There is a story that a university in Scotland once wished to honor a scholar who had done some significant inquiry into the life and work of one of its own most illustrious former scholars, the 16th century Scottish reformer, John Knox. The tradition in that and several other universities was that, if possible, a cap belonging to the subject of the study -- in this case John Knox -- would be given to the person being honored, if such a cap could be found. In that way the honoree would have something personal, imbued at least in thought, by a sense of the man who had once worn it. But the only cap of John Knox that anyone knew about had already been presented to someone else years before. However the university did possess a pair of trousers that had once belonged to Knox, so they had a cap made from its material and presented it to the scholar who, though surely amused, was undoubtedly grateful to have received anything actually owned by that reformer and theologian.
Such symbols, and often rather humble ones at that, are important because they connect us to people who are important to us. Indeed in some cases authority is inherited with a symbol denoting ownership, or in some countries, the right to a title. The reading for today from 2 Kings tells of the apprentice prophet Elisha who inherited the mantle -- a sleeveless cloak -- that had been worn by his aged mentor, the prophet Elijah, and had come to be symbolic of his authority as a prophet of God. The power and greatness of Elijah always seem to be expressed in terms of legends and miracles. One of these legends is inferred at the very beginning of today's reading, that Elijah would not die as ordinary mortals do. Rather, like Enoch before him, he was to be taken up to heaven in a whirlwind. What a way to go, and it wasn't even in Kansas!
Apparently that impending event was no secret. It seemed well known among the company of prophets, or the members of the prophetic order that came out to meet Elijah and Elisha along the way. In fact they came out to warn Elisha that his mentor, Elijah, was about to be taken away from him. But apparently Elisha was also aware of what was about to happen. It is clear that he had no intention of letting Elijah out of his sight. Despite Elijah telling him at several points on the way to wait while he went on ahead, Elisha stayed close at hand. Almost at the last minute the old prophet asked Elisha what he wanted from him before he departed. Elisha's answer was "a double portion of your spirit." Now while the request was a compliment to the old prophet, in the end Elisha apparently did not receive that "double portion," but he received something else, and perhaps something more important. As they were walking along suddenly a chariot and horses of fire came between them, and Elijah was swept up in the whirlwind and his mantle dropped to the ground. The story beyond today's reading goes on to tell us that Elisha picked up the mantle and went back to the Jordan River they had crossed together earlier. Elisha struck the water of the river with Elijah's mantle just as the old prophet had done earlier, and the waters parted, and Elisha crossed over. The crossing of the Jordan was, symbolically, the Rubicon which separated the apprentice or assistant that he had been, to become in his own right the prophet of God.
So Elijah was gone. Elisha had assumed his mantle and the authority it symbolized. The parted waters even attested that he now had the powers of his now departed mentor. The other prophets who saw Elisha return recognized his new authority. After these prophets searched in vain for three days for the body of the old man, they returned and asked Elisha to use his new powers to sweeten a well which theretofore had only brought forth bad water and sickness and poor crops. So Elisha went to work and became the prophet of the Lord in the midst of the people, as Elijah had been before him. Today, by tradition, the finest spring in Jericho is sometimes called Elisha's Fountain. A tradition based upon the legend of Elijah's departure from earth in the whirlwind is that the prophet would return to earth before the Messiah would appear. In fact, a tradition among the Jews at Passover is to set a place at the table, but leave it empty for Elijah, or perhaps an unexpected or needy guest, and the door is left open a crack for the same reason. The tradition that Elijah would return as a presager of the Messiah provides a bridge to another important scripture for today from Mark's gospel.
