This is the last in our “Out of the Cocoon” series of worship services that focuses on change. You can find the series on our Web site, fbctopeka.org and in the narthex. Our text has been Ephesians 4:15, “Speaking the truth in love, let us grow up in every way into him, into Christ.” We’ve been looking at the process of growing up into Christ.

We began this series by looking at the baptism of Jesus and considering the profound change that happened in his life. The carpenter became the Christ. That’s a change, and the world has never been the same. At the time of his baptism, we heard the Spirit speak to him and to us saying, “This is my son with whom I am well pleased.”  We were told, “This is my son.”

Today, we are thinking about another pivotal moment in his life and we will begin with a very quick walk through Luke, chapter 9. In verse 10, Jesus and the disciples are looking for a retreat. They are tired and they are looking for a place to rest. They think that they have found one in Bethsaida but the crowds find them there and, instead of resting, they serve dinner to 5,000 men and maybe 15,000 people if we count the women and children. That is not a restful evening!

They search out another place where Simon confesses that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. Once again, we are told that he is God’s Son but this time we are told that he is the Messiah, the one anointed by God to be the agent of God’s Kingdom. Jesus is the one who will ultimately cause the whole world to live in obedience to God and in that obedience, the whole world will know the peace of God. What an assignment that is!

Jesus acknowledges the confession and announces that in order to bring the world into God’s Kingdom, he, Jesus, must suffer and die!  Simon could not believe it. He said so and Jesus replied, “Get behind me Satan!”  Apparently there is more to know than that Jesus is God’s son and that Jesus is the Christ.

In Luke’s gospel, Jesus goes on to say some incredible things. In verse 23, he tells the disciples that if they want to go with Jesus, they must be willing to carry their own crosses. “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself daily, take up his cross, and follow me.” You can only go to where Jesus is going if you take up the cross that belongs to you and follow Jesus. If you want to end up at Jesus’ destination then you must walk Jesus’ path.

He tries to explain himself by saying that any person who tries to save his own life will lose it but any person who loses his life for the sake of God’s Kingdom will find it.

He seems to be saying that you will find the richest and best life possible, both now and forever, in the service of God and God’s Kingdom. When you humble yourself enough to obey God and do what God tells you to do and be the person that God tells you to be, then you will find that instead of being humiliated and destroyed, you will live the strongest and best life possible.

For the disciples, these lessons were taught over a long period of time but for we who are left to read the passages, these lessons seem to come at us in rapid-fire succession. The Messiah has to die. We have to deny ourselves and take up our cross. We can only find ourselves when we lose ourselves. It still makes my head spin and I’ve been reading the gospel for a lifetime. What does all of that look like?

Now, in verse 28, we get a picture and it is more puzzling than the instruction. If “take up your cross daily” and “lose your life in order to find your life” is difficult, just listen to the story.  Better yet, use your imagination and try to see the story. I really believe that it is a story that has to be seen.

Jesus and three of the disciples climb up a mountain. Even though in those days they walked everywhere, I suspect that climbing the mountain was hard work. In my imagination, I see them getting to the top, a little winded, a little sweaty, and a little tired. Even so, there is something special about climbing to the top of the mountain. From the top of the mountain, you can see things that cannot be seen in any other way.  The mountain top gives us a sense of perspective and we discover that we are not nearly as large as we usually think. On the mountain top the sheer breadth and depth and the expanse of the view imposes a sense of humility and there we can begin to lose ourselves in order to find ourselves.

The mountain top gives us a sense of being above the ordinary things of earth and a little closer to heaven. In the space age, we know that the difference is really rather small but even so, when we climb up high we often find ourselves feeling that we are a little closer to God.

Then Jesus begins to pray. We usually think of prayer as talking to God and that is a good thing. But for this morning’s conversation, let me slightly alter the description. I think that prayer is better described as “paying attention to God.”  It is talking and listening and waiting and remembering and thinking and all the things we do when we pay attention to God. 

So Jesus walks away from the others and looks around from the mountain top. Does he close his eyes or kneel? Does he bow his head or look up or just look around? I don’t know.  It doesn’t matter. Jesus is paying attention to God. Talking, listening, pondering, thinking, wondering, remembering, he is consciously in the presence of God who is always present. Jesus is paying attention to God.

And things begin to change. His face takes on a kind of glow. I wonder if it is like a man or a woman who is in love. I’ve seen their faces glow. Have you seen the man or woman who has just won the big prize? Their faces can glow. In this holy moment, where Jesus  has time to give his undivided attention to God, he becomes intensely aware that he is in God’s presence; Jesus’ face begins to glow.

And his whole robe seems to be brighter. It’s like seeing lightening through the linen. It shines. It glows.

Now this stirs my imagination. I know that it is beyond my understanding because it is supposed to be beyond understanding, but there in the presence of God, Jesus receives visitors. At first I want to scoff. We all know that Elijah and Moses have been dead for hundreds of years. How can they be there?

