Luke 9:28-36

Today, Pastor Jack tells us that Peter, James, and John were with Jesus up on the mountain to pray, when they were treated to the greatest light show the world had ever seen. A divine revelation of the glory of Heaven with Jesus standing there praying and exposed in all His glory.

Father, we ask Lord that you would anoint us to be students of your word.
Lord made the going forth of your truth, grab our hearts and father there will be 2000 years removed.
We pray Lord. Now in jesus’ name that you would allow us to almost sense and feel the sounds and the sights and the moment especially of this portion of scripture, the grandeur of it all.
Oh Lord God, we pray for your touch before we ask it in jesus’ name and all God’s people said, amen.
Let’s turn our Bibles. Then to Luke chapter nine verse 28 Luke chapter nine verse 28.
And we are looking at a message this morning entitled When Life’s exposed, when life’s exposed.
And we’re gonna see and we’re gonna hear the eyewitness accounts of Peter James and John as they went up with Jesus too.
The amount of what is known as transfiguration where Christ is illuminated before them and what it all means to us today and the fact that life as life isn’t Jesus Christ is exposed for all to see.
Luke chapter nine verse 28. Let’s begin right there.
It says now it came to pass about eight days after these sayings that he took Peter John and James and went up on a high mountain to pray.
And as he prayed, the appearance of his face was altered and his robe became white and glistening and behold, two men talked with him who were Moses and Elijah who appeared in glory and spoke of his deceased or his death, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.
But Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep.
And when they were fully awake, they saw his glory and the two men who stood with Jesus, then it happened that as they were parting from him, that Peter said to Jesus master, it is good for us to be here.
Let us make three tabernacles or three tents, one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah not knowing what he said.
While he was still seeing this, a cloud came and overshadowed them and they were fearful as they entered into the cloud literally.
And the voice or a voice came from out of the cloud saying this is my beloved son, hear him.
And when the voice had ceased, Jesus was found alone, but they kept quiet and told no one in those days, any of the things that they had seen there is no doubt to me that the chief aim of Jesus in all of his ministry is to get people to get you and I to see who he really is.
When we give the gospel, when we teach the Bible, when we as Christians proclaim God’s person, we are explaining to the world and revealing to the world, the nature of Jesus Christ.
If you want to know God, the Father, you look at Jesus Christ, the son God sent the Son to expose or to reveal or to announce to us the very intent and nature of God.
Jesus never wanted to be kept secret. Neither were his words kept secret.
By the way, in John chapter 18 verse 20 and John 18 20 Jesus says, I have spoken openly to the world and in secret, I have said nothing, whatever Jesus did was a very, very awesome and grand illuminating thing and whatever Jesus experienced was published in the Bible and, and put out to the entire world to read and to know and I love that about God, what he does.
He does publicly, everyone who Jesus called to come to know Him. He called publicly even Nicodemus.
When Jesus invited him to come to know him as Lord and Savior in time, Nicodemus came publicly, Jesus’s life was an exposed life and we’re gonna see an awesome miracle today and an exposure of the Son of God like we have never seen before.
The event before us was announced by Jesus earlier.
We remember in our previous study together that in Luke 9 23 Jesus had said to them when he got done teaching.
He said, I’m gonna tell you something.
There are some of you around me now who will not taste of death till you see the kingdom of God come in power.
Jesus had been saying that in fact, he had asked the disciples who do you say that I am?
And Peter gave the answer. Then Jesus went on to say in Luke chapter nine about following him that if we were gonna go about this life trying to hoard up and protect our lives and live it for ourselves, that we’d wind up wasting our lives.
But he said, if we gave our lives, that is if we lived our lives for him, we would wind up finding our lives and being those who follow him.
And then right on the heels of that, he said, there are some standing here that will not see death until they see the kingdom of God come.
Well, we’re gonna find out in our study today just exactly what Jesus meant by that.
Because as we go in to verse 28 to 36 we see life exposed before us.
Point number one in our study together.
Church take notes if you would jot it down when life’s exposed, this is what we begin to understand.
We see the glory of heaven above verses 28 to 31. All important.
We see the glory of heaven above this way when we are determined or when we set our heart to pray, this is a beautiful invite that Jesus gives.
