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It is good for us to be here

(Mt 17:4)

       Several years ago, Jean and I visited the Vatican. While praying in one of the chapels of St. Peter’s Cathedral, I felt a tremendous joy in my heart. There was complete peace in my mind. I felt that I could have stayed there forever, kneeling, praying, reflecting, and listening to the sound of the voices of nuns singing in the background music pervading the chapel. Even after a considerable length of time, I was reluctant to leave. I wanted so much to stay. But it was time to go.

        I feel almost the same way every time we have a Marriage Enrichment Retreat at Kinasih. I do not want to leave the place. I am reluctant to return to Jakarta. I want to stay there to relish the feeling of joy and prolong the period of consolation that I always experience during our retreats. The MER I and MER II that were held in Kinasih last week were no exception. In fact I felt this desire to stay longer in that place even more intensely. During the entire retreat, as I deliver some of the talks, as I participate in the singing and praising, and as I listen to the sharing of the participants, I felt strongly the presence of the Lord. He seemed so close to me. I imagined the Lord being present there in His glory touching the hearts of all the participants and the members of the service team.

        When the Lord revealed His glory to Peter, James and John on the Mountain of Transfiguration, the three must have felt the same kind of joy, the same kind of peace, but much more. The Gospel of Matthew describes what happened. After six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” (Mt 17:1-4).

Six days before His transfiguration, Jesus talked to His disciples about His coming passion. He told them that He must go to Jerusalem to suffer and be killed. Peter did not want to hear anything about it, but Jesus said to him, “You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do” (Mt 16:23). Thus when Peter saw the transfigured Jesus in his glory, he must have felt a special kind of joy. He must have experienced a foretaste of the vision of the Son of Man which Jesus promised a few days earlier when He said, “Amen, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom (Mt 16:28). During that brief moment, seeing the face of Jesus shining like the sun and His clothes becoming white as light, Peter must have lived through a piece of heaven. Hearing the voice of the Father asking them to listen to His beloved Son, Peter and the other two disciples must have felt a holy fear that leads to a feeling of great consolation.

Peter wanted to remain in the mountain where he encountered the Divine Presence. He did not want to leave. He did not want to go back to Jerusalem. Peter even offered to build “dwellings” for the Lord, Moses and Elijah so that they could all stay there. “Lord, it is good for us to be here,” Peter told Jesus. “Let us not go to Jerusalem but stay here where we are safe,” Peter must have thought. Peter must have remembered that a few days earlier, Jesus told them that He would have to undergo great suffering in Jerusalem. Why then should they leave Mount Tabor? Why then should they go to Jerusalem?

        During our weekend retreat in Kinasih, we experienced our Mount Tabor. Perhaps not much unlike Peter, James and John, we also saw a little bit of God’s glory during the weekend. In His great love and compassion, God had allowed us to experience a little bit of heaven, a little bit of the peace and joy that we could expect to experience when we finally join Him in the new Jerusalem. Therefore, we did not want to leave the place. We wanted to savor the joy, to relish the delight, to enjoy the pleasure of being in the Divine Presence.

But just as it was at the Mountain of Transfiguration, like Peter, James and John, together with Jesus, we all have to “come down from the mountain.” After the weekend retreat at Kinasih, we have to leave and go to our own “Jerusalem.” We have to go back to our work, face the boss at the office, meet deadlines, help the kids with their homework, drive them to school, attend to daily house chores. “It is good for us to be here,” but not yet … there is still a battle to be fought, a war to be won. Yes, indeed, it is good for us to be here. But we still have to earn a living and fulfill our mission to give life.

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