Prayer: Almighty God, on the mountain You showed Your glory in the transfiguration of Your Son. Give us the vision to see beyond the turmoil of our world and to behold the King in all His glory; through Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen. (“Lutheran Book of Worship,” collect 20)
I had not heard the sentence before but it made an immediate impression on me. Mr. Elijah Cummings, a member of Congress from the seventh district of Maryland, said this: “God sits high but looks low.” That’s what the Transfiguration is all about. Today many Christians are hearing the story of the Transfiguration in their churches. I’ll confess in the early years of my ministry, I found this incident perplexing, hard to understand. Let me begin today by reading what happened on that mountain according to St. Luke, chapter nine.
“Jesus took Peter, John, and James with Him and went up a mountain to pray. While Jesus was praying, the appearance of His face changed, and His clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly both Moses and Elijah were talking with Him. They appeared in heavenly glory and were discussing Jesus’ approaching death and what He was about to fulfill in Jerusalem.
“Peter and the men with Him were sleeping soundly. When they woke up, they saw Jesus’ glory and the two men standing with Him. As Moses and Elijah were leaving Him, Peter said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, it’s good that we’re here. Let’s put up three tents- one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.'” Peter didn’t know what he was saying.
“While he was saying this, a cloud overshadowed them. They were frightened as they went into the cloud. A voice came out of the cloud and said, ‘This is My Son, whom I have chosen. Listen to Him!”
“After the voice had spoken, they saw that Jesus was alone. The disciples said nothing, and for some time they told no one about what they had seen.” (Luke 9:28-36)
That is a strange story, isn’t it? But it’s easy to understand. God sits high but looks low. Peter, James, and John saw the high Son of God in all His glory, “glory as of the only-begotten of the Father,” as John later described (John 1:14). When Peter wanted to settle in and enjoy the glory by putting up three tents, his suggestion was ignored. Instead, a voice spoke from heaven. Then Moses and Elijah disappeared. Now they saw only Jesus, looking as He had before the transfiguration, the glory no longer seen by their eyes but fixed in their memory for the rest of their lives. This Jesus, looking now like anyone else, led the three disciples down from the mountain to the plain, the lower places where people were living their daily lives. God sits high but looks low. That’s where Jesus still brings His salvation today, down here, where you and I live; where we are occupied with our daily business, where we sometimes rejoice but just as often where we are troubled and hurt.
A book I turn to from time to time is “Amazing Grace” by Kathleen Norris. It’s an unconventional religious book, looking at faith from a perspective of common sense. An incident from her life illustrates how God comes down with what we religious people call “salvation.”
“It was Sunday morning,” she writes “and with people driving to church, traffic on our normally quiet street had picked up. I sat in our kitchen- my husband was still asleep. I listened to our friend’s story. David had brought him home after locking up the bar (where he worked) the night before, as the man was in no condition to drive. He had spent the night sleeping on our couch. Now I was making breakfast for both of us, and he was in a talkative mood.”
Ms. Norris goes on to say their friend had been raised in western North Dakota. He had worked in the oil fields, made a lot of money, most of it spent on alcohol and some on drugs. He had gotten involved with some Wyoming drug dealers in a scheme to make big bucks.
Ms. Norris continues, “He said he had thought things were working out fine. He and the guy he was in business with were making good contacts, setting up a network, and he felt lucky to have fallen in with someone with so much experience. Then, one day, as they were driving on the outskirts of the small city that was to be the base of their operations, his friend veered, suddenly, onto the shoulder of the road. He had seen an acquaintance driving past in the other direction and was debating whether to turn his car around and follow him. ‘I need to kill him,’ he said matter-of-factly, reaching for a gun that our friend had not known was stashed under the front seat. ‘I need to kill him, but he’s with someone, and I don’t know who. So it’ll have to wait.'”
Ms. Norris’ new friend then said, ‘It was right then I decided to get out. This was over my head.”
Now let me read the next sentence from the book- the sentence that prompted me to share her story with you. She wrote, “And that is salvation, or at least the beginning of it” (p. 18ff). That one sentence raised questions in my mind. How much did this rough guy from North Dakota know about Jesus? Did he understand the faith? Could he recite John 3:16 or Ephesians 2:8-9? Those are some of the test questions that religious people like to hone in on. His story doesn’t sound like salvation from sin, death, and the devil, and yet here’s her sentence, “That is salvation, or at least the beginning of it.” A few lines later she quoted the “Oxford Companion to the Bible,” which says, “the primary meaning of the Hebrew and Greek words translated ‘salvation’ is non-religious” (p. 20).
