Rev. Melanie Harrell Delaney

Stained Glass Rev. Melanie Harrell Delaney February 12, 2015 2 Corinthians 4:3-6 3And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.4In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’ sake. 6For it is the God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

Mark 9:2-9 2 Six 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 anymore, but only Jesus. *** I remember the stained glass windows in the sanctuary of my childhood church. Colorful rectangles with bold colors painting pictures of Jesus’ birth, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, a cross, and radiant tomb representing the resurrection. I remember sitting in church with my parents many a Sunday, studying the pictures of the windows, repeating the story of Jesus in my mind as I glanced from window to window. At the age of 5 I didn’t catch much of anything the pastor said during his sermons, but I remember the story of the windows. I remember noticing how the sunlight shining through those windows left colorful streaks on people’s cheeks or the walls, or the carpet, wherever the light came through. I liked looking at all the people with the colors of the stories of Jesus on their faces. It made them glow, as the light shone in, and I liked to think of it as God painting us with the colors of heaven. Our scripture passage this morning is also about light, and about the stories of Jesus. It is about who Jesus was and who he was becoming. It is about a moment on a mountaintop where God’s light shone not in a rainbow of color, but in a blinding white…

The story picks up with Jesus taking a walk with three of his closest friends and disciples—Peter, James and John. Verse 2 says “six days later,” which points us back to what had been happing in chapter 8. After a series of miracles and healings, Jesus starts saying some things that worry the disciples. Things about the Son of Man enduring great suffering, rejection, and death. Just before the scripture passage we read this morning, Jesus tells a crowd of people that in order to follow him, really, they need to deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow him.

So “six days later,” Jesus James and John are walking up a mountain together. Mark doesn’t tell us why, or what the disciples know. Perhaps they’re looking for a place to pray, for a time of rest and renewal. Perhaps they’re talking like good buddies as they go, kicking rocks and joking around.

But it gets serious when they arrive at the top, for Mark tells us that Jesus “was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white,” so white that not even mom’s best bleaching efforts could match them. Peter, James and John were astounded then, and dumbfounded next when they saw Elijah and Moses, two majorly important figures of the Jewish faith, appear out of nowhere, talking with Jesus on the other side of the rock! Except it couldn’t be them...they were long dead...what was going on? Were they seeing things?!? What should they do?

Just as any of us would be in the experience of such an experience, Peter, James and John were terrified...speechless. Stumbling over his words, desperate to say something to make sense of this vision, Peter mumbles quietly, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”

Some scholars think Peter was referring to the upcoming festival of booths, a week-long pilgrimage to the Jerusalem Temple in which tents are erected symbolizing the fragile dwellings of the Israelites during the 40 days of their exile between slavery and the promised land. Other scholars say that perhaps Peter was trying to prolong his time on the mountain with Jesus, offering to make dwelling places so they might stay there awhile. He wants to honor the vision, honor the moment, make it last.

But as you know, time moves quickly when we aren’t paying attention. Before the disciples had a chance to ask questions, before they could whip out their smart phone for a picture (wink) or build those dwelling places, it got dark. A cloud moved in thick like a fog. One of those eerie moments when a thick cloud covers the sun and a bright sunny day turns into gloom and shadow within seconds. I always get chills when that happens. I imagine that the brightness of Jesus’ clothes seemed to fade instantly and the disciples’ hearts started to race as they looked around trying to orient themselves, eyes trying to adjust to the dramatic shift from blinding light to darkness.

And then the voice: ‘This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!’”

We call this Sunday before Lent “Transfiguration Sunday.” Year after year we hear this story of dazzling white robes, mystical visions, and mountaintop experiences. Mark’s not the only one who tells of this strange experience. Luke tells a version as well. So we read it almost every year and my attention usually lands on the location, the mountain-top experience, or maybe even Peter’s quick suggestion to build tents there on the mountain. But this year something else caught my attention. I couldn’t get beyond the dramatic change between light and dark. The cloud, that shifted the story from blindingly-white clothing to a dark shadow. And then this: Have you ever noticed that in this story, God speaks after the darkness falls? God’s voice echoes through the mountain not while Jesus shines brilliantly and there is no doubt of the holiness of the moment. Instead, God’s voice is heard just when the cloud descends and the darkness is most disorienting.

