March 16, 2025 I am at Saint Gregory Abbey in Shawnee, OK
Genesis 15: 5-12 + Psalm 27 + Philippians 3: 17-4:1 + Luke 9: 28-36
We are so like Peter, James, and John in this ninth chapter of Luke’s Gospel. They want nothing to do with suffering, but they sure like the glory. Immediately before this mysterious event, Jesus has shared with his closest companions his sense of what lies ahead for him if he continues his mission fulfilling his Father’s will. He had to have been filled with a sense of dread and surely some fear. I suspect that he shared this with his companions hoping for a pledge of their support when he his finally attacked by the leaders of the people. As Luke tells it however, they say nothing as Jesus speaks about how following him would mean taking up a cross.
Perhaps to prepare them for what they would see on another hill outside Jerusalem, Jesus takes these three to another hill where he prays and they sleep. This is the same three who do the same thing in a garden after their Passover dinner. On this first hill they want to hold on to this great glory and declare that it is good to be there. Then on that other hill, they are nowhere to be found.
They are so like us. We want nothing to do with suffering, or for that matter others who are suffering. We don’t want to see it. So, we close our eyes as if sleeping would make it all go away, and we are quiet too often saying nothing about the injustices that cause so many to suffer. Yet when the glory time comes, most of us would be found at the head of the line like Peter who wants to share in that glory by building tents. Yet he wants nothing to do with anything or anyone when it comes to suffering.
For the second time in Luke’s Gospel there is a voice from heaven. At his Baptism Jesus heard a voice that said: “You are my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.” No one else heard that voice there are the Jordan. It was spoken only to Jesus. Now the voice speaks for a second time, and now it speaks to those three disciples with an added directive: “Listen to him.”
Two powerful statements leap off the page of this weekend’s Gospel: “Listen to him” and “It is good for us to be here.” They had a hard time listening when he did not say things they wanted to hear. Yet, the command will not go away. Then for Peter to say that “It is good to be here” when Christ is revealed in his glory is troubling because when it would have been good to be on another hill, he was absent. We can leave this church today with those two statements ringing in our minds. We have come to listen, as he tells us to take up the cross and follow him. While it is good to be here today, it would be better if we were with the suffering, the lonely, the homeless, the sick, or the imprisoned. It will very good when we can say that and mean it as we accept and take up the crosses that do and will always come our way.