A Glimpse of Glory

Transfiguration Sunday

Sunday, February 19, 2012

“A Glimpse of Glory”

Mark 9:2-9

This year’s National Football season has been called the season of the Quarterback with so many terrific performances.  Ironically one of my favorite quarter backs, Peyton Manning sat this season out because of a neck injury and it also appeared from their play that his team the Colts also sat out the season winning only 2 games and losing 14. The only consolation is that Indianapolis hosted the Super bowl and Peyton got to look on as his younger brother Eli defeated his arch-rival Tom Brady.

 

The real story though was rookie quarterback Tim Tebow of the Denver Broncos.  Tim is notorious, as the media paints the picture, for wearing his faith on his sleeve.  When the starting quarter back for the Broncos was injured and it appeared the Broncos season was headed toward the bottom. In steps rookie Tim Tebow, leading his team to six straight victories and a respectable season of 8 wins and 8 losses and a place in the post season play offs.

When the media wanted to talk to him about football, Tim instead talked about Football being a platform for thanking His Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and talking about the Hospital he is helping to finance and build in the Phillipines.  The media did not take too kindly to this and neither did much of the public.  With cameras pointed at him Tim puts a finger in the air after making a touchdown or he takes a knee. Even though other players have done this in the past, this action now has a name, Tebowing. Now it seems if anyone else does it they will be ridiculed in the same way.

When I first saw him do it and how the media was covering it I had mixed feelings about this sort of witness.  My first thought was, is he promoting a theology of Glory. Is he saying that God is on the side of the Denver Broncos? Is God against the teams or the defender that Tebow just burned with a completion or ran by with a touch down? It becomes the same problem that occurred but more extreme when Christian soldiers battled and killed soldiers in Europe from the middle ages through WWII. Does God pick sides?  Does he bless some and not others?

If we think that honoring God will make us successful then we are getting the wrong impression and are deserving of criticism.

Rather, we know that from the scriptures this is not true, our Lord rains and provides sunshine for the good and evil alike.  We also know that the Apostles did not boast in their success but in their weakness and in their defeat.  However we also as Christians do give thanks also in times of plenty and in perceived success.  We acknowledge where are daily bread comes from. Tim has never said that God chose his team over the other although we do not know for sure what he prays as he is kneeling.  Perhaps a reporter should ask him that.  Is he praying for a victory? Is he just praying that he can do his best? Isn’t praying to do our best what we all would want as we work in our various vocations.

As soon as Tim speaks after the game tweets fly that both lambast and defend him. Late night comedy shows make it a habit of ridiculing Tebow and perhaps accusing him of things that are not so true.    Even after the season it seems that ESPN Sport Center, because he is so controversial, is now bringing him up in connection with rookie NBA sensation Jeremy Linn of the NY Nicks. One CBS poll showed that 45% believed that Jeremy Linn’s sudden rise in success was due to divine intervention. 

Even if we are unsure whether these athletes are operating under a theology of glory at least it appear the media is. The media will say anything whether it is true or not to sell advertising.  And it certainly is interested in stirring the pot through omission of facts and misinformation whether it is sports or politics. The greatest hate mongers in the world are in the media.

The culture does chafe at the idea that there is a God and that God picks sides.  To say that God picks sides is worth criticizing but what really get’s the culture upset is the witness that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that we are sinners, not good enough for God and Heaven and that Jesus Christ and his imputed righteousness is our only salvation. 

It is good that Tim publically acknowledges and thanks God and specifically, Jesus Christ and that this has resulted in his altruism his concern for others to the point of building a Hospital overseas. But it is the witness that Jesus died for him and His sins and that of the world’s that the Holy Spirit will use to create saving faith in those who listen. It will also create at the same time more hatred, criticism and resistance.

Jesus at the time of his transfiguration was facing resistance and intolerance. Even though Jesus alleviated much suffering, healing diseases and casting out demons, He was doing it at inappropriate times like on the Sabbath.

What He did was considered work and he even caused those he healed to break the man-made civil code surrounding the Sabbath by asking the formally lame to pick up their beds.  Most scandalous of all, Jesus was forgiving sins. This was blasphemy in the minds of the Pharisees and Scribes. Only God can forgive sins, ironically they were right they just could not conceive of God taking human form, God incarnate, en-fleshed in Jesus. 

Jesus must have looked unremarkable. Or perhaps it was just the familiarity. Jesus had grown up in front of them a child and now a man. Familiarity they say breeds contempt. Jesus also it appears himself was keeping his purpose and mission a secret. He healed but he told those he healed not to spread the word about him but they did it anyway.

Likewise Jesus told the disciples, Peter, James and John not to speak about what they had seen on the mountain until after He rose from the dead.  What? What was that? Jesus was headed for death.  That ran counter to the beatific vision these disciples had just witnessed on the Mount of Transfiguration. The veil was removed and the divinity of Christ shown through His humanity. With Jesus’ transfiguration we see a glimpse into the glory that is to come.  Jesus becomes brighter than any light and his clothes turned bleach white. He literally shows himself to be the light of the world. He is accompanied by two of the most respected prophets of the Old Testament both received into heaven already in bodily form, Moses and Elijah.

Then we have the appearance of the cloud. The same glory cloud that engulfed Moses on Mount Sinai but this time it engulfs Jesus and just as His baptism that began His ministry and the season of Epiphany we hear the Heavenly Father speak, “This is my Son, Listen to Him.” And then there is only Jesus.

This glimpse of Glory was short lived because its purpose was to prepare these Apostles for what was to come, the cross.  There is no victory apart from the cross. There is no forgiveness of sins apart from the cross.  The scandalous and embarrassment of the cross was necessary for Jesus to endure so that He may stand in the place of all sinful man.  Receiving what they what we deserve. 

A theology of Glory says you can have it now, if you honor god, if you ask god for it he will oblige because you are a relatively good person. A theology of the cross shows that we are not entitled to God’s goodness and mercy yet He delivers it to us anyway. Delivered through the preaching of the word and the sacraments both very humble and unremarkable in their means but effective due to God’s promise attached to them.

The Father says,” listen to Jesus.”  He is headed to Jerusalem to suffer and die for your sins but He will rise again defeating sin, death and the devil.  There is no resurrection without death. This is something we must all consider. As a colleague and friend Pastor Matthew Payne says, “Remember, that in the end, we win!”  Yes we will win but victory is through the cross, through Jesus.