Now I’ve got hundreds and hundreds of theological books in my study at home, so I checked that out. Sure enough, the primary meaning of the word “salvation” is not religious. Let’s look at Jesus in the New Testament. In the New Testament, in Jesus’ healing miracles, the verb “to save” occurs 16 times. One example is Matthew 9:20-21. According to the English translation, a woman with chronic bleeding said, “If only I touch His clothes, I’ll get well.” That’s a translation. The original Greek text literally says, “If only I touch His clothes, I will be saved.” Now I don’t mean to lose you with this Greek stuff but I do mean to make this point: The first meaning of the word salvation is deliverance from illness or some other bodily threat. In Matthew 8:25 the disciples’ boat is about to be swamped by high waves on the Sea of Galilee. They called out, “Lord! Save us! We are going to die!” And so the most basic meaning of “salvation” is that God, here Jesus, helps people out of some very serious physical problem.
But there’s more. Jesus did not found health clinics or social agencies; He founded a church. If the church is faithful to the New Testament, it will not be content only to tend to bodily needs of people. Yes, the church should do that but the Bible tells us that the One who sits high looks low, He looks deeper than the physical.
So we don’t want to stop here and confine Jesus to some kind of spiritual medical practice. Oh, He can heal people if He graciously chooses. But again, He founded a church whose greatest message is a deliverance, a salvation. Here comes the ultimate meaning of the word – a salvation from the deadly consequences of sin and Satan. This ultimate meaning of salvation is also taught by the New Testament. In Luke 7 a woman who had a bad reputation, probably a prostitute, invited herself to a gathering of religious snobs. Jesus was there too, not because He’s a snob, but because He was trying to get the religious people to see they weren’t as holy as they thought. This woman comes in crying, washes Jesus’ feet with her tears, dries them, and anoints His feet with perfume. This woman had no health problem that we know of, only her sins. We’ve all got sins, whether we’ve confessed them or not. Jesus said to her, “Your sins have been forgiven.”
The Bible tells us, “The other guests thought, ‘Who is this man who even forgives sins?’
“Jesus said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you. Go in peace!'” (Luke 7:48-50).
The word “salvation” has a wide range of meanings. When that North Dakota drug dealer decided to get out, he had been saved from a situation that threatened his life. It was the same for many people “saved” by Jesus from health problems or some other physical danger. God looks low. God does that so that He can raise our sights. He wants us to see that life is more than the body. He wants us to see that we are afflicted by sin, religious and non-religious people alike. Deliverance from sin and its terrible consequence of death, deliverance from the power of the Devil, is the most basic deliverance, the salvation that you and I need more than any other.
That’s why God wants to lift your eyes to the cross. This unusual event of the Transfiguration is used in many churches today because it makes the transition from the season of Epiphany to that of Lent, which begins this Wednesday, Ash Wednesday. The theme of Epiphany, the weeks following Christmas, is the glory of God revealed in His Son Jesus Christ. That’s the glory that Jesus showed to Peter, James, and John on the mountain. Lent, in contrast, is about the suffering and the death that Jesus endured to pay the penalty for your sins and mine. Interestingly enough that’s exactly what Jesus spoke about with Moses and Elijah on the mount of Transfiguration. “They appeared in heavenly glory and were discussing Jesus’ approaching death and what He was about to fulfill in Jerusalem” (Luke 9:31). Such a strange joining of themes — glory and the cross! God sits high but looks low.
Last December I was in New York for a meeting of the American Bible Society. One evening the people of the ABS were very kind and took us to dinner on the top of the World Trade Center. I’ll tell you, I felt out of my element. The view of the city was absolutely spectacular but everything down on the ground seemed so small, so insignificant. The Statue of Liberty, for example, seemed only an inch tall from my perspective way up on the 106th floor.
