Life moves on. Luke—ever the
careful physician—alone records certain human details: their drowsiness, their
fear, their silence afterwards. He notices how people actually are in moments
too large for them. Sometimes we read that drowsiness as indifference.
Scripture invites a kinder reading. Bodies yield under the weight of sorrow and
strain. A symptom of grief is profound, deep sleep – (we see this in patients
when things get uncomfortable. Many of you know it: after long hospital
nights, after funerals, after the day the papers are signed, a deep sleep
comes, not from laziness but from grief and depletion. Jesus was praying under
the agony of what lay ahead—His cross, our sins, a cup He alone could drink.
The disciples already sensed a loneliness coming, the ache of losing the One to
whom they had given everything. To love deeply is to accept the possibility of
deep hurt. Their sleep was proof of their great attachment, and their deep
sympathy in His sorrows. Luke says – “sleeping for sorrow” – on account of
their sorrow – their grief was great. Life presses and we retreat. Still, God
meets us where we are, heavy-eyed and human.
Yet the Lord chose to show them
something before the valley: a preview of His glory and a promise that
suffering would not be the last word. On that mountain, heaven’s witnesses
stood beside Him—Moses, the lawgiver, and Elijah, the prophet—bearing testimony
that the whole story of God points to Jesus.
Luke names the subject of their
conversation: His exodus. Not merely His death, but His departure through death
and His passage beyond it; not only a leaving, but a leading. As Israel once
went out of Egypt toward a promised land, so the Son would go out through a
greater Red Sea—the grave—and open a way where there was none. Calvary and the
empty tomb are one saving journey: a departure from bondage, an arrival into
promise, accomplished “at Jerusalem” and offered to the world.
We see in v. 33 that Peter wanted
life to somehow stop where he was. He said – “without knowing what he was
saying “ – [probably because he was so bewildered in his state of ecstasy]. We
would probably have been the same. Peter remarked, “Let’s construct three
booths here – for You, Moses, and Elijah!” [In Lev. 23:42, there is a reference
to “booths”: …dwell in booths after being brought out of Egypt.] Peter’s
impulse was understandable: “It is good to be here! Let’s build shelters. Let’s
hold this moment.”
We know that longing. We try to
freeze joy with cameras and keepsakes, to make the good day endure by sheer
will. We savor wedding days, a child’s first cry, a season when the house is
still full. But Scripture says there are no stopping places in life. Life moves
on. The sun sets on mountaintops—and it rises in the valleys where people need
healing. Immediately after the Transfiguration, Jesus descends to a father
begging for his tormented son. Glory is never given so we can camp; it is given
so we can go.
Peter learned that life moves on!!!
They heard a voice! Matthew records that they fell to the ground – Jesus came
and touched them and said “Don’t be afraid.” For the pleasant moments that we
would like to hold forever – life moves on! We can remember but we can’t hold
on.
Life moves on physically. Our
bodies are made for motion and function; when heart and lungs stop, earthly
life ends. Life moves on emotionally. To live is to feel, to be aware and
responsive. Some of us have witnessed a loved one kept alive by machines while
the person we knew seemed far away; it taught us that pulse is not the measure
of a full life. And life moves on spiritually. We are not meant to circle the
same patch of sand forever. In Christ, we grow up into Him. We press on toward
the mark.
The Bible’s hope is not static; it
is pilgrimage. Abraham went out, not knowing where he was going, because he
trusted the One who called. Israel moved toward promise, often stumbling, yet
led by God’s presence. The church moves by the Spirit from Jerusalem to Judea
and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.
Perhaps you are tempted, like
Peter, to settle where you felt God most clearly—a conference high, a
youth-camp firelight, a season when prayer was easy and the bills were paid. Or
perhaps you are in the opposite place: a hard valley you would give anything to
escape. A pink slip. A diagnosis. The long tail of a pandemic that rearranged
your world. A fire that took your home. A betrayal that took your breath. Hear
the same sermon in both seasons: life moves on. Not in the shallow sense that
time heals everything, but in the holy sense that God leads His people on. The
cloud that overshadowed the mountain was not a fog of confusion; it was the
sign of God’s near presence. From within it came the command that still orders
all Christian living: “This is My beloved Son; hear Him.”
When the cloud lifted, “they saw
Jesus only.” That is not loss—it is clarity. Teachers, mentors, even the great
saints, must step back. Christ remains. He is enough. He is the Way through
your exodus and mine. He is the Word we must hear when we would rather build
tents. He is the Hand that touches trembling disciples and says, “Rise, and do
not be afraid.”
First, God gives us mountaintops,
but He calls us down to mission. The light is not the destination; it is the
preparation. The test of true glory is what we do next: do we walk with Jesus
into the crowd, the classroom, the job site, the kitchen table, the hospital
room? Do we bring the patience we learned in worship into the traffic jam? Do
we bring the peace we found in prayer to the person who wounded us? Life moves
on—so must love.
Second, Jesus’ exodus defines ours.
Some exits are forced on us; others we must choose. We may have to leave a sin
we have coddled, a bitterness we have narrated too long, a fear that has become
a friend. We may have to leave a good season because God has a better
obedience. Our leaving is safe because His was saving. He went before us
through death and shattered its power. He rose, ascended, and poured out the
Spirit, so that we never walk alone.
Third, “hear Him” is the Christian
posture in every season. When joy swells—hear Him. When sorrow drowns—hear Him.
When opinions multiply—hear Him. The Father does not say, “Admire Him,” though
we must; nor “use Him,” though He helps; but “hear Him”—obey His Word, trust
His heart, shape your steps by His voice. That is how pilgrims travel well when
the road bends and the weather changes.
Think about a young couple saved
for years to open a small café. Opening week was a blur of joy—the sign lit,
friends crowded in, reviews were kind. Then came supply shortages, a broken
oven, a slow winter. They learned to bless God for both the ribbon-cutting and
the repair bill, because life moves on and faith is proved in the long
obedience. Life moves on; Jesus moves with His own. I have had many
disappointments and so have you. But perhaps we need this message even more –
for the moments of darkness and despair and loneliness change one circumstance
– LIFE MOVES ON! Our lives are not stagnant.
Many of us have had to say good-bye
to beloved parents or even to children. Some carry the ache of a broken home.
Some are watching children step into an unknown future. We cannot hold even the
sweetest days; we can remember them with gratitude. And we cannot be trapped by
the hardest days; we can trust God to redeem them; the child of God can know
that life is a pilgrimage; it is going from the Egypt of life – to the promised
land. Jesus is the Joshua who leads the way.
Charles Spurgeon once wrote “If
Christ is not all to you, he is nothing to you. He will never go into
partnership as a part Savior of men. If he be something he must be everything,
and if he be not everything, he is nothing to you.”
He said in more words what
Scripture says in fewer: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”
When all else passes away, Christ remains. That’s why the Gospel is not advice—not
what we must climb up to do, but an announcement—of what He has already accomplished
through the cross, the tomb, and rising again to open for us a way out of
bondage and into promise. Therefore, repent and believe. If you have never
trusted Him, this is your day: step onto His rescued road, leave Egypt behind. If
you are His, take courage; rise—do not be afraid.
To Peter and the other
disciples—after telling them to get up and not be afraid—“Jesus was found
alone.” Alexander Maclaren wrote: “So all other teachers, helpers, guides, are
lost in His sight, or drop away as the ages roll on, and He only is left. But He
is left, and He is enough and eternal. Happy are we if in life we hear Him, and
if in our experience Jesus is found alone, the all-sufficient and unchanging
companion and portion of our else ‘lonely and restless spirits.’”