This morning we look together in God's Word in 2 Peter 1, verses 16 through 18. 1 Peter 1, 16 through 18. People of God, hear the glories of the gospel and the exaltation of our Savior, Jesus Christ. For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to him from the excellent glory. this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain." People of God, those verses of 2 Peter set before us two great events in the life of Jesus Christ. one that is yet to be, one that has already happened, though the two here in the passage are inseparably connected. Indeed, one might think of the transfiguration of Christ on the mount as a prefiguration a pre-figure of the second coming and of Christ in glory. This mount of transfiguration, which is an event in the life of Jesus that is not often reflected upon. But Peter, one of the three disciples that actually saw this event, He is the one that the Holy Spirit so directed to impress upon us its importance and brings it to us in this passage. It is not a part of the Apostles' Creed, and therefore we do not look at it very often. decades, a couple decades ago, several decades ago. I preached through the Gospel of Luke, and we certainly dealt with it then, but I cannot find a record of having addressed particularly the Mount of Transfiguration with you in the last twenty years, and so it's high time we get there. In these verses there is a declaration concerning the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. That language in the New Testament is reserved for the second coming. And so as a introduction to the Mount of Transfiguration, Paul, Peter brings in a declaration concerning the second coming, contrasting it with what we do not follow. We do not follow fables. myths. The word here for fable in the Greek is mythos. Well you know what English word we get from that. Myth. A myth. A made up tale. A fictional account. A not true story. And Peter and the Word of God is directing the attention to all the man-made religious myths about gods and false gods that permeated ancient society and that permeate our world today. They are all myths, fables, false. not true, whether it be Mormonism or Hinduism or any other false religion, fictional story. You contrast that to the Word of God. And there is this declaration then by Peter that that what we know is made known to us. Now, in the following verses in this chapter, we focus on the nature of the revelation of God's Word to us. So we won't have that focus here. But the Word of God makes known to us things we may never be able to know through our scientific investigation. You cannot, through an examination of even the glories of creation, you could not come to a conclusion that Jesus Christ is going to come again. You have to have that made known to you. But when it's made known, The word made known here is that it is something that you come to understand and have a firm conviction of and know to be true. So we know that there is a second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ because it has been made known to us. In verse 16, Peter makes a switch in the text. He goes from, moreover, I will be careful in verse 15 to ensure that you always have a reminder of these things, and then in verse 16, for we did not follow. And so he now places himself alongside all the others who are bringing the word of God to the people of God, who are those who have been granted the unique privilege of being a vessel through which the Holy Spirit inspires them to bring knowledge. And of course, also being in the presence of Jesus Christ and learning from him things of the future. And so he says, we make known to you these things about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. And that is a theme in 2 Peter. In 2 Peter 3, verse 4, we read concerning, where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. And he's going to address those who say, how come he's not back? Or 3, verse 12, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat." Again, a reference to the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. That in harmony with the prophecies that are given in the Old Testament, particularly in Daniel chapter 7, 13 and 14. Daniel chapter 7. verses 13 and 14. And here we have, and this of course is in the context of the declarations concerning the nature of the son of man being that one who will be an eternal king, God incarnate. And that is set before us in 7, 13 and 14. I was watching at the night vision and behold one like a son of man coming with the clouds of heaven. He came to the ancient of days and they brought him near before him. Then to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and his kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed. and people of God. We see here in the Old Testament references and expectations of the glories of the second coming of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one who would testify to these things in verses like, Mark chapter 13 verse 26. Mark 13 verse 26. And Jesus picks up this language of Daniel and He declares this, Then they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. So we see in the New Testament this declaration of the coming of Jesus Christ with power being connected to that second coming. And of course, the book of Revelation will have many instances of this, whether it's at the very beginning of that book in Revelation chapter 1, Revelation chapter 1 verse 7, where we read, Behold, he is coming with clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of him. Or Revelation 22 verse 20, the second to last verse or these last two verses of the Bible. He who testifies to these things says, Surely I am coming quickly. Amen. Even so, come Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. come, Lord Jesus." This second coming is set before us here in 2 Peter 1. But the reference, it is a prelude to the declaration, for He received from God the Father, or the coming of our Lord Jesus, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. So there's this coming of Jesus Christ in glory, and then Peter says, but we were already eyewitnesses of his majesty. We already saw what is coming in history, in his first coming, though it was not seen clearly. It was not seen clearly. So where do we read this? In Matthew chapter 17. Matthew 17, 1 through 9, we have the account of this transfiguration. We call it transfiguration. Now children, we call it that because the very appearance