Glory on the Mountain & Majesty in the Valley
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Collin Hansen:all wanna go ahead and, open up to Luke chapter 9. Luke chapter 9, we're gonna start with verse 27. Luke chapter 9 verse 27. Let's listen very carefully for these other words of god. Jesus speaking here in verse 27.
Collin Hansen:But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of god. Now, about 8 days after these, sayings took, he took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, 2 men were talking with him. Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his exodus, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.
Collin Hansen:Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake, they saw his glory and the 2 men who stood with him. And as the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, master, it is good that we are here. Let us make 3 tents. 1 for you, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah. Not knowing what he said.
Collin Hansen:Verse 34. And he was saying these things. As he was saying these things, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud saying, this is my son, my chosen one. Listen to him.
Collin Hansen:And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen. Verse 37. On the next day, when they had come down from the mountain, a great crowd met him. And behold, a man from the crowd cried out, teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child.
Collin Hansen:And behold, a spirit seizes him and he suddenly cries out. It convulses him, so that he foams at the mouth and shatters him and will hardly leave him. And I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not. And Jesus answered, oh faithless and twisted generation, How long am I to be with you and bear with you? Bring your son here.
Collin Hansen:While he was coming, the demon threw him to the ground and convulsed him. But Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the boy and gave him back to his father. And all were astonished at the majesty of God. Will you pray with me? God, we want to see your majesty.
Collin Hansen:We want to see you for who you are. Not as who we want you to be, or perhaps who we need you to be tonight, but who you are. Open our eyes and reveal yourself to us tonight. We pray these things in the powerful name of Christ. Amen.
Collin Hansen:So we've made our way to the transfiguration. I myself don't recall ever hearing someone preach on the transfiguration. In the eastern church, in eastern Christianity, it's it's very celebrated. There's a feast day. Now, much like how we, celebrate the incarnation, Christmas, and the resurrection, Easter, but we don't in in the in the west, we don't really celebrate the transfiguration as they do in the east.
Collin Hansen:When when the feast of the transfiguration occurred, 2, 3 months ago, none of you gave me a card. None of you invited me over for dinner. It just kind of came and went, and I'm sure that very few of you, if anyone, had it on your calendar, that it was the feast of the transfiguration. However, in the eastern world, in the eastern Christianity, it's a very celebrated time. Much like here, this weekend, my friend Adam put up a Christmas tree.
Collin Hansen:1st full weekend of November. Alright? I mean, it's kind of maybe you all maybe everyone here did, and that's why you're you don't want to laugh at Adam. I'm going to laugh at Adam. I'm going to laugh at him, because it's kinda it's kinda stupid.
Collin Hansen:It's a little little early, a little bit early, but but we do that because we're excited. It's a there's a celebration all around it, but but not so when it comes to the transfiguration. And really, this is symbolic of something that's that's bigger. And so, really, I'm going to give a brief historical sketch full of sweeping generalities, but bear with me, Okay? Because because I think that this matters in how we hear this, and hopefully we'll we will hear it anew tonight.
Collin Hansen:This division, between the the Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity, a lot of that happened because of the Latin speaking Roman world and the Greek speaking world and and some division that happened there culturally, somewhat naturally, that happened. But then as as time went on and the cultures grew, in kind of 2 different ways, we see how philosophies and other world religions start to impact the Christian understanding. Then you have Western philosophy, you have the reformation, 16th century enlightenment, which happens around 17th century, and how the enlightenment greatly impacts the western church and how we understand things because that leads into the modernism and the postmodernism, the, existentialism, all these different movements that start happening in Western thought. And so as as that's happening, we have to see how this affected the church in the way we process things. You see, with the enlightenment, there was this emphasis on reason.
Collin Hansen:Everything in life was to be ordered according to reason, and and as individuals, we would seek knowledge on our own, and things that were unreasonable, such as faith and superstition, we would we would cast out. And this this is huge because whether we want to admit it or recognize it or see it or not, it impacts the way we process and think today, centuries later. Now, enlightenment on the eastern side, it was happening there as well, but but they were seeing meditation solitude, almost detachment, a numbness, detaching themselves from feeling things and, and as they would focus in for enlightenment, for Nirvana, as they would ascend to enlightenment. So whereas on one side, it was reason, it was thinking and things that could be measured, and the other side, it was what was spiritual in those pursuits. And it's really no wonder that that this is going to impact the way we think about the transfiguration.