I am enough of a historian and biblical scholar to say that this will not meet the standards of historical verification. We have nothing scientific or material; there are no artifacts to prove this story.  Outside of the biblical accounts, there is no historical evidence for this story.

But the gospel is not about history. This is about Jesus and his relationship with God and it is about you and me and our relationships with God and Jesus. And as a clue to our relationships, this story has enormous power.  The source of Jesus’ power is to be found in the way that he pays attention to God. The secret to Jesus’ identity is in his prayer. And that has been the source of power and identity for all of God’s people for all time.

So, as Jesus is praying, Moses and Elijah show up. Can I tell you a secret? You may think me a little odd. Well, for some of you it will only confirm what you already think! But Christmas Eve morning, when I arrived at church and walked into my office to make final preparations for the day, I had the strangest nostalgic emotion come over me and I heard myself say out loud, “Merry Christmas Dad – merry Christmas Mom.” How crazy is that? Neither Mom nor Dad is alive in this world. But the human spirit is a wonderful thing and by the blessings of memory, and association, and emotion, and perhaps as a gift of grace from God’s Spirit, they were with me that morning.

Is that what happened to Jesus and the disciples? I don’t know but I have already told you that this is beyond my comprehension. While Jesus is paying attention to God, he experiences the presence of the two great prophets of Israel, Elijah and Moses.

He is keeping company with the man who looked the tyrants Ahab and Jezebel in the eye and told them that they were wrong in their morality and in their worship. God sent the drought and in the great contest with the prophets of Baal, Elijah prayed and sent the rain. This is the prophet who ran for his life and found himself in a lonely cave looking for God. He was battered by the rain, the earthquake and the fire and then he heard the voice of God in the still small voice. Jesus is talking with Elijah, the one who looked the King and the Queen in the eye and said, “In the name of God, you are wrong.”

And he is with Moses, the one who led The Children of Israel out of the Egyptian enslavement towards the Promised Land – the embodiment of freedom and justice. And it is with Elijah and Moses that Jesus talks about his own departure, his own death.

And as they are talking, a cloud descends on the mountain and envelopes them all. What is this about? Last week I attended a meeting with the Executive Committee of our national Ministers Council. As we were talking, one man said that his wife had struggled desperately with a life-threatening medical problem and that they were just now coming out of the fog. A second said that he is nearing the end of his doctoral dissertation and that it feels like he is walking around in a fog. And the third said that she had recently been married, and that she was just now coming out of the fog.

The cloud and the fog are not quite the same but they are close enough for me so I began to think about it. What they were saying was that there was something in their lives that demanded all of their attention and energy and that everything else seemed to be out of focus and confused. The season in which the illness or the dissertation or the wedding demanded their attention and energy was such that everything else was less attended and seemed to be a little dazed and confused and out of focus.

So the cloud (the fog) descended on Jesus and the disciples. God had so compelled their undivided attention and energy that everything else was left in the fog. As the fog blinds us to everything that is not immediately before us, ok giving their undivided attention to God blinded them to everything else. Everything else was left to take care of itself. And in this moment of undivided attention, they heard God say, “This is my son. Pay attention to him.”  At the baptism, God said, “This is my son with whom I am pleased.”  In Peter’s confession we learn, “You are the Christ, the son of the living God.” Here we hear, “This is my Son, listen (pay attention) to him.”

The experience was so compelling that the disciples wanted to build little houses on the mountain and just stay there forever, but Jesus knew better. You see, you cannot live that way for long. As wonderful and beautiful and satisfying as this God-only ecstasy can be, you cannot stay there. You cannot live in the fog. You cannot live in the cloud even though that is where you heard God. You have to come out!

So Jesus took them down the mountain to find the rest of the disciples trying to heal a distressed boy. They couldn’t do it and when they asked why, Jesus answered, this can only be done with prayer and fasting. For this kind of power, you must give time and energy in prayer. First you have to pay attention to God!

I come out of this story with two things, and there are many many more to find. First, while we never can be quite like Jesus, we need to find times for our own “God-only” experiences.  Prayer, paying attention to God, is at the heart of our walk with Jesus. Those moments are as critical to our souls as water and food is to our bodies.  Talking to God, listening to God, reading God’s scriptures, thinking about God, learning the lessons of Jesus, prayer is food for the soul and absolutely necessary if the rest of our lives are to be whole. You cannot live only in that cloudy room, but you do need to visit frequently.

Secondly, God said this about Jesus, “This is my son. Listen to him.”  The American Baptist church talks a lot about believing and believing is a good thing.  However I believe that we need to talk more about listening to Jesus and following Jesus and going where Jesus has gone in order to end up where Jesus ended up because I am convinced that he is the one who will lead us into the heart of God. As we listen to him, we will indeed hear the voice of God. As we lose ourselves in him, we will find the self that God created us to be and we will live the lives that God intends.

This time, Jesus went up on the mountain to pray. In another moment, he taught us to go into our closet or room to pray. Wherever the place, the instruction is clear, if we want to grow up in every way into Christ, we must pray. We must personally and carefully pay attention to God.

Let it be so.