Just this week, a disturbing news story took over the headlines. Kayla Mueller, a 26-year-old being held hostage by the terrorist group ISIS, was killed by airstrikes on the terrorist compound where she was being held. Americans grieved, knowing that she had been killed not by the terrorists, but by our own bombs. We grieved because she was our own. We grieved because she was young. And as we learned more about who she was, we grieved because she was brave and kind and someone who represented the very best of American idealism and faith.

Kayla was a student at Northern Arizona University when she joined a Campus ministry and got involved in social action. The Washington Post reported that “she volunteered nights at a women’s shelter, protested genocide in Darfur and started a chapter of Amnesty International. She volunteered at a summer camp for young African refugees in Israel, and she went to Israel’s occupied territories to show support for Palestinians. She protested torture in Guantanamo Bay, and she went on a humanitarian mission to Guatemala. In India, she taught English to Tibetan refugees and to poor women and children.”

In 2011 Kayla wrote, “I believe that if we can’t handle learning about the darkest places of our world, they will turn into the darkest places in us…I find God in suffering,” she wrote, “I’ve known for some time what my life’s work is, using my hands as tools to relieve suffering.”

Around the time that she wrote these words, Kayla traveled to Turkey to help Syrian refugees. A year later, Kayla was captured and held hostage for over 18 months. While imprisoned, Kayla wrote a letter to her family.

“I have been shown in darkness, light,” she wrote. “[I] have learned that even in prison, one can be free… I am grateful. I have come to see that there is good in every situation, sometimes we just have to look for it. I pray each and every day that if nothing else, you have felt a certain closeness + surrender to God as well.”

In the midst of one of the darkest situations any of us can imagine, Kayla wrote about light. After witnessing great suffering in the world around her, and enduring her own deep suffering, she continued to see and sense God’s presence holding her and others. Through the compassion and dedication she lived, Kayla continues to shine God’s light even after her death. This is our calling as Christians. Not that every one of us is called to go to Syria or fight Ebola Liberia or speak the gospel in the heart of drug cartels in Mexico. We’re not all called to the kind of courageous, dangerous work that many of our heroes do. But witnessing the light of God that shines through those who, by faith, give of their lives to alleviate suffering wherever they are, or those who glow with forgiveness, or compassion, kindness, and strength, reminds us that all of us, no matter who we are, are bearers of God’s light.

In his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul is competing against a group of “superapostles” who have come to the church suggesting a different interpretation of Christian faith. The superapostles are preaching a religious experience of ecstatic joy, a “feel-good” faith. They are telling the Corinthian Church that Paul is mistaken, blinded in his teaching. For Paul, Christ’s death and resurrection is a clue to the way God works and is working in our world – bringing the current reality to an end so that it can be resurrected to a new reality. Paul taught that all Christians should be ready at any time for the end of the current world, which would likely bring a degree of suffering, and the beginning of a new one which would contain only joy. For Paul, the way to new life would come by way of the cross.

While Paul preached of a “holy discomfort” with the present status of the world, calling for people to be discontent with brokenness, injustice, scarcity, exploitation, violence and death all around them, he called o God’s people to continue working toward God’s vision of community, wholeness, justice, abundance, peace, love, and life. The superapostles preached a gospel of escape from the present world, while Paul envisioned a transformation of it.

Paul uses language of a “veil” covering the truth, suggesting that some have been blinded to the light of God. “For it is the God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (v. 6) Paul describes a light that shines in our hearts, that can be visible to others, which then gives glory to God.

A light that is kindled by attention to God and awareness of the holy all around us. A light that is fueled by prayer and the in-breathing of the Holy Spirit. A light that grows brighter every time we make God’s love real to others in our midst: by unexpected forgiveness granted, by taking time to see the grocery store cashier, the custodian at work, the disheveled man sitting on a bench as beloved children of God, by really listening to others, and living as generously as possible.

