A mystery beyond words: sermon for Transfiguration Sunday, 19 February 2023

Both of our scripture readings are stories that happen on mountain tops, and involve mortals experiencing the glory of God. The first reading is Exodus 24:12-18. Moses has freed the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt, and is now leading them through the desert to the promised land. On the way, however, God has made a new covenant with them, based on the Ten Commandments. Now, to seal the covenant, Moses goes up the holy mountain, Mount Sinai, where God will give him the Ten Commandments on stone tablets.

The Gospel reading is Matthew 17:1-9. The apostle Peter has declared that Jesus is, indeed, ‘the Messiah, the Son of the Living God’. But Jesus has warned his disciples that he will suffer and die, and that they must ‘carry their cross’ and suffer, too, if they want to follow him. So the disciples are pretty confused, as Jesus takes just three of them up a mountain. The mountain, the clouds, the light and the voice from heaven is all very reminiscent of Moses’ experiences on Mount Sinai. And, indeed, Moses, together with the Hebrew prophet Elijah, appear in this story.

In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

In the tale of what has become known as the ‘transfiguration’ of Jesus, the disciples get a glimpse of the glory of the God who has sent Jesus. Maybe we should just go through this story and how it might help us to see glimpses of God’s glory and wisdom.

The story begins with Jesus, Peter, James and John climbing ‘a high mountain’. It’s a bit odd that Jesus would take just three of his friends off at this point. For the disciple band is restless- it seems that their following Jesus will get them into trouble. He is not going to set Israel free, like a conventional politicians or guerrilla leader. In fact, he’s told them that he will suffer and die- and that suffering is ahead for them, too. Shouldn’t Jesus be staying with his, answering their questions and offering them comfort at this difficult time?

Well, we know from other parts if the Gospels that Jesus did sometime seek solitude. He needed time by himself, to pray and commune with his Father. So it’s not really surprising that he would take his closest confidants off on their own. There are Christians who claim that they are too busy to pray. But if Jesus needed to take time for God, why shouldn’t we need it as well? We can certainly experience God in everyday life. But worship and prayer are essential. We all need to make time for God.

It is no accident that they go up a mountain, for this strange tale is meant to remind us of Moses going up a mountain to receive the Law which governed the life of Israel- of which the Ten Commandments are at the basis. We are told that Moses climbed Mount Sinai, it was covered in cloud, and then

The dazzling light of the Lord’s presence came down on the mountain. To the Israelites the light looked like a fire burning on top of the mountain.

In the culture in which Jesus lived, light and clouds were to be expected when you experienced the presence of God. So it is in our Gospel reading: as his friends watch, something odd happens to Jesus:

As they looked on, a change came over Jesus: his face was shining like the sun, and his clothes were dazzling white.

When I read stories from the Bible, I always wonder ‘what really happened?’ For we know that the stories were handed down through a number of people, before they were written down.

But if you ask me about the ‘what really happened’ behind today’s Gospel story, I have to say I don’t have a clue. It’s all so very strange- man going shiny, clouds and light and so on- it’s very alien. But what I do think is this- something deeply moving and mysterious happened to the disciples on that mountain. Peter, James and John were what you might call the chief disciples. They would go on to take leading roles in the Jesus movement after his death and resurrection. This story must have come from them. And it was thought to be so important that, strange story that it is, Matthew, Mark and Luke included it in their Gospel books.

So the mountain, the light, the cloud- all is an attempt to put into human words something which is almost impossible to put into words.

Of all the arts, the only one I can claim to have much understanding of is music. I learned piano when I was young, and had good teachers. I know something about musical techniques, where I know almost nothing about, say, painting. I can look at a Rembrandt and be impressed without  knowing what he did with the paint to do that, but I can listen to Beethoven and be impressed in a different way, because I know a wee bit of musical theory. But what I really like about music is that it doesn’t need show you anything, or tell you something, for it to work. A song, of course, has words; musical theatre or opera can be a feast for the eyes as well as the ear. But you can listen to just pure music on its own, and be moved by it. But why it moves you is ultimately impossible to put it into words.

But I like words, and I like to explain things, and so the mystery of music is a bit unsettling. And yet, in that respect, it’s a bit like my faith. I obviously do a lot of explaining about faith (it’s my job- and I’m doing it now). But isn’t there an element of faith which is just inexplicable? Don’t we all sometimes feel that we believe, because we just do? And isn’t God, ultimately, inexplicable?

Jeremy Taylor, who was an Anglican bishop in the era of Oliver Cromwell, once wrote

A religion without mystery must be a religion without God.

I used to think that everything could be explained, but as I get older, I realise that old bishop had a point. Take away the mystery of faith, and there is nothing left.

