A sermon by Senior Minister John B. McCall, February 22, 2009
Mark 9:2-9
“If my life is a book,” said Charlie Brown, “I’m afraid I’m stuck in the table of contents.”
If your life is a book, where are you: in the preface, an early chapter, the final chapter or, perhaps, just a footnote?
This metaphor works because we know we live through chapters – distinct segments or installments that are part of the same story. We compose our lives from different elements and issues. Just like a good novel, we may feel our lives building to the crescendo, the climax that forever remains a defining moment, dividing life in two parts – before and after.
You may instantly think of such a moment in your own life: leaving home, falling in love, the birth of a child, the death of a parent, a major illness, getting laid off, quitting a job, being the victim of a crime, leaving a marriage, breaking through an addiction, moving to Maine… finding Christ.
Some such events seem to happen to us – we’re the innocent (or naive) bystander who gets hit by a truck that comes out of nowhere. Or someone gives you a whack on the side of the head (for no good reason!) that changes everything. It might even be a birthday! As Mark Twain observed: “The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much; if he is an optimist after it, he knows too little.”
When such a moment happens we have to draw on all our resources and decide how to push on. I remember one person I was counseling years ago who referred to such a moment, saying “It was almost as though everything in my life was laying a foundation in place and building up to that time. I didn’t know what it would be, but when it finally came, everything fell into place and I said “so this is what I’ve been waiting for!”
This curious, mystical event we call the Transfiguration is certainly a defining moment. It’s recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Jesus and his disciples have been in the Galilee, their home territory. Passover is approaching and he’s told them he must go to Jerusalem. Jesus knows what lies ahead – the disciples don’t seem to understand.
Before he left, he went to the foothills near Mount Hermon, far in the north of the Golan Heights. Suddenly Jesus was bathed is dazzling white light, his appearance was changed or “transfigured.” There with him appeared the first among the prophets, Elijah, and Moses, the great law giver.
Peter immediately said “Jesus, it’s good for us to be here. We’ll build three shrines right here where you and Elijah and Moses can stay.” And just then, a bright cloud settled over Jesus and the voice of God said “this is my son, the beloved; listen to him!” When the cloud lifted Jesus was alone. The disciples vowed not to say a word to anyone!
It’s a dramatic story with many elements. Most importantly, it tells us Jesus had the blessing of the two central characters of the Jewish story, Moses and Elijah, and that their mantel had fallen on him. Frequently Jesus had appealed to the law and the prophets as a source of his authority and this story confirms it.
This mountaintop experience brings to mind the familiar story in Exodus when Moses was on Mount Sinai and he was transfigured – his appearance dramatically changed by the presence of God. That was when Moses received the tablets of the Law – the Ten Commandments.
We remember, too, the familiar words “this is my beloved son…” We heard it before: at the time of Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River, about three years earlier. As John lifted Jesus up from his immersion, the clouds opened, a dove descended, and the voice of God said “You are my son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” [Mark 1:9-11] That was the beginning, and this now was the defining point – the end of his wandering ministry of preaching, teaching, and healing. If it had ever been possible for him to turn back, it was no longer.
It’s no accident that we go to particular places to feel the presence of the spirit, or to place ourselves within God’s reach. How many of us walk the beach or climb a mountain in order to soak in the glory and power of God’s beautiful creation.
At particular times, and in particular places, God’s spirit connects powerfully with our lives and so turns us, that evermore we’ll think of life “before and after” that particular moment.
For Dr. Albert Schweitzer it was a quiet evening in 1903, as he prepared a seminary lecture for the next day. Shuffling through his papers he came across a magazine accidentally placed in his faculty mail box and an article called “The Needs of the Congo Mission.” As he skimmed through it, the eyes of this great humanitarian fell on the words of a medical missionary:
The need is great here. We have no one to work the northern province of Gabon in the central Congo. And it is my prayer as I write this article that God will lay His hand on one one on whom, already, the Master’s eyes have been cast that he or she shall be called to this place to help us.
That night Schweitzer wrote in his diary: “My search is over.” Within a matter of months he resigned all his responsibilities and left for the Congo. For him life was forever divided in two – before and after that single night in his study.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer called this kind of moment “The Great Divide.” Bonhoeffer was a young Lutheran pastor in wartime Germany who was arrested and finally executed for conspiracy to assassinate Hitler. In his classic book called The Cost of Discipleship he wrote:
The first step which follows Christ’s call cuts the disciple off from his previous existence. The call to follow at once produces a new situation. To stay in the old situation makes discipleship impossible.
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What about your life? As I’ve talked, have you thought of a defining moment that divides your life into before and after? Possibly you can’t name such a time. There may have been several smaller moments, none of which stands above the others. You may even be sure that you’ve already lived such a moment. But, the most profound event may lie just around the corner, later today.
For us, as for Jesus, this all matters so much because we know that life reaches its pinnacle when we find something that matters in the larger sense – when we realize that our life can make the world better, touching one or more lives profoundly, bringing respect and dignity to God’s people.
Dag Hammarskjold, in his personal journal called Markings, wrote:
I don’t know who – or what – put the question, I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer “Yes” to someone or something. And from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that therefore my life, in self surrender, had a goal.
Few of us will be written up in history books. It’s unlikely that anything we say will be long remembered. But it surely matters that you are living now, persevering now, pressing ahead now. And God is with you in this very moment, this very place.
Whether you stand on a mountain top, or in the valley as dark as the shadow of death, pray for lives that welcome the Spirit, that show openness to God’s presence, and that somehow leave the world a little better because you have passed this way.
The next time you come to a fork in the road – a time of crisis, of opportunity, of choice – ask yourself whether this may, indeed, be the place where heaven and earth meet, a time that truly has the potential to divide your days forever in two – before and after.