The Hope of the Believer . . .

The Hope of the Believer...No. 8

JESUS TALKED WITH THE "DEAD" ABOUT HIS DEATH 

Heaven and earth meet in a glorious way on the Mount of Transfiguration. We don't know for sure what mountain it was, maybe Tabor or Great Hermon, but it doesn't matter. The story is told by Matthew, Mark, and Luke. All three tell us that Peter, James, and John went with Jesus into the mountain. Matthew and Mark say their purpose was to be alone; Luke says they went there to pray. All three preserve for us the basic facts, that while Jesus was there with them in the mount he was trans-figured before them.

Mark explains transfigured by saying Jesus's clothes became dazzling white, "brighter than any earthly bleacher could make them." Matthew explains transfigured by saying Jesus' face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as the light. Luke says he was praying when he was transfigured and that the aspect of his face was changed and that his clothes became brilliant as lightning.

All three evangelists tell us that Moses and Elijah appeared with Jesus and talked with him, but it is Luke who adds two crucial points to the story. He says that Moses and Elijah "appeared in glory," which tells us that there was real heaven present in this earthly scene. Even more impressive is that Luke tells the reader what Moses and Elijah talked about: "they were speaking of his passing which he was to accomplish in Jerusalem."

This establishes my thesis that Jesus talked to the "dead" about his own death. It is a scintillating story, one that is full of exciting implications and of one that should thrill our hearts and buoy up our hope

I put "dead" in quotes because Moses and Elijah were not dead in the sense that they no longer lived. They were very much alive, for they knew what was going on on earth and were dispatched by God to encourage his Son to drink the cup the Father had served him. They appeared in glory because they were in glory. For the moment part of heaven had come down to earth. The apostles saw what few mortals have ever seen, residents of heaven talking to a man upon the earth. They must have marvelled to the point of being speechless. Peter eventually says some crazy thing about building three abodes for each of those he sees in glory, but Mark and Luke both say that Peter did not know what he was saying. All three record that they were frightened.

While we may conclude that God arranged this glorious experience especially for the encouragement of Jesus as he faced the Cross, we may also see in it a means of strengthening the apostles and giving them hope of a triumphant future. Jesus must have known something of what was going to happen on the mount, and he saw to it that it was witnessed by weak, mortal man. But he took only three of the apostles with him, the three he usually selected on special occasions. In Mk. 5:37 it says that he permitted only Peter, James, and John to go with him into a home for a special ministry. This shows that Jesus was training both an outer circle of disciples and an inner circle. In the mountain the three select apostles bore witness to a heavenly display of glory that affected their testimony for the rest of their lives.

In 2 Pet. 1:16-18 Peter points back to the Transfiguration experience as he bore witness to the gospel, recalling what he had seen and heard when he was with Christ "in the holy mountain." In John 1:14 another of the three apostles recalls the experience as he identifies Jesus with the Word become flesh: "We beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth."

What a show that was on the holy mountain! It served as a stage suspended between heaven and earth. The actors were the two great luminaries of Israel's religion, Moses and Elijah, along with the Christ himself. Angels too vast to number made up the audience. And yet lowly fishermen of our tiny planet were given a box seat so they could gain some insight into the vastness of the glorious Christ and share it with the rest of us mortals. It is one more instance of the magnanimity of God's grace. And it is one more reason why the believer can abound in hope, for what those three men saw on that occasion anticipates the glory that will be for all those who are destined to become like the glorious Christ. What a blessed hope that is!

This story indicates that once the deceptive barriers of "this world" are removed there is a close fellowship between the "living" and the "dead." The apostles did not have to be told who Moses and Elijah were. They recognized them at once even though they had never before seen them. And Moses and Elijah, though "dead" for centuries, knew exactly what was going on upon earth. Language was spoken, which may have in this instance been the universal tongue of angels spoken in heaven or their own earthly dialect, but in either case they all understood it alike. The point is that there was meaningful dialogue and fellowship related to what the God of heaven was up to. And whether one was already in heaven or yet upon earth did not matter. For the moment on that mountain the saints on earth and those in heaven were as much together as if they were sitting in the same assembly.

We might think of Moses and Elijah as representatives of their particular eras. Moses represents the Old Covenant and all the promises that pointed to the coming Christ, and his presence shows that all this is being realized in Jesus Christ. Elijah represents the prophets who told of the coming Christ, and his presence proclaims this fulfilled. When God at last speaks from heaven, he lays down the foundation truth of our faith, anticipated by the law and the prophets: "This is my beloved Son. Hear Him!" (Mk. 9:7).

Here we have the basis of discipleship and the bond of union. When we heed the call of the Transfiguration and resolve to follow Jesus Christ unconditionally we are truly his disciples, and we are at one with all others who so resolve.