Collin Hansen:The enlightenment gave way to, and there's a, there's a quote from Thomas Jefferson on, on your worship guides. I'm not, I'm not trying to hate on, on Thomas Jefferson. I love nickels and $2 bills. I use them as often as possible. However, he he he did this work called the Jefferson Bible, where like many other people before him, had tried to take out all things supernatural, all things that were mysterious and mystical, and remove it from the Bible, and therefore, getting to what was real and reasonable.
Collin Hansen:You see, the people that did it before were called heretics and sons of Satan, but really, Marcion, he he he tried the same kind of thing. Let's take out different parts of the Bible. It really ends poorly, Because at that point, you start making this Jesus or this God to be who you want him to be, and here we are confronted with this transfiguring Jesus. He's not very acceptable. And so as we are products of this huge event in history and the reformation happening right before the enlightenment and really how, how this movement for reason impacts us.
Collin Hansen:Because when we hear this story of Jesus and his glowing face, it's bizarre. This is the the tough Jesus to believe in. And so we we can even come into places like this and we want information. Give me a good book. Give me good teaching, load me up with good information, and we start to bypass what it means to live according to the spirit, to worship in spirit and truth and the very formation of our hearts.
Collin Hansen:This is problematic. And so as, as we dig into this, we see that just like the disciples, we are in desperate need of seeing the kingdom of God and the glory and the majesty of Jesus. And so we will be looking at the story, really, there there are 2 different scenes and and and there are 2 themes that are really coming out. And the first is the glory on the mountain. After telling the disciples to take up their crosses, then we're going to get into that next week.
Collin Hansen:We're kind of dancing around a bit here in in Luke 9 thematically, but after Jesus calls for the disciples to take up their crosses and follow after him, after he shows what real discipleship is supposed to look like, not just adoration, but an obedient servant. After he has shown that to them, he he he says that there will be some of you that will not taste death before you see the kingdom of god, and and he takes them up 8 days later up to a mountain. And he goes up there to pray. And as he's praying, and maybe he's even praying for his disciples to see his glory, As he prayed, his his face was transformed. It was transfigured and and his clothes began to shine like lightning.
Collin Hansen:And then Moses and Elijah appeared. Now I'm not going to assume that you know who Moses and Elijah are. So so often, church is kind of like walking into a movie halfway through and everyone just expects you to know the people. And so, I kind of faked it till I was about 19 and didn't really know who these people were. And so, just to give a brief little snapshot, Moses was an Old Testament prophet.
Collin Hansen:God had called him to lead Israel out of enslavement, out of bondage in Egypt, and and that was the Exodus. You can find that entire account in the book of Exodus, appropriately titled. Now, he led them across the Red Sea and into the wilderness, and and they were led in this time by a cloud. This cloud that led them to safety. And that cloud was the presence of god.
Collin Hansen:That that's what that is what was symbolized. That was what was actualized in front of them was was the presence of God leading them out of that bondage. There's so many parallels between the Exodus story and what we see here tonight. And, and just to write some of these down, look, look at them later. Exodus 24, Exodus 13, Exodus 34.
Collin Hansen:132434. All of them are so many, rich symbols that that you see paralleled here on top of the mountain with Jesus. Moses went up, once they were led by that cloud to Mount Sinai. He was led up and and encountered God and that is where he was given the commandments of God, the law. He was given the law and he came down.
Collin Hansen:That's when the golden calf tablet's broken. Trelton Heston goes back up the mountain and, receives these new tablets. Now, during that time when he goes back up the mountain, he is in the presence of God, and when he comes down, his face in fact, it it it says that his very flesh was shining. It was shining because he had been in the presence of God. The shining face of Moses.
Collin Hansen:That's in Exodus 34. Let me just read a portion to you. Verse 29. When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the 2 tablets of the testimony, the law in his hand, as he came down the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. His very skin now now that that's that's that amazing place where the supernatural isn't just this extra realm, this parallel realm that you go from one into the other.
Collin Hansen:His skin, his flesh was shining with the glory of god. How I mean, try and take that in. I studied for this all week, and and I would just find myself just sitting there, like, this is how do we how do we get here? If you've ever heard me preach before, I always talk about reality. I blame it on my undergraduate studies in postmodern philosophy.