And verse 28 it says now it came to pass about eight days after these sayings that he took Peter John and James.
And he went up note this on the mountain to pray.
And what’s important about that the saints recorded here in verses 18 to 26 are those identified regarding the life of Christ?
He says, listen, I’m speaking to you about these things and he’s gonna reveal that to them in a very key place.
It’s gonna be Mount Hermon. Look at this photograph. First of all is, does that not look like here?
Huh? I know that. I just, I just heard that that’s what I thought.
That’s not Mount Baldy though. That’s Mount Hermon. This is the Jezreel Valley so fertile and beautiful. Next slide.
Look at these pictures as we go through.
Here’s the foothills coming by the way, the Mediterranean is to my back and that roadway will take you down in that valley.
Down below is the Valley of Armageddon, my ghetto valley and then up to Mount Hermon.
And there is Mount Hermon where um if you live in Israel there, you’re visiting, you can ski on a beautiful uh warm day down in the valley just like it is here.
You can go to the beach one day or you can go skiing on that very same day right here in Southern California.
Israel is the same way. You can go to the beach at the Mediterranean or drive and go skiing on Mount Hermon.
The Bible says that he went up the mountain, not a mountain or a hill.
It is very specific that it is Mount Hermon because during the time of Christ, as some people have thought that maybe it’s Mount Tabor, but Mount Tabor had a town on top of it and Mount Hermon was known as the mountain.
It’s Israel’s highest peak over 9400 ft high.
And so Jesus takes his disciples up there, but note this, he takes his disciples up there not to have them pray.
It’s not what it says. He went up there to the mountain to pray.
Jesus is gonna go pray every time God is gonna do something awesome and unique. He always takes Peter.
James and John. I’m very encouraged by that because you know Peter Peter always in the bayou.
He does it here again today. He’s got his foot and mouth disease.
He always opens up his mouth and sticks his foot in it before he says anything reasonable.
Peter will just say something and get in big trouble.
But thank God after the resurrection, Peter was filled with the spirit of God and became a great champion of the faith and spoke wonderfully regarding of course, the Lord and was martyred for his preaching of Christ.
And then James and John. These are the brothers James and John, they were also known.
Do you remember what their nicknames were in scripture? Very good. The Sons of Thunder.
You don’t get that title by being some wimpy guys. These dudes had to be brawlers and Gnarly guys.
They owned a fishing companies. Ebony was their dad. So they’re tough fisherman.
You’ve got Peter who according to church history, we can’t prove it.
But according to church history speaks about Peter being a very big and burly guy. He was a fisherman.
You got James and John who according to church history were prone to get into uh arguments nicknamed the sons of Thunder.
We’ve joked around about them in the past how these were two guys that probably wore leather robes and had black boats, you know, and drove around in black donkeys in their day.
These were rough guys. The sons of Thunder And Peter Jesus takes them up to this very special place to expose to them something about the glory of heaven.
And it is a beautiful thing to note that Jesus is praying.
It says there in 28, verse 28 that he prayed.
The Bible also tells us that as he was praying, something began to happen.
Now, the beautiful thing about this is Jesus most often in your Bible reading, you know that Jesus so often prayed alone and I did a little background check on this just to be sure I had it right.
Did you know that Jesus and scripture has found after a hard day of ministry praying late into the night.
Don’t you think you want to go to bed? Don’t you think you want to be like Dwight L Moody?
When he preached a great evangelistic sermon in England, he preached that message.
Thousands came forward to accept Christ and Dwight L.
Moody was traveling with his grandson and it’s recorded in history from the writings of his grandson, Dwight L.
Moody came into his hotel room in London and took off his big jacket.
And uh by the way, the details are these exactly Dwight L Moody kicked off his boots, took off his clothes, jumped into his bed, all £320 of him broke the bed and said, good night, Lord, I’m tired and went to sleep and his grandson recorded that and it’s now you can read that in history.
Jesus didn’t do that. Jesus ministered hard and then he would go and pray.
Jesus has found late at night praying.
The Bible tells us that Jesus has found very early in the morning while it was yet dark praying.
And then there are accounts in the Bible as when he picked his disciples that he prayed all night through, he never went to bed praying.