This Gospel story speaks of mystery. The greatest mystery of Christianity is how Jesus of Nazareth could be, somehow, also God. When we read of Jesus shining in this story, I think that was Peter, James and John trying to speak of something which they couldn’t really put into words.

Recently, someone said to me ‘The trouble with people in our culture is that they have not experienced Christ directly’. We talk a lot about feelings and experiences in our culture, but I think it is true that we seem to have lost the capacity to experience the divine. We are entertained to death, we have music and art and culture all around us at the touch of a button, but it seems to serve to cover up a gap in our culture. That gap is what we might once have described as the mystery of God.

As Jesus is bathed in light, it is as if the barriers between time and eternity are breached temporarily, for Jesus seems to be in conversation with two men who had lived centuries earlier- Moses, and the prophet Elijah. I think their appearance reminds us about something which is important to our understanding of worship.

I think our worship should be contemporary. I think it should reflect the world as it is today- in music, in prayer, in preaching. But the best worship always takes us back to the past. We read from the Bible, a set of ancient books. Our preaching is coloured by the theology of those who came before us. We often sing hymns written a long time ago. But if you take all that too far, you end up with what is called traditionalism. That’s when (in church or elsewhere) nothing new ever happens. As grumpy Scots might say, doing things ‘as it’s aye been’ (or we think it’s aye been!). Traditionalism is the fear that, if we deviate too much from what we did before, God and our ancestors might get angry with us!

But traditionalism is a dead religion, frozen in time, scared to move forward. Perhaps Peter, the disciple, was a bit prone to that. For when he sees Moses and Elijah talking to Jesus, he says a very strange thing: ‘Let’s make tents! One for you, Jesus, and one for Moses and one for Elijah!’

Deciding you want to make tents in the middle of a profound spiritual experience is very odd. But I think it is that Peter wanted to capture the moment, capture the situation, to have some physical manifestation of spiritual moment. But that’s to freeze a spiritual moment in time. Traditionalism is when you try to capture your spiritual ancestors and keep them frozen so you can come and see them when you feel like it. The Bible often speaks of ‘the living God’- God who is present, and at work, in the here and now. But traditionalist church is like a mausoleum- an empty monument to the past.

For Peter should have noticed that Jesus wasn’t worshipping Moses and Elijah- he was talking to them. For Jesus, his spiritual ancestors are living beings, visiting from the past, with whom it’s possible to have a conversation. And it’s a moment which quickly passes- Peter doesn’t get a chance to put up his tents. For these mysterious divine moments don’t last. The curtain is pulled back for just a moment, before the ancestors send us off to live our faith in our own way, in our own time. The Bible, the tradition of the church, our ancestors in the faith- they are there, not to solid block of marble weighing down on us, but sources of wisdom, conversation partners, witness to the mystery of God in the past which can help us live our faith in the contemporary world that we live in.

The light fades, a cloud comes across, and from the cloud, the voice of God-

This is my son, with whom I am well pleased- listen to him.

Perhaps these are the most important words in this story. The disciples have seen Jesus in literally a new light. It’s a glimpse of who Jesus really is. The light is the divine light- Jesus is man like no other. But it’s not enough to simply acknowledge in words that Jesus is the Son of God. More is required of us: ‘listen to him!’

Christians are required to listen to Christ, to let his words and actions shape the way we live. Jesus was a man of peace. He healed the sick. He had time for outcasts and foreigners. He teaches us to love our neighbours, and reminds us that our neighbours are not just people who are like us. He taught us to be forgiving. But do we listen to him?

There have been Christians who thought that slavery is acceptable. There are Christians who think that women should be second class citizens. There are Christians who believe that racism is approved by God. There are Christians who think it’s okay to treat people badly because of their sexuality. The leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church think that God wants Putin’s armies to destroy Ukraine.

This is my own dear Son, with whom I am pleased—listen to him!

But who’s listening? Am I listening? Are you listening?

The mystery of Christianity is that God became a human being and lived among us. In the first chapter of the Gospel of John, we read

The Word became a human being and, full of grace and truth, lived among us. We saw his glory, the glory which he received as the Father’s only Son.

Peter, James and John certainly saw the glory of Christ on the mountain that day. They are our spiritual ancestors, and if they walked and talked among us today, what might they say to us? I think they would remind us that we, too, can see the glory of God in Christ. And that if we listen to him, we might help other see that glory, too.

Ascription of Praise

To God be honour and eternal dominion! Amen.

Biblical references from the Good News Bible, unless otherwise stated

© 2023 Peter W Nimmo

Featured image: Transfiguration (Anonymous artist) Mural, San Francisco, USA. From from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=58833

The Glory of Love — Silvio José Báez, ocd

The Gospel of this Second Sunday in Lent is filled with sun and light (Mt 17:1–9). Jesus took Peter, James, and John with him and led them up a high mountain. There he was transfigured before them: his face shone like the sun and his clothes became dazzling white (Mt 17:1).

