Unable to Do and Afraid to Ask for Help

Scripture Lessons: Exodus 34: 29-35 and Luke 9: 28-45 Sermon Title: Unable to Do and Afraid to Ask for Help Preached on February 27, 2022 Our daughter Cece is newly interested in football cards, which gave me a reason to dig all my old baseball and football cards out of our basement. Going through them with Cece has helped me remember those days when a piece of cardboard with a picture of an athlete on it really mattered to me. I remember sneaking them to school and trading them during recess, or spending Saturday mornings in Blue and Gray Sports Cards on Roswell Road. That place is still in business somehow. By the time I was 12 or 13, I was into cards enough that my dad would drive me to these big baseball card conventions, where I could walk around and spend my whole allowance. Those conventions were big rooms full of tables and sports card dealers with their most valuable cards in plastic cases. Sometimes, the dealers there would put together grab bags: a bin full of envelopes, with each envelope containing two or three cards. You could pay a couple dollars to reach in, grab an envelope, and that envelope might have a valuable card in it, but it might not. One Saturday afternoon, after having cut the grass for my parents and a few neighbors, I accumulated $40, all of which I spent on these envelopes. I reached in, grabbed 10, opened them, one after another, and was disappointed to find that I hadn’t gotten anything good. Basically, I had wasted all the money I’d worked hard for on 10 envelopes of worthless cards. I was so disappointed that I let it ruin my mood. Worse, that day my grandfather went with us to the card show, and while I was off wasting money on grab bags, he bought me a pen shaped like a baseball bat. When he gave it to me, I was too grouchy to be grateful. I’m not sure that I really even said, “Thank you,” and so my lasting regret from that day is not wasting $40 but acting ungrateful to my grandfather, who bought me something thoughtful. Can you relate to any of that? I was so disappointed about what had just happened that I couldn’t appropriately respond to the person right in front of me. Something like that, but in a much more profound and shocking way, happened to the disciples in our second Scripture lesson. We call today “Transfiguration Sunday,” and we remember today this moment where Jesus was up on top of the mountain so close to God. It’s a moment that brings back memories from our first Scripture lesson from the book of Exodus when Moses spoke with God, received the Ten Commandments, and was so physically changed by his proximity to divinity that his face shone; only the transfiguration in Luke speaks of a more profound transformation than there was in Exodus, for Moses’ face shone, but Jesus was dazzling white. Notice in the first Scripture lesson that Moses’ appearance was shocking enough that Aaron and the Israelites were afraid to come near him. How must the disciples have felt? Having heard the Savior speaking of His departure, then seen Him so transfigured alongside Moses and Elijah, then heard the voice of God speak directly to them, they came down from the mountain, surely with their knees shaking. It should come as no surprise that while they came down, their heads were still up in the clouds; yet a crowd was waiting for them. Among the crowd was a desperate father whose son would be seized by a spirit. When he had the chance, this desperate father said to Jesus, who came down later, “I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.” Why not? Well, isn’t it true that from time to time, we all become so preoccupied that we come home already overwhelmed with thoughts spinning in our heads? We’re down from the mountain though our heads are still in the clouds. We aren’t really listening when people talk to us. We aren’t fully present. Our minds are spinning, and we’re unable to fully function. Maybe you’re at the dinner table, and someone keeps asking you to pass the salt, but your mind is still in an afternoon meeting; or maybe you’re in a meeting but can’t stop thinking about a child sick at home. This phenomenon is a part of being human. As humans, we can’t be in two places at once. When we try, it causes stress. Have you heard about stress? Some people don’t like to talk about how they’re feeling. It’s hard to talk about emotions, so people like Brené Brown, five-time best-selling author, try to help us out. In Brown’s newest book, she attempts to define those feelings we feel, like fear and anxiety. In her definition of anxiety, she quotes a song Willy Wonka sings while his boatload of children and their parents careen through that dark tunnel, taking them all deeper into his chocolate factory. The song goes like this, and it does make me a little anxious just hearing it: There’s no earthly way of knowing Which direction we are going. There’s no knowing where we’re rowing Or which way the river’s flowing. Is it raining? Is it snowing? Is a hurricane a-blowing? Not a speck of light is showing So the danger must