Is there something possible about prayer that we’re not fully aware of?
Could it be that that wonderful scripture of Isaiah that announces to us about us having our strength renewed?
Is found in prayer, not orange juice or working out. But prayer.
Could it be that the spiritual man is someone that is rejuvenated in prayer?
We know that to be the case, Jesus is praying and he wanted his disciples to witness something.
It was for them to see what a wonderful thing.
And if Jesus, this is always amazing to me, you might say Jack isn’t Jesus the son of God, God in flesh and the earth.
And why did he pray? Why did he have to pray?
Remember this in your good theology, Jesus is 100% God and 100% man in his divinity, he could be no perfect in what he was.
He was God in flesh, in his humanity.
He was just like you and I yet without sin, did Jesus get tired? He got tired.
Did he get hungry? He got hungry.
Did Jesus feel when he got his finger scratched or when they put those nails into him?
He felt every bit of it?
Not only that, but does he feel your emotional and spiritual stress that you and I go through?
Yes, all of it. Jesus experienced all these things yet without sin for He was God in the flesh and experiences all these things that you and I struggle with.
He was tired, but Jesus prayed for strength. He was strengthened.
Jesus prayed for peace as it was in the garden piece was given to him and direction he prays and his father leads him.
If the Son of God praise and needs to pray, then how much more do you?
And I need to pray. We see the glory of heaven above come down when we pray, when we determined to see him.
And then secondly, we see the glory of heaven come come down from above.
When we desire to follow him, when we are faithful to follow the Lord, look what happens.
And as he prayed, verse 29, I love this.
The appearance of his face was altered and his robe became white and glistening and behold, two men talked with him who were Moses and Elijah who appeared in glory, literally in the Greek.
It is a, they appeared in the glory.
Oh, listen, I hope I do justice to this these few verses because you know what, honestly, we could stay the whole month in these verses.
I kid you not listen to this as he prayed. Will you circle that something happened?
When Jesus prayed, listen. Those of you who have taken time to pray, doesn’t something happen when you pray?
When you pray, I’m assuming we’re Christians this morning. Look, you got up.
Oh, you got up early on this. Is it springtime or what? It feels like winter?
You’re here, you’re bundled up. You came early first service. We are praying people.
When we pray something happens when we are faithful to follow Jesus, Peter James and John, they go up to the mountain and they’re gonna see something happen.
I want to argue with you this morning that when you just make yourself available to come, to pray, to present yourself there for God to speak to Him, to be with Him, things are gonna happen, things will move in your life.
And so as he prayed now, by the way, the Greek clearly implies that as he was praying, the disciples were sleeping, they were already asleep.
We understand from the wording that it’s night the disciples go to sleep.
Jesus is praying and while they’re sleeping, notice his appearance that is of his face was altered and his road became white and glistening.
And Matthew chapter 17 verse two, it says, recording this from Matthew’s perspective and he was transfigured before them and his face shone like the sun.
The reason why I wanted to point out that verse out of Matthew 17 2 is because the word shone like the sun means that when the disciples did wake up and in a moment they will wake up, they’re gonna to see Jesus in church.
This is awesome. If you’ve read the Bible about heaven, doesn’t it say about heaven?
That from the throne of God, there are lightnings that shoot forth from the throne of God. That is awesome.
Why is it important? Because as Jesus is praying, he’s transfigured before the people or before the disciples.
And what happens is there is this appearance of his countenance and from it, the lightning of glory begins to shoot forth from him in radiating pulses of light.
That’s what the word means. Would you not want to see this?
Especially against a black starlit sky on top of Mount Hermon, Jesus is praying and his very appearance, his face is altered.
The word transfigured here is a very familiar word to all of us.
It is the Greek word metamorphosis where we get metamorphose, it means to be changed or revolutionized.
It means to be transformed. Jesus face didn’t change in shape or size, it changed in its appearance as it radiated while he was in prayer.
This is a literal moment of divine revelation coming forth from Jesus as he was standing there, the glory of God was exposed in and through him.
But there’s more here than what meets the eye. This exposure of Jesus and Jesus being exposed to us.
