There, Jesus' "face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light" (Matt. 17:2).

The three gospels Matthew, Mark, Luke, records a significant event "Transfiguration of Jesus" in the mountain. Only three disciples (Peter, James, John) visualized the mountain-top transfiguration of Jesus, which didn't bring significant changes immediately as one might expect to happen. Upon witnessing Jesus shining like a sun, Peter gives a surprisingly casual – and perhaps clueless – initial response. God the Father was trying to convey the message of Christ, but immediately that didn't strike their minds and hearts. The Apostle Peter once astounded and fell to his knees, watching the miracles the Jesus performed (Luke 5:1-11) is now offering His skill in tent-making to the transfigured Jesus (Matthew 17:4).

A voice from heaven proclaimed that Jesus "is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him" (Matthew 17:1-5). Many times we are like Peter without giving proper attention to what God wants to communicate to us.  Later, after the resurrection of Jesus, the disciples generated major changes in them. Peter one who had a casual look at the event of mountain-top experience later recounts that the disciples were "eyewitnesses of his majesty" (2 Pet. 1:16).

Both Moses and Elijah appear along with Jesus in the mountain top, but later the cloud and the two great figures vanish, with Jesus alone remaining. Jesus and his disciples step down the hills to the bottom where they encounter a demon-possessed boy who was helpless to heal him. Jesus heals him completely. The two incident between the great mountain top experience and the struggles of the plain that's so striking. We do have spiritual mountain-top experiences, perhaps in a service of worship or maybe even on a literal mountain-top. We see everything clearly, and God is very real. But most of our lives, and most of our ministries, are spent in the plain, struggling with intractable problems and difficult people.

It's easy to get discouraged. But someone's said, "Never doubt in the darkness what God has shown you in the light." Those glimpses of glory are foretastes of heaven. They are far more real than the disappointments and difficulties. They remind us of the presence of God in our lives and His support through ordinary, dull, frustrating times.