of Jesus is changed. There are old people who make pictures of what they want to represent as Jesus. Now, I don't even think that's a good idea, but oftentimes these artists did that and they put a halo, they put a bright light, a circle of a light above the head of Jesus. And that was because they said his divinity is always seen when he was on earth. They thought you could see the divinity of Jesus Christ. That is not normally true. There was no halo about Jesus. If Jesus would have been in this group of people or if we would have lived 2,000 years ago and he was one of you sitting here, there would be nothing that I would see about him in his physical appearance that you would go, oh, there's the divine Christ. You would not see that. When he comes in the second coming, he will come with power and glory. And we'll conclude our sermon with a description of that out of the book of Revelation. Although it's not a literal description, but it's trying to get at the very nature that Jesus Christ will, his glory and his power will shine forth from the very presence of his resurrected physical body in ways that it didn't even do following the resurrection. But on the Mount of Transfiguration, in all of the days that Jesus lived on the earth, at that moment in time, what would be the normal thing in the future was manifested in history. One commentator said it was as if the divinity of Jesus Christ burst forth from his humanity. And if there's any place in the New Testament where that's the case, it is here, where you get a glimpse of His glory, that you will see clearly when we die and go to heaven, that you will see clearly when Jesus Christ comes again, when we will see clearly for all of eternity. Matthew chapter 17, 1 through 9. Now after six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, led them up on a high mountain by themselves, and he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as the light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with him. And then Peter answered and said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, let us make hear three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah. And while he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them. And suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him." And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid. But Jesus came and touched them and said, Arise, and do not be afraid. And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only. And then they came down. Now as they came down from the mountain, Jesus commanded them saying, tell the vision to no one until the son of man is risen from the dead. This is in terms of the life of Jesus shortly before his death. In Luke chapter nine, Luke chapter 9. We read this about this account in verses 28 through 30. Now it came to pass, about eight days after these sayings, that he took Peter, John, and James, and went up to the mountain to pray. And as he prayed, the appearance of his face was altered, and his robe became white and glistening. And behold, two men talked with him, who were Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory, and spoke of his decease, his death, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. In this moment, God is now manifesting the glory of Jesus to his disciples. Shortly before his gory death, he is presented in glory. He himself. They saw his majesty. They saw his glory. His face shone like the sun. That's pretty bright, because if you look at the sun, you can't really look at the sun, because if you actually look at the sun, you would be blinded. You would become blind. And this is like the sun right next to you. I mean, like from here to probably the organ, this is all the farther away they were. They were close to Jesus. They were on the mountain with Him. And He is shining like the sun. He is transfigured. There's no picture. There's no lightness around a head in a picture that can do this. No picture could ever represent what really was happening. Can you imagine the sun shining out of a person? This is Jesus. And in this moment, he is transfigured. His glory is being displayed to the disciples, but only three of them. And they can't tell anybody about it until he's risen. Because his first time on earth was a time of humiliation, not glory. And yet, God the Father manifested, the glory of Christ was seen, and the Father declared His pleasure with the Son at that moment. And Elijah and Moses spoke to Him. Moses, that great prophet who would beg to see God and saw the back of God as it were, but for a second and his face shone so that he had to cover it when he came down off of Mount Sinai. And now, contrasted to Moses whose glory faded, the glory of Jesus Christ is like the sun. A hundred times more radiant than Moses face. Because that radiancy was coming from within the son himself. It was a manifestation of his majesty. We saw his majesty. in a way that they had never seen His Majesty before. Oh, they saw the miracles. They saw the miracles. But people of God, remember that Elisha, some of you have been doing the devotional, the devotional that we give to our church, and in there we have the works of Elisha in history, and Elisha was a mighty miracle worker. He was the miracle worker prophet of the Old Testament. Jesus was a mightier miracle worker than Elisha. But miracle workers and miracles were not unique to Jesus. And Jesus in His miracle working was demonstrating an absolute dependence and perfect harmony with the Holy Spirit in all that He did And so the manifestation of the glory of Jesus at the Mount of Transfiguration was different than the testimony of the miracles concerning His purpose, life, work, and ultimate divinity. But this was seen. They were an eyewitness. And then they heard a voice, a voice which declared that God the Father was one with God the Son, and that God was well pleased with what Jesus had done in everything Christ was perfect. And now they heard, and now they saw, and now they hear it from God the Father. And then when He's displayed in His majesty, He received, He was gifted, it was a gift from God to the Son, this declaration. One can imagine as Christ walked to the cross, because this event is certainly set in the context that Jesus is going to the cross. He's on the way to the cross. And now He has this event in His mind and in His heart, that His glory was revealed to three disciples. His glory was acknowledged by Moses