Collin Hansen:But, but I I'm concerned with reality and seeing this thing in flesh and here in these beautiful Hebrew words, His flesh his flesh was shining because he had been in the presence of God. Something to keep in mind, when he when he came back, they said, Moses, you're gonna need to to cover that. It's freaking everyone out. We're very scared. And they set these limits around the mountain.
Collin Hansen:Like, don't get close to it. Moses, you talk to God. We don't want it. He will kill us if we talk to him. Like, we don't want we they wanted this distance.
Collin Hansen:They needed a mediator. And we talked about that, when we studied exodus last year, this desperate need for a mediator and, and Moses came reflecting the glory of God. Keep that concept in mind. Reflecting the glory of God. And Elijah, he was a prophet.
Collin Hansen:He came after Moses, he also had this mountaintop experience. When Israel, many of them had gone astray and they were worshiping false gods and one, a god that was being worshiped was Baal, And this is the big competition, your god versus my god. Let's take, 2 big bulls and see whose god sets 1 on fire. I mean, weren't these fun times? And so, they they get in there, and, there are 450 prophets of Baal cutting themselves, crying out to Baal, and of course, nothing happens.
Collin Hansen:And then Elijah calls down and and says, for these people to know that you are Yahweh, you are the God of Abraham, you're the God of Jacob, you're the one who fulfills promises. You have not, been unfaithful, although the people have been unfaithful. As he he calls us down and then, the wood, which has been soaked by water after water after water that Elijah has called to be dumped upon the offering is consumed by fire from heaven. And so there, there's this other mountain top experience that Elijah has with God. Now there there's another scene a little bit later on in Elijah's, life where he hears the voice of God.
Collin Hansen:He's in a cave and, and fire and, and wind and earthquakes, all of this happens. And then this, this whisper of God's voice comes to him and instructs him where to go next. Read the old Testament. It's, it's pre like, it's neat. Like there are all kinds of things that happen like that.
Collin Hansen:And and and when you hear those things and and you have visuals of those things, when we come back to this visual scene, this reality on top of Mount Tabor with with Jesus and 3 of his closest disciples, we start to see some connections. These 2 prophets, the law, Moses, and and the great prophet Elijah are talking to Jesus about his exodus. Now, that's a pretty literal translation there in the Greek, that they are discussing his exodus, not just to take the the people of god to another point of safety. You know, at that point, there was the Roman rule. And not just to remove them to a but to take them out of the bondage of sin itself.
Collin Hansen:The master sin. Jesus would ransom them away. His exodus. And Peter calls out. Peter calls out and says, it's good it's good that we're here.
Collin Hansen:It's good that that we are in this place. Let's make 3 tents. In fact, that can be translated as tabernacles, which is another thing that should remind us of the Exodus story. Let's make 3 dwelling places. Now, there was this, prophecy that in Malachi, the the right before you get the white page in your Bible, before it trans transitions into the New Testament, there's this prophecy that Elijah's going to come when the kingdom of god comes.
Collin Hansen:And in Malachi, this this prophecy is is declared, and Peter knows this and he sees Elijah. And he sees the glorious Jesus, and he says, let's make tents, let's let's make dwelling places here. And that is, an error that requires divine clarification. We need someone to step in and clarify what's happening here. And so another cloud comes.
Collin Hansen:Cloud comes and the 6 were enveloped by the cloud and a voice comes. A voice just like what Moses heard. A voice like Elijah heard. And he says to all that can hear, this is my son, my chosen one. Listen to him.
Collin Hansen:The voice of God distinguishes Jesus from the law and the prophets. The voice of God declares to the disciples that this is not just another prophet. This is not someone equal to Moses or Elijah. This is the son of God. The chosen one.
Collin Hansen:Listen to him. Remember what that cloud represents. God's presence. And here, everything is put on Jesus. All attention is put on Jesus.
Collin Hansen:That this great prophet Moses, this great prophet Elijah, that that all attention is given to Christ alone. Now also remember that everyone's afraid of this cloud. A great distance has to be made between this cloud and sinful people. I mean, this is, this is where, the, in the Holy of Holies where the ark of the covenant, which is not just something to do with Indiana Jones, there was actually this ark that was made and, that was a dwelling place of God, and when people would go in, when these priests this this priest that was allowed to go in there, he had to go in with blood, a sacrifice, and even then, no one else wanted to go in there in case that guy died, which sometimes happens if you get close to the ark. They they had a rope because they wanted to drag him out because no one wanted to get that close to god because that meant they were coming in contact with the holiest of all things.