“Let’s go,” Jesus says, as the disciples stare blankly. They follow, still not sure of what they had just seen. As they’re walking, the disciples ask questions. “Did that really happen?” “Was that really Elijah?” “What were you guys talking about?” But Jesus doesn’t answer their questions...not yet. Jesus warns the disciples not to tell anyone what they had seen. Just forget it.

But it was too late. Jesus had been transfigured. The disciples had seen it. Now, every time they looked at him they would see him differently: dazzling white, side by side with Elijah, completely mysterious, completely holy...like Yahweh, God. Their eyes have been opened to a new way of seeing their beloved, transfigured, friend.

The dictionary definition of transfigure is: “to change in outward form or appearance; transform. or to change so as to glorify or exalt.”In the vision, Jesus is transfigured before Peter: scripture describes him as glowing, but it’s more than that. Something happens that makes Peter respond the way he does: He wants to prolong the experience, so it’s got to be more than just a change of clothing appearance. In that moment, Peter begins to understand something important about Jesus’ very being -- who he really is. This moment of Transfiguration on the mountain marks a shift in who Jesus is: Until now his friends have known him as a wise, traveling rabbi. Now, as they go down the mountain and toward Jerusalem, toward the cross…Jesus becomes divine savior. The veil has been lifted there on the mountain. Peter starts to see Jesus...really see him. And something changed on that mountain...was it just outward appearances? Was it just Jesus who was transfigured?

I doubt it. Visions change us. Mountaintop experiences impact our lives in a huge way. Even when we come back down, we’re not the same person we were. If we are lucky in our faith journey, we experience one or two of these moments: when we find ourselves so blinded by the light of God that it becomes the spark to light the flame of faith within. But even if these moments aren’t so dramatic or ecstatic, even if we can’t name the precise moment when we were changed, being a Christian should change us. Experiencing God with wide open hearts and minds should transform and transfigure us, too, lighting a fire within to compel us forward in God’s call for us to join with the Holy One in redemption and healing of the world.

I wonder whether Kayla Mueller had a mountain-top moment that illuminated her call to help others? Was it a mission trip? A particular experience that taught her to really see people the way God sees them? Did she have a difficult time in her own life, through which God held her and in which she learned the strength of her own light?

For surely, the clouds can be thick sometimes. Daylight always turns to Night and the winters can seem far too long. But we are reminded by Mark, and the story of the Transfiguration, that God’s light does shine and God’s voice is heard especially in the darkness.

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross once said, “People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”

As a child, I used to think that the stained glass windows were a gift, a secret that only the people on the inside God to know. The light streaming from the sun, reflecting on people’s faces was so brilliant and beautiful. But my perspective shifted once when my family left the church after a late-night worship service. I happened to look up to the windows of the church, which I assumed would be dark as usual from the outside. But they weren’t! The windows were glowing with a sparkle I had never seen before, lit by the light of the worshipping community within. It was then that I realized that the stained glass wasn’t just a gift for us on the inside, but for everyone. And in fact, the windows were even more beautiful when the light from within shone into the dark night outside. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross once said, “People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”

I loved those windows. And I remember once driving by our church and looking up to where the windows were, being terribly disappointed that from the outside the pictures didn’t glow. The windows were dark. From then on I considered the beauty of the stained-glass an insider secret, something that God made special for Sunday mornings when we were in church.

Mountaintop experiences have a way of doing that -- ending too quickly and pointing us back down to the valley.

1. Transfiguration is about change. Jesus was changed before Peter’s eyes a. what was the purpose? To signal a shift in his story – from wandering rabbi to divine savior. 2. We don’t like change. Fear it actually. (Peter’s fear?) 3. Change and darkness are synonymous to us 4.

Charles F. Kettering once said, “People are very open-minded about new things, as long as they’re exactly like the old ones. “