Peter Didn't Want Him to Go, a sermon based on Matthew 17: 1-9, preached on February 15, 2026

People are full of surprises, and that includes Jesus. In this Gospel lesson that we just read, Jesus was transfigured or transformed before three of His disciples. When they reached the top of that high mountain, His face shone like the sun, His clothes became dazzling white, and suddenly appeared before them two great and long-dead heroes of the Old Testament: Moses, who led the Israelites out of Egypt, and Elijah the Prophet, who in his own time, went up to the top of a mountain and was taken by God into Heaven. Our Gospel lesson describes the disciples as afraid in this moment. Why wouldn’t they be? Perhaps, they thought they were hallucinating, thinking to themselves, “I knew we shouldn’t have eaten those mushrooms Thomas found back in the valley,” or more likely they were thinking to themselves, “I thought I knew who this Jesus was, and now I feel like He is someone else entirely. Have you ever had such an experience? I’ve been watching a TV show called A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. It’s about a knight who travels around with a young squire who turns out to be an heir to the throne. This surprise is so shocking to the knight that he’s rendered speechless. He feels betrayed. How did those disciples feel when the Jesus they thought they knew appeared before them next to Moses and Elijah, with His face shining like the sun? While people are full of surprises, sometimes those surprises are so terrifying that we steer our relationships towards the routine, the safe, the predictable, and the secure. Do you remember writing in your friends’ yearbooks, “Don’t ever change?” We want our friends to stay the same. We want our spouses to stay the same. Yet monotony can turn into a prison. Last week, I was at Kroger, and I had the pleasure of running into Jane Pratt in the baking goods aisle. There, she told me that when she got married to John some years ago, she had no idea that saying “I do” meant she’d have to come up with something to cook him for dinner every night from now until the day she dies. At that, another woman shopping for baking goods started to laugh out loud. She was eavesdropping in the Kroger aisle and told us, “That’s why I became a flight attendant. I had to get away from cooking dinner night after night, always coming up with something new. My husband would wake up in the morning and ask me, ‘What’s for supper?’ I said to myself, ‘I have to get out of here!’” The monotony of cooking dinner night after night after night seemed to her like a trap to be escaped, for while routine can feel safe, people need room to grow. Relationships thrive on both routine and variety. If you cook and he cleans, why not trade jobs for a week? Or, better yet, go out to dinner. Try something new. Allow each other to break out of the rut. That’s important in a marriage, and if that’s important in a marriage, wouldn’t that also be important with all our relationships, including our relationship with Jesus? Does Jesus still surprise you? Are you still dedicating yourself to the study of Scripture to learn about who He is? Does following Him push you beyond your comfort zone, or have you put Him into a little box of your own expectations? Has your relationship with Jesus fallen into a monotonous pattern of meatloaf on Monday, chicken on Tuesday, and then church on Sunday? Peter didn’t want Him to change. Up on the mountain top, Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” When you hear Peter say, “Lord, it is good to be here” up on this mountain top, know that what he’s really saying is, “Lord, let me keep you where I’m comfortable.” Friends, we must let Jesus be who He is, not who we want Him to be, just as we must let our kids be who they were created to be. We’re back in that season of high school seniors getting accepted to college. Parents are thinking of their kids growing up and leaving home. I tear up just thinking about Lily and Cece leaving home, so I ask parents who have already watched their chicks leave the nest for advice when I have the chance. One parent, years ago, told me that watching your kids leave home is heartbreaking. The only thing worse is watching them stay home forever. My friends, you know that a part of every human relationship is allowing the people we love to grow and change and become who God called them to be. Christ was called, not to be Peter’s best friend, but to be the Savior of the world. Are you letting Jesus be Jesus or trying to put Him in a box and place Him on a shelf? Nailing Him down was what they tried to do to Him 2,000 years ago, and people are doing it still. We can’t put Him in a box and confine Him to our agendas. No one can keep Him up on the mountaintop. Instead, we must follow Him down from the mountain to encounter again all the broken and hurting people in the valley below, who are just as full of surprises as any one of us. One of the great ministries of our church is the food pantry. Leadership of this ministry has just changed. Martie Moore, who led this ministry and brought it so far, has decided to really retire, so she’s passed the baton to Megan Rubio, an actual rocket scientist with a passion for service. For the first time this month, it was Megan sending out the monthly report of meals, diapers, books, and dog food distributed. You see, under the leadership of Martie Moore, our pantry expanded. Not only do we give out food on Tuesdays, but we also give out diapers, dog food, and children’s books. One station even collects prayer requests, but back to the children’s books. Megan’s monthly report from the food pantry included the story of one child who went through our food line and received a brand-new children’s book a couple weeks ago. That child was so touched by the gift and moved by the sentiment that the next week, she donated 10 of her old books to contribute to our effort. I don’t know how you think of the people who come to our food line, but I assure you, those people, like all people, are so full of surprises that you can’t know them without coming down from the mountain top to meet them face-to-face. People are full of surprises, and that goes for all people. That goes for all people, even us. Even Peter. You may know that this road down from the mountain leads towards the arrest of Jesus, after which Peter will deny Him three times. Such a moment of weakness filled Peter with such shame, and yet Jesus didn’t confine Peter to that moment. Jesus doesn’t confine us to any one step on our spiritual journey. So long as He is beside us, He will lead us beyond our sins and to salvation, so let us continue being surprised by each other just as Jesus is always willing to be surprised by us. I want you to know that I plan on giving up social media for Lent because getting to know people based on what they post on social media makes me feel like I don’t like anyone. I want to be surprised by the goodness of people, so I’m going to try to get to know some of them face-to-face again. If all people are full of surprises then I’m not going to give up on people based on what they post on the internet. I’m asking you to do the same thing. Leave the comfort of your pew to get to know somebody new. Leave the safety of your living room to be reintroduced to your neighbors. Start up a conversation with the ladies you see in the grocery store aisle and be surprised by how much you have in common, for we live in a world where people are not all that different, and yet we often act like some are good and others are the enemy. Did Jesus not come to save all people? Did He not go down from the mountain to encounter even those who would arrest and crucify Him? My friends, we cannot hide from the world up on the mountaintop, nor can we rest in our assumptions concerning the people of God, but being continually surprised by the people around us, let us follow Jesus out into the world. Learn something new about someone who doesn’t look like you. Learn something new about people who are suffering in this country. Let us all come down from the mountain, following Jesus out into the world as He leads us all in the path of salvation. Amen.