We are going to continue today in our progression through the Gospel of Luke. I don't know how long we've been here. I'd have to look back at my notes, but it's been some time, I know. And if you want to be turning there, I don't believe that we will read it to begin yet, but we'll be in Luke chapter 9. We're actually going to back up just a bit, and then we're going to make our way forward. Here in a moment, we'll read beginning in verse 18 of chapter 9, and then we want to read through verse 36. this well-known passage on the Transfiguration of Christ. So be turning there. And if you want to jot down a title for the message, this will come into focus more as the message progresses, but the title would be Certainty on the Mountain. If you want a subtitle, it would be The Revelation of the Transfiguration. But I want to begin today with Philippians 4.13. You don't need to turn there. You know it. Even if you don't know that you know it, you do. It's the passage that so many quote. You've seen it in many different places. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. You've seen that on posters. You've seen it on mugs. You've seen it on all kinds of things. You've seen it on t-shirts and motivational quotes. And it sounds like a promise that Christ is going to help you accomplish whatever it is that you seek to accomplish. And I don't want to be too harsh or split. too closely, but that really isn't at all what that verse of scripture is talking about. That's Philippians chapter 4 verse 13. Philippians chapter 4 verses 11 and 12, Paul talks about how that he had learned to be content in whatever state that he had found himself in, whether it was good or bad, whether he was hungry or whether he was full, whether he had much and plenty or whether he had need. He then said, In all of that, whatever condition I might be in, I know that I can do all things. I can be content in all things through Christ who strengthens me. You've also heard the verse in Jeremiah. I believe it's the 29th chapter when one verse is pulled out and it says, I know the plans I have for you. Do good things. And we've seen that verse as well in many different contexts. We read that, though, and think, well, God has a wonderful plan for my life. And I don't want to dispute that. He does. But that's not what that verse is talking about either. The context of that verse, God had just said and was continuing to say, he was speaking to Israel, not an individual, but a nation. And he was saying to them, I know the plans I have for you. And you know what those plans were? 70 years of exile and suffering in the land of Babylon. That was the plans God knew he had. for His people. But that's not how we read that verse. When we pull it out, we make it say what we want it to say. And I know that that's a temptation that we have. And I, by the way, wouldn't dispute some of the ideas and the thoughts that people will take from these passages. But I do want to point out that there is a very important exercise that we must always undertake when we're reading Scripture. And that is, of course, to know the context. When you pull verses out of their context, we lose what God is, I believe, trying to say. When we do that with Luke chapter 9, we can, if we're not careful, lose what Luke is really trying to say when he talks to us and reveals to us this transfiguration of Christ on the mountain. We pull it out and we try to look at it by itself. And sometimes we try to look at verses these verses 28 through 36 of the Transfiguration, almost separate and removed from the very verses that have just immediately come before. But beyond even that immediate context, because we are going to look at the Mount of Transfiguration today, what it shows us, what it reveals, the revelation of the Transfiguration. What do we see here? What's going on? And sometimes we can struggle with an answer if we do not root it carefully in the context in which Luke carefully And it has been some time ago now when we began this look at Luke, but I want to remind you once again what Luke said in chapter 1. Luke says to Theophilus, the one he is writing to, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty. concerning the things you have been taught." Luke told us why he's writing this gospel. It was for Theophilus, and I believe by extension you and me, that we might have certainty of the things that we have been taught. Luke made no hidden agenda in his gospel. He was not trying to say some confusing or there's no reading between the lines. There's no magic formula. There's no hidden meaning here. Luke says, I am laying this out before you, Theophilus, of the eyewitness accounts of the life of Christ that you might be certain. That's why he wrote it. And I desire for you and for me and for us together to continue to be, or to find for the first time if you've never been there, certain of what the Scriptures say, certain of what God has said. The Greek word certain means to be firm, to be secure, reliable, stable, certain. I would say to you today, let it never be said that Christianity is a religion of the weak-minded or that Christianity cannot stand up to the harshest of critics or even the most difficult circumstances of life. It stands up to them all. It's difficult days that we sometimes are called to walk through. God's Word is sure and it is steadfast. and