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Mark - Part 9
- 1. visions, veils, & confusion i can hear clearly now….
- 2. mark 9:2-13
- 4. everything more than it seems
- 6. dust
- 8. bee
- 10. sand
- 12. transform, awe & power
- 16. Please sit down. Ellis Boyd Redding, your files say you've served 40 years of a life sentence. Do you feel you've been rehabilitated? Rehabilitated? Well, now let me see. You know, I don't have any idea what that means. Well, it means that you're ready to re-join society... I know what “you” think it means, sonny. To me it's just a made up word. A politician's word, so that young fellas like yourself can wear a suit and a tie, and have a job. What do you really want to know? Am I sorry for what I did? Well, are you? There's not a day goes by I don't feel regret. Not because I'm in here, because you think I should. I look back on the way I was then: a young, stupid kid who committed that terrible crime. I want to talk to him. I want to try and talk some sense to him, tell him the way things are. But I can't. That kid's long gone and this old man is all that's left. I got to live with that. Rehabilitated? It's just a bullshit word. So you go on and stamp your form, sonny, and stop wasting my time. Because to tell you the truth, I don't give a shit.
- 17. metamorphoo
- 18. take a step back
- 19. open your eyes on the mountain
- 20. inner reality
- 21. fuzzy?
- 22. when he took the three disciples to the mountainside to pray, his countenance was modified, his clothing was aflame. two men appeared: moses and elijah came; they were at his side. the prophecy, the legislation spoke of whenever he would die. then there came a word of what he should accomplish on the day. then peter spoke, to make of them a tabernacle place. a cloud appeared in glory as an accolade. they fell on the ground. a voice arrived, the voice of god, the face of god, covered in a cloud. what he said to them, the voice of god: the most beloved son. consider what he says to you, consider what's to come. the prophecy was put to death, was put to death, and so will the son. and keep your word, disguise the vision till the time has come. lost in the cloud, a voice: have no fear! we draw near! lost in the cloud, a sign: son of man! turn your ear! lost in the cloud, a voice: lamb of god! we draw near! lost in the cloud, a sign: son of man! son of god!
- 23. sign and voice
- 24. resurrection
- 25. puzzling
- 26. so what is being said? • transform • remove the veil • listen obey
- 27. i can see clearly now what’s the next story?
Editor's Notes
- Six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John, and led them up a high mountain to be alone. As the men watched, Jesus’ appearance was transformed, and his clothes became dazzling white, far whiter than any earthly bleach could ever make them. Then Elijah and Moses appeared and began talking with Jesus. Peter exclaimed, “Rabbi, it’s wonderful for us to be here! Let’s make three shelters as memorials—one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He said this because he didn’t really know what else to say, for they were all terrified.Then a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my dearly loved Son. Listen to him.” Suddenly, when they looked around, Moses and Elijah were gone, and they saw only Jesus with them.As they went back down the mountain, he told them not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept it to themselves, but they often asked each other what he meant by “rising from the dead.”Then they asked him, “Why do the teachers of religious law insist that Elijah must return before the Messiah comes?”Jesus responded, “Elijah is indeed coming first to get everything ready. Yet why do the Scriptures say that the Son of Man must suffer greatly and be treated with utter contempt? But I tell you, Elijah has already come, and they chose to abuse him, just as the Scriptures predicted.”
- Pivotal point in the account of Jesus by the theologian Mark.Chapters 1-8 there has been this build up to the recognition of Jesus as Messiah and his kingdom. Peter’s declaration in Mark 8 – you are Messiah. The one hoped for, for generations, the one come to rescue the world, to establish the Kingdom of God.The coming of the KofG with power (miracles, deliverance, overturning religion, the submission of nature) has a lot more to do with the radical defeat of deep rooted evil than with the destruction of the good world God made and loves.Chapters 9-15 is the build up to Jesus’ death. Jesus seems to think that evil will be defeated and the kingdom will come, precisely through his own suffering and death.So Jesus says follow me and it isn’t for a pleasant afternoon walk but a walk into danger and risk.
- What is it all about?Hallucination? Vision? Veil lifted? Celtic Christianity talked about “thin places” where the gap between our realm and that of the kingdom was thin?I’m going to try and convey so of what they experienced?
