Welcome
Invite various persons to bring a designated item and use this liturgy as a way to begin your time of learning together.
One: The season of Advent is past and the celebration of Christmas is given way to a New Year, but the story of God’s faithful love continues in
All: Jesus the Christ
One: The Magi followed the star to discover the light that overcomes darkness
(Place a candle on a table but don’t light it yet)
All: Jesus the Christ
One: The light of the world is God’s own Son
(Light the candle)
All: Jesus the Christ
One: Baptized by water and the Spirit he was anointed by God as
(Place the bowl of water on the table)
All: Jesus the Christ
One: We give thanks and remember, we too are baptized and made siblings with
(Each person touches the water)
All: Jesus the Christ
One: We are here, Holy Spirit, ready for your leading.
God sightings and prayer offerings
Invite each person to share where they saw or experienced God this week. Invite each person to share something — a person, community, experience, event, etc. – for which they want to offer prayer.
Good and gracious God, we thank you for all the ways you were and are present in our lives and in the world. [Invite each person to say aloud the sighting they named earlier.] We bring our prayers to you, prayers for… [invite each person to say aloud the prayer need they named earlier]. In Christ’s name we pray, Amen.
Connecting with Scripture: Mark 9:2-9
Note: If possible, have paper, paint, markers or crayons available for participants to use as they listen to the second reading of Scripture.
Read the Scripture aloud the first time using the New Revised Standard Version or the Common English Bible.
Give each participant a blank piece of paper and spread a variety of colored pencils, crayons, markers or paints in the center of the table. For the second reading of the text, invite participants to use colors as they listen to biblical passage again. The aim of this experience is not to illustrate the text in a literal manner, but to “listen with color.”
Connecting through story
Watch this clip from the movie “Pleasantville.”
- Why were some people in black and white and some in color?
- What caused the color to emerge in people?
- Why did Bud insist that the color was coming from inside them and wanted to come out and shine?
Connecting with our lives
Engage in dialogue:
- Why do you think Jesus took Peter, James and John up on the mountain with him?
- Why do you think Moses and Elijah were the two who appeared?
- What is their connection to Jesus?
- What do you think James, Peter and John were thinking?
- What did Jesus want them to learn up there?
- Why do you think they wanted to stay on the mountaintop?
- Why do you think Jesus would not want them to stay?
- What did they need to do when they came down from the mountain?
- Why do you think there is such a strong connection between this story and the story of Jesus’ baptism?
- Why do you think this story comes on the Sunday before the season of Lent begins?
- When have you had a “mountaintop” experience?
- Was your impulse to stay on the mountaintop or to return home? Why?
- What do you think Jesus wanted you to do once you returned from that mountaintop experience?
Teaching points that can be incorporated into your discussion:
- This story in Mark 9 is often called the transfiguration. Transfiguration means to be changed. In this instance, it means to be spiritually changed.
- Moses and Elijah are two very significant characters in both the Jewish and the Christian faiths.
- Moses is the central human figure in the identity story of the ancient Israelites. God used Moses to save the Hebrew people enslaved in Egypt, to lead them to freedom and the Promised Land and to mediate the covenant relationship between God and God’s people. They know who God is, who they are and to whom they belong through their mediated experience with God. There were to recognize, honor and worship the one true God and no other gods. In so doing, they would be given the Promised Land.
- Elijah, whose very name means “Yahweh is my God,” was a great prophet sent from God to bring the Israelites back onto the right path of relationship with God. The ancient Israelites strayed from the covenant and began to flirt with other gods (namely Baal) and Elijah was the one sent to call Israel into greater faithfulness. The end of Elijah’s story is that in a great whirlwind, a chariot of fire appeared and whisked Elijah to heaven. To this day, during every Jewish Passover meal there is an empty chair and a cup of wine awaiting Elijah’s return to announce the coming of the Messiah.
- The return of Moses and Elijah signals to the Peter, James and John (all three faithful Jews) the announcement that Jesus is the Messiah.
- In both the story of Jesus’ baptism and in this transfiguration story, the identity of Jesus is revealed and confirmed: This is my son, my beloved, in whom I am well pleased.
- Baptism is our identity story. It tells us who we are and to whom we belong.
- It is an outward expression of an inward experience.
- The transfiguration gives the disciples the experience of witnessing a most amazing vision.
- That vision was not light shining on Jesus, but coming from
- The Spirit shone in that moment showing the disciples who Jesus truly was.
- Jesus would not allow James, Peter and John to stay on the mountain. He wouldn’t allow himself to stay on the mountain. There was life and work and even death that still needed to be done.
Using paper and crayons/pencils/markers, create a graphic novel (comic book) rendition of the story of the transfiguration.
You might also watch the whole movie “Pleasantville,” picking up on the themes of transfiguration.
Prayer
Close your time together by praying for one another, your neighbor, community and the world
REBECCA DAVIS is the associate professor of Christian education at Union Presbyterian Seminary in Charlotte, North Carolina. A teaching elder and certified educator, she served congregations for over 20 years before moving into academic teaching. In addition to teaching and mentoring students, her passion is child advocacy and ministry.
