Why couldn’t they stay on the mountaintop?
I think it’s because the transfiguration isn’t just about God’s presence. It’s also about God’s absence.
What makes me say this is that Moses and Elijah weren’t there for the disciples. “Heavy with sleep,” says the passage, they awakened slowly to what was going on. There was a conversation already underway that would have taken place whether or not they awoke to hear it. It was between Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, and they spoke about his “departure.” Literally in the Greek, his exodos.
“Let’s put up some shelters.” Skene. Tents. Tabernacles. What they didn’t grasp was that the time was drawing near for the living tabernacle, Jesus, to depart from them.
See, it’s no coincidence that just prior to this story Jesus has predicted his death for the first time. He is coming into an increased understanding of his calling as Messiah. He is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets. He is the New Moses. Just like Moses led the Israelites in an exodus out of Egypt, to liberation, his calling involves an exodus as well. Bodily departure, death on the cross. To fulfill his calling though, he must go down the mountain, away from the presence of God, away from the company of his friends.
And so this passage is not just about presence but also about the absence that is to come. What the disciples will miss.
There’s a movement in Christianity, maybe a kind of sub-evangelical movement, to depict Christ very personally, as if we can speak to him and he can speak right back. And although the songs and books that depict this highly accessible Christ are often moving and theologically sound, they can’t be our entire diet. This kind of faith can’t be our everything.
That’s because Christ is not here. He has departed from us. It was always part of the plan.
In Luke 9, Jesus is coming to the point in his ministry when he sets out towards Jerusalem. God says at the end of the passage, “This is my son, whom I have chosen.” Chosen for what? We all know what awaits in Jerusalem.
I hope you don’t take it as sacrilegious to say this, but I think Jesus was afraid. That he was tempted to abandon the calling that he had come to understand as death. Several times in the gospel, Luke disabuses us of the idea that Jesus, because he was divine, was fearless in the face of the cross. Jesus was human. I.e., “Father if you are willing, take this cup from me.”
So, from this perspective the transfiguration becomes a story not just about Jesus’ glory but also about Jesus’s need. His human need to receive comfort and encouragement from heaven.
Yes, the Transfiguration is when Jesus, up to this point, is most visibly divine. But what his disciples lacked were the eyes to see that in this one shining moment, their friend was most profoundly, fully human. Deeply like one of them. Deeply in need of their love.
That Jesus struggled to fulfill his heavenly purpose of dying on a cross shouldn’t come as a shock to us. In fact, it’s an integral part of our faith. Being both fully God and fully man, he was chosen by God to die on the cross. But grace depends on him choosing the same.
The transfiguration, I think, was pivotal for this choice. It’s no coincidence that just a few verses later, in verse 51, we’re told, “As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus set out resolutely for Jerusalem.” What will happen there we all know.
The transfiguration shows the light of God shining through humanity. What this means for us is that because of Jesus, ordinary, everyday people can radiate the glory of God by making ourselves vulnerable to transformation through God’s grace. That’s what it means to live in the light of the cross. That there’s actually more grace to be had down the mountain than on top of it. That even the places in our world where there is great need, even the dark places in our hearts where sin abounds, are places capable of being transformed by grace. Where perhaps grace is already at work. Where God’s glory is trying to break through.
We observe Lent in order to prayerfully ask God to give us eyes to see this mystery when we behold it on Easter. Humanity fully alive. Divinity in the flesh. Jesus Christ, fully God and fully human.
We prepare for this mystery by repenting, turning from sin towards God, visiting the dark corners of our hearts and turning them over to God. Recognizing that in grace there is a possibility that even the most broken things can be forgiven, re-made, and shine like transfiguration.
Klaas Walhout graduated from Calvin in 2016 with majors in philosophy and religion. After five years on the East Coast, he now lives in Grand Rapids, where he spends his days (and sometimes nights) working as a hospital chaplain.
