Only Jesus - Part 5

 

Continued from previous post…

 

            Let’s go back to our fisherman Peter on the watershed mountain and see where the water flows.

            “Ah, we’re almost to the top,” Peter thinks.

            Once there a change comes over Jesus, His face shining like the sun, His clothes as white as light. And look – there are Moses and Elijah with Jesus, talking to Him about what will transpire in Jerusalem.

            “Oh wow, this is great,” Peter thinks, “this is great, great, great. I’m back to a wow experience…Jesus is giving me a wow experience. This is great…now what to do?”

            “Lord,” Peter says to Jesus, “if it’s okay with you let’s build three tabernacles here, three places of communion, three monuments, three places of meeting, one for You, one for Moses and one for Elijah.”

            And while Peter continues talking, a bright cloud envelopes them and a voice from the cloud says, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him.”

            The disciples fall on their faces in fear….

            I wonder how long they lay there…faces to the ground…in fear of the awesome holiness of God?

            There is a tension in the Christian life that many people misunderstand. On the one hand God calls us into intimacy with Himself, He invites us into the very fellowship of the Trinity…and we’ll explore more of this on a future Sunday. As we come into this fellowship God’s perfect love casts out all fear – and that is the way we are to live in regard to fear…as most people commonly understand the term…but then…not only is God intimate…God is also transcendent…that means that God transcends everything there is and everything we know…and that while we are invited into the fellowship of the Trinity and into deep intimacy with God…and while God’s very life dwells within us…while all these things are true…that God is also other than us…He remains God and we remain His creation…He remains our Father and we remain His children…Jesus remains our Lord as we remain His servants…Jesus remains the One and Only Savior and we remain those whom He has saved…

            And to be in the Presence of this Holy God…is to know a holy and reverent fear…and it is good that our faces be on the ground.

            I wonder how long Jesus waited before He came and touched them? Did He allow the words of His Father to sink into the impetuous Peter and into James and John?

            What would our response have been were we in Jesus’ place?

            “Oh Peter, that’s okay, I know you didn’t mean to say what you did.”

            “Come on and get up guys…it’s alright…nothing to worry about. Let’s have a big hug.”

            “It’s okay…God didn’t really mean what He said…please don’t be upset.”

            I wonder what my response would have been? What would your response have been?

            From a wow to an ouch in under ten seconds. One moment Peter is basking in the glory of God and is privy to a holy conversation between Jesus, Moses and Elijah…the next moment God the Father rebukes him…from a wow to an ouch…Peter has done it again.

Jesus comes and touches them, saying, “Get up and don’t be afraid.”

            And…as they open their eyes…they see Jesus only.

            What if Peter had had his way? What if Peter had built three tabernacles, three places of communion…one for (of course) Jesus, one for Moses and one for Elijah?

 

To be continued…