Life's Highs and Lows

Life’s Highs and Lows, Ups and Downs

Matthew 17:1-21 GNT

A sermon delivered by the Rev. Dr. Randy K. Hammer on Feb. 23, 2020

“Peter spoke up and said to Jesus, ‘Lord, how good it is that we are here!’” Matthew 17:4

Have you had the experience of being away on vacation somewhere, and you had such a wonderful adventure that when it came time for you leave and start back home that you got depressed?  At least some of us have had such an experience, I imagine.

Years ago, when I was a teenager and then a young twenty-something, our number one vacation destination was somewhere along the Atlantic Ocean – Myrtle Beach, Charleston, Savannah, and so on.  In the 1960s, for people of the community where I grew up, the default vacation destination was, in fact, Myrtle Beach.  If you went anywhere on summer vacation, you most likely went to Myrtle Beach.  (Just for the record, today I would much rather go to the mountains.)  But at that time in my life, I loved the beach.  And every time we would vacation there, I would think how wonderful it would be if we could actually move to a seaside community.  Early in my ministry, I thought that being able to become minister of a church in a beach town would be paradise!

Well, I remember how I felt when it was time to go to the ocean one last time, and then pack up the car and start the eight-hour drive back home.  I would get depressed, or grumpy to say the least.  I didn’t want to leave behind the ocean paradise that we had known for three, four, or five days and go back to the world of work, paying bills, and everyday problems.  I remember one trip in particular when I was quite grumpy on the way home from Myrtle Beach, and I probably negatively affected everyone else’s ride home as well.

Can you relate?  Again, most of us have experienced those highs of life – those seaside or mountaintop experiences when we wanted to say, “It is good to be here!  Can’t we just settle down and stay here?”

Such was Peter’s sentiment, as the Synoptic Gospels tell the story at least, in this very mysterious passage that has come to be known as “The Transfiguration of Jesus” passage.  And this passage, by the way, is the traditional story that is read in many churches today, the last Sunday before the beginning of the season of Lent.  Today, on the Church calendar, is “Transfiguration Sunday” in fact.

But this is one of those biblical passages where the truth of it lies more in the symbolism and literary elements employed than in the historical details.  Throughout his gospel, Matthew goes to great lengths to depict Jesus as the new Moses for a new age.  As Moses went up the mountain to meet with God, so does Jesus.  As Moses’ face shone from being in the presence of God, so does Jesus’.  As the heavenly cloud of God’s presence appeared over the tabernacle of Moses’ day, so it appears over Jesus on the mountain.  As the voice of God spoke from a cloud of fire on Mount Sinai to dictate the Law to Moses, so God’s voice speaks from the cloud to Jesus.  As Moses represented the Law and Elijah the beginning of the line of the Hebrew prophets, so Jesus embodied both the Law and the Prophets, but with the caveat, “This is my own dear Son!”

But with that bit of background in place, the point that I wanted to emphasize today is that Peter, James and John had some kind of mystical mountaintop experience, an emotional or spiritual high which carried them away and from which they did not want to come down!   The thing about those mountaintop highs is they are good for all of us every now and then.  All of us – even Jesus himself included – need those mountaintop high experiences every now and then to recharge our emotional and spiritual batteries.  That is sort of what visiting America’s national parks does for me each summer. 

 As noted previously, I have had many such experiences at least bordering on the mystical over the years – walking on the ocean’s shore, standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon, standing in awe before Hubbard Glacier, Alaska, looking up at the giant sequoia trees in Sequoia National Park, standing at the base of Niagara Falls, gazing up at El Captain in Yosemite.  We could go on and on.  Lord, it is good to be here!  Can’t I just stay here?

But we all know that is not the way that real life works.  Life does have its occasional highs, but it also has its extreme lows.  Life has its days when we are feeling up; but there are also days when life finds us feeling very low.  Jesus, Peter, James and John came down off their high mountaintop experience to a world of sickness and suffering.  Or as Isaac S. Villegas puts it in the latest issue of Christian Century  magazine, “Peter follows Jesus down the mountain, a return to the unspectacular life they know – the day-to-day of discipleship, love for neighbors and strangers, and confrontations with the authorities.”¹  They had not much more than returned to civilization when they were met by a distraught father whose son was tormented by frequent seizures that caused him to fall into the water or the fire.  The desperate father had already sought the help of Jesus’ other disciples who had remained below, but they were helpless in the face of such human suffering. 

The scene is captured, by the way, in the painting titled “Transfiguration” by 16th-century Italian painter Raphael, which contrasts the scene of the transfigured Christ on the mountain in the background with the scene of suffering humanity down below.

No, we can’t stay in such an emotional or spiritual high permanently.  Standing at the base of the giant sequoia trees or at the base of Niagara Falls would get old after a while, I imagine.  And standing there forever would do no one any good.

What is needed is for folks who are willing to return to the foot of the mountain where we encounter the sick and suffering of the world and in faith do what we can to make a positive difference and help alleviate at least a little bit of the world’s suffering.

In thinking about this passage this past week, I was reminded of the story of the young man who was born into a life of luxury and spent his early teenage years as a confirmed sinner.  The young man was spoiled, indulging himself with fine food, wine, and wild living.  By age 14, he had left school and had the reputation of being a rebellious teenager who frequently drank, partied, and broke the town curfew.  Then when war broke out, he was forced into action and was quickly captured by enemy soldiers, and along with other wealthy troops he was taken as a prisoner of war and held for ransom.  He spent nearly a year in a dank cell in miserable conditions awaiting his father’s ransom payment to free him.  Upon his eventual release, he returned home sick in both body and mind. 

One day as he was traveling the countryside, he encountered a leper.  Previously he would have run from such an one, but he was moved to embrace and kiss the man, an incident that changed his life.  Now in his early 20s, the young man began turning his focus toward God.  He spent an ever-increasing amount of time at a remote mountain hideaway, praying and looking for answers.  But he did not stay at that mountain hideaway.  He ended up immersing himself in the world, caring for suffering lepers and seeking to restore the original values of Jesus to the Church that in his day had become decadent and corrupt.  He was a young man who was changed by the world of suffering that he witnessed, and a young man who ultimately and profoundly changed for the better both the Church and the world.  The young man was Francis of Assisi, perhaps the world’s most beloved saint.²

But the point I set out to make here is this: Francis could have continued in his life of luxury, but he didn’t.  Francis could have remained hidden away in that remote mountain hideaway, praying and meditating, but he didn’t.  Francis saw that real life, real service, real satisfaction happens in the world where people are sick and suffering.

Well, two of our United Church members will join others from First United Methodist Church in going on a mission trip to Honduras where they will encounter real life, real human need, and real human suffering.  And we have the opportunity to help support them and make a positive difference.

Yes, all of us need an occasional mountaintop experience that awes us and serves to refresh us and recharge our emotional and spiritual battery.  The mountaintop highs of life are wonderful and provide us with a sense of wonder and awe.  But down below remains a world in need of the kindness, compassion, and service we can offer.  And to refer to Isaac S. Villegas again, “God’s presence transfigures this life. . .  To attend to the present and wonder at the ordinary; to let this life astonish us with the sacred.  It is good for us to be here – right here where we are, for this too is holy ground.”²  Sometimes we tend to forget that everyday life can be holy ground too.  And engaging life and meeting human need in the here and now also brings satisfaction to the soul,  giving life a sense of purpose.  May it be so for us.  Amen.

¹Isaac S. Villegas, Christian Century, Feb. 12, 2020.

²adapted from biography.com, https://www.biography.com/religious-figure/saint-francis-of-assisi.                               ³Villegas.