away those aspects of God we don’t like, or which make us uncomfortable.
Or, maybe, we just leave those uncomfortable parts of God up there on the mountain. Why even carry them around with us?
If God says “put away your sword,” but we rely on weapons of violence to make us feel secure, well, we’ll just leave that part of God up there on the mountain, and not carry it around with us.
And if God says, “do justice for the poor,” but we rely on our wealth to make us feel secure, well, we’ll just leave that part of God hidden in the container, and not show it to anyone.
And if God says, “love your enemy,” but we just can’t let go of our hatred toward that one person who is against everything we believe in, well, we’ll just keep the container closed up, and not show anyone, and tell them they don’t need to see God for themselves, that they should just trust us when we tell them what God is like.
But God cannot be contained. God cannot be carried around in your backpack, and taken out and shown as you feel fit. God is so much bigger than that.
And this bigger God was revealed through Jesus to Peter, James, and John, at the transfiguration.
It’s interesting that, just before the transfiguration, Jesus asked his disciples who they thought he was. It was Peter who answered, “You are the Messiah.”
And Jesus commended Peter for his answer.
But then, immediately after that, Jesus talked about his death and resurrection, and Peter rebuked Jesus for saying that, because apparently that did not fit with Peter’s idea of what a Messiah was supposed to be.
Peter had this idea of what a messiah was supposed to be; he had that idea in a box. It was an understandable, containtainable idea.
But the idea that the messiah could die and rise again was outside that box that Peter had constructed. Peter’s understanding of what the messiah would be did not allow for death and resurrection.
And when Peter rebuked Jesus for saying that the messiah would die and then rise again, Jesus in turn rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind me, Satan!”
It was as if Jesus was saying to Peter, “Your idea of what the messiah is is too small. Your idea is too limiting. How dare you limit what God can do? Come on, Peter; expand your understanding. Don’t let your mind limit who God is or what God can do.”
Last Sunday evening, our middle school and high school youth started brainstorming ideas for Youth Sunday, which will take place next month. One of the ideas suggested was trying to understand a God who is known through Jesus, but also through Buddhism and Islam and other religions; and honoring the questions that naturally arise when one ponders just how it is that God can be so big…
And it seemed like such a mature topic. It was, essentially, a suggestion to ponder the God who exists beyond the boxes and containers we have created for God.
Micah 6:8 says “what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God.” I often pondered what it means to “walk humbly with God,” but I’ve come to realize it means, among other things, not putting God in a container.
It means understanding that God is so much bigger, so much more, than my understanding of who God is. It means knowing that there is always so much more to learn about God. It means honoring the questions we have about God, and knowing that, no matter how many answers we may find, that there will always be more questions.
So no wonder we all have slightly different ideas about God—or, in some cases, big differences in our ideas about God.
And even though I went to seminary and have spent 25 years as an ordained minister, studying scripture, I would never claim to have all the right answers about God. I am always learning. I am always listening. I am always asking questions.
And I am learning from you. Already, in small groups, in conversations, and in emails I’ve received from some of you, I am learning. I am growing. I am opening my box, my container, to ideas that I haven’t considered, or ideas that I have overlooked.
And if I’m always learning, always trying to understand more of this God who is so much bigger than I can imagine, it means that the me of five years from now will have a greater understanding than the me of today, which means that the me of five years from now will look back on the me of today and wince at some the things I am wrong about, just like the me of today winces when I look back at the me of five or ten years ago, and I see the lack of understanding I had then.
So, as we all learn and grow together, it’s important to keep our minds open. We value diversity at First Christian Church, and that includes valuing diversity in how we think about God. Your neighbor in the pew may have a different idea than you about some things. Can you at least listen to their idea, and try to understand where they are coming from? Maybe you’ll come to see that they are right; or, maybe you won’t quite agree with them, but you will gain a new insight into what you do believe.
Sometimes, I’ve had to do this for issues of justice and privilege. When I read or hear someone talking about injustice committed against people because of their race, or about the privilege that white people have in our society, they sometimes come across to me as angry and accusatory, and my initial reaction is to put my defenses up.
But I have learned the importance of truly listening—not just to their words, but to their emotions, and the experiences they’ve had which contribute to those emotions; the pain they have suffered because of how they’ve been treated.
And once I get past my initial defensiveness, I realize there is a lot to learn— I thought I knew everything, but I actually knew very little.
It’s not always easy. It’s often humbling. But to admit that you may not be in full possession of the truth—that there are others whose experiences may help you achieve a greater understanding of the issues we face—is key to growing in wisdom and growing in faith.
At the transfiguration, Jesus was fully revealed. The full truth of who he was and who he is was put on full display.
Peter, James, and John were there. They experienced it all. But they didn’t quite know what to make of it at the time, and it was just one step in their growth and learning as disciples.
As we prepare for this season of Lent, which starts on Wednesday: may we approach faith with the same awe, the same humility, that the disciples did.
May we learn to open ourselves to new understandings and new wisdom.
May we recognize that none of us is in possession of the full truth…but together, as we listen to one another, share with one another, dialogue with one another, pray with one another, read scripture with one another, and be church with one another, we will continually draw closer to God, the one is abundantly far more than we can imagine.
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