However, it being Thanksgiving week (a good time to clean one's desk) and me just back from an uncharacteristic two weeks of travel to three different places (making cleaning one's desk a sad necessity), I happened upon some notes I took last week at the 1st Annual YMCA US Mission Network Conference. And I like them. But not enough to let them chase around my desk for Heaven-knows-how-long. In looking for someplace to put them, I thought, "Hey! I'll blog them!" Lucky you.
Lisa Harper, a popular, ridiculously funny and refreshingly theologically deep Christian author and speaker was one of the keynotes. She talked about Mark 9. My signature paper in seminary was on Mark 9. And...I learned some stuff from Lisa. As she spoke I had more than a couple of "aha!" moments. Even a few "why didn't I see that?!" realizations. Not to mention "well, that's very consistent with the rest of the Book of Mark and I totally missed it!" recognitions. It was embarrassing. Also refreshing. Here they are in brief:
- Moses had been barred from entering the Promised Land--even after all he'd done. But in the Transfiguration, he made it!
- Before he was barred from entering the Promised Land, waaay back on Mount Sinai, Moses had asked to see God's face, and was kept from doing so. But in the Transfiguration, Moses is with Jesus on a different mountain. And he gets his wish--he looks on the face of God!
- Finally, it was still God's face being seen when Jesus came down the mountain. It was the face of God that the father looked into as his sick, demon-possessed boy was convulsing and throwing himself around.
And you know what? I'm going to leave it at that; let you think on these things. Maybe they are new to you, maybe they are old news, and maybe they make no sense at all. But there you go.
Chew, chew, chew.
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