Episodes
Sunday Feb 07, 2016
Elevation Matters
Sunday Feb 07, 2016
Sunday Feb 07, 2016
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli at Foundry UMC, February 7, 2016, Transfiguration Sunday.
Texts: Exodus 34:29-35, Luke 9:28-36
I’ve been studying how to read blueprints. “Elevation” refers to the view looking sideways at the object. As I explored the idea of elevation as the view “looking sideways” I stumbled upon what appears to be an extraordinary work—now 15 years old—called The Art of Looking Sideways by the late British designer and art director, Alan Fletcher. In one interview, Fletcher says that the book is “for visually curious people who don’t like to walk around the world with blinkers—like all the rest of the world does.”[i] (“Blinkers” is the British way of referring to what we call “blinders,” pieces of leather that are placed at the side of a horse’s eyes to stop it from looking sideways.) The book is described as “a primer in visual intelligence, an exploration of the workings of the eye, the hand, the brain and the imagination. It is an inexhaustible mine of anecdotes, quotations, images, curious facts and useless information, oddities, serious science, jokes and memories, all concerned with the interplay between the verbal and the visual…”[ii] Even a cursory review of the book’s pages online was somewhat mind-bending and very thought-provoking. The art of looking sideways…
To deal with matters of elevation is to look sideways at something—literally to see it from north, south, east, west in order to have a sense of perspective and wholeness. It is also—more metaphorically—to be open to new revelation, new vision, to “take the blinkers off” in order to perceive things in a less narrowly-focused or one-dimensional way.
This is always the task of biblical study and interpretation. Every passage of scripture can be explored in many dimensions—historically, from the perspective of genre or form, comparatively with other literature or other scriptural passages, theologically, devotionally, anagogically, and on it goes. Many of you know the story of the blind men and the elephant: Once upon a time, there lived six blind men in a village. One day the villagers told them, “Hey, there is an elephant in the village today.” They had no idea what an elephant was. They decided, “Even though we would not be able to see it, let us go and feel it anyway.” Each of them touched the elephant and described it in a different way—“Hey, the elephant is a pillar,” said the first man who touched his leg. “Oh, no! it is like a rope,” said the second man who touched the tail. “Oh, no! it is like a thick branch of a tree,” said the third man who touched the trunk of the elephant. “It is like a big hand fan” said the fourth man who touched the ear of the elephant. “It is like a huge wall,” said the fifth man who touched the belly of the elephant. “It is like a solid pipe,” said the sixth man who touched the tusk of the elephant. Finally, another man came by and explained that the elephant had all the qualities the men had described; they had simply touched it at different places.
When we encounter scripture, we can “touch” it at different places. Does our Gospel passage today point to something that really happened in history? Does it include symbolic and thematic elements that, when compared to other scripture accounts—like the passage from Exodus —reflect Jesus’s close proximity to God? Is this passage a literary device that is placed within the larger narrative to highlight Jesus’s clarity of purpose even as the disciples—both those on the mountain and those left below—struggle to grasp what Jesus is saying and who Jesus is? Is this story an invitation to emulate Jesus’s practice of turning to God in prayer—and in this case, prayer in the face of fear and danger and challenge? Does the story present images—like visions, auras, and voices in clouds—that point toward the mystical elements of Judeo-Christian tradition? Does the appearance of Moses and Elijah invite deeper reflection upon the connection of our Christian tradition to the Jewish law and prophetic traditions? Is this story an epiphany—that is, a revelation or manifestation of Jesus’s divine nature? Does the passage challenge us to listen more consistently and deeply to Jesus?
I would argue the answer to all these questions is, “yes.” And within each question are depths to be explored. The Gospel we heard today is the author of Luke’s version of what is commonly called “the transfiguration.” Generally, “transfiguration” is defined in two primary ways: a change in form or appearance and a spiritual change.[iii] In other words, transfiguration is a change that is manifest both physically and spiritually. It is not one or the other. The stories of Jesus reveal again and again the mystery of God made manifest in human form—the physical and the spiritual, the horizontal and the vertical, the human and the divine, the limited and the infinite, met together. The story of Jesus’s transfiguration is one of these moments. We can receive and wrestle with these stories in all sorts of ways—touching the texts and the tradition at different points to discover the depth of their meanings.
And yet there are those who take only one perspective…Those who take scripture out of context—out of narrative context, historical context, cultural context, theological context; there are those who want to read scripture “literally” even when large chunks of the Bible were never meant to be read that way. There are also folks who would, like Thomas Jefferson (who actually carved up the Bible with a pen knife), reject any reference to the scientifically unexplainable, who have little openness to mysticism or to spiritual and devotional ways of engaging the text. These partial ways of reading scripture are equivalent to trying to build something with only the floorplan of a blueprint—to build without elevation or looking sideways. If we try to understand and build our lives of faith through such a one-dimensional reading of our sacred texts, then we will never be complete. Our lives—like our interpretation of scripture—will be flat; there will be little depth or nuance to our faith perspective.
One clear and consistent message in the story of the transfiguration as it is found in Matthew, Mark, and Luke is the command: “Listen!” “Listen to my beloved child, Jesus…” There are many ways that God communicates with us—through images, other people, music, and so on. But our tradition teaching that one of the primary ways we listen to Christ is through engagement with the scriptures. Are you listening? Are you If so, how? When? The Bible can be an intimidating book—because it is so varied in genre, style, source, and more. But there are good study and devotional Bibles out there to help you “look sideways”—that is, to explore the text with open mind AND heart (there is information to help you find a Bible in the church office). There are resources available that can help you learn to pray with the scriptures, listening for God’s voice speaking to you in the text. There are human resources in this congregation who I encourage to step up and teach a Bible study or a course on Lectio Divina (praying with the scriptures). Jesus went up on the mountain not because he enjoyed mountain climbing, but to pray. And in the midst of prayer, he communed with Moses, the giver of the Law, and Elijah, primary among the prophets. In one sense, you might say that Jesus was praying with the Hebrew scriptures—the law and prophets—as he contemplated his “departure” which was his death in Jerusalem. Over and again, throughout the Gospel accounts, in the midst of temptation and challenge of every kind, Jesus called upon the scriptures to strengthen, guide, and sustain him.
As we move closer to General Conference as a denomination and to the presidential election as a nation—and in the midst of whatever personal trials we may be facing—what a gift to be able to draw upon the sustaining resources of prayer and scriptural reflection. This is a gift, not just because the more we know scripture the better we fare in debates with those who want to use the Bible as a weapon, but also—and more importantly—because if we’re truly engaged in these practices with eyes and hearts and minds open to the variety of ways to receive God’s Word, we will have a much greater chance of keeping a healthy and kin-dom-focused perspective. And, like Jesus who turned again and again to God in times of struggle and uncertainty, we will receive grace and encouragement to face whatever comes with love and with conviction to stand firm for the cause of right. Others might even begin to see in our lives an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace…a transfiguration, a sign that when God is involved there is always more than meets the…well, there is always just more.
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