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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
‘It is good for us to be here.’
Luk_9:33
But even as St. Peter uttered the words in an ecstasy, so are those words being echoed on all sides, by lips which know not what they say. ‘It is good to be here. Here let us build up tabernacles.’
I. No continuing city.—A man has hosts of friends, is genial and popular, and made welcome everywhere. The pleasures, the excitements of the world, are freely offered to him, and gladly seized. He says, ‘It is good to be here—very good; I only wish I could always be here.’ Well, the years roll on—changes come—reverses overtake him—the friends who flocked about him in his prosperity vanish. He, the same one who used to say, ‘It is good to be here’—who dreaded the time when he would have to bid farewell to the world—is weary of everything, and longs for the end. Ah! in a state in which we have no continuing city, who would say ‘It is good always to be here’?
II. The world not good.—There are some who, in their love for the world, are saying, ‘It is good for us to be here. The world, and the things of the world, are very dear to us—we care for nothing else.’ Ah! God open their eyes before the storm break that shall lay their earthly tabernacle in ruins.
III. Where it is good to be.—There are others who would tarry for ever on the mount of transfiguration with their Lord—who dread the daily strife of tongues; the world’s sneers, and scoffs, and hardness, and unbelief. Many of us would fain escape the shame and offence of the cross. But our work lies where that offence daily meets us; and thither God’s voice calls us. There let us be found—our loins girded, our lamps burning—when the Master comes.
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Rev. J. B. C. Murphy.
Illustration‘St. Peter saw quickly enough it was good to get a sight of God’s glory. So it is. David saw the same from the lovely shining stars—they told him of the power of the Maker. “When I consider the heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the sun and moon … what is man, that Thou art mindful of Him?” A God so great to look upon and care for so small a thing as I! It was good for St. Peter and St. James and John to know Jesus as God and see His glory. It will be good for us to climb the upward path of difficulty, and on the mountain-top to see God too. We do not all see Him the same way, but His glory is revealed in so many things all around that we cannot miss the sight if we only look for it. If we miss seeing how great and glorious God is, then it is because we use our eyes wrongly or we do not look for Him. “Let us make three tabernacles.” That’s where St. Peter made a mistake; he meant “Let us stay here!” ’