I was reminded of this when I was reading about the new Martin Luther King Jr., documentary that was released yesterday. The documentary includes a snapshot of the last speech King gave-the day before his assassination. It ended with the hauntingly prophetic words: "I don't know what will happen now; we've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop. ... And so I'm happy tonight; I'm not worried about anything; I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." The next day Martin Luther King Jr. lay dead on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel.

In the weeks just before this speech Martin's private journals describe his fears-fear of vilification, fear that his work was all for naught, fear of being shot, maimed, killed, fear for his family. And yet on the eve of his own death, Martin Luther King Jr was unafraid...for he had been to the mountaintop. He had not just seen the transfiguration of Jesus; he himself had been transfigured, transformed by the power of the living God. We have seen it in this very church, when we've heard Ruby Sales teach us about non-violence by having her own life saved as a child during this same civil rights movement by a young Episcopal seminarian Jonathan Daniels who shielded her body and took the gunshot that had been intended for her. We have seen it in this very room, as we have listened to Bishop Gene Robinson tell us stories of courage that have come from a life transfigured by God's presence, transformed by grace, and given the courage to stand up for the dignity of each of us here this morning - our dignity as children of God, whether gay or straight or conservative or liberal.

In each of these people we have had the opportunity to glimpse, as O'Driscoll puts it, "a peak high above the lower slopes where we do most of our own journeying." Martin, Ruby and Gene knew that each of us would have fears or things in this life that scare us; life can be a scary place! Each of them knew something far more important, that we do not have to BE our fears. We do not need to live lives shaped and formed in the image not of the living God but the image of our fears. To spend our life, AS fear is to pass our time disconnected from life, one another and God. Fear robs us of the awareness that suffering hurts others in just the same way that it hurts us. We lose our sense of empathy-of compassion...and ultimately a straightforward sense of conscience. Empathy-compassion, reveals to us how likely it would be for someone to feel diminished if they were lied to, violated if they were stolen from, disempowered when excluded, desperate if they were hungry. Transfiguration is about becoming a follower of the Jesus of the mountaintop, who in getting in touch with who he was in God's eyes could then be fearless in coming down off the mountain and facing Jerusalem.