the great prophet and Elijah the great prophets of the Old Testament. And they talked about his death. They talked about his death. And they were, and Jesus said, don't talk about it until I'm raised. And you see now that this glory was used in God to encourage, to strengthen his son for the task ahead. This is my son in whom I am well pleased, this declaration. that is seen and heard. That declaration in the text where it declares that the Father then now in another visible manifestation of it, now there is in the midst of Jesus who is shining bright, in the midst of the two prophets, Moses and Elijah, who are certainly appearing in a totally miraculous, unique way on earth. In this whole context, the Father, a voice came from the excellent glory. The voice came from that one who is all glorious, the Father in heaven, from the excellent glory. So you notice the repeated theme of glory here. You may not have caught it, but all of our songs so far in the Psalms, they all had an element of bringing glory, of acknowledging the glory of God. The glory of God. We began our prayer with an acknowledgement of the glory of God. And that's the glory that's being manifested on the Mount of Transfiguration to the Son from the one who is the excellent glory. This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. This is my beloved Son. This is unique language in all of Scripture between God and an individual person. And it's between the person of the Father and the person of the Son. It's His eternal Son. It's the unique Son that is in focus here. It is that Son who is truly divine, that Son who existed before the foundations of the world, who is now transfigured before the disciples. This one. And this is the testimony. One of the commentators that I read, his whole theme of these verses was this. We were eyewitnesses. We heard a voice. We saw. This is apostolic testimony of historical reality. Not a myth. Something that happens in history. And just as this happened in history, so it will happen in history that he will come again in all of his glory. And we are witnesses. We see, we saw Jesus, we heard Jesus, this consistent theme of apostolic revelation, whether it be here or whether it be in the gospel of John or whether it be the book of Hebrews. That which we have seen, that's which we have handled, that's which we have almost tasted, as it were. We felt him. We knew this. Jesus came. This is a historical reality. Why are you a Christian? What is the fundamental perspective of the Christian faith? Is it that there is a possibility that one's life can change? Christians, people who become Christians, their lives change. So is that what makes Christianity Christian? Is that what makes it real? What makes it real is that Christ was real. He was really on earth. He was really the son incarnate. He acted in history. Believe the apostolic witness. Do you believe the apostolic witness? That's the question. Lots of things make people change. Lots of things make people feel different. Lots of religions have claims to some moral code that we might even say, there's some good in that moral code. They say, don't rob your neighbor, don't kill your neighbor. Okay, we can agree with that. But only the Bible gives us the truth of Christ. The testimony of the apostles, prophets of the Old Testament, because what Moses and Elijah represented is in perfect harmony with what Peter declares here. Do you believe the testimony of the apostles? There is the uniqueness of the Christian faith. It's historical. It's rooted in the historical reality of the incarnation, the conception of Jesus in the womb. that then you come to the birth of Jesus Christ, and the life of Christ, and the transfiguration of Christ, and the death of Christ, and the resurrection of Christ, and the ascension of Jesus Christ, and we are eyewitnesses of His glory, and we are eyewitnesses of His suffering, and we're eyewitnesses of His death, and we have made known to you its meaning by the revelation of the Holy Spirit, Christ died for sinners. Jesus Christ is honored by the Father. It is declared that He is the one that is well-pleasing, and that one in whom He is well-pleased, God the Father would go on and declare, that sacrifice of my Son, I am well-pleased with it. the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ, that One who pleased the Father in every way perfectly. It has been accomplished. A perfect willingness to obey. A perfect willingness to die. the historical reality revealed in its significance in the Word of God. But though He came suffering and dying, His glory was manifested on the Mount of Transfiguration but for a moment. But what was for a moment here is for eternity, is for eternity. because right now Jesus Christ sits at the right hand of God glorified. And that glory will be revealed. It will be revealed to everyone who dies. It will be revealed at the second coming. And that glorious wondrous Savior is described for us in Revelation chapter nineteen beginning with verse eleven. Now I saw the heavens opened and behold a white horse and he who sat on him was called faithful and true. that one in whom God was well pleased, Jesus Christ. And in righteousness He judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns. He had a name written that no one knew except Himself. He was clothed with the robe, dipped in blood, and His name is called the Word of God. And the armies in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, followed him on white horses. Now out of his mouth goes a sharp sword, and with it he should strike the nations. And he himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And he has on his robe and on his thigh a name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Jesus Christ transfigured for a moment in His first coming. Jesus Christ revealed in all of His glory as King of kings and Lord of lords at His second coming and for all of eternity. We shall behold His glory. Amen. Gracious God and Heavenly Father, We thank you for this moment in history where the glory of Christ was manifested in His transfiguration. O Father, though we do not see Him now as such, may we by a true faith believe the apostolic testimony May we by a true faith embrace all of His works on earth, all that was well-pleasing in Your sight. And so may we flee to Christ crucified, that we may flee to Christ glorified, that we may rest in Him. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.