A few days after Jesus had told the disciples of his impending suffering, and of the way and cost of his own discipleship, he took three of his closest friends among the disciples -- Peter, James and John -- to a high mountain apart from anyone else. While they were there they had a remarkable vision of Jesus in which he was transfigured before them. That is to say they saw him in what we might call a non-earthly appearance, and dazzlingly bright. In the vision they saw Jesus talking with Moses, the law-giver, and Elijah, the prophet. Clearly Mark is telling us this vision has messianic significance, the symbolism of which would not be lost upon the disciples, nor upon the Christians of the Markan tradition whose belief about Jesus it represented. The vision is to attest to who Jesus is -- the Messiah, the Christ. In Matthew's and Luke's accounts Peter says to Jesus, "it is good for us to be here," seeming to imply that it would also be good to stay. Peter would like to have commemorated the moment -- held it there if he could, despite his fear -- by building three booths, one each for Jesus and Moses and Elijah. Then at the end of the vision, as they were about to descend from the mountain, a voice came from the clouds saying, "This is my son, the Beloved; listen to him!" Have you ever been on such a wonderful emotional high you wished it would never end? Perhaps you remember the euphoria after a spectacular concert, or a summer camp, or a very moving religious retreat, or a memorable time with someone very important to you. How we would like to capture those moments and make them last forever. How we wish we could remain on the level of an enlightened moment, or a time of emotional or spiritual sensitivity that seems to come to us so rarely. Such times can be the touchstones of a new awakening in us, to be recalled later with some nostalgia as bright moments never completely dimmed by time. We want to cling to them, preserve them, and recreate them if possible. But the realities of life do not allow us to continue to live at that peak level all the time. In fact those high points of our experience probably stand out in bold relief against where we do live most of the time. Those singular moments; those times of inspiration and enlightenment, of joy and enthusiasm not only add zest to life, but they also give it direction and meaning.
A reading of the gospels will reveal that for the disciples themselves there was no other comparable revelatory and visionary experience while Jesus was with them. And in this one only three of the 12 were involved. The other nine only heard of it, presumably, by word of mouth tinged with the enthusiasm of Peter, James and John. Yes, the gospels tell of healings and of Jesus teaching and feeding multitudes of people, but nowhere else do they have such an emotionally charged experience as those three with Jesus on the mountaintop that day, until the Spirit came upon them at Pentecost. Rather the gospels tell us of the daily work of Jesus and the disciples, going from place to place on the dusty roads to teach and preach. They tell of conflicts with local village elders, and criticism from the religious establishment, and the friction of differing ideas. Luckily some give us a few of the teaching parables of Jesus. But for the most part it is everyday routine, but nevertheless energy-consuming activities -- crowds of people, teaching, ministering to individual needs -- from which Jesus and the disciples tried to get away alone for a brief time of quietness. So while the disciples were with Jesus, learning from him and witnessing the things he did, the gospels do not indicate a life of constant excitement and euphoria.
Most ministers hear complaints from time to time from people who ask, "Why isn't the church more exciting?" I've never been really sure what people mean by that. Certainly the church may seem pretty dull to people who are in search of excitement. Contrary to the enjoyable fiction perpetuated in films from "Going My Way" to "Sister Act," excitement is not something that is "produced," as though it were a function of the songs we sing, nor by an evangelistic style of preaching, or decoration of churches with banners, or hand-pumping or hugging friendliness. Those may all have their place. The assumption underlying the question seems to be that whenever we worship together it ought to be highly charged with emotion. We need to recognize that there are as many people turned off by that approach as there are attracted by it. Also it is impossible to maintain a high emotional level, or to re-create it over and over, Sunday after Sunday if, indeed, that were important. This is not to diminish the fact that the church always needs new ideas and material, and needs to seize upon the inherent drama of the good news in worship. At the other end of the spectrum the Friends (Quakers) have discovered the Spirit's presence in simple calm quietness, perhaps because they have cultivated to a rather high degree the ability to listen to the inner spirit, or to the voice of God. There are renewal movements and retreats and the like in our churches from time to time. Given wise leadership and realistic expectations they can be very beneficial. The church always needs new ideas and a new infusion of spirit. There is a danger, however, when people return and, with disappointment in their voices and some disillusionment about the church that sent them, declare, "Why can't the church be like that?"
Well, maybe it could be if an occasional week-end retreat was all it did. Retreats are often rarified atmosphere. They are designed to be mountaintop experiences, composed of a select group of people who are going with a special purpose and perhaps prepared with some expectations, and away from the pressures of everyday life, with a program that can be recycled for each new group that comes. That's not what the local church does. The committee meetings, and Sunday school teacher recruitment, and financing the church program, and keeping the buildings in shape are not generally very inspiring stuff. Teaching a class of little children, or conducting a choir rehearsal with key people missing, or teaching a class of adults who were out too late the night before is hard work. So is dealing with grief, and counseling people with marital problems, and standing beside the bed of a dying friend, and calling on people who are lonely. We don't have an abundance of volunteers for these kinds of things. When I hear someone say, "Why isn't the church more exciting?" I usually conclude that the person who says it may be somewhat out of touch with what the church is doing on an everyday basis. It is true, the church generally doesn't do a very good job of being exciting, at least in terms of emotional appeal. It is good when we can appeal to people in such a way that they feel taken to the mountaintop, and experience a time of special spiritual awareness or enlightenment, or even conversion. But then we need to hear, as the disciples heard, "This is my son, the Beloved; listen to him!" Our best efforts at renewal are not in tinkering with structure and worship, or messing with people's emotions, but in cultivating the ability to hear the word of Jesus, and then to do it.
