A glimpse of Glory

My Dear Friends,

I hope you are having a good day. The sun is shining here in Calpe, (well it was when I wrote this yesterday) and I am feeling good!

On Sunday in church we will have the following Gospel reading:
Mark 9.2-9
Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. Then Peter said to Jesus, ‘Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.’ He did not know what to say, for they were terrified. Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!’ Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus. As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. 

This ‘Transfiguration’ was a glimpse of glory given to Peter, and the ‘Sons of Thunder’ – James and John to give them some sense of brightness before the dark clouds of the future threatened.

They were up there on the mountain and became aware of the radiance of Jesus and the presence of Moses and Elijah. In Jesus they were aware that all that Moses and Elijah hoped for was fulfilled.  Like Moses, Jesus would bring people to the freedom of the Promised Land. Elijah, the greatest of the prophets, and Jesus revealed all that he stood for. The people had longed for their coming again.
But there was more. As God had appeared to Moses in the cloud, now he was present in the mountain. And the voice ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, listen to him!’

They had received a glimpse of the Glory of God, but they had to descend the mountain and make their way to Jerusalemfor the events of Holy Week.

We have this reading just before we begin Lent. 
It set the disciples up with a strength to try and face the unknown future with the trauma and uncertainty that held. They were certainly empowered and moved by it, and not surprisingly wanting to hang on to it. But that is not the way with glory.

Back to us today. We face an uncertain and traumatic experience of the future, and we long for God to give us some strength – to reveal himself, and let us know he is who we believe him to be. And we look. And we wait. And we pray. And we read our scriptures………….

But there is no manufacturing of the Glory of God. It does not come to us on demand or even on request. But rather we spot it most unexpectedly, usually when we are engrossed in something else.
Or we may not even spot it at all.

I have been blessed with a few ‘Religious experiences’ during my life, and they were never sought and always not what I was looking for. And they never happened on an ordinary Sunday Morning Service.

One was as I watched a post mortem in the Royal Free Hospital where I was working. I was asked if I wanted to see one, and it became the source of my most powerful experience of the wonder and Glory of God. I just felt I knew that God was the very essence of creation. We are designed and made, we are not just some random accident.

My second was as I sat at the bedside of a dying parishioner. Her family and I sat for four hours, and we held her hand, and I read the scriptures, and we chatted and cried, and I anointed her as she died, and we all felt the presence of God who welcomed her home.

The third was when I was out for a curry. It was not my turn to drive, so I was offered a beer, but for some strange reason I stuck with coke!!! 
Just as we finished our meal I got a call to go to the bedside of someone who was dying. 
Somehow I felt that God was involved in me not drinking. That was not so much about the Glory of God, but his presence.

The fourth that I would like to mention is when I had to preach at the funeral of the Babes in the Wood murder victims. Karen Hadaway and Nichola Fellows.
The sermon I preached was not the one I had prepared! Words came unexpectedly out of my mouth, so much so that I had no idea what was coming next. It genuinely felt ‘Inspired’ and I am sure God revealed something of himself to me through that experience.

Of course we have experienced the wonder and beauty and awesomeness of God at many times during our lives, and they have helped frame our faith.

But what about now, when we are looking, pleading for something or someone to give us strength and hope to carry on, so that we can get through this together. 
A sign of his love and presence would help us all so much. But people ask me, and they say I can’t see him. I can’t hear him. I have never had one of those Mystical Moments, those Mountain Top experiences that make it all seem so real.

Well as I said, we cannot manufacture them, and they don’t come on demand, and truth be told, we may not recognise them if they came.
But here is an idea.

My friends the Monks at Alton Abbey spend their life being ‘Religious’. They do ‘Church stuff’ all day every day, and go to their chapel five times a day. But it is when they retreat to their cell, their own simple space, and be still, and oh so quiet, that they will hear the voice of God.

Sometimes we are too preoccupied, or looking too hard, and demanding some sort of proof and we miss those moments of Glory that God gives to us. Sometimes we just don’t have the eyes to see, or the ears to hear, and the Glory passes us by. Sometimes we are crying out for a glimpse of God, but we are wanting it so much on our terms that we fail to accept the mystery that surrounds us.
But sometimes – just sometimes, something happens and deep inside we know that we are in the presence of God and we can say ‘Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.’

Take a moment to pause from your worries, and think back to some glorious moment that you have experienced, when God seemed very real. A moment of untold beauty, the birth of a child, the feeling when life really did make sense. That moment when you climbed the mountain. Treasure it, and hang on to the feeling it gave you.

My Friends, be still and know. Be quiet and content, and allow your anxieties to drain from your mind, and create some space afresh, so that you can feel the God who dwells in your heart.

Bless you, Bless you, Bless you,

As ever,
Fr Marcus