Glimpses of Mystery - Light for the Journey

Mark 9: 2-9

Roger C. Lynn

February 26, 2017 

Transfiguration Sunday

(click here for the audio for this sermon)

Within Celtic spirituality there is an understanding of “thin places” – locations and occasions when the veil between the everyday, ordinary world of our senses and the extraordinary, expansive world of sacred divine presence grows thinner (more accessible). I am intrigued by this idea, because it resonates with my own experience of the world. It is still not clear to me if the “thinness” is connected to particular places or if it is related to how much we are paying attention. And, quite frankly, I’m not really sure it matters. In Thomas Cahill’s “How the Irish Saved Civilization,” when speaking of the faith which Patrick brought to Ireland, Cahill writes, “The world is holy, not just parts of it. The sacred dance of the sacramental life, a sacramentality not limited to the symbolic actions of the church’s liturgy, but open to the whole created universe. All the world is holy!” St. Catherine of Seina put it this way, “All the way to heaven is heaven.” By whatever means the “thinness” comes to be perceived, there certainly seem to be those times when we become particularly aware of the presence of the sacred surrounding us. And when such experiences find their way into our lives, one of the first things we discover is that we simply do not have enough words to adequately describe them. We resort to poetry and metaphor in an attempt to at least scratch the surface. 

During my time in Ft. Smith, Arkansas Jack Pollard was the chaplain at the hospital there and a member of my congregation. In 1990 he published a collection of his columns from the hospital magazine. This is what he wrote in his introduction. “Our eyes perceive the world around us, but there is another realm which lies beyond our sight. While life’s deeper meanings may be contained in the obvious, they wait for our minds to grasp them. Occasionally truth seeks us out, flashing into our awareness unexpectedly, perhaps in the midst of our daily routines. It is for us to remain teachable seekers, open to all that our creator may yet have in store. If we stop with what we can see, we will miss a lot. Life truly is more than meets the eye.”

Jesus takes three of his closest friends with him into the mountains to pray. And there they have such an experience. It is more than they can comprehend. It is more than they can deal with. They were, in Mark’s words, terrified. They use words like transfigured, and conjure up images of dazzling light and voices from clouds. Peter wants to capture the moment and contain it. “Let’s build three dwellings!” But that is not the way of such experiences. They cannot be captured or contained. They cannot be adequately described or even understood. They can only be experienced. Jesus even warns them on the way back down the mountain to refrain from talking about what just happened. Why? Perhaps because they aren’t yet ready to talk about it. Such things take time to settle in. Whatever meaning they might hold for us and for our living is not always immediately apparent. “Live with it for a while,” Jesus seems to be saying.

The psalmist offers us a description of what such an experience is like. “We were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy.” (Psalm 126:1-2) Sometimes that is all we can do. Sometimes that is enough. Such experiences are a gift to be savored. They offer us hope to get us through the tough times. They offer us light to lead us down the shadowed paths. 

I know that such experiences do occur, because I have experienced them. Indeed, they probably occur more often than we notice. Certainly more often than we talk about. Sometimes they are dramatic. Sometimes they are quiet. Sometimes we can easily dismiss them as coincidence. Sometimes we cannot explain them at all. But if, in Jack Pollard’s words, we remain “teachable seekers” then we will catch glimpses of Mystery to remind us that there is more to this life than meets the eye.

I had the honor of hearing about such a glimpse in the days following my dad’s death back in 2006. I had the wonderful opportunity to become acquainted with a delightful, caring young Hawaiian woman named Lala. She and her husband own a cremation business in Hawaii and we had the good fortune to engage their services. They are people who have truly found their place in the world. One morning Lala called to let me know the status of things, and then she said, “I have story to tell you. I came to work this morning and my husband was already here working on your dad. He called me over and said, ‘Come here! I need your help. I found his wedding ring on his finger and I can’t get it off. He must never have taken it off. I’m afraid I’m going to dislocate his finger.’” So they worked and worked trying to get the ring off, but it just wouldn’t budge. Finally her husband went down to the other end of the warehouse to get something that might help, and Lala was left holding my dad’s hand. And she started to pray. “Mr. Lynn,” she said, “if you want to keep this ring, then you keep it. But if you want your family to have this ring, then you’re going to have to help me. You’re going to have to give it to me.” And she slipped her fingernail under the edge of the ring and it slipped off his finger.

What does that “mean”? I’m not at all prepared to say for certain. What I am sure of is that it represents one more glimpse into the vast, mysterious, sacred ocean of God’s presence in our lives and in our world. There really is more here than meets the eye. There is always more here. And I, for one, want to stay alert and keep looking so that I won’t miss such experiences when they come my way. What are you ready to see?