"Stay Awake"

“Stay Awake”

March 2, 2025 Cobleskill United Methodist Church, Pastor Anna Blinn Cole

Luke 9:28-36

Transfiguration Sunday

Luke 9:28-36

The Transfiguration

28 Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. 29And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. 30Suddenly they saw two men, Moses and Elijah, talking to him. 31They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. 32Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep; but since they had stayed awake, they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. 33Just as they were leaving him, Peter said to Jesus, ‘Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah’—not knowing what he said. 34While he was saying this, a cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. 35Then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!’ 36When the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen.

Rows and flows of angel hairAnd ice cream castles in the airAnd feather canyons everywhereI’ve looked at clouds that way

But now they only block the sunThey rain and snow on everyoneSo many things I would have doneBut clouds got in my way

I've looked at clouds from both sides nowFrom up and down and still somehowIt's cloud illusions I recallI really don't know clouds at all

Joni Mitchell wrote this song in 1966.  I was in college when I first heard it.  It was love at first hear.  The song is about how we change over time and the things around us take on new meaning.  What once were fanciful puffy make-believe designs in the sky, clouds as an adult bring rain and cover the sun.  

The song goes on to talk about love and life in the same way.  Joni Mitchell’s song was never a hit for her, but it went on to be covered by other people more than 1500 times including Frank Sinatra, Willie Nelson, Bing Crosby, Pete Seeger and Judy Collins, in many, many different musical genres.  Joni Mitchell was only 23 when she wrote the lyrics to this song, yet it has wisdom beyond that young age.  It finds a vantage point to look at like from both sides: the before and the after.  To realize that there will be some things that are always a mystery.  

The song has become legendary for the way it strikes a chord with the way we human beings find ourselves being human.  We think we know something, only to have what we think we knew seem like an allusion.   It may start with clouds, but we quickly learn it’s much bigger than clouds.  It’s love.  It’s life itself.  The very bedrock of what we took for granted can disappear beneath as only an allusion of what it once was.  

This is a nostalgic song, but its staying power is in its piercing ability to name the emotions we feel when things change.  It’s power is in the way it stays awake through the disorienting experiences of life and comes out with wisdom on the other side. 

I listened to this song a lot this week when it suddenly dawned on me that it’s an anthem—kind of—for Transfiguration Sunday: a Sunday that’s all about change.  The name Transfiguration identifies the mountaintop experience three disciples had with Jesus that we heard in the scripture today—but it’s an experience they easily could have missed.  This was the what happened: Jesus has just been teaching to the crowds and his disciples, giving them difficult but important instructions for living and now they go to the mountain to pray.  And as Jesus is praying, his figure—his appearance, his clothes, his face—all of it begins to glow and shine. And suddenly Jesus is joined by the image of two others—rock stars of the faith, actually—Elijah and Moses.  It was probably surprising enough to see two people with Jesus who were very much not alive any more, but it’s what they were talking about that might have been even more disorienting.  They were talking not about instructions for living life, but the way in which Jesus would soon be departing life.  The plot of the story was suddenly changing.  Death?  Wasn’t he just talking about how to live?  Is this even the same Jesus?  Is this even the same story? 

Peter, James and John, the three unsuspecting disciples who came with Jesus to this tipping point, were the only living witnesses to this spectacularly dramatic pivot in Jesus’ story. These three disciples were special.  But they were also sleepy.  “They are weighed down by sleep,” the Bible says. Maybe it had been a hard hike up the mountain, I don’t know.  It’s both surprising and it’s not: The world as they know it is changing.  Their teacher is talking with dead prophets about dying soon himself and the disciples are…. being human and feeling sleepy.  

The gospel writer, Luke, could have definitely left this detail out.  But by including the detail that they were sleepy, it’s even more important that the Bible also says they stayed awake.  They stayed awake.  And because they stayed awake, the Bible tells us, that despite the change and the disorientation they must have felt, “they saw his glory.” Even though they had just climbed a mountain, even though they were tired, even though didn’t understand one iota of what they were seeing, because they stayed awake, they didn’t just see Jesus glowing, they saw Jesus’ glory.  

It may be a weird holiday in church today called Transfiguration, but change is also all around us outside of the walls of this sanctuary.  

The ground beneath us is constantly shifting.  

• Children grow up too fast.  Just when you think you’ve figured something out about parenting, the equation changes. 

• A country’s values seem to change overnight – who our allies are, what our priorities are, our sense of liberty and justice itself—the ground beneath us feels like its shifting.  

• Even history itself feels like it’s being rewritten.  Often times when I’m writing a new sermon I’ll look at the one I wrote three years earlier when this same scripture reading came up.  I looked at that sermon and nearly wept at the way, three long years ago, my sermon was echoing a national outrage that a sovereign country like Ukraine could be ruthlessly invaded by another country all in the name of “Christian” values.  It’s disorienting to see how much has changed.

The underlying question in the midst of Transfiguration Sunday is: How do we rise above the disorientation of change?  How do we find out what’s real and true?  Is the before true?  Is the after true?  And the difficult answer is: both/and. Life is both the hope-filled ascent to the top of the mountain, the tipping point, and also the sorrowful descent on the other side. The question is not about how we resolve disorientation, it’s about how we stay awake to it.  

Up on that mountaintop, the trajectory of Jesus’ life changed for good.  His disciples had been used to seeing him as a teacher that would always be with them.  Now they saw him as a teacher who would ultimately have to leave them.  The naivete was gone.  The rose-colored glasses were stri

pped off.  They bore witness to the change, not because they wanted to, but because they willed themselves to.  This was too important for them to close their eyes.

When change happens to us, it can be because we want it or it can be because it’s thrust upon us.  But don’t for a second think that you can avoid the change by looking away or by closing your eyes.  When we approach change with our full attention, when we go into it with our eyes wide open, we gain a wisdom that isn’t cheap.  

“Something’s lost, but something’s gained” as Joni Mitchell’s song goes.  Life can be disorienting right now, but can you will yourself to keep your eyes open?  Sad or scary or disorienting as it may be, when we stay awake, we are not alone and we will go into the future ready for what comes next. 

Grace and Peace,

Pastor Anna