When was the last time something happened that took your breath away, made you long to linger, or drove you to snap a photo or buy a T-shirt just to stay in the moment?  I am not sure why, but I think my mother could practise being “present”, she could see God in her grandchildren being kind, cardinals on a snowy day, or the worst choir’s best effort.  Did she have a gift for wonder or did 40 years 4th grade and Senior High Sunday School hone her sense of awe? 

Have you ever wondered why our Bedouin spiritual ancestors, Abraham and Sarah, slipped out of their tents one night and moved away from the fire light and olive-oil lamps, past the sleeping flocks, to gaze at the night sky? There is something magical about a dark sky.  Have you paused under a million stars and tried to count them?  The universe woos us to pull out a blanket and fix our eyes on the heavens.  If you have never been to a certified dark sky space, make that pilgrimage.  You may see God in a glowing galaxy or hear the Universe calling out your name.   https://darksky.org/ 

Out under a dark sky 3000 years ago God said  “Abraham, Sara, Look toward the heavens and count the stars, if you are able to count them… So shall your descendants be. I will bless you…so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you… and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” ( Gen 12, 15, 17, 19)  Abram and Sara laughed. Abraham fell face down before God, overcome with awe and faith, but also doubt. Jews, Christians and Muslims, we all trace our faith back to that holy moment 3000 years ago. Go outside not to conquer, but just dwell.

Moses had settled down from his adolescent freedom fighting days. He married Ziporrha and found a refuge with his father-in-law, Jethro the priest of Middian. Raised in the Egyptian palace, Moses now tended sheep.  Grazing the flocks in the foothills of Mount Horeb, Moses looked up and saw flames. Somehow a bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed by the fire.  The writer tells us Moses thought, “I must turn aside and look at this great sight and see why the bush is not burned up.” The Bible does not list curiosity as a spiritual gift, but I believe that it is. How can we love God with all our mind and not be curious? God created curiosity inviting us to explore creation, to seek and find, to dig into science, and hold the universe with a sense of reverence, wonder and respect.

When God saw Moses turning to investigate, God called “Take off your sandals for you are standing on holy ground.”  Why do such rituals matter?  What rituals ground you? I have made a ritual prayer out of the stretching of my arthritic fingers. Maybe rituals free up our minds from our immediate concerns, allowing us to drift out into deeper spiritual waters? “Take off your shoes”, perhaps calls some to keep the holy space pure, but could it be an invitation to feel the holiness wiggling between your toes like the sand of  a warm beach?  (Exodus 3) 

How do these thin moments, when heaven seems to dwell on earth, change us?  I am not sure, but do you think Moses would’ve found the courage to stand up to the most powerful nation on earth without turning aside, taking off his shoes, and wrestling with God about the cost of leading people into freedom? 

In the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord while sitting in the Temple. 2500 years ago, you would have had to travel to Babylon or Rome to see a more beautiful building than the Jerusalem Temple.  It was a wonder of the ancient world. Music, beauty, art, architecture can open a window into heaven.  We do not know if the Temple choir was singing or if Isaiah sat alone in the sanctuary, when Isaih saw God. Isaiah heard the angels sing:  “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of God’s glory.” The pivots of the temple shook and the sanctuary filled with smoke and the Lord said, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And Isaiah said, “Here am I; send me!”  (Isaiah 6)

Someone told me last week how when the whole congregation joined the children’s choir singing the last verse of “This Little Light of Mine”, the children’s faces lit up, perhaps feeling embraced by the congregation. . Maybe you have seen or been the face of God to someone in worship? I do not know if the angels were singing, but one day, decades ago, it felt like God was calling to me, “Who will go for us?” and I said, “here I am Lord”.  

Mary had a lot on her mind when she “set out and went with haste to”  the hill country. When she entered her aunt’s house she called out to Elizabeth.  When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. … As soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who believed!”  Has someone ever embraced you: speaking faith, hope, love, solidarity, steadfastness and strength into your life?  Lives have been changed as we pass the peace of Christ to one another. 

In chapter 16, just before the transfiguration, Jesus asks us, “Who do you say that I am?”  Who do we say that Jesus is?  How do we explain the ground of our being? Can we find the words, does a creed due it justice, is faith reducible to a few sentences?  Is there a creed true enough to lead us to love our neighbors as ourselves, forgive 77 times, give without expecting anything in return, or do right by even our enemies? 

Six days later, Jesus took Peter, James, and John to the top of a very high mountain.  We need daily pilgrimages away from our distractions. It is hard to make a connection with Heaven when our attention is held by parasitic social media algorithms that pull us away from what is real around us.  It is hard to enter a thin place when our schedules leave no space for daily rites and weekly sabbath. It took an hour or more to walk up the mountain. Jesus’ transfiguration feels like it lasted just a few seconds. They see Jesus shining like the sun, chatting with Moses and Elijah. Jesus touches their shoulder and they look up and it is gone: Elijah, Moses, the Cloud, the Voice!  How many holy moments have we missed looking at our screens or rushing to the next thing?  When did we last do some holy daydreaming?

Matthew’s description, “Jesus was transfigured”  is brief and leaves us with questions. Why not take us all up on the mountain to see this sign from heaven? That was the devil’s suggestion in the temptation story!  Why these 3? Why Moses and Elijah, the law and the prophets? What did Moses say? Could the disciples even hear what was said? How did they know it was Elijah and Moses? 

Instead of answering our questions about the transfiguration Matthew focuses on Peter’s  reaction  “Lord, it’s good that we’re here. If you want, (I love Peter’s framing, it reminds me of Jesus in the Garden: Lord if you want…) I’ll make three shrines: one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”  That is what I would have done, opened a retreat center, made a  T-shirt, painted an Instagram ready transfiguration mural on a wall, or put up a shrine.   

A bright cloud overshadowed them and a voice called out a statement of faith, “This is my Son whom I dearly love. I am very pleased with him. Listen to him!”  It is a kind of a creed, but in no way does it capture the holy moment that forever changed Peter, James and John’s life. How do we explain the holiest mysteries that ground and guide our lives? How do we rehearse them? 

The disciples fell on their faces, filled with awe. Jesus came and touched them. “Get up,” he said. “Don’t be afraid.” When they looked up, it was over.  Holy moments are often fleeting, someone touches our shoulder and suddenly things are back to normal, but if we learn to dwell in these holy moments, our lives can be forever changed. 

We are the most distracted people ever to walk the face of the Earth.  We need rituals to stay holy and human. We need to fall to our knees, laugh, count the stars, turn aside in curiosity, embrace each other, take off our shoes, make pilgrimages to the Temple, to neighbor’s homes, to mountains, out to the night sky.  We need to learn to be present, to prayerfully be open to what is actually real, God-given, ordinary, human, and unmediated around us. 

Let us step outside, count the stars,  turn aside to see, take off our shoes, fall on our eyes, embrace one another,  and perhaps find Holy ground. Oh, let us be open to seeing the face of God, hearing the still small voice, even if we can’t find the words to completely explain it.  And may these thin places, these holy moments, when we see Christ shining like the sun, so strengthen us that we walk humbly with God and each other, love mercy and do justice. Amen