UCC Church of Charlotte

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Sermon for February 22 - Transfiguration Sunday
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Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:35:37 AM
From:
Phil Hobson   
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To:
Phil Hobson 


Mantles
II Kings 2:1-12      
Mark 9:2-9

Grace and Peace to you this morning.  Grace and Peace.
    
Anybody here wear hand-me-downs as a child?  You got to wear it after your older brother or sister had outgrown it.  And when you outgrew it, it got patched up again and passed down to the next one in line.
    
Many of us inherit our look from the generations before us.  It may be a father's eyes, or a mother's nose, or grandma's dimples, or grandpa's jaw line.
    
We may have our family's mannerisms.  We may be quiet like one forebear, or loud and boisterous like another.  We are the spitting image of one ancestor, but walk and talk just like another.
    
We know that some problems are passed along genetically, such as predilections to addiction, or predispositions to certain illnesses.  But emotional patterns are also inherited.  We may have similar reactions to things as our parents, or we may react the exact opposite.  Funny thing about opposites in emotions.  They are often far closer to each other than we think.
    
Something I heard at a funeral years ago was to picture what I wanted to inherit from the one who had passed away.  Not physical stuff, not money, not a stamp collection or anything like that.  What qualities did I see in them, what traits did they possess that I wanted to show more of in my own life.
    
I have my grandfather's home communion set.  My mother's father was a minister and a district superintendent in the Methodist church.  I have a box of his old sermons, and I have his home communion set.  You can tell it's old.  The little container for the grape juice and the four cups are all glass, not plastic like the new ones.  And the silk liner is a little stained from where the bottle leaked a little many years ago.
    
But I has also inherited some of his desire to see people helped, to see tangible ways to bring people up and build them up and better themselves.  Ministry in the mid 1900's and the early 2000's may be worlds apart in some ways.  But I have inherited some of his dedication to seeing people realize that the kingdom of God is hardly just somewhere we go after we die, but something we practice here and now.
    
This morning's stories are about inheritance, about the mantle of leadership being passed on to the next generation.  Jesus on the mountain with Moses and Elijah, receiving the mantle of the faith from both its pillars, the law and the prophets.
    
And Elisha, receiving the tangible mantle of Elijah, taking on a double portion of the Spirit that impelled Elijah.  (Some have remarked how similar the stories of Elisha and Jesus are.  Perhaps this makes more sense this morning.)
    
Now Elisha is persistent.  Three times Elijah says, "Stay here, for the Lord is sending me on ahead."  And three times Elisha shows persistent faithfulness.  "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you."
    
Twice, the prophets gathered at the places where Elijah and Elisha stop speak to Elisha about his master, his mentor, his friend being taken up by the Lord.  And twice, rather than falling into melancholy or grief or worry, Elisha tells them, "Yes, I know.  Hold your peace."
    
Elisha is persistent even when the one he is following and all those around him tell him to lay off, to rest, to go do something else.
    
Maybe it takes someone this persistent to receive Elijah's mantle.  Maybe it takes someone willing to walk after Elijah like this  to inherit from Elijah the role and place and mantle of the prophet.
    
And after our reading this morning, Elisha, carrying the mantle of Elijah, goes and strikes the river with it, and it parts, just as it did for Elijah.  We know he is the heir of Elijah.
    
And then we get to the scene on the mountaintop, where Jesus and Peter and James and John are there, and the tableau is set, with Jesus receiving the mantle of Elijah and Moses, the prophet and the law, the pillars of the faith.
    
And Peter, poor persistent Peter, wants to enshrine it all, to set up tents, to house these three.  
    
But the story isn't about spreading cloth into tabernacles and camping out up here in the glory of the moment.  The story is about inheritance and the mantle that we wear, the faith in which Peter and the disciples and the church after them are to be clothed and garbed.  It isn't the cloth that shelters us from the elements, but the faith we have received from generations before us, which clothes us with hope for the day and the future, and joy for our connection to God and one another, and forgiveness, and strength for service, and all the gifts of the Spirit.
    
Who are our examples of faith necessary for the day?
    
Who are the living testimonies of faith we want to be like?
    
Are we willing to ask for a double measure of their spirit?
    
Are we willing to be persistent in our following?
    
I heard a wonderful definition of maturity the other day.  It goes something like, "Youth is when we sit in the shade of trees we did not plant.  Maturity is planting trees in the shade of which we will not be here to sit."
    
Are we going to accept the mantle of faith passed down to us from generation to generation?  And are we going to live a life such that someone after us says, "I want to be like them.  They are my role model of faith."?
    
Because in times such as these we need not just a faithful people, but a persistently faithful people.
    
And it helps to know that God is faithful, and God is persistent.  And God equips us to do everything God calls us to do and be.
    
Thanks be to God. 
Amen.