Glory

The scriptures referred to are Exodus 34:29-35, 1 Corinthians 3:12-4:2 and Luke 9:28-36.

The first Doctor Who convention I attended was in my hometown of St. Louis. My wife came and we brought our 1 ½ year old son. 2 events stand out from this event nearly 40 years ago. One was the costumes of the attendees. Some had put an incredible amount of work into looking like the Doctor or various aliens. The authenticity they achieved was incredible. One guy built a working radio-controlled model of the Doctor's robot dog, K-9!

The other thing I will always remember is meeting Tom Baker. Of the 5 actors who had portrayed the Doctor on TV thus far, he had played the part the longest and he was the most popular version of the character at that time. We had told my son that the actor would be there and he seemed excited. As we were eating at the banquet Tom Baker entered the room and went around to each table, greeting the fans. When he got to our table, my son, rather than look awed or pleased, burst into tears and turned away as if trying to escape him! As happy as he had seemed at the prospect of meeting the hero of our TV show, the reality of seeing the Doctor there in the flesh was too much.

In the Old Testament, there was a fear that if you saw the face of God, you would die. Because to see someone's face you had to be in their presence, as when we talk about having a face-to-face meeting with someone today as opposed to being on video. It was deemed fatal for a ordinary, sinful human to be in the presence of the holy God. After Jacob wrestled with the Angel of the Lord, he named the place Peniel, which means “face of God.” He said, “It is because I saw God face-to-face and yet my life was spared.” (Genesis 32:30) When Moses asks to see God's glory, he is only allowed to see the back of God. “But,” the Lord said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” (Exodus 33:20) And indeed when prophets like Isaiah and Ezekiel have visions of God, they never describe his face. (Isaiah 6; Ezekiel 1) And others, like Elijah and even Moses upon his first encounter with God, tend to hide their faces from that sight. (Exodus 3:6; 1 Kings 19:13)

However while you might not be able to look God in the face, you definitely want God to turn his face to you. The priestly blessing of Aaron goes, “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26) Even if you can't look at him, you want God to be watching over you. It's kinda like not being able to look directly at the sun but still wanting the sun to shine on you.

Conversely for God to hide his face is a disaster. (Deuteronomy 31:16-18) It is the result of people sinning to the point where God removes his presence from them and lets them suffer the consequences of what they are doing. It is the equivalent of God saying, “I can't even look at you now.” Until the people turn back to God, he will not turn to them.

Our reading from Exodus takes place after the portable shrine called the Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting is set up. In the previous chapter we are told: “And whenever Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses. When the people would see the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people, each one at the entrance of his own tent, would rise and worship. The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, the way a person speaks to a friend. Then Moses would return to the camp....” (Exodus 33:9-11)

Our passage takes place after Moses carves out two more stone tablets to replace the ones he broke when he saw the people worshiping the golden calf. He writes the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments, on these tablets and brings them to the people once again. But the peculiar side effect of being in the presence of God's glory in the form of the pillar of cloud and fire was that Moses' face was radiant. It glowed in a way that frightened people. When he was made aware of this, he would veil his face.

Unfortunately when St. Jerome translated the Bible into Latin, he traced the Hebrew word for “rays” of light back to its primitive roots and rendered it “horns.” Thus the idea arose that Moses had horns, which unfortunately mars the otherwise wonderful statue of Moses that Michelangelo carved. I wish the guy who took a hammer and chisel into St. Peter's in the Vatican and attacked Michelangelo's Pieta, which shows Mary holding Jesus' dead body, had instead taken those horns off his statue of Moses. Unfortunately this bad translation also led to the medieval anti-Semitic trope that Jews had horns and looked like Satan. Which proves that such people either did not actually know any Jews or did not look at them very closely.

Anyway the radiant face of Moses was eerie. But it was a reflection of God's glory. And that leads us to today's gospel. The last incident Luke records before this passage is Jesus asking his disciples, first, who did the crowds think he was and, secondly, who did they think he was. Peter says, “The Christ of God.” In other words, the Anointed one whom God sent to save his people. The disciples would probably think this meant Jesus was going to be a holy warrior king like his ancestor David. But what Jesus says next surprises, offends, confuses and discourages them.

“The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” (Luke 9:22) Now there were a few competing ideas back then of what the Christ or Messiah would be—and that was not one of them. If the Messiah was not a king, then maybe he'd be a priest or a prophet. What he would not be is dead. How could that possibly help God's people?

Peter objects to this line of talk. Ironically Peter had just said Jesus was God's Anointed but now he telling Jesus he is nevertheless wrong about his own mission. And according to Matthew and Mark, Jesus harshly rebukes him. Peter is looking at this purely in human terms and thus he is acting as God's adversary. (Matthew 17:22-23; Mark 8:32-33)

Then Jesus makes things worse. “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23) Give up all rights to yourself, take up the instrument of your ugly, painful and dishonorable death, and follow me? And do that every day? Is Jesus nuts? What were the disciples to think about their leader?

