Peter, of course, is overwhelmed, trying to make sense of it all, trying to capture the moment. One wonders whether the modern idiom would not have been to build shelters but rather to take a selfie. "Elijah, Moses - come one, watch the beards, yes, gather together...... Facebook, you know, Facebook, oh, never mind, smile....oh where's Jesus when you need him......?"
There is little difference, we hold on to what we can, make sense of things as best we can, panic when we don't understand. We often don't do well, sit still, just exist in the moment - instead we push on through, hurry on by. Things have never been different, despite what we might think.
When Jesus goes up the mountain he is not going to show his disciples how things might be, he is going to show them the deepest reality of how things already are. He is going to show them the truth of who he is. There were those who might claim he was Moses or Elijah reincarnated - obviously he was neither as they were both there - so who else, who else could he be?
When the disciples had seen Jesus next to Moses and Elijah, in light beyond light, as who He really was - as God from God, light from light, as Son of God - they would never see anything else quite the same again. It was not, of course, their job to stay on the mountaintop - mountaintops are not places where we live, but through the lens of the mountaintop experience life in the valley is altered for ever.
I often tell the story of going up Haleakala on Maui for sunrise. It is dark on ascent, of course. The sunrise is above the clouds and is spectacular and as you come down you realise you have been somewhere else, somewhere which has changed your perspective. This time with Jesus on the mountain, how did that change the perspective of the disciples, how did they see the world differently as they came down.
This week, of course, sees the release of that movie (50 shades). I have not read the book and neither do I intend to see the movie. This is not really out of some sense of moral absolutism, I have some of that in me, but rather it is a sneaking suspicion that, at root, this sort of thing, does us more harm than good.
You see one of the changes I bet those disciples pondered coming down that mountain was relational. When they thought about what they had seen and who Jesus was they realised that they were in that mix, that Jesus was their friend. I wonder what value they found in that. I wonder how they thought about themselves?
The picture at the head of this post is actually grains of sand which are magnified several hundred times. Just like many things which are small and come in great quantity like snow or even leaves, we tend not to look to closely at individual grains and our eyes do not do a good job of seeing infinite detail even if we do pay attention. If we zoomed in even closer we would go down to a molecular level which is only visible under a microscope, a truly hidden and fascinating world in creation.
The picture is two of many billions of grains of sand. Perhaps it sounds cliched to say that God knows each of them in their infinite variety - but it is worth bearing in mind that God does. The same God that in Jesus climbs mountains with His disciples revels in the beauty of each and every grain of sand. Which is, in my book, pretty cool.
The thing is, once you have seen life from the mountaintop, once you have seen transfiguration, you cannot look at things quite the same again, once you have seen the beauty of one of two grains, surely you have to wonder about the whole beach and once you wonder about the beach don't you have to start wondering what else is out there and don't you have to start wondering about us, about you and me.
Once you start wondering about you and me then don't you have to ask some serious questions about looking after this stuff of which we are made, which God actually values and thinks is beautiful. You, me, those disciples coming down the mountain....none of us are disposable, replacable, endlessly reusable.
You see, it is not just about the way I see things but it is about me - it is about how important I am, how important you are - about how beautiful and precious we all are - that moment on the mountain changes that.
I worry that we too often see ourselves in a long line of just another. Just another person, just another thing, just another commodity and we really are not and we really have to take time to stop and notice why we are not. We really have to notice little things like grains of sand and think about where we base our deepest being? Where we find our deepest reality? Are we running around like Peter missing the moment for trying to save it or are we watching and waiting with Christ? Are we standing in awe that this is the way God really is and, yes, this is the way God really touches us - this is glory which reaches all of us.? This is glory which we can all reflect, all enjoy. We are not called to live in shadows of grey, but in transfigured and transformed light which values our whole being.
Perhaps as we approach Lent we need to remind ourselves of the color and variety in life, the color and variety which God sees in each of our lives. Perhaps instead of grey days we need to have forty days of color, days where we look at ourselves, or at least try to look at ourselves as God sees us - or as God want to see us. Color is created by bouncing rays of light, light which comes from a dancing creator - darkness and grayness exist in places where light cannot bounce and Lent is about letting go of those places.
Forty days of color. Forty days of letting in the light - of letting go of the darkness in our lives. Forty days of transfiguration looking, seeing the deepest reality of our lives - of looking at ourselves as God sees us.
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