This week’s reading details the events that lead up to the Transfiguration. Luke’s text skillfully staircases these revelatory experiences as steps along the road to the ultimate mountain top experience.

The disciples witnessed Jesus casting out demons (Luke 8:32) and his resurrection of a child (8:54). Jesus sent them out on their own mission journeys, empowering them to heal and exorcize demons (9:1). He miraculously fed five thousand people with five loaves and two fish (9:112-17). Peter even experienced a moment of faith and clarity, declaring Jesus to be “the Messiah of God” (9:20).

Immediately after Peter’s confession, however, Jesus reveals to his disciples the startling new work that the “Son of Man” will undertake — suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection (9:21-22). Manor …