be growing. Are the fires of hell a-glowing? Is the grisly reaper mowing? Yes! The danger must be growing For the rowers keep on rowing. And they’re certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing! Does any of that sound familiar? Have you ever ridden on Willy Wonka’s boat of anxiety? Maybe you’re on it now, for these days, there’s plenty to be anxious about. Denise Lobodinski sent me a picture of a kindergartener holding back tears as she draws a picture on her desk. The caption reads, “I am tired of witnessing historical events. Enough is enough!” and so maybe we sing: Is it hot? Or is it snowing? Are the winds of war a-blowing? Should we wear a mask? Or stay at home? Get out and live? Or bar the doors? Is any light a-showing? Then the danger must be growing. Is the ICU still full? What’s the stock market doing? Is the church thriving or will everyone worship at home in their PJs from now on? Just what is going on? I don’t know, but when I don’t know, it often feels like it must be bad. Think about it from the disciples’ perspective: Now Jesus is leaving, and God is speaking. What are Moses and Elijah doing there? Haven’t they been dead for like 1,000 years? We’re up on a mountain. Can we stay here? If we must come down, what will happen to Jesus? He thinks He must die, but we want Him with us. As we come down, there’s a man who needs help with his son, but we can’t even tell which way is up and which way is down. Yes! The danger must be growing For the rowers keep on rowing. And they’re certainly not showing Any signs that they are slowing! If that was what was going on in their heads, you can’t blame them for not being able to heal the child. They were overwhelmed! Yet, despite what they were feeling, Jesus has no patience for them and their anxiety. He says, “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you?” Then He healed the boy Himself, and while everyone was amazed at all that He was doing, He said to His disciples, “Let these words sink into your ears: The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into human hands,” only they did not understand this saying, and they were afraid to ask Him about it. Isn’t that the way it is with us sometimes? They were unable to understand, and so they were unable to do. Jesus calls them perverse, which means wrong but determinedly so. They couldn’t heal the boy.; Jesus had do it. They didn’t understand what He meant when He said He would be betrayed. They were afraid to ask Him any more about it. This is the way it is with anxiety or preoccupation, worry or profound disappointment: Our minds spin with trying to solve problems we have no power to solve, while the problems we could solve, we’re too distracted to deal with. A prayer then comes to mind: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; The courage to change the things I can; And the wisdom to know the difference. My friends, this prayer is the way off Willy Wonka’s boat of anxiety and the way towards making a difference in this world. What we must do is accept the things we cannot change. We cannot change the past, so we must let it go before we miss the chance to change the future. We must not become so exhausted worrying over things that are none of our business. There’s an expression for this condition among Christians: “He’s so heavenly-minded that he’s no earthly good.” Likewise, there are those among us who are so fixated on what’s happening in Washington, D.C. that they’re no good in Marietta, Georgia. It’s been something like that for me. The pandemic, the variants, the weather, the invasion of Ukraine, and my mind keeps spinning. Miraculously, last week I had the chance to get away and go skiing with our two girls in North Carolina. Going down a mountain, trying to keep up with our daughter Cece, who was going down a black diamond run, my ski got caught and I fell head over heels. It was one of those falls where my stuff was all over the place: a ski pole over there and a ski down below me. It was bad enough that a man asked me if I was alright. I said I was. Then he asked me, “Were you trying to keep up with her?” Of course, I was. How hard it is to accept our limitations. How hard it is to come to terms with what we can’t control. Yet, when we are consumed with what we can’t change, we forfeit the chance to change the things we can. If there is a clear lesson for us today on this Transfiguration Sunday, I believe it is that Christ is now walking towards Jerusalem, to His death, to save the world. That’s His destiny, so we must watch Him as He goes, give thanks to God that He’s going, but most of all in watching, we must accept that, along with so much else, we cannot change His course. Can we accept that? Can we accept what we cannot change? We must, for there are those nearby whose hands will not be held unless we hold them. There are those nearby whose words will not be heard unless we hear them. There are those nearby who will not be healed unless we heal them. Today, now, what is in your power to do? Go and do it, trusting God with the rest. Amen.