Collin Hansen:And they feared their life. And here, the disciples are in the cloud because they have the great mediator. He has come. The one that will not strike them down dead. And they come into that cloud and the truth is proclaimed in the presence of God.
Collin Hansen:And they were left, in that moment, then the, the cloud was gone and Jesus was, was alone And the disciples didn't talk about that. These disciples that in a few verses are gonna go through stupid quabbles like, who's the greatest among us? Who's the greatest disciple? And Peter, this guy who will say, I don't know this Christ. I don't know this man.
Collin Hansen:That they were invited into this cloud. But just as there is glory on the mountain, there is majesty in the valley as Jesus goes down. And I I used to always, think that the disciples were the were the the bad ones in this scene. They can't heal the guy's kid, and then, but then the dad was he's begging. I mean, it's his first born.
Collin Hansen:But what's happening is that he is doubting the power that the disciples have, Which is the power of Jesus. Doubting the power of God. And that is why Jesus cries out to this twisted generation, how much longer must I bear with you? And bear with you can also be understood as how much longer must I put up with you? But Jesus reaches out across this massive divide of doubt, and he heals the boy.
Collin Hansen:He is not just majestic and and full of glory on the mountain, but he is in the valley. I, Yesterday morning, there was a gospel channel. I don't really know exactly what was happening on my TV, but, but there were large, arenas full of people, somewhat clapping on beat and and singing these, these gospel songs. And every one of them was about needing strength in in a hard time. I mean, how desperate are we for this?
Collin Hansen:I don't know where you are this week and and what's going on in in your world today, But I would imagine that with this many people that that some of you are hurting pretty badly. Now, whether or not you would admit to it, and maybe you did or didn't say anything in your small groups, and and maybe there is even something that came to mind and you thought, I can't share that. We've got like 5 minutes and I probably we need this majesty in the valley. We need a Lord that's not just raining up on the mountain where things are good, and where we can say, it's good for us to be here. Let's build tents.
Collin Hansen:Let's stay here. You see, Jesus couldn't do that because he knew that the fullness of the kingdom would come in time, and that the cross was coming. That was the exodus in Jerusalem. Suffering. Agony.
Collin Hansen:And it takes this transfigured Jesus, this transfiguring Jesus to come and heal this disfigured world. Do you see that? Do you see how you need that? Because it's great if we all come in here and we agree with this idea. I mean, that's fantastic.
Collin Hansen:We we come in, and we all say, we we agree, and we'll we'll sing songs, we just agree on these things. But something bigger and deeper must be happening than just agreeing with an idea. Something bigger and deeper must be happening, and that is why it is so important that we would be confronted with the reality that Jesus, along with this world, is not as it appears. Jesus and this world, they are not as they appear. There is something bigger and deeper at play.
Collin Hansen:The transfiguration is a moment that declares Jesus's identity and his mission, That he is the son of God. That he is above and beyond the law and the prophets, and that it also declares his mission, that he is coming with the kingdom and, and we prayed this together. And so when we are praying and when we are singing that something bigger and deeper is it, is at work. That we are praying for the kingdom to come, for his will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. See, this isn't just Platonism.
Collin Hansen:This isn't, this isn't just thinking that there's this material world and it's so bad and let's get out of it and let's get into the spiritual realm. God became flesh not to get us to escape from this material world, but to redeem it. And that is our hope in this transfiguring Jesus. Would you guys pray with me? Hear these words from the book of Hebrews.
Collin Hansen:Long ago, and at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of god, And the exact imprint of his nature. And he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.
Collin Hansen:Having become as much superior to angels, as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. God, we are in such great need of revelation. It is so easy for us to be consumed by the struggles that surround us. And we can forget that there is a King full of glory and majesty that is in the valley. And that our disappointment that we do not live on top of the mountain.
Collin Hansen:Father, as we could be so consumed by that, so broken by that. Father, you come to us in the valley With all your glory and majesty. Father, at the, at the transfiguration, we see the kingdom breaking into this world. Your promises were validated and the king of glory was seen in all of his majesty. He was not reflecting it like Moses, but he was emanating the light of glory from within.
Collin Hansen:Lord, help us to see that Christ whose face shines so brightly, Even in the valley where we can behold his majesty. We pray these things. We ask these things in that strong name of Christ. Amen.