- When I was about 8 or 9 I got a microscope for my birthday and suddenly I became aware of a world that I had never seen before. I scrabbled around looking for things to put under the lens so I could see things more clearly. There was a whole different dimension to the world I had known until that point.Do you know what this is?
- Common experiences but move it up a scale, turn the lever up to 12 out of 10The story of Jesus’ transfiguration which is translated from the word metamorphoo from which we get the word metamorphosis seems to have been an actual event in which the deepest significance of everyday reality suddenly and overwhelmingly confronted Peter, James and John.Peter, as per usual blurts out foot in mouth disease and God’s response is shut up and listen.
- What has happened in Mark so far? Jesus has, metaphorically speaking, led the disciples up the mountain of a new view of God’s kingdom. In extraordinary actions and puzzling but profound words he has unveiled for them what God is up to. Those ‘outside’ look and look, but they never see, yet the disciples are having their eyes opened so that they can see for the first time the inner reality of God’s kingdom and the central truth that Jesus really is the Messiah – even though he doesn’t look like what they might have expected.So the story so far keeps telling us about eyes being opened, in several senses, and it all concentrates on Jesus himself and God’s kingdom that is arriving with him.
- Now Jesus takes the disciples literally up a high mountain and something similar happens, though on another level. All cultures apart from western culture, though we are increasingly realising it, have realised that the world we live in has many layers, many dimensions, and that sometimes these dimensions, normally hidden, may appear.Like when I was eight, we can the look for a moment into a different reality, gasp with wonder and ever afterwards see things differently.That’s how it was on this mountain – Mount Hermon, just north of Caesarea Philippi.
- What was the inner reality of Jesus’ work? He was continuing and completing the tasks of the great prophet Elijah, and, behind him, of the greatest prophet of old, Moses himself.Both of them had disappeared from view rather than died in the ordinary way, surrounded by their families and friends. Legends had grown up about their being somehow spared proper death. Now they reappear, with the veil of ordinariness drawn back for a moment, and Jesus is with them, shining with a brilliant light.
- What does it all mean then?It isn’t a revelation of Jesus’ divinity, if it were, that would make Elijah and Moses divine too, which Mark certainly doesn’t want us to think. Mark does believe in Jesus’ divinity, but he hasn’t yet told us why? Rather, as the similar experiences of mystics in various ages and cultures would suggest, this is a sign of Jesus being entirely caught up with, bathed in, the love, power and kingdom of God, so that it transforms his whole being with light. A bit like the way music transforms words that are sung.
- This event, the metamorphoo, is the sign that Jesus is not just speaking and doing the truth. It’s the sign that he is indeed the true prophet, the true Messiah.And that too is what the heavenly voice is saying. Jesus is God’s special beloved son. Elijah and Moses were vital in preparing the way; Jesus is finishing the job. And the instruction is to listen to him, and by implication do as he says.For Peter, James and John the realisation that Jesus is Messiah is enough to be going on with.
- But once again Jesus tells them not to reveal what they’ve seen and he gives them a cryptic time frame – until the son of man has risen from the dead.This puzzles them for as good Jews they thought the resurrection would happen at the end of time. It would happen to all the righteous Jews. And here Jesus seems to be saying that resurrection is being split in two. Resurrection is coming forward and crashing into the middle of history and is going to happen to one person ahead of all others.Confused disciples – for sure and they remained confused and puzzled until after the event.
- All of this could remain puzzling to us, too. We don’t generally experience things as dramatic as this story. We don’t unlike the disciples here try and interpret details of our lives and times according to a detailed scriptural plot. But each of us is called to do what the heavenly voice said: Listen to Jesus, because he is God’s beloved son.
- Transfiguration – Revelation of who Jesus really is, a glimpse of the reality of the kingdom, part of a bigger story, pivotal point in Mark.Transform – this is an account of what is really real. Romans 12:2 – transform your mind so you can know God’s willThe reality of the kingdom in our livesRemove the veil – enter into the story and mission of GodThe veil torn in two, the barrier between us and the kingdom of God removed. Veil in the temple at Jesus’ deathCreation – Separation – World not as it is meant to be – Rescue – World as it was always meant to be is crashing in, the created order will be restored – No separation between God and mankind.Listen Obey – what is Jesus saying, what is he asking us to do, what is he doing – do that.