the price that Christ paid on the cross to save the world from its sin, and the gospel message itself. It is, I tell you today, I don't know whether you believe me or not, or you share my certainty. I say to you today from a heart that is certain that what we read here is true. That it defines reality. That it tells us what truth is. This scripture, Christianity as informed by scripture, is firm and is secure and it is truth upon which you can build and base your life. There's nothing else that can do that for you. Man's opinions, his philosophies, The money that maybe you might find some security in from time to time if you're a wealthy person. Your health. All of these things are not equal to the certainty that is found alone in the truth as God has revealed it to us. And I think that's even more important, or perhaps that's not the right word, I think that's even more telling that Luke would write to Theophilus this way as they were living in a Greco-Roman world that was just saturated with competing philosophies. Many of them, Stoicism, Epicureanism, Cynicism, there were these mystery religions, there was Gnosticism, there were all of these things all claiming to offer some version of truth. And Luke writes to Theophilus and says, I'm laying all of this out. from the first chapter to the last. And of course, Luke didn't divide them up into chapters. He wrote one letter to Theophilus. And remember, he said at the beginning, I'm writing this so that you can be sure. And when we look here at chapter 9, we need to base our view of chapter 9 and the transfiguration in the larger context of Luke's intention, which is to give certainty, and then within the immediate context, which is what he has said recently, even beginning in verse 18. I think Luke's promise to Theophilus of certainty would have stood out to him in the world that he was living in full of philosophies, full of people who were clever with their speech and their arguments and speculation. And Luke offers eyewitness testimony to the truth of Christ. Read with me. I do want to come back to verse 18 and we'll read down through verse 27 and then later Again, we'll pick up and read the transfiguration, but I do want to set this immediate context before you once again, because I believe it all comes together. Now, it happened that as he was praying alone, the disciples were with him, and he asked them, who do the crowds say that I am? And they answered, John the Baptist, but others say Elijah, and others that one of the prophets of old is risen. Then he said to them, but who do you say that I am? And Peter answered, the Christ of God. And He strictly charged and commanded them to tell this to no one, saying, The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And He said to all, If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God. This is the immediate context for the transfiguration. Remember, by the way, it's very helpful for us to have chapters and verses, and it's very helpful for us to have the headings that the translators have inserted into the text, but we must sometimes put blinders on to that and remind ourselves Luke is just writing. He's still writing. He's not changing his thought. He's not putting his pen down. He's not getting up and walking away and saying, what should I talk about next? He's writing a letter. And the transfiguration is within the context of what he's just written. And I think to see the transfiguration rightly, we must have solidly in our minds this context that he has laid out for us. this context of what Jesus has said and what Peter has said, what the crowds were saying, what Jesus calls people to. And in the midst, again, of a society in Theophilus' day filled with all kinds of philosophies and opinions and people who exalted other men and put them on pedestals and had all these different philosophies, Luke is writing and saying, this is what I want you to be sure of. You know, we live today in a world that's still full of a lot of different philosophies. I think a lot of them are the same, just maybe different names. There's secular humanism that we live in, the belief that human reason and personal fulfillment, that's the ultimate meaning of life. Moral relativism, postmodern skepticism, even Eastern mysticism is taking hold among many places in the West today. The prosperity gospel itself, the distortion of Christianity that the promises of health and wealth and comfort are a sign of God's good pleasure and God's intention for your life. We have other things that battle for our view of reality and truth. and certainty, and one of them is political ideology, one way or the other, placing ultimate hope in either progressivism or conservatism, as it might be said, in a political sense. We have scientific materialism. Nothing's true if you can't objectively measure it scientifically. We have all these competing things that are taking hold of our minds at times and trying to convince us of what's real and what's true and about which we can be certain. And Luke is writing to Theophilus and he's saying, I'm telling you, eyewitness accounts, this is an orderly account, which means to me, by the way, that he intends to write it the way he did, he penned it the way he did, obviously under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but in his own words, for a purpose of giving Theophilus