This took place shortly after Jesus had revealed to them that he was resolved to go to Jerusalem, where the Jewish authorities, after making him suffer greatly, would put him to death (cf. Mt 16:24–25). The disciples had been shaken by the Master’s words and filled with fear at the tragic destiny awaiting him. Everything had grown dark for them: they were confused, afraid, and beginning to lose heart.

On the mountain, the three disciples contemplate for a moment, in the intimacy of the mountaintop, the humble glory of God hidden in the humanity of Jesus. He wanted them to understand the path of love he was ready to walk—even to suffering and death. There he chose to reveal to them the secret concealed within his humanity: the glory of love that moved his heart and led him to a boundless self-giving for humanity.

The radiant face of Jesus is an image to be engraved on the heart for the darkest day, when his face will be struck, insulted, humiliated—when it will no longer appear transfigured but disfigured. This is the great challenge that Peter, James, and John must accept. They are called to discover the mysterious thread that unites the Mount of the Transfiguration and Mount Calvary: the disconcerting relationship between blazing light and total darkness, between the transfigured face of Jesus and the disfigured face of the Crucified One.

For the three disciples, such an experience was necessary—one that would strengthen them, enlighten them, and make them feel enveloped in the love that filled Jesus’ life. They needed to step back from daily reality, from their fears and shadows, and open their eyes to something new and luminous. They had to understand that the final word in history does not belong to suffering, injustice, evil, or death. Soon they would live through the night of Jesus’ passion and death; it was important that they experience it knowing that its darkness would not last forever. No night in life lasts forever.

Jesus led them to the summit not to distance them from reality, but so they might step back and gain a broader and deeper vision of life. From above, the landscape can be seen more clearly. It isn’t healthy to live only on the flatlands of routine—conditioned by the pressures of daily life—filled with fear before the challenges we face. We must step back and rise above the quicksands of failure, mediocrity, and hopelessness, and free ourselves from the ideological quagmires that make us rigid or pessimistic.

On the mountain, Peter, James, and John were able to see, beyond appearances, a deeper truth: in the humble humanity of Jesus they contemplated the radiant glory of God. Today this same challenge stands before us: to see beyond appearances with the eyes of faith. The world teaches us to judge by success, outward beauty, and visible power; faith invites us to see with different eyes. On a cross, the world sees defeat; faith sees the triumph of love. In our crises, the world sees failure; faith discovers opportunities for growth. Every difficulty contains a seed of grace; every tear can become a spring of blessing.

Faith is like a new pair of lenses that allow us to see reality clearly. Without faith, we look at life through the eyes of fear, hopelessness, and human calculation. With faith, we see with the eyes of love, hope, and eternity. Faith helps us recognize that God is never absent; he is always weaving something beautiful, even when we cannot see it. Faith allows us to glimpse resurrection in the midst of death, light in the midst of darkness, meaning in the midst of chaos. With that gaze, we can move forward when everything seems lost, because we know that the end of the story will be fullness of life and light.

In society as well, there are moments of confusion. We feel scattered, weak, even unsuccessful in achieving the results we hoped for. Injustice and violence seem invincible; no paths toward resolution appear. Weariness, failed attempts, and disappointments overwhelm us. In those moments we must climb the mountain: step back, rise above the flatlands of personal interests, and leave behind the ideological quagmires that make us rigid or pessimistic. The light of the Risen Lord—which conquers sin and death and is already present, in anticipation, on the mountain—enables us to see reality with new eyes and widens our vision and our hearts.

The new light radiating from Christ transfigures us; it grants us a renewed vision of life and history; it gives us strength to continue striving for a new world and keeps our hope from withering. Illuminated by Jesus, we won’t be sowers of darkness or prophets of doom, but humble sowers of sparks of light where shadows seem to reign.

Like Peter, James, and John, we too must climb the mountain again and again and allow the light of the Risen Lord to shine into the darkness of our existence. We climb the mountain when we pray. In prayer, in silence with the Lord—even for a short time—his light transfigures us. Moments of prayer aren’t useless; they are necessary. We must expose ourselves to that loving light, dedicate time to listening to Jesus, to conversion, and to rejoicing in his luminous presence.

When we contemplate the light of the Risen One, we aren’t blinded, nor do we forget our commitments. Like the disciples, we must always descend into the valley of daily life: the ordinary rhythm, the struggle and fatigue of each day. In this Eucharist we stand on the holy mountain, contemplating the radiant face of Jesus and listening to his voice. When the celebration ends, let us descend into the valley of everyday life enlightened by him. May the light of Jesus make us strong and radiant. May it