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THE KING’S BUSINESS
there is a cross for you. If any one would be My disciple, let him deny himself; and take up his Cross and follow Me.” Not a word is then recorded for a week. There is a week of silence, and many Bible students think a week of estrangement, It seems to have been a little more than Peter and the rest of them could bear, and the Lord just left them to think about it in their sulki ness for about a week. He let it soak in, so to speak. Then He takes them up into the mountain top, to give them a view of the glory beyond, so that for the glory that was set before them they might endure the cross and de spise the shame. These estranged, dis couraged, disheartened disciples He .takes up into the glory, that He may fit them for their better work. Then as to the Process of it. Luke says, “ He took Peter and John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray.” He did not take them up primarily to be transfigured before them. According to Luke, His prim ary purpose in going was to pray. “ And as He prayed, the fashion of His countenance was changed.” The Transfiguration took place while He prayed. “ As He prayed,” as He looked up into the Father’s face, as He loved, as He adored, He was trans figured. That is the kind of praying that transfigures, not the prayer of the ’ beggar, “ Ask and receive” : there is no great heroism in that. Any beggar on the street can do it, just ask and receive; and if you have never had an answer to your prayer in that sense, you have not entered the degree of pauperdom in the kingdom of G°d- There is something more than begging in that word, something of giving, 3of surrender, happy in the thought that the Father is present and smiling and speaking favorably. That suggests the word, “He that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently
His own encouragement. I do not think He needed that. But He was transfigured for the encouragement of the three disciples, Peter, John and James. Why did He take them, and leave the others at the foot of the mountain? Because they were His three favorites, who lived very close to Him? Dr. Morgan says he thinks that our Lord took Peter, James and John because they were the worst of the lot, and needed the Transfigura tion more than the rest. Well, wheth er that be true or not, there is some thing to sustain it, for Peter, the im pulsive man, the blunderer, the man who could say the wrong thing at the wrong time, and do- the wrong thing in the wrong way, when left to him self, needed this unveiling of the glory. John was the disciple of love, to be sure, but a regular Boanerges, and ready to call down fire on his enemies, and make short work of them. He needed the unveiling of the glory from above. And James, to have the honor of being the first martyr, oh ! he need ed the glimpse o f the glory to prepare him for it. Peter needed it more for the future, John needed it for the Isle of Patmos, and James needed it for the beheading block. “ He wastrans figured before them.” This transfigur ation was to be a preparation for a larger and deeper and holier work in their lives. “ After six days.” Luke says, “ A f ter about eight days,’ including the first and the last, while the other two evangelists simply count the six days: between.,Go back the six days, and see what we can find. Jesus has told the disciples that He is going up to Jeru salem to die. He puts the Cross be fore them, and Peter says, “ It shall not be.” The Lord turns to him and says, “ Get thee behind Me, Satan! This power o f selfish personality that would deflect Me from the Cross is still at work in you. The Cross is My Mission. And more than that, Peter,
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