EMMANUEL UNITED CHURCH

SCRIPTURE READINGS

February 19, 2012

GOD’S WORD FOR US

The First Lesson is:    2 Corinthians 3:17-18

Introduction to the reading:   Paul celebrates God's Spirit which is not far away but is acting within us to transform the way we think and act.

¹⁷Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. ¹⁸And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

The Responsive Lesson is Psalm 50

Introduction to the Psalm:   In this Psalm we see God's light summoning and challenging creation to live with justice.

God, the Almighty, has spoken;

          and summoned the world

          from the rising of the sun to its setting.

God shines out from Zion, a city perfect in beauty.

          Our God appears, and will not keep silence. 

Before you, God, runs a consuming fire,

and a mighty tempest rages about you.

          You call on the heavens above,

          and on the earth below,

          to witness the judgement of your people:

'Gather my people before me,

the people who made covenant with me by sacrifice.'

          The heavens proclaim your justice,

          for you yourself are judge.

The New Testament Lesson is:    Mark 9:2-9

Introduction to the reading:    This story marks the end of Jesus' ministry in Galilee and the beginning of his journey toward Jerusalem.

^9:2Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, ³and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. ⁴And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. ⁵Then Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” ⁶He did not know what to say, for they were terrified. ⁷Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” ⁸Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus.

⁹As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.

Thin Place Moments

     Why do we climb a mountain?  Because it’s there.  For the challenge.  To gain a new perspective.  The ancients climbed mountains to get closer to God. When Jesus takes Peter, James and John with him up a mountain, its so they can gain some inner  perspective but first the experience there causes them to lose perspective.  The moment blinds them, and confuses them. 

     And what about us? How are we to understand this story? If your Bible has footnotes, this passage should have plenty.  It’s a passage with echoes from other stories of scripture.

     We hear an echo of Moses climbing up Mount Sinai to receive the 10 commandments,

     There’s a connection here back to Jesus’ baptism.  The words that they hear on the mountain are almost the same as God says to Jesus in the Jordan River, “This is my son in whom I am well pleased.”

     The story also points ahead to the journey toward the cross. When the disciples descend the mountain they will be headed south to Jerusalem where prophets are persecuted.

      Transfiguration points to three seasons in the church year - Epiphany’s voice of revelation, Lent’s danger and finally Easter’s hope.  Easter is about transformation, and this text, is the first sign of Easter.  The disciples don’t really get the point that at the end of this hard road to Jerusalem, there will not only an ending but also a beginning. 

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      This is a story about Jesus, who he is and where he is going.   It’s also about us, who we are and where we are going. 

      The disciples have their minds expanded here by something way beyond their rational understanding. Jesus suddenly appears to be far more than they realized.  His shining clothes dazzle their eyes. They have a vision of Elijah and Moses. Jesus is on speaking terms with the great teachers of the past.

      The three disciples want to so something to recognize the occasion.  They offer to get busy and build three little shrines. That’s what you did when you had a sacred encounter. 

     Jacob had a dream about a ladder to heaven and when he woke up he built a little altar on the spot.

     In this vision, the three disciples hear the message or sense it on some level, “This is my son, listen to him.  The moment of truth is right here, right now.  In this moment.  Don’t just do something. Listen!”

     That is exactly what is hardest to do.  To be still, not wishing you were somewhere else.  To be present, attentive, aware, grateful for the moment, appreciative of where you are. 

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     According to a study from the Pew Centre, mystical experiences are not so uncommon.  The study reports that 50% of Christians in the mainline churches claim to have had experiences we can characterize as self- transcendent.  These are what Martin Buber called, an I-Thou experience, or what Celtic Christianity called a “thin place.” 

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     Thomas Merton had one of these moments. Merton was a Trappist monk who managed to be both socially engaged in peace issues and committed to a life of poetry, writing and contemplation. 

     Merton recalls a thin-place moment which propelled him into exploring deeper dimensions of his life.  Here’s how he tells it,

     “In Lousiville, on the corner of Fourth and Walnut in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people, that they were mine and I was theirs, that we could not be alien to one another, even though we were total strangers... 

     As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm now that I realize who we really are.  If only everybody could understand this!  But it cannot be explained.  There is no way of convincing people that they are walking around shining like the sun.”

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     The experience of the disciples and of Thomas Merton are what the Bible calls Awe.  And awe is the beginning of wisdom

      Awe is Moses pausing to see a bush that does not burn which leads to a second career as a leader in the Great Escape from Egypt.

     Awe is the priest Isaiah doing his daily ritual in the Jerusalem temple when utterly unexpectedly he is overcome with a vision of the awesome presence of God.

     Awe is what Elizabeth Barrett Browning is getting at when she finds the inspiration of the Holy Presence in every little plant.

              “Earth’s crammed with heaven,

               And every common bush afire with God;

               But only he who sees, takes off his shoes. 

               The rest sit around and pluck blackberries.”

                                           _____

     Bruce Sanguin uses A.W.E. as an acronym for Awakening to Wonder Everywhere.

      900 years ago Hildegaard of Bingen wrote that “every creature is a mirror of God that glistens and glitters.” That’s awe.

      I took a puppy for a walk yesterday and got a fresh lesson in all the wonders along the road to be discovered and picked up in his 9 week old mouth.  He picked up little treasure, little bits of paper and sticks that I never noticed.  And everything was awesome and fascinating. 

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     Awe is important because if we don’t recognize the glistening and glittering of the cosmos, then we neither respect nor care for it and eventually all of us suffer. 

     William Blake once wrote, “If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite, For man  has closed himself up, til he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern.”

     Blake give us a striking image of a person squinting out of tiny cracks in a cave at the shining brightness just beyond reach.

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     Contrast that with a painting by Salvador Dali in 1925, called Person at the Window, a painting of a young woman looking out an open window.  She has all you need for transformation, fresh air, a wide open vista in front of her, a physical connection to the world beyond, a view of the water, the bay, the sky.

     In the painting, we stand behind her and we can see things she cannot, like the reflections of the light and water in the window behind her.  And she also can see things that we cannot from her angle.

       If we linger a while, then we see more.  The more attentive we are, the more we notice, the more the possibility of wonder.

     And then if we take the next step and join her at the window, or engage her in conversation, then we learn from each other.  We share a second perspective and we are richer and deeper for it. 

     If you want to see this painting yourself, you can find it on the second bulletin board, on the way to coffee in the CE hall.

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      In the spirituality of Jesus, there is a need to step aside and find the thin places that soothe and startle us with new insight, and there is a need to come back down the mountain, to step back into the brokenness of the world and to renew our commitment to being a community that nurtures and supports each other and that lives out our mission for others in the world. 

May it be so for us.  

with thanks to :

William Blake, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Bruce Epperly, Hildegaard of Bingen, David Lose, Thomas Merton