John Wesley was a powerful dynamo of spiritual power who started a movement that profoundly changed a nation and produced a body of followers, but he records only one such dramatic moment in his own life. It wasn't in church either, but in a little meeting house on Aldersgate Street in London, where, by his own admission, he went very unwillingly. In what we might call a study group today, someone was reading a tract by Martin Luther, called "Preface to the Epistle to the Romans." Not very dramatic material, it would seem, but Luther's words concerning "the change that God works in the heart through faith in Christ," touched Wesley deeply and he felt his heart "strangely warmed." Still rather tame, as mountaintop experiences go. Not the kind of thing people mean when they want the church to be more exciting. But for Wesley, it was enough, and it is the moment he cites in his journal when he was sure of his own salvation, and is surely the critical experience that inspired a lifetime of social action and teaching and preaching. Yet Wesley never again mentions another experience that even comes close to that one. This drama of the soul and its life-long effect reached John Wesley through the intellect, and the Spirit of that encounter accompanied him throughout his life. It was no vision, as for those three disciples, but a more ordinary inspiration that dawns upon the spirit through the intellect, of the sort that you or I might have when in our quest to know the power of God in our own lives we come to a moment where we say, "Aha!" and realize that our spirit has been touched profoundly, perhaps by something we have read or heard, or a thought that suddenly becomes clear.
Martin Luther King, Jr. underlined his impassioned message of civil rights claiming "I've been to the mountaintop." Wherever and whenever that high encounter with God took place in his life, it sent him back down into the cities and streets, into the ghettos and the poor rural areas. It sent him to city hall and to Washington, to the Birmingham jail, and to Selma -- and to Memphis. He didn't have to continually re-create the encounter. He continued to listen to the word of Jesus, and that was enough. Mark tells us that when Jesus and the disciples started back down to the valley, Jesus asked them not to talk about the vision they had on the mountain, at least not until after his resurrection. Of course as yet they had no idea what that meant. But it was probably good advice anyhow. We sometimes tend to talk too much about the things we understand least. Neither did they go down to the other disciples and tell them they must try to have the same experience. Some people tend to over- validate their own very personal religious experiences and think that others must have them as well. But Jesus' counsel to them was to be quiet until a later and perhaps more appropriate time. Perhaps for the other disciples, as for most of us, there would be less dramatic but just as valid revelations and inspirations. Peter and the others, who would have liked to have lingered and enjoyed the high place of the theophanous vision a bit longer, were nevertheless led back down to the valley. There was a group of people awaiting them, and there had been some controversy. Doesn't it seem as though that's the way it always happens? One is brought back to reality rather abruptly. I know that for me it has happened sometimes after a particularly fine and moving worship service that I want to savor for a while, that someone has greeted me with some need that I must attend to, or a complaint that I must hear. We want to stay a bit longer in our enjoyment of a meaningful moment, but the needs of the world await us.
The needs of the world that awaited Jesus and his disciples were focused in a father who had brought his young son to be healed. I remember seeing an artist's depiction of the scene. There is the mountain -- the scene of the magnificent messianic vision -- and there are Jesus and the three disciples descending the path. At the bottom are the father and son, with others around them awaiting for Jesus. That's the way life must be also, with the heights of inspiration painted on the same canvas as the valleys where we live and serve. They are part of the same thing, and can never be very far apart.
The high and revelatory moments of life come to us in various ways. A few are fortunate to experience very dramatic high moments of illumination and exaltation. For others of us those high moments of illumination are, like Wesley's, more quiet and inward. But it is when we encounter the presence of Christ that we have the chance to view life from a new perspective, with luminous vision and clarity. And then, like Elisha coming back across the Jordan, and Jesus and his disciples coming down the mountain, we are brought back to the world of human encounter.
Yes, we've been to the mountaintop! We've been with Jesus! We have seen a vision, and we'll never be the same. We even have someone to show us the way to serve and love, for the admonition to the disciples is to us as well, "This is my son, the Beloved; listen to him." Where we are called to live is the valley of everyday life and to bring the light and clarity of our vision with us, and the vision God gives us is enough to illumine every encounter.
Lord, you have indeed sent somebody to help! You have sent us!
