Below is the sermon from Sunday, March 6, Transfiguration. The readings each year meet Jesus and the disciples going up the mountain, where Moses and Elijah appear with Jesus and God's voice repeats what we also heard in the baptism story, "This is my son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him." It's a mystical moment, but Jesus doesn't stay there, but leads the disciples back down the mountain, realizing he is headed to the cross.
Vicar Brett Wilson – Transfiguration A – 3/6/11 – CELC Lancaster – Matthew 17:1-9
Honey, when you're out at the store, can you pick up some transfiguration? What'd you do this weekend? Oh, a little transfiguration. Transfiguration is a big word. One we don't use all the time. Every year we celebrate this festival on the last Sunday before Lent – the Transfiguration of our Lord. The gospel reads “Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. 2And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white.”
The story of Jesus' transfiguration is a mountaintop experience – it harkens back to Moses who just like Jesus and the disciples, went up the mountain and experienced God's glory. Images of light are associated with God's presence on the mountaintop is something that we are familiar with, like the burning bush. Often in the bible these moments happen on top of a mountain, but these game-changing moments can happen elsewhere. Like Paul on the road to Damascus, when he sees the bright light and hears the voice of God, and is forever changed.
Maybe you have had transformative, transfiguration experiences in your own life. We long for these mountaintop experiences. Those moments of climax and change, or a twist in your story. When clarity came or the whole world around you shifted. Maybe it was when you saw your child for the first time, or when you knew you found the right job or vocation. But it could also be when you received a diagnosis, or mourned a death, or overcame some disabling challenge. Good or bad, these moments bring some clarity. Those are transfiguration moments.
We long for God to break in, for transfiguration, transformation, metamorphosis, change. We look for transformation in our relationships, on our bathroom scale, and even in our spiritual lives. But it's not something we can just pick up at the store. And when we look at the newspaper, though, or flick on the news, and most often hear about the wrong kinds of transformation.
The transfiguration is a glimpse of God's glory and fullness. God's voice from a cloud says “This is my Son, the Beloved, with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” We have heard this before – at Jesus' baptism – and these two festivals – baptism of our Lord and transfiguration of our Lord bookend the epiphany season. Epiphany is all about light, and the identity of God revealed in Christ. And this image of light and clarity from God – that this one is the savior, is also the bookend that opens us into the season of Lent. The light and the image of Christ in God's eyes foreshadow the light of Easter, but also remind us that this vision won't all make sense as Jesus also foretells the journey to the cross, the journey we will take with him this Lent.
Transfiguration is a big word, and the mystical nature of this story can make it seem like something so high on the mountains and so far from our Monday mornings. But let's go back to that word transfigured again. Not a word we hear a lot, but one that's important in this glimpse of who Jesus is. The treasure is here, Jesus isn't the only one transfigured in the bible. But the other two times this verb is used, it's to describe us! And it's not about mountaintop, climactic experiences of our faith, but about the whole journey.
In 2nd Corinthians 3:18, Paul writes about our everyday lives of faith - “And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” God is about the business of transformation, transfiguration, in our everyday lives, off the mountain. Remember, Jesus doesn't stay on the mountain, but comes down. Jesus cares and stays with us in our everyday lives, in the valley. Transformation, transfiguration, is God's work in us over our whole lives, not just a climactic moment or a total change.
The only other time the bible uses this verse is one of my favorite verses, Romans 12:2 - “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Transfiguration, God's process of moving in our lives and transforming, renewing and shaping us to draw nearer to him and reach out in faith, is the story of our whole faith lives. It is also the shape of our Lenten journey, which begins this Wednesday. When the ashes are put on our foreheads and the words are spoken, remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return, these are bookends of our life here on earth. But they also speak to the larger journey, to God's claim on us in the shape of the cross, starting in baptism when God claims us as his own and ending only on the last day when God will call us home. We get these glorious glimpses – in the light that reflect God's glory and how God moves and shapes us every day. Transfiguration is not a one-shot thing, or a high point we long for, but the shape of our whole lives, as God forms us. The shining light of Epiphany and God's promises will carry us on to Easter. We might look at our bodies, the newspaper, or the past, and think – where is the light – but remember – this is God's continuous work of transforming us. God gives us this light and our loved ones, our community, and our church, to reflect back to us how we see God at work.
The story of Jesus' transfiguration gives us a glimpse of Easter light, but Jesus doesn't stay there. He rejects Peter's offer to build homes to stay at this place which seems so near to God. Instead, Jesus comes down off the mountain, to live among the people, to complete the mission of his life and do everyday things. God's transforming, transfiguring power is in your everyday things, continuously working. Luther writes, “This life, therefore, is not godliness but the process of becoming godly, not health but getting well, not being but becoming, not rest but exercise. We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way. The process is not yet finished, but it is actively going on. This is not the goal but it is the right road. At present, everything does not gleam and sparkle, but everything is being cleansed.”
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