This way is an amazing thing that we as gentiles just don’t quite get all of us this morning or at a severe handicap because we don’t have a Hebrew or Jewish background.
When you begin to read these scriptures and I want you to be sensitive to this.
There’s going to be the mentioning of the of let us build tabernacles and Moses and Elijah, you cannot read this portion of scripture without being introduced to the old Testament models of what’s being said if you’re Jewish this morning and you don’t understand that Jesus is your messiah.
Listen carefully as Jesus was praying, the Shah Kina glory of God is the word.
The Chicana began to come forth from Him. Church. Listen, the glory of God began to come out of Him.
The glory of God didn’t come upon Him.
The glory of God did not descend, illuminate Him, make no mistake about it.
The glory of God did not come from Moses and it did not come from Elijah.
The glory of God came out of Jesus Christ, which is extremely important to understand that especially in the Old Testament economy.
Why is that so important? Because the Chicana glory of God was that glory that you read about in your Bible?
Reading through the year, the one year Bible where you read where the glory of God came over the mercy seat as Moses and the Children of Israel were in the wilderness and they carried the ark of the covenant.
Did you ever see Raiders of Lost Ark?
The movie, remember that Steven Spielberg had that great pillar of light coming out of that box, the ark of the covenant, the glory of God resided over the ark.
And then when God moved into the temple, we’ll read about that later in Solomon’s great temple, God moved in before the priest, the priest were getting ready to move in.
The priests were getting to walk in and the Lord showed up and the glory.
The Chicana was so great that they couldn’t even make it into the building. That’s awesome.
It is an a divine revelation of the very essence of God. The Chicana glory. It’s his dwelling place.
It’s what he looks like for no physical I can behold him.
John chapter 17 verse five speaks about and Jesus speaks about himself where it says, oh father, as he prays, father glorify me together with yourself with the glory which I had with you before the world was ever created.
Jesus Christ resided in the glory of God in heaven above before the world was ever made.
Heaven above had come down among men.
In John chapter one verse 14, the Bible says that the word of God became flesh and dwelt among us.
And we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth, the glory of God, the Chicana glory.
When you do a good study in this, you must come away with understanding that Jesus is none other than the Messiah of God, the Savior of the world, the light of the world and the Chicana illumination of God Himself.
Church. If you take the implications of that in the burning bush that was their burning on Mount Sinai but not consumed.
We understand that to be Christ, the Chicana Gloria over the arc, we understand that now to be Christ, the glory that God showed when a Theofanis took place that is a pre incarnate appearance of Christ, the glory.
We understand that to be the Jesus of the Bible, the scripture says in Romans chapter 12 verse one and two, which is a great witness for us.
It’s a great example for us to present our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, which is our reasonable service and not to be conformed to this world.
Don’t become like the world Christian.
If you are becoming more like the world, they need to check and see if you really know the Lord, we are not to be conformed to the image of this world, but we are to be what’s the word transformed by the renewing of your mind?
That is God’s sanctification. Work in our lives that you may be able to prove what is the good and acceptable perfect will of God.
Jesus is showing the disciples that when we pray things change and when he prays heaven comes down.
And so as he prayed, the appearance of his face was altered, jesus’ physical body illuminated. Listen to this.
The word alter, our altered is hetero sauce. It’s a great great word.
It means that it’s the same face or the same Jesus.
But now in a different appearance, it’s the same kind or we would say heterosexual, the same gender hetero.
It’s the same Jesus. But now the glory is coming out of Him.
What an amazing thing, same Jesus.
He just looks different and note this his uh his robe.
You know, he didn’t go behind some rock or some tree or bush and change his robe and, oh, look how brighter it looks old.
One of the gospel says that his robe.
This is kind of why I say that in a flippant way.
But listen, one of the gospel writers say that his robe became wider than any launders ability to whiten.
I love that. Why you guys? Sorry. But I tried to show you this this morning.
I brought in my one million candle. What flashlight?
And I was gonna put a T shirt in front of it, but it just didn’t work.
It wouldn’t have worked in here.
But when you, you can’t even look at that light when you hit it with, with the fabric, the fabric wasn’t bright white.
Jesus made the fabric bright white. It’s not the clothes you wear that make you a man.
That’s the man who makes the clothes.