This great truth served as a corrective to Peter's impetuousness, who because he saw three men "in glory" wanted to build a tent for each of them, one for Moses and Elijah as much as for Jesus. This is the flaw that often makes discipleship conditioned upon our own will. We want God to do it our way! Each wants his own little tent in glory!

It was a fearful moment for the apostles when Moses and Elijah disappeared as suddenly as they appeared. The glory had passed. Only Jesus stood there with them as before. But the message was clear. Others may share Christ's glory but no one else, not even a Moses or an Elijah, is his equal as God's own son. Hear Jesus Christ is heaven's mandate to sinful humanity!

The Transfiguration must have been a turning point in the pilgrimage of our Lord, serving as the occasion on which Jesus resigns himself to face the Cross. If Jesus "grew" in stature and wisdom, and did not start out full grown in every respect, as Lk. 2:52 indicates, then he might well have come to see the full measure of "the cup" that he was to drink only gradually. We know that he did not start his ministry by talking about his death. He talked rather of life, repentance, the coming kingdom, and he was at first highly successful. He first went out to bring "the lost sheep of the house of Israel" back to God. He did not go to the Gentiles. He might well have supposed at the outset, that as God's prophet for the new age, he would be able to do just that, bring his own people back to God.

But the powers of evil conspired. The Jewish system itself rejected him, seeing him as a threat. They had the power to turn even the people against him. The tables were turned. Jesus now had to hide out and to take precautions not at first necessary. It was only then that he began to talk to his disciples about his own death.

The turning point may have been when he left Galilee and went into Tyre and Sidon (Mk. 7:24). Mark says he did not want anyone to know where he was. It looks as if he might have been there for some time, even though he did not succeed in completely getting away from it all. Was this when he came to see more clearly what God intended for him: that he was to receive from the hand of his own Father "the cup" that only he could drink? It was upon his return from Tyre that he began to warn his disciples of the leaven of Herod and of the Pharisees, and only then, according to Mark, did he make the first mention of his impending death, which he was to repeat again and again. Then comes the glory of the Transfiguration.

There is no way for us to fathom the mystery of the Cross, as to why God should will that Jesus should die for all mankind. No theory is wholly satisfactory. It is enough for us to see that Jesus, however reluctantly, at last accepted this as his great task. The mystery is compounded by the fact that Jesus realized that it was not the Jewish leaders and the Roman authorities who imposed upon him the sentence of death, for they were but instruments in God's hand. It was God himself who served his son the cup of untold agony and suffering. And it was to the Father himself that he in the end implored that the cup might be withdrawn: "Abba, Father, all things are possible for You. Take this cup away from Me; nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will" (Mk. 14:36).

This pitiful scene should wrench our souls in that it focuses upon the indescribable suffering of our Lord and lays bear what it means to be a Christian. In that agonizing cry to heaven he is like a little child in great distress. Abba, Father!, he cries out as a helpless Jewish child would. "It is possible for you to save me from this, Please!," he was saying. What mattered most to Jesus in that agonizing hour was that he do his Father's will. Then came the prayer of resignation, "Not what I will, but what You will."

For his own eternal reasons the God of heaven did not withdraw the cup, but he gave his son the grace to bear it. Part of the preparation was the Transfiguration. God sent Moses and Elijah to be with Jesus. The record says they talked about "the decease which He was about to accomplish in Jerusalem" (Lk. 9:31). Was this an explanation of why God was so acting or was it encouragement in the face of a great ordeal? We only know that it was the Cross that was the subject or the "Exodus" as a whole.

The word for decease or departure is the Greek word exodus. Moses had lead an exodus, and now he was talking to Jesus about the exodus he would lead. The curtain would fall in the impending events in Jerusalem. It would all be over. Our Lord would make his exodus, which is different from dying. Jesus did not "die" in any real sense. He rather made his departure. And that is what Moses and Elijah talked to him about.

Our Lord suffered agonizing loneliness, not only as a reject of his own people, but as a reject of heaven as well. His great task now clearly defined, he set his face toward the cross. Elijah and Moses were there to help him through it all.

Because of the great truths of the Transfiguration we are able to face tomorrow. It prepares us for our exodus from this world. It shows us that we are not going to die anymore than Jesus died — or Moses and Elijah — but that we are going to depart. And it shows us that when we lose ourselves in doing God's will all will be well, no matter what comes. Even when we may not quite grasp what is going on. We don't have to understand.

Our departure? If heaven and earth got together on that mountain and talked about Jesus' departure from this world, why should we not share with each other the glory we share as joint heirs with Christ? If you are a true believer you have a reserved seal It is in fact marked "In glory," which is more than first class.

The likes of Moses and Elijah may come calling at anytime. Or will it be your saintly mother or that darling grandchild. "Departure time!" they will tell us. And what a show we are in for! It will then be evident what should already be apparent, that nothing else in this life really matters except our exodus from this evil world. — the Editor