certainty, certainty about the things he'd been taught, and this is exactly what Luke does in chapter nine. He begins, as we looked back here on verse 18, as Jesus is asking, who do people say I am? And then we won't rehash that. We know we've preached that message. We won't go into those details. But it comes back down to Jesus churning the question, but who do you say that I am? And Peter then says, you're the Christ of God. You're Him. You're the one that we have been waiting for. You're the one who has been promised to us from the Old Testament. And then, right on the heels of that, Jesus says, You're right, Peter. And in verse 22, He says, I'm going to suffer many things. And I'm going to be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and scribes, and I'm going to be killed, and on the third day, I'm going to rise. But Jesus, immediately upon Peter's confession, says something to him that no doubt no one was expecting of the Messiah, that he would be betrayed in such a way, and that he would be delivered over and killed. And upon that, immediately thereafter in verses 23 through 26, Jesus then says what the call of discipleship really is. It's like he's saying, if we look at all of this together, Peter, you said I'm the Christ. Well, if I'm the Christ, I want you to understand what that means for me. It means I'm going to die for you. And then he moves on and says, and if you want to follow me, if you want to be a follower of me as the Christ of God, do you know what the path is? Self-denial. Complete abdication of your own interest and desires to follow me where I will lead you. That's the call of discipleship. And some would say, well, why? Why would anyone lend themselves to that? Why would anybody voluntarily deny themselves to follow this man, Christ? Well, the transfiguration answers that question. I believe it's all tied together. And he said in verse 27, didn't he, There's some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom. I do believe, I believe that at least in part, the fulfillment of that is found immediately here in the transfiguration when Peter, James, and John set their eyes upon a glorified Christ and a glorified Moses and Elijah, and they get a vision of the kingdom. Peter, you're the Christ. You're the one we've been waiting on. Jesus, yes. And I'm going to be betrayed. I'm going to be delivered over. I'm going to be killed by the scribes and the Pharisees. And if you want to follow me, you're going to have to be willing to follow me through that path. And there's going to be some who are going to see the end of that path, which is glory with me in heaven. Given Luke's stated goal, and the clear to me contextual connection of the transfiguration to what has just been written, it seems clear to me now that Jesus' words in verse 27 are a foretelling of what Peter, James, and John are getting ready to see. And so with that lengthy opening, let's look at verse 28 through 36, the transfiguration of Christ. Immediately on the heels of what he said, Luke just continues on. This is now about eight days later. About eight days after these sayings, he took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake, they saw his glory and two men who stood with him. As the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, Master, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for Moses and one for Elijah, not knowing what he said. As he was saying these things, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud saying, this is my son, my chosen one, listen to him. And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen. That last piece there, I believe, meaning up until the time of Jesus' death and resurrection. And thereafter, I believe, they proclaimed this to as many as they could. Luke 18 through 36, taken together, I believe, represents the sum of Christianity. It's the whole package. the whole context contained in a brief section of scripture, but all four components must be present in order to see and fully understand what Christianity really is. It is that Jesus is the Christ of God, that we individually must see him as that and be able to say to him, not merely to someone else, not merely acknowledge it to somebody else, a preacher or a friend or someone or anybody like that, but to confess it to God and to Christ Himself, you are the Christ, and to say with Thomas, my God, my King, and my Lord, you are the Christ, and you must know that. And then to live the Christian life. It is a life that is lived in self-denial. And as we live that, and we are then made more than conquerors with Christ, and we'll be raised with Him if we suffer with Him. And so we're raised with Him in glory, and we get a Peter, James, and John Dew, and through them, and their eyewitness testimony to Luke, and Luke's accounting here, we read it 2,000 years later, we get this picture of the kingdom previewed and promised to us, and promised, by the way, in verse 27, when Jesus said, some of you are gonna see this. And Luke then, again, immediately continues, and eight days later, they do. And I want to look at this transfiguration and take some things and hopefully it will be of help. Moses and Elijah appear with Christ in glory. So, you know, Theophilus, Luke might say this, Theophilus, life after death, it's real. Here are Moses and Elijah. They died centuries before, but here they are. glorified bodies. Theophilus, you can be certain that there is life after this one. What your heart tells you is true, though your eyes have never seen it, though you cannot observe it, scientifically speaking at least, though you have never seen it with your eyes, that your heart tells you is true, it is true. Peter, James, and John saw Moses and Elijah speaking with Christ. Not manifestations like Moses and Elijah. Not ghosts that appeared like them or representative of them. No, it was them. Peter, James, and John saw these two men standing and conversing with Christ. And so we can be certain. We can be certain that we too, that life continues beyond the grave. