The Veil is Lifted
February
18, 2007
Al Hocutt
Growing up as a child one of my
favorite TV characters was the Lone Ranger. He had a white horse and a
white suit and white handled six shooters. But the most exciting thing
was, that he wore a black mask. The mask hid his identity. As I grew
older, it became clear that just wearing a simple mask over the eyes was
not enough to truly hide someone. It seemed silly that the people were
fooled by the mask. People wear masks everyday, masks that don’t hide
their faces but hide their spirits from the world.
Moses was called by
God to deliver God’s
people from oppression and slavery. Moses listened and led
God’s people into the wilderness to the foot
of Mt. Sinai. Moses traveled to the mountain top and
God wrote with his own finger the laws for God’s
people. God’s people turned away and made
golden idols to worship. Moses traveled up and down the mountain five
times to hear God’s Word and deliver the Word
to God’s people. When Moses came back down
the mountain Moses’ face shown with a brilliant light, so bright that
Aaron and the people were afraid to come near Moses. Moses began to put on
a veil or mask to shield the people of God.
Moses would remove the mask in the presence of God
and replace it each time he came down the mountain. Moses hid his face
from the people of God.
We all have the wonderful
advantage here in North Carolina that we have the mountains in a short
driving distance. It is a glorious vision to climb to the top of
Grandfather Mountain and stand to view the greatness of
God’s creation. We even have a mountain top
experience and our lives are changed as we stand in the awesomeness of the
beauty.
It is the mountain top where
Moses met God. God
descended into the world and dwelled with the people of
God. The symbol of the mountain and cloud is
a symbol of the presence of God on earth.
God makes our horizontal into a vertical.
Moses ascended to the mountain top and descended with the witness of the
revelation of God. The shining face of Moses
is the result of his presence before God. But
this brilliance goes beyond a shinny face; Moses now embodies the presence
of God for the people of
God. We celebrate Transfiguration Sunday
today because the veil has been lifted and we stand in the presence of
God to be embodied with the power of
God. Moses removed the veil and turned to
God and the people were set free. No one
stands in the presence of God and leaves with
a life that is not unchanged by the experience.
Removing the veil opens our life
to the truth of the Messiah. Lifting the veil allows us to enter the
presence of Christ and begin a step-by-step
journey into a life of transformation in spiritual growth and moving
closer to embodying the presence of God.
The word transfiguration is a
translation of the Greek word metamorphoo meaning a change of form.
Luke uses the phrase egeneto heteron meaning simply “changed”.
Luke’s gospel comes to us today as a bridge between the season of Epiphany
and the season of Lent. Transfiguration Sunday is a reminder of
God’s choice to come to earth in the form of
human flesh to change our lives forever.
Congregations and small groups
within them are probably tired of the cliché of “journey” in
describing our lives in Christ. But our life
is a journey, a walk with the living Lord. The journeys that we take
reveal to us our weakness and our strengths and allow us to face who we
really are. The transfiguration took place after Peter confessed that
Jesus was the Messiah and
Jesus announced that he must suffer, die and
be raised on the third day. The disciples are in total disbelief and can
not accept what they have just heard. Then comes the transfiguration and
Jesus glows with the light of
God and Moses and Elijah are with him.
The transfiguration is a glimpse
of the resurrection, the kingdom of God
beyond the cross and the victory over death. The disciples had hard days
before them and they would need this glimpse of the kingdom to sustain
them in their journey. In our walk with Christ
we also hit difficult times and sometimes we take the wrong path. The
transfiguration of Jesus is the sign that
points us to the truth and the way we are to go and remind us that
Christ is with us each and every day.
Luke has woven a common thread
from the story of Moses, the shinning light of God,
into the gospel with the transfiguration of Christ.
The gospel has been given to us this morning to share with us the
transforming power of Christ, to witness a
moment in the life of Christ that unites with
us. We become a witness to the birth, baptism, life, ministry, the
miracles, and the acceptance of others, the healing touch, the compassion,
the love, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus.
We hear the voice of God speaking to us in
the cloud saying “this is my Son, listen to him.”
The most amazing event of the
day was the disciples, non-reaction to the transfiguration. They were
sleeping! The first thing that Peter wanted to do was to put up a tent in
honor of the occasion. They only felt the heaviness of the situation when
the cloud of God surrounded them and the
voice of God begins to speak. And then they
were afraid to tell anyone!
Jesus
and the disciples came down the mountain and were greeted with the same
desires of the people to be healed of their sickness.
Jesus asked the wonderful question of how
long this perverse generation would remain faithless and unwilling to
believe the truth. Standing on the mountain top is a glorious event in our
lives but it will not sustain us when we travel down in the valley. Only
when we have the ability to remove the veil from our faces and look fully
into the glorious face of Christ will we be
changed. Jesus came to change the world one
life at a time. When we gather at the mountain top we can not build our
tents there and leave them behind. Our bodies become the tent of the
living Christ to be brought down to others to
share in God’s glory and kingdom. It would be
so powerful if we could say to those around us “Have I ever told you that
every time I see you I think of Jesus
Christ;
Your eyes, like
his, are full of compassion.
Your face
sometimes seems to shine, as though you’ve been in communion with
God.
Your
hands, like his are marked from the pain and suffering that comes of
helping others
Your
words, like his, bring hope and truth.”
Each of us has a choice to make in our
lives. Do we only stand at the bottom of the mountain and never take the
risk of seeing the glory of God? Do we come
to the valley knowing that Christ has touched
our lives but are unwilling to share it with others? Do we turn inward and
never reflect Christ to others? The apostle
Paul said it a lot better than I, “And all of us, with unveiled faces,
seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being
transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for
this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.”
Let us go forward with unveiled faces
shining with the light of Christ, take off
your mask.
