-The festival of the Transfiguration was instituted by Calixtus III in 1457 to commemorate the defeat of the Turks on August 6 of the previous year. Lutheran usage has moved the feast from August 6 to the Sunday before Ash Wednesday

 

-Mountaintop Experiences. Moses meets God on Mount Sinai and is forever changed. The Psalmist speaks of worshipping God on God's "holy mountain." In the Gospel reading Jesus and three of his disciples are on a mountain, and there they see Jesus for who he truly is.

 

-The Bible does not say which mountain it was where the Transfiguration took place.  It is only described as "the" mountain

 

-Transfiguration is the story of those who continue to function as ordinary people and yet people adopted as God’s children, transformed by the gospel to know both God’s forgiving grace and his terrible righteousness. Dan Nelson

 

-"To see him standing there with Moses and Jesus was like seeing the Mount Rushmore of heaven -- the Lawgiver, the Prophet, the Messiah -- wrapped in such glory it is a wonder the other three could see them at all." Barbara Brown Taylor

 

-In the Bible, mountains have a clear, symbolic meaning as well.  We find most of the significant events taking place on mountains, some famous, some anonymous as in our text for today.  The Psalmist said, "I will lift up my eyes to the hills�" (121:1).  The Biblical characters looked to Mt. Moriah, Mt. Horeb, which is the same as Mt. Sinai, Mt. Zion, Mt. Nebo, Mt. Carmel, Mt. Gilboa, the Mount of Olives, the sermon on the mount, and a hill called Golgotha.  Mickey Anders

 

- Sweet hour or prayer, sweet hour of prayer, that takes me from a world of care"    hymn

 

-Transfigurations are big business today. I don't know anybody who doesn't want one, including me. And many of us work hard and spend a lot of money to get one -- a new face, a new look, a changed appearance.

 

- ...the cloud, the dazzling white garments are all biblical ways of describing a transcendent moment...for a moment, the veil is pulled back.   Willimon

 

 

-The Celtic peoples talk of "thin places" where the distance between heaven and earth seems thin. What have been the thin moments and thin places for you? What role have they played in shaping your witness in daily life?

 

-The Hebrew word for “shine, glow” resembles the word for “horn.” When Jerome translated the Vulgate, he mistranslated and inserted the Latin for “horns” in verse 34:29. Thus, Michelangelo’s famous statue of Moses shows him with horns!

 

- Mountain top experiences:  Moses at Sinai; Elijah at Mt. Horeb.

 

- “Peter wanted to fix that transfiguring, mountaintop moment in concrete, seal it in epoxy for all time.  But we can't.  Glimpses like that come, and they go.  When such a glimpse is given you, on a mountaintop in Judea or in a Sunday pew in this congregation, cherish it, but don't even try to capture it for it is a gift, a glimpse, a fleeting, blessed, gift of revelation.”William Willimon

 

-Theophany, which means appearance of God, a manifestation of God.

 

- This scripture is patterned after Moses's experience at Sinai

 

- We all try to preserve peak moments in our lives.

 

- There is one more mountain for Jesus to face...Mt. Calvary

 

- Transfiguration Sunday marks the end of the season of Epiphany.  There is a lot of talk about light during Epiphany - beginning with that bright shining star that led the Wise Men to baby Jesus.   like the comic strip cartoon of a light bulb going off next to someone’s head when some revelation occurs. Epiphany in the original Greek means ‘to shine upon’, ‘to give light to’. And today’s texts of transfiguration are all about light shining, from people’s faces, because they have encountered the mystery of God.  Transfiguration is the culmination of the epiphany season, the grand finale, where Jesus is revealed to us as being one with God.  This biggest epiphany of all - this holy shining moment up on the mountain - comes right before Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent.  And this is not an accident.  There is a connection between this epiphany - the transfiguration - and what is to follow.  The transfiguration is the prelude to the cross.  It is also what helps us endure and make sense of the cross.  Jesus’ return trip down the mountain is the beginning of his fatal journey to Jerusalem.  God claims us in one holy, shining moment, and then sends us back down the mountain.

 

- We can and will experience God again, but it is at God’s choosing, not ours

 

-United Church of Christ Statement of Faith, has  the phrase about accepting the cost and joy of discipleship. 
 

-  Jesus’ mountaintop experience of God was sandwiched right between predicting his suffering to his disciples for the first time, and beginning the journey to Jerusalem.  His holy shining moment had everything to do with the cross.  We read this text today, a few days before the beginning of Lent.  We are given the light of God to carry within us into the difficult days ahead, to sustain us. 

 

 -The dwellings (or booths) suggest residency, permanent placement. Peter wanted to hang on to the moment, to capture Jesus as transfigured. But the mission was in the valley, not on the mountain. 

 

-The early church leader Augustine was once accosted by a heathen who showed him his idol and said, "Here is my god; where is thine?" Augustine replied, "I cannot show you my God; not because there is no God to show, but because you have no eyes to see Him."