Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“Now Peter and his companions were weighed down with sleep; but since they had stayed awake, they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him.”
NL Daily Devotion for Sunday, March 2, 2025
by Pr. Sara Gorman, Clergy Stuff
Main Idea: Sometimes it’s impossible to explain what just happened in front of us.
The phrase in this passage that always catches my attention is “dazzling white.” I think it’s kind of a funny descriptor because white is white. And while there are six hundred options of white at the paint store, let’s be realistic-they all look the same. So when I read dazzling white, I think of freshly fallen snow on the next day. Right when the sun hits it just right, there’s a sparkling that is blinding. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, just ask someone who lives in the north. I’m sure they’ll be happy to explain what this looks like, and how it is even more annoying in October.
If you happened upon this dazzling fluffy stuff and didn’t know what it was, chances are you’d be speechless. And that’s kind of how the disciples felt. They didn’t know what was going on, and they didn’t have the words for it either. They saw two men talking to Jesus and then it was only Jesus on the mountaintop. Where those two men disappeared to, they didn’t know. They had no words to explain the situation to anyone if they asked.
So, when Jesus and the disciples went down from the mountain and the crowd met them, Jesus did what he did best-he made a difference in someone else’s life. He healed a child who was possessed with a demon. And the crowd was stunned just like the disciples were earlier, they wouldn’t have been able to tell you what just happened, because it wasn’t something they’d seen before.
So, it should be no surprise that when Jesus told the crowd he would be betrayed they didn’t know how to respond to that either. It wasn’t something they’d encountered before, and as a result they didn’t ask questions because they didn’t want to be seen as foolish. How would you respond if one of these two things happened right in front of you? Would you have the words to explain what happened?