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? Paul said. Theophilus, this is true. Here, these two men that died, well, one died long ago. We know Elijah was taken up into heaven in a whirlwind, but somehow, yep, here they stood in glory, talking with Christ. And that's the promise, by the way, for all who, like Peter, say, you're the Christ. who deny themselves and follow Him in their life and who suffer with Him and die in Him and will be raised with Him in glory, maybe one day you will be standing with Christ and speaking with Him. unbelievable thought what a marvelous thought what a thought that ought to bring a smile to our face even in the depth of suffering or shame or loss and grief there's something there that one day it's like job i've lost it all my children are gone my wealth is gone my health has left me why my wife has forsaken me but i know my redeemer liveth and i'm gonna see him in the latter day And this picture that James and John and Peter see, this glorified Christ and Elijah and Moses standing there, you can then take confidence, Theophilus, if you believe like they did, you're going to be standing with Christ in the kingdom too. So may that take root in our heart. C.S. Lewis said this about the transfiguration. He said it shows us that the real world, and real world is in quotes, The world of glory and divine presence is more solid, more substantial than the shadows we walk in. Moses and Elijah appeared in glory, reminding us that the life to come is not less real than this one, but infinitely more so. Oh, that we would see our existence in that light. I live here for just a little while. Here in a little while, I'll turn 53 years old, And that's just, that's nothing. And whether I live to be 103 years old, it will be nothing because I will continue beyond this life because I, when I was 11 years old, God saved my soul and I know him and I can look to him and say, you're the Christ of God, Jesus. You're the one I put my trust in. You're the one I put all the chips into the middle of the table and said, upon you and upon you alone do I trust. Upon you alone do I believe. And in you alone will I find comfort and rest in my weak, weak way. Through these years since then, in those moments when I've tried to be living my life in self-denial, and boy, they've been far too few and far in between, too far in between. And yet in those moments, Lord, I wanted your will and not my own. And there were times that I suffered, Lord, with you, because I knew and I believed that one day I would be raised with you anew in heaven. And the transfiguration shows us that, and it gives us a clear picture of that truth. But what were they discussing? You know, the scripture, it does indicate or it seems to indicate to me that Peter, James and John might not have actually heard the conversation, but somehow they knew what it was about, whether Jesus told them later or whether they did hear part of it. I don't know, because it says that they saw, but it doesn't say that they heard and they were coming out of a sleep. They were like they were always good at being asleep when important things were happening. I have to raise my hand. I do the same. spiritually sleeping when important things are happening. But whether they heard it or not, they understood what the conversation was enough that either they related that to Luke or God through the Holy Spirit related it directly to Luke when he was writing it. Either way, it doesn't matter. The truth is the truth. And what we're told is what was the conversation between these three men. Three men. Because Jesus is a man. He is God. He is man. It says that they were talking about his... ESV says departure. I believe King James says his death. Others, it's the same. The word, which is quite interesting to me in the Greek, is Exodus. They were talking about his leaving. And we then, do we not see shades of Exodus and the Israelites out of Egypt and God's deliverance from them? They were talking about the departure, the death, the suffering of Christ that he was soon to face. This picture of glory is a picture of what follows suffering and the sorrow of the cross upon Christ. It is not a substitute for it. Far too many people want the glory without the cross. They want the promise of Christianity. They want the promise of prosperity. They want the promise of heaven without the cross. We want to know God and be right with God without asking him to forgive us of our sin. We want God to be on our side and to be our patron, but we do not want to serve him the way that he says we must. And he's just said it again. If you want to follow me, you must deny yourself, lose your life