“Glory and Glimmer”
Exodus 34:29-35
Luke 9:28-36
I’ll be honest with you: I have no idea what happened up there on top of that mountain. I don’t know if Moses and Elijah really showed up or if Jesus’ face and clothes started glowing or if all of it was someone’s vivid imagination or their way of explaining what really did happen.
But I’ll be honest with you: I don’t think it really matters.
I think the truth of this story, like those of most of the stories in our scriptures, comes from our openness to it and our willingness to explore it and to trust that God can speak to us through it. When we can trust that scripture comes to us bearing news of liberation, healing and hope, when we choose to let it have its way with us, it is both true and powerful.
And so it is that, even as our rational 21st-century minds might think it highly unlikely for Jesus or anyone else to suddenly begin glowing atop a mountain, scripture is forever telling us that there is much more to this life than we can imagine. Scripture is forever telling us that we are so much more than we can imagine or see—at least most of the time.
Let me tell you about something called biophoton emission.
Now I’m no scientist, but as I understand it, all living organisms emit a very weak—largely invisible—light when super-charged molecules go through certain metabolic processes. Apparently, this is different from bio-luminescence, which is a visible light emitted by certain species. We can see jellyfish, shrimps, glowworms, and fireflies, for example, glow in the dark.
But biophoton emission is one thousand times lower than the visual capacity of the naked human eye. We can’t see it.
And still, in 2009, when scientists put five naked men in extremely cold and utterly dark and sealed rooms and then monitored them with special cameras, they saw light. They concluded that all of us “directly and rhythmically” emit light, and that it is our faces that shine brightest, especially around the cheeks and mouth.
The scientists concluded that, “The human body literally glimmers,” which is to say that the light each and every one of us carries inside us is not only spiritual but also biological. It can be measured.
I tell you this not to try to convince you that Jesus really was transfigured up there, or that Peter, James and John really did see him aglow and hear a divine voice and enter a cloud and all the things.
I tell you this to underscore the truth that all of us glow from time to time, that all of us are filled with the glory of God. I tell you this to invite you to wonder with me how we might be transformed if we saw that glory revealed, if we could actually see one another shining.
How would we be different? How would our society be different? How would the world be different? Would we treat others with more dignity and respect if we could see the light emanating from their bodies?
What if we could see Donald Trump or Elon Musk shining—glowing as they go about their cynical and destructive work? Would our feelings about them change? What if they could see the light emitted by trans folks, women, immigrants, and people of color? What if they could see the glory of God in HIV-positive children in Africa and the U.S. government employees who oversee aid programs? Would they reverse demeaning executive orders and restore life-giving programs and essential jobs?
Would they be transformed? Would we? Would we be so awestruck that we might never be the same? Might we actually cherish and care for one another if we experienced each others’ holy glow and heard them pronounced beloved?
What would help us to see the glory, the God, that, as Thomas Merton said, is shining through the world all the time? And what is it that, as Robert Benson says, has the power and potential to punch holes in the “darkness all around us” so that we might see the Light and “rejoice in the glow of it?”
I’m going to suggest that at least one critical glory-revealing, life-changing experience is awe—the sense of being in the presence of something so beautiful or vast or other-worldly that we feel both small and a part of something amazing. Awe calms our nervous system and releases oxytocin, the so-called “love hormone that promotes trust and bonding” with others.
There is so much in our lives and our world that we cannot control. But we can seek out awe, we can put ourselves in the path of healing love-light—by doing all manner of things, including cherishing our children, being mindful as we go through our days, enjoying a sunset, taking courage at a protest, staring at the stars, worshipping with an open heart, trying new things, or laughing with a good friend until we cry.
Awe allows us to lose ourselves in beauty, love, and joy. It frees us—at least for a moment—from our worries and fears and then opens us to wonder. Awe enables us to see differently, to see the light and glory in others, to recognize that everyone is beloved. And every time we experience awe our hearts are opened to still more wonder and awe.
The photo on the cover of your bulletin this morning shows me standing on the top of Ireland’s Croagh Patrick in 2005. So much history, tradition, and beauty surrounds Croagh Patrick that my friend Charlotte and I approached it with a mix of awe and excitement.
People have been making pilgrimages to the summit of Croagh Patrick for no less than 5,000 years, when it is believed that pagans gathered there to mark the beginning of the harvest season. And it was on the same mountaintop that, according to tradition, Saint Patrick himself fasted for 40 days in the year 441.
Now more than 1 million people a year make the climb for the adventure or the punishment of it. Some of the pilgrims walk the rocky path barefoot, and some even crawl over the sharp stones on their knees, as a form of penitence and devotion. There’s a little chapel at the summit where, on certain days, a priest hears confessions and celebrates mass.
My friend and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about and to experience it ourselves. Maybe we would have some kind of mystical experience. Besides that, all the guide books described the views of Clew Bay from Croagh Patrick as nothing less than magnificent. And so we began the steep ascent.
By the time we reached the top, my shirt was soaked with perspiration—and Clew Bay was nowhere to be seen. The summit was totally socked in by clouds.
And then, as we stared into the thick gray cloud, an opening appeared, as if a window onto the heavens. Through the veiled window we could see the brightness cast by the sun and captured by the cloud. The glory was not in a particular view; it was all around us.
Friends, God’s glory is in us and everyone and all around us—whether or not we can see it, whether or not we can feel it. Especially at distressing times like these, when God’s glory is hard to see or feel, we must choose to trust that it is there and that it will hold us.
Especially in the midst of a dangerous storm, especially when all seems lost and it’s all we can do to stand our ground, we must seek out the glimmer and glory that is all around us. We may have to climb tall mountains to find it; we may have to cross oceans; or finding it may be as simple as choosing to see—really see—all the goodness and beauty in our lives. When we train our hearts and eyes to see it, we will see it, and we can choose to surrender ourselves to its healing, transforming powers.
We, too, have been chosen by God to shine brightly in this world. We, too, can let a holy glow transform us from the inside out.
