Many of us can recall a time when we had a peak spiritual experience.  It may have been a great sermon that we heard in church that resonated throughout our heart and mind as if God were speaking directly to us.  Perhaps it was a song that we heard that carried us away to another place and time, another dimension.  For me, many of what I may refer to as deeply spiritual experiences have actually occurred within the wondrous context of nature.  Hiking in the mountains of the West have more than once transported me into another place where the ordinary mode of perceiving was transformed.  The beauty and grandeur of land forms and contours of sky and earth have many times taken my breath away and painted a picture of the divine that has stayed within me to this day.  There is inspiration, awe, excitement and deep shades of mystery that perplex even as they incite delight.

The book of Daniel (Dn 7:9-10, 13-14) describes for us not only a glorious vision but almost an almost terrifying one:

As I watched:
Thrones were set up
and the Ancient One took his throne.
…his throne was flames of fire,
with wheels of burning fire.
A surging stream of fire
flowed out from where he sat;
Thousands upon thousands were ministering to him,
and myriads upon myriads attended him.
The court was convened and the books were opened.

Flaming fire and thousands of people gathered around the “Ancient One” all within the context of what appears to be a court scene.  Daniel goes on later in that passage to describe the coming of “one like a Son of Man” who receives dominion over the entire world.

Mark’s Gospel (MK 9: 2-10) recounts a parallel story, this time involving Jesus and his closest disciples.  They climb a mountain together and the disciples witness the transfiguration of Jesus, wherein his appearance becomes dazzlingly brilliant.  And then from the skies comes the voice of perhaps the “Ancient One” referred to in the book of Daniel:

Then a cloud came, casting a shadow over them;
from the cloud came a voice,
“This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.”

I am struck by the fact that in the midst of this brilliant transfiguration, a cloud appears that casts a “shadow over them.”  And it is from the darkness of the cloud that the voice identifying Jesus comes.  Rather than the awe-inspiring and even terrifying picture that Daniel gives us of the “Son of Man” having dominion over all, the identification that God gives Jesus from the darkness is quite simple yet so rich and deep in meaning.  ‘This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.’  It is the Love of God that identifies Christ.  And it is precisely the Love of God manifested in Jesus the Christ that will ‘guide’ the disciples if they (meaning us) will Listen!

Loving and Listening.  I have to say that I have not necessarily thought of those two terms together very often.  I am struck though by their close proximity in this story of the Transfiguration.  From the darkness of the cloud, the mystery of the ineffable, the God that we cannot see, the identification of Jesus comes as proclaimed ‘My Beloved,’ and then the instruction to Listen.  The order of the two words in the text may be important.  In order to listen, to really discern – what has been referred to as ‘obedience’ – it seems that we must go to the deepest place within us – the Beloved Space of God.  The most precious Love within us as God’s indelible stamp on our souls is the place where we are called to pay attention.  Here we can listen from the deep space within our hearts where God does dwell.  This is what God is revealing on the mountain to the disciples, to us, in and through the Incarnation of God, Jesus the Christ.

I sense that it is not so much just the words that Jesus will say to his disciples in his lifetime that constitute what they should be paying attention or listening to, but perhaps even more so, the mission is to pay attention to the loving life that Jesus leads under the direction of his loving father.  And it seems to be precisely the unconditional love of God that transfigures the life of Jesus as the Christ.  Jesus listened by trusting in the Love of God and then loved others in and through this listening.  The two seem to go hand in hand and becomes the recipe for transformation and what is called in the Scripture as Transfiguration.  So, I wonder if more than a description of the transfiguration of Jesus, Mark may also be pointing to the direction wherein we can be transfigured or transformed within the wholeness of our being.

Peter seems to be hinting about this in his second epistle (2 Pt 1:16-19) when he says the following:

Beloved…We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven
while we were with him on the holy mountain.
Moreover, we possess the prophetic message that is altogether reliable.
You will do well to be attentive to it,
as to a lamp shining in a dark place,
until day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

Peter is reminding us that when God addresses Jesus as the Beloved, we are also being addressed.  We are the Beloved in and through Christ.  We hear his voice from heaven and have the same responsibility to ‘do well to be attentive to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until day dawns and the morning star rises in our hearts.’

It’s many times in the dark places of our lives that we are called forth to trust in the Love of God in our lives.  It’s many times within the shadows cast in our pathway that we are called to Listen in Love – to be loved and to BE LOVE!  Isn’t this really the whole message of Christ that we are shown not just in the words from his mouth, but the loving actions of his healing, welcoming, saving, ultimately his death and rising?

Sometimes it’s easy to glamorize the Gospel message, and miss what transfiguration and transformation involves.  It’s the willingness to hold within our hearts the darkness in our lives that inevitably comes under many guises.  To hold it with the trust that Christ had in God – the trust that the morning star will rise in our hearts, and not only lead us through the death and darkness but to be as a lamp shining in a dark place, witnessing the power of being loved and being Love.  Our struggles are never meant just for us, but their deepest resurrect-ive meaning lies within the context of our lives, the people around us and ultimately for the whole world.

This is the Beloved space given to each one of us in our creation – that tiny divine spark that Thomas Merton spoke about that becomes the passageway of God’s love resounding in our lives and declaring to all the world that I am Beloved, that you are Beloved, that we are all beloved and we have only to be attentive to this, to hear this over and over again in our lives.  If we can learn to listen to God’s love in this Beloved space, the tiny spark which we each have within us can take on the force of a Supernova, creatively participating in the transfiguration of each other over and over again!

Peace,

Thomas