After dinner, on the street, I felt back in real life. Impatient motorists blowing horns…as if that would make a difference! Business execs on cell phones. “Are they confirming some appointment,” I asked myself, “or are they saying again, “I won’t be home until late”? I see a young woman in the crowd, crying. “Why?” I wonder. A beggar asks for a handout. Down here, not up on the 106th, is real life.
God comes down in Jesus Christ to give you new eyes, to raise your lowly sights to the glory that will be revealed when He comes to take all His people to be with Moses and Elijah and all the faithful in heaven. Down here, whether on the streets of Manhattan, in North Dakota, in your life or in mine, is where He comes to meet us. As Jesus left the mountain for the plain, still today He comes by His Spirit to meet you where you are. His word gives faith and is the Good News that can work the ultimate salvation in your life. That’s why the heavenly Father spoke out of a cloud on the mountain of Transfiguration and said, “This is My Son, whom I have chosen. Listen to Him!” (Luke 9:35). In your situation, as humble as it may be, as unimportant as you might think you are, down here where you and I live, the invitation is to listen to Jesus. In listening you will “come to look with new eyes at matters great and small….” God sits high but looks low. In listening to the Good News, the Spirit of God will plant in you “Christ, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). Amen.
LUTHERAN HOUR MAILBOX (Questions & Answers) for February 25, 2001
ANNOUNCER: Welcome to the question and answer segment of “The Lutheran Hour.” I’m Mark Eischer. Joining me is Dr. Dale Meyer.
MEYER: Thank you, Mark. Today’s session promises to be very interesting. I’m welcoming into the studio via telephone, Dr. Charles Manske, who is speaking with us from Irvine, California. Dr. Manske, what’s happening?
MANSKE: Well, we’re starting a new Lutheran church in Grand Cayman. That’s an island between Cuba and Mexico on the Caribbean, one of the prime recreation destinations in the world.
MEYER: That means it’s not a place of extreme poverty.
MANSKE: That ‘s correct. People in the mid-west and upper mid-west and Canada who spend their winters in more summer-like climates are likely to choose Florida, Arizona, or California. But those with more discretionary funds will go the Caribbean and Grand Cayman.
MEYER: You’re going to start a new church in Grand Cayman. When is that church going to hold its first worship service?
MANSKE: Its first worship service will be Sunday, March 4, and I will be talking about the discipleship and the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
MEYER: Well that’s next Sunday. How did you come up with this idea?
MANSKE: A number of us were on Seven Mile Beach, the main hotel center in Grand Cayman. We decided to say some prayers and ask God what He wanted us to do. And we seemed to get some clear direction that He was directing us to begin a new Christian mission in Grand Cayman. So we brought together a group of laypersons responsible for establishing the church.
MEYER: Dr. Manske, before we went on the air you were talking about the involvement of the laity in starting this new church. Tell me more about that.
MANSKE: Laypersons are the key individuals involved in establishing this mission. They take up the example of Acts 8 which says in verse four; “Those who have been scattered abroad went about preaching the Word.” And in Acts 8:1 it says “They were all scattered except the apostles.” In the same way here at Grand Cayman the key people are lay persons from all over the United States and Canada who want to honor Jesus Christ with the Good News, by beginning Lutheran worship at Christ Lutheran Church.
MEYER: In addition to our Lutheran Hour radio program, what other ways are you getting the word out about this new church?
MANSKE: There are a number of newspaper ads we have put together. One is entitled “Two Ways to Meet God: One Way is God’s Way and the Other is Not.” We’re using this newspaper ad in Grand Cayman for our Lutheran worship services. And Lutheran Hour Ministries is utilizing this ad in various other Latin American communities, as well. Other ads are: “If Life is like a Baseball Game, Would You be a Winner?” Another one says, “No God or Know God. Still another ad reads: “The Bible Is God’s Word.” All of these are ways in which Lutheran Hour Ministries and Christ Lutheran Church in Grand Cayman are working together to bring the Good News of Jesus Christ to the Cayman Islands.
MEYER: Well, Dr. Manske, certainly all of our prayers are with you. We wish the blessing of the Holy Spirit of God upon the proclamation of the Gospel in Grand Cayman and specifically upon the beginning of this new congregation at Christ Lutheran Church next Sunday, March 4. Thanks so much for being with us.
ANNOUNCER: That brings us to the end of our broadcast for this week.