So, eight days later, when our Gospel passage begins, the disciples are pretty bummed out. And I think that is why Jesus takes the 3 leaders of the Twelve up the mountain with him. They needed to see God's glory in a conventional way. So as he is praying, Jesus' face changes and his clothes become dazzling white. The Greek means “to gleam or flash like lightning.” Too bright to look at directly. But that's not all.

Two men appear: Moses, the lawgiver, and Elijah, the premier prophet. I'm not sure how the disciples recognized them but they are significant figures in Judaism. Both men got a glimpse of God. Moreover, Moses, when he died, was buried by God (Deuteronomy 34:5-6) and Elijah didn't die but was taken up to heaven in a whirlwind (2 Kings 2:1-12). And both, because of their proximity to the presence of God, “appeared in glory.” As did Jesus.

The Greek word for glory means “praise, honor, what evokes a good opinion.” It was used to translate the Hebrew word for “glory” which was derived from the root word for “weighty or heavy.” God's glory has weight, importance, significance. So the point is not that Jesus and the two others were merely shiny. It was like God highlighted them, made them stand out, because of their great significance. And just like my son saw a person he had previously only seen on a screen, right there, solid and substantial, Peter, James and John were looking at 2 guys they had read and heard about, right there, flesh and blood. And they saw Jesus as he really was, the light of God embodied. And just as my son was freaked out, what they saw blew their minds.

And then a cloud, as in Moses' time, came down upon them and they were terrified. And as Moses heard God speak to him from the cloud, they hear God's voice saying, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” Listen to him about what? We are told earlier that Moses and Elijah are talking to Jesus “about his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.” Moses has tasted death and Elijah has gone up into heaven as Jesus will at his ascension. So when Jesus talks about his death and resurrection he is not crazy. That is my plan, God is saying. Pay attention to what Jesus says!

And while what the disciples see is what they, and any Jew, would expect in a vision of God's glory, Jesus, once again, sees things differently. We see this most clearly in John's gospel. In John 7:39 Jesus is speaking about the Holy Spirit, but we are told “Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.” (Emphasis mine) In John 12:16 we are told that the disciples do not understand the real significance of Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem. “Only after Jesus was glorified, did they realize that these things had been written about him...” (Emphasis mine) So there is a part of Jesus' life and ministry that comes before he is glorified and a time after he is glorified. What specific event glorifies him?

Jesus' ministry is to plant the seeds of the gospel among his own people. So when during the week before his death some Greeks come to see Jesus, he says, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies it produces many seeds.” (John 12:23-24) And this talk of death is not merely symbolic because he says, “Now my heart is troubled, and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour?' No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name!” (John 12:27-28) He continues, “Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” And we are told, “He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die.” (John 12:31-33) To Jesus what will glorify him and God is his death on the cross.

We think of glory in human terms as did Peter at first. It is triumph over your enemies; it is streams of light; it is splendid to look at. But in Jesus' reckoning it is not. Jesus' glory is in sacrificing himself to save the world. So to some it will not look like triumph but defeat. It will not look bright and shiny but will look like a world where the sun is darkened. It will not look splendid to the eye but will look ugly and bloody and shameful. By the world's standards it doesn't look glorious but ghastly.

Unfortunately there are people who think the best way to glorify God is to imitate what the world thinks is glorious. Make bigger buildings and flashier services and pour more money into what looks good rather than what does good. We are loathe to make sacrifices, especially personal ones. Deny ourselves? Accept the risk of pain and death and dishonor in following Jesus? That's crazy.

But as Paul says, we need to lift the veil from our minds and see clearly. We are all going to die anyway. We can die desperately clutching the empty shiny things that will not save us, or we can realize that in the end what endures is the Spirit and embrace him. The Spirit is God's presence in our lives and true freedom comes from inviting him in. With the Spirit in our hearts and in our minds, we will see the true glory of the Lord, Jesus Christ, God's Son, our savior. And by letting the Spirit be in charge we will be changed, “transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” That is what our faith is really about: becoming more like Jesus, day by day. And it's not like the people at Doctor Who and comic conventions, who make themselves look like superheroes outwardly but who lack their powers. Because what the Spirit is changing is not what's on the outside but what's within.

What the disciples needed to see what a glimpse of God's glory that they could understand. Because the real glory of Jesus was going to be hard to look at. Until Easter morning when it all fell into place. And once again Jesus would be transformed, and this time some of the disciples wouldn't even recognize him at first. (Matthew 28:17; Luke 24:15-16; John 20:14-16) And I think that was because Jesus' face was beaming. Not with literal light. But with the crucifixion behind him, with our salvation secured, with the weight of the world lifted from his shoulders, with nothing to cloud his countenance, I imagine that his joy could not be contained and his face was lit up by the biggest smile anyone had ever seen. And one day, when we have crossed through the valley of the shadow of death and have awakened to the light of heaven, and when we see him there, arms open to welcome us, our faces will break into radiant smiles that will mirror his. And we will be in his presence from then on. And it will be glorious.