#DailyDevotion Jesus Manifest His Glory & Our Hope

Mark 9²After six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John with Him and led them up a high mountain to be alone with them. He was transfigured before them, ³and His clothes became dazzling white — no one on earth could bleach them so white. ⁴Elijah and Moses appeared to them and were talking with Jesus. ⁵“Master,” Peter said to Jesus, “it’s good for us to be here. Let’s put up three shelters, one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He didn’t know what he was saying; they were so terrified. ⁷A cloud came and overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud: “This is My Son Whom I love. Listen to Him.”

After six days, so this would be the seventh day. Is Mark insinuating this is the Sabbath day? Even if it is not ‘the’ Sabbath day, i.e. Saturday, it most certainly is ‘a’ Sabbath day. What do I mean? I mean Jesus taking these three up the mountain to pray with him is certainly time away from the crowds to rest and spend time with God in prayer. We may even see this as a foretaste of that eternal Sabbath we enter into when Jesus comes again and we see face to face in all his glory and are transformed to be like him.

Yes, Peter, James and John see Jesus transfigured before them. He reveals his glory to them, that which he had before creation with the Father. It is this glory which we hope to share in when Christ comes with all his angels and we are resurrected from the dead. As the Hymn “Oh, Wondrous Type! Oh Vision Fair” says, “Of glory that the Church may share,” and “Christ deigns to manifest today what glory shall be theirs above” Jesus on the mount makes manifest what he shall transfigure our lowly bodies into when we receive spiritual bodies and life overtakes the death of our flesh.

So Peter will write later, 1 Peter 5:1 “ saw Christ suffer, and I share in the glory that is to be revealed.” Paul says in Romans 5:2, “We boast in the hope of God’s glory.” In chapter 8 of the same he says, ¹⁸“I think what we suffer now isn’t important when I compare it with the glory to be revealed to us.” Jesus tells us in John 17:22, “I gave them the glory You gave Me to make them one as We are one.” Finally, Paul says 2 Cor. 4:17, “The light trouble of this moment is preparing for us an everlasting weight of glory, greater than anything we can imagine.” As we go through suffering in this world, we are encouraged to look to the crucified and transfigured Christ and there see our reward for being faithful to him and bearing our suffering without falling away.

Now before Jesus returns to normal the Father speaks from heaven and says, “This is My Son Whom I love. Listen to Him.” You would think that seeing Jesus transfigured, seeing Moses and Elijah and hearing the Father speak these word would be the end all of things. Yet Peter later writes in his second epistle, 2”¹⁸We heard that voice speak to Him from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain. ¹⁹And we have, as something more sure, the prophetic Word. Please look to it as to a light shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the Morning Star rises in your hearts.” We like the spectacular. The one who has seen the spectacular says the Bible which we read daily is more sure and certain and we should engage ourselves in it until Christ is revealed and we are transformed bodily by his life and light.

Heavenly Father, you have given us a foretaste of what we will be when our LORD Jesus Christ manifested his glory to his disciples. Grant us a steadfast faith even in the midst of suffering so we remain steadfast and receive the gift of your glory when he returns. In Jesus’ name. Amen.