Last Sunday of Epiphany, February 19, 2023: Exodus 24:12-18; 2 Peter 1:16-21; Matthew 17:1-9; Psalm 2
Strange things happen on mountaintops. Mountaintops are among the world’s “thin” places, places where this world and others meet. Maybe because there is less oxygen, maybe because the effort getting up there, maybe because the astonishing vistas we see there, mountaintops are places that change us. For the ancient Hebrews, God lived on mountaintops. So in today’s lessons, we have mountaintops.
Moses goes to the mountaintop to receive the ten commandments. His journey is marked by mystery: for six days, the “glory of the Lord” settled on the mountain, and it was shrouded in cloud. On the seventh day, Moses is called by the Lord. The writer tells us that the glory of the Lord was “like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel”. It was terrifying. Moses went into the cloud and disappeared, effectively, for forty days and forty nights.
In today’s Gospel, in a passage that follows the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus goes with three of his disciples to a “high mountain”. The scene starts out with Jesus being transfigured before his disciples, “his face shone like the sun”. And Moses and Elijah appeared, talking to Jesus. Strange though this must have seemed, Peter seems to take this in stride, planning to make three dwellings. But then a “bright cloud overshadowed them”, and they hear the Lord’s voice, telling them that Jesus is his son, and “Listen to him”. They are terrified and fall to the ground.
What is most striking here is that while the voice of God is terrifying, Jesus is not: he “came and touched them, saying, ‘Get up, and do not be afraid'”. This is the reassuring gesture of a friend. When they do, they are alone with Jesus on the mountaintop. But Jesus does not want this story told, at least not yet: he tells his disciples not to tell it until after he has been raised from the dead.
The message here is clear: we need to listen to Jesus, but we do not need to fear him. Unlike God, who is terrifying, Jesus is approachable, and cares for us. Our job is to listen. That is difficult enough.