for my sake. Pick up your cross and follow me." They were discussing, and far be it from me to disagree with those who are far more learned than I am, that Moses represents the law, and Elijah representing the prophets, and together they represent the Old Testament, that they've all been pointing to Christ. All of it has been pointing to Him, and here they are on the Mount of Transfiguration, and of all the things they could be talking about, This is what they're talking about, the death of Christ that was coming. Because it is, of course, the most appropriate thing for them to be discussing, because that is the key that makes it so any of us have any hope at all, is the death of Christ. The Law and the Prophets testify together in Moses and Elijah that God's plan is the way of suffering. Because when Jesus said it in verse 22, that I'm going to be betrayed, that I'm going to be killed by the and the scribes, God in bringing these three men together, attested to the truth of that plan. And they understood the plan and they affirmed it. And so the Old Testament is a foreshadowing of the cross and affirmed its necessity. Dietrich Bonhoeffer on the Transfiguration said this, it's not an escape from the shadow of the cross, but a strengthening for it. The glory revealed on the mountain is the glory that will shine through the suffering. The disciples needed to see that the cross is not defeat, but the very path to glory. Muslims have a very hard time with the cross and the death of Christ. They think, how could such a thing be? How could God humble himself to such a thing as that? Just pagans have a hard time with it, believe it. Why would this be necessary? It is the very path. It is not a defeat. It is the paving of the way to victory. The victory that only Christ could win. The cross would be a terrible trial for the disciples. When they watched Him on the cross and watched Him placed in a grave and waited those three days. would have been a terrible trial for the disciples. And beyond that, even after his resurrection and his ascension to home back into heaven, those years that remained to them, all but one of those apostles died a martyr's death. And I believe them seeing the transfigured Christ or hearing Nathanael and Bartholomew and the others that weren't here on this specific day, as Peter, James, and John would tell them, no, we saw it. We saw Him glorified. We saw Moses standing with Him. We saw Elijah there. This is true. The cross was a terrible day, but it was the day of victory at the same time. Jesus' suffering is essential, but His suffering is going to lead to glory. And I believe that's another revelation of the Transfiguration for us even. Our suffering is essential, but it is not the end. It is the path. to glorification with God. Jesus has called his disciples to self-denying obedience through suffering, which is no less than what he himself did in his life. He denied himself. He set aside, Philippians tells us, he laid down his privileges and took upon himself flesh and became a servant. But the suffering is not the end, but the necessary means to the glory that awaits Christ and that awaits all who follow him. I find Peter's reaction to this is he comes out of his sleep and he sees what he sees, and I think there's some things that would enlighten us to think about with regard to what the Transfiguration reveals to us. The disciples wake from sleep, they see the glory. Peter, always seemingly foot and mouth. Let's make three tents, Lord. One for you. It's good that we're here. Let's make you a tent. Let's make Moses a tent. Let's make Elijah a tent. Now, we can't really speculate too much on why Peter said what he said, because even Luke said Peter didn't know what he was saying. If Peter didn't know, then neither do I. But I know that his immediate reaction was that. Let's build three tents. And he saw Moses. Somebody knew it was Moses. And he knows it's Elijah. And of course, he knows it's Christ, even though Christ's face has changed. It's been altered according to what we just read. But he knows who it is. Let's build three-tenths. Well, what's wrong with that immediate reaction? God the Father. You want to be reprimanded. God the Father corrects him. Well, what was wrong with what he said? Well, three-tenths does seem to indicate that Peter in his mind was putting all three on an equal footing. Our tendency, and Peter's, because we're right there with him. Our tendency can be to elevate teachers, preachers, traditions, leaders, right alongside Christ, and let's build them a tent, too. As a Jew, Moses and Elijah would have been men that Peter, James, and John might have been in awe of. This is Moses. In fact, they might have been, and there's some implication Peter may have been wanting to worship them. Let's build them a tent. Let's build you one, Lord, because you deserve it. But Elijah and... Jesus, do you know who these two people are? This is Moses and Elijah. These are two of the most powerful men that ever walked the land among our people. There might have been some stargazing and some feeling that we're in the presence of celebrity here. Let's build three tents. Maybe they might even... Listen, this hits home, I think. They might even... have been as impressed by seeing them as they were Christ. Verses 34-36, God the Father arrives on the scene in a cloud and it