Jesus on the Mountain

MARK 9:2-8

INTRODUCTION:

Just now we sang the familiar old hymn “Blessed Assurance, Jesus Is Mine.”

That hymn was written by Fanny Crosby, who wrote many of our favorite hymns.

Fanny Crosby was blind. Historians aren’t sure whether she was born blind or whether she was blinded when she was six weeks old as a result of poultices put on her eyes when they developed an inflammation.

Fanny Crosby didn’t let her blindness limit her usefulness.

She was an active Christian. She was dedicated to work in rescue missions.

She was a gifted poet. She wrote many popular songs.

And she wrote many, many hymns. Dozens of them are still printed in our hymnbooks, including the one we just sang, “Blessed Assurance, Jesus Is Mine.”

Fanny Crosby didn’t regret that she was blind. She said, “When I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior.”

We are all looking forward to seeing Jesus.

We wonder what he will look like. Of course, no one on earth knows. But we have a hint of what it will be like to see Jesus in a story that is included in three of the gospels.

We read the story in the Gospel of Mark (9:2-23):

And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John and lead them up a high mountain apart by themselves; and he was transfigured before them, and his garments became glistening, intensely white, as no fuller on earth could bleach them. (Fullers were people who worked with cloth. One of the things they did to cloth is bleach it.)

And there appeared to them Elijah and Moses; and they were talking to Jesus. And Peter said to Jesus, “Master, it is well that we are here; let us make three booths, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” For he did not know what to say, for they were exceedingly afraid.

And a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud. “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”

And suddenly looking around they no longer saw any one with them but Jesus only.

I. Let us picture the scene.

Jesus along with Peter, James, and John had climbed the mountain. It had been a hard climb.

It was evidently night time. Jesus, we read, used to go up into the hills to pray at night.

This time he took three disciples for company. Did he suspect that something special was going to happen?

We read in Luke that the disciples were very sleepy but kept awake and that Jesus was praying.

Suddenly Jesus was “transfigured.” Mark tells us that “his garments became glistening, intensely white.”

Matthew tells us that “his face shone, and his garments became white as light” Matthew 17:2).

Then two of the greatest figures from Israel’s past appeared—Moses and Elijah. And they were conversing with Jesus.

I suspect that Peter and James and John could hardly believe their eyes—or ears.

We don’t know how they knew those two men standing with Jesus were Moses and Elijah. Maybe Jesus greeted them by name.

Luke adds a little detail we didn’t read in Mark’s account. He tells us that they were talking about Jesus’s departure—the death he would soon die.

And then a cloud overshadowed them and a voice came out of the cloud: “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”

“And suddenly looking around they no longer saw anyone with them but Jesus only.”

II. So what did this dramatic event mean?

A. First, let us consider what the experience meant to Jesus.

Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem.

He knew that he would suffer many things in Jerusalem, be rejected, and be killed.

The Cross would be such a dreadful experience that Jesus would experience a crisis of faith.

He would become convinced that God had forsaken him.

Jesus’s death was—we believe—the most terrible death ever experienced by any human from the beginning of time to the end of time—because in that death, all the sin of the world was gathered up to burn itself out in the body of Jesus.

On the Mount of Transfiguration, God was preparing Jesus for that awful day.

Here Jesus hears again the reassuring words from God that he heard from heaven at his baptism: “This is my beloved Son.”

This experience on the mountain would give Jesus courage to continue to the victorious end when he would exclaim from the Cross: “It is finished!”

B. Now let us consider what the Transfiguration meant to the disciples.

Less than a week before this Jesus had spoken of his approaching death and the news had shocked his disciples.

It was such a terrible prospect that they couldn’t believe their ears.

The disciples would also face a crisis of faith. They would fail.

Peter would deny Jesus.

James and John would run away with the other disciples (although John would later return to the Cross).

The experience on the mountain of transfiguration was given to the disciple as a foretaste of Christ in glory.

The experience would help them come back to faith after their shattering experience at Golgotha.

John would later write in his gospel: “We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

And in 2 Peter we read this testimony: “We were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.’ we heard this voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain” (2 Peter 1:16-18).

C. We have talked about what the Transfiguration meant to Jesus and what it meant to the disciples. Now we will consider what it means to us.

Listen to the words the Father, spoke from the cloud: “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”

In these words, God is telling us, not just to “hear” the words of Jesus but also to “listen.”

God is saying, “Listen, and act on what you hear.”

When we believe in Jesus, we trust in him, and we obey him. We build our lives on him.

When the cloud had lifted, Moses and Elijah had disappeared. We read, “And suddenly looking around they no longer saw any one with them but Jesus only.”

We used to sing a song with a refrain that went like this,

Jesus only, let me see,

Jesus only, none save he,

then my song shall ever be—

Jesus! Jesus only!

Peter, James, and John never forgot that vision of Christ in glory. They carried it in their hearts for the rest of their lives, and passed it on to those they taught, and finally the story has come to us.

Let us always picture in our imagination these images: Jesus in the manger, Jesus teaching his friends, Jesus welcoming sinners, Jesus on the mountain, Jesus on the Cross, and finally, the Lord in Glory.

Let us constantly meditate on his words so that we may always listen to him and seek to please him in all we do.

And when the time comes when we meet him on the other side, we will be meeting our Best Friend.