JUST A STOPOVER: LISTEN THEN MOVE ON

2nd Sunday of Lent
Lk 9:28-36

One of the images we have about life is the image of a journey. We journey through life. And no one can make that journey for us.

In the journey called life, the road is not always smooth and straight. There are rough and bending path along the way. Our journey in itself may be marked with some detours and even u-turns. We sail seas and swim rivers, enter tunnels and explore forests, stray in wastelands and bask in a field of wheat. But there is nothing more overwhelming than mountains in life.

No one can ignore a mountain. By its very nature, a mountain is imposing. We can either cross it or go around it. We can conquer it or it can conquer us. Conquering a mountain means climbing it. Cursing it means being conquered by it.

Jesus faces a mountain today. He does not curse it; He climbs it. He does not take the easy way by going around it; He makes the difficult choice of scaling it. Jesus does not allow His mountain to conquer Him; He conquers it instead.

Mountains are not only geographical elevations. They are also crisis-situations. Their height and width may mean either consolation or desolation to us. Mountains are not only peaks along our journey in life; they can also be crossroads. Every crossroad is a moment of crisis. Depending on how we respond to it, a crisis may mean grace or disgrace, blessing or chastisement, a bend or a block, a beginning or an end. The same is true with our mountains in life.

Jesus, in becoming one like us in all things but sin, shares in the journey we call “life”. He, too, has His own mountains. Jesus has His days of consolation and nights of desolation. He has His moments of standing at the center of crossroads. He, too, has His crises. But no matter what, He conquers all His mountains. Today, He shows us how we should conquer ours.

Let us take a step backward for a moment. Last Sunday, in the wilderness, we heard Satan tempting Jesus. Each time Satan tempted Him, Satan would begin with this phrase: “If You are the Son of God.” Satan wanted Jesus to prove Himself by means contrary to God’s will. Jesus heard Satan but He did not listen to Him. He did not give in to his temptations. Rather, Jesus fought Satan’s temptations with the Word of God.

Today, on top of a mountain, we hear a voice from a cloud, saying, “This is My Son, the Chosen One. Listen to Him.” God does not only affirm that Jesus is His Son but also that Jesus is the Christ, the Christos, the Chosen, the Anointed, One. We hear the voice and the voice wants us to listen. Let us give in to it. Let us listen to Jesus, the Word of that voice.

By climbing His mountain, Jesus tells us that we should climb ours. Let us climb our mountains; let us not curse them. Conquer our mountains; do not let them conquer us. For we have what it takes to scale our mountains because we, too, are sons and daughters of God. We are not the Chosen One but we have been chosen in Him who climbs His mountain with us today.

Jesus does not climb His mountain alone. While no one can climb His mountain for Him, Jesus nonetheless took three of His closest friends – Simon Peter, James, and John. Common interpretation of this action of Jesus is that Jesus wants His three disciples to witness His real glory before He endures His agony. However, nothing hinders us – most especially if we truly believe that Jesus is not only God but is also truly human – to contemplate on Jesus taking His closest friends with Him in climbing His mountain because He longs for the assurance of their love and support. Jesus comes closer and closer to His cross and while it can be very frightening to die, it can even be more frightening to die alone.

After climbing His mountain, Jesus goes down from it. Mountains are not meant to be anyone’s permanent address. The breathtaking view from the top of a mountain can be tempting in itself for anyone to pitch his tent there and forget that he is just passing by as he makes his journey called “life”. Jesus shows us that we go up our mountains in order to go down from them. Reaching the top of our mountains is not yet conquering our mountains. Going down from them is. Many think – and they are gravely mistaken – that mountain climbing is about reaching the top of a mountain. No. Mountain climbing is about reaching the summit and returning to the base. For a mountain is worth climbing only if it is possible to go down from it.

We journey in life. We journey through life. Our journey in life takes us in and through Lent once more. On the one hand, Jesus helps us feel and recognize His presence with us as we make our journey through this season. On the other hand, we accompany Jesus make His journey to Jerusalem where He will die on top of another mountain. Together with Jesus, we make a “trip to Jerusalem”, the kind of “trip to Jerusalem” that is not similar to what we play during parties. It is not the kind of “trip to Jerusalem” that goes around chairs; rather, it is the one that climbs mountains. It is not about scrambling for seats to win the game, but about carrying crosses to gain eternal life. This one is the original “trip to Jerusalem”. Today, we make a stopover on top of a mountain. We listen. Then, we go down to move on.