overshadows them. Again, echoes of Sinai in the Old Testament. And the Father speaks and He says, This is My Son, My Chosen One, which is what Messiah means. This is My Son, My Chosen One. Listen to Him. What did God not say there? He did not say, these are my servants. Listen to them. He said, this is my son. Listen to him and him alone. The father then confirms everything Jesus had said about the cross. In verses 22 through 26, he affirmed everything Jesus had said about what it is to follow him. He had confirmed everything that the Old Testament had pointed to him. Moses and Elijah, in their disappearance, exalt Christ. And that is often what a preacher or anyone who is trying to serve the Lord inwardly in some sense desires. Lord, may I disappear and in my disappearance, may the only thing people see is you. And just see you, just hear you, just long to be with you, just be impressed with you, impressed with nothing else, not the building, not the eloquence of the preacher, not the beauty of the singing, not the amount of money that we can gather, not the good things that we can do, not the poor that we have fed and clothed, not the widow that we have provided for, may none of that be at all impactful to us in light of what the transfiguration reveals, which is that Jesus is the one upon whom our eyes ought to always rest, and may they turn from absolutely everything else. And Lord, if I'm in the way, then get me out of the way, because people need to see him." And Elijah and Moses, I think, gladly disappeared from the scene after speaking with their Lord and their God. We too often try to exalt men to places and say, let's build them a tent, and God says, what are you thinking? This is my son. Hear him. All that Jesus had been saying, he just affirmed. Peter, James, and John had read about it in the Old Testament. God had affirmed it for them 2,000 years ago on the Mount of Transfiguration, and may he affirm it in our own hearts today. Jesus found alone that visual demonstration. Christ has no He says, God does, listen to him. Listen to his teaching about the cross. I have to go. Peter's still, he's yet, isn't he, he's going to say, far be this from you, Lord. Don't, when Jesus said, I've set my face to Jerusalem, I'm going to be betrayed and they're going to take my life. And Peter says, far be it from you, Lord. And Jesus says, get behind me, Satan. The cross is the path. So many today, they want to think, I want to be saved without the conviction and the need for forgiveness. But that's the path. You can't get there from here without going through it. It's necessary. It's essential. And I will say this, if the Father of all the creator of heaven and earth the holder of it all and the infinite being that is God if his own son in the garden of Gethsemane looked up in prayer sweating drops of blood and saying is there any other way and God's silence was the answer you can be sure that there's no other way we can be certain of that Listen to Jesus teaching about the cross. Listen to His call to costly, self-denying, life-losing discipleship. And trust Him through suffering and His promise that it leads to glory. And see revealed in the Transfiguration the fullness of the hope of the Christian. I'm going to one day be able to stand with my Lord in a glorified body and speak with Him. And speak with Him freely in the kingdom of God that is coming, that is eternal, where there is no night. The gates are wide open because there's no threat. And yet, at the same time, I believe there will be journey and discovery and longing that is ever and always fulfilled in this unimaginable, unending satisfaction that we find in God, who is infinite. If you're just looking forward to heaven because there's people there that you like and there's gold streets and there's pretty temples and the weather's always going to be perfect, those people are going to wear really old and the beautiful things are going to look very average to you in a very short amount of time. It's Christ and God who will drive you in eternity to ever and always pressing satisfaction and contentment and gain and joy and peace. But this transfiguration must be seen in the light of the verses that have immediately come before it. The transfiguration is God's divine amen, we might say, to what Christ has been saying. Listen to Him. So I ask you as we close today, are you listening to Him alone? Or are you building tents for someone else? Maybe even a gifted person that has been a good influence. And that's fine. Don't misunderstand. God puts people in our life to help But may they never, ever take the place of Christ. Are you listening to Him? Are we placing other voices above His on equal footing to where we build them a tent along with Christ in our lives? Are you listening to His call to discipleship? And are you trusting in His view that one day it leads to glory? The revelation of the transfiguration, certainty on the mountaintop. This is where we ought to be. I pray that you are there as we go through this life and its struggles and don't see the things maybe that we'd like to see at times and we feel defeated. May we go to the mountaintop to God in prayer and see Him there and say, You are the Christ. You are the Christ of God. I will follow you. I know one day I'll be with you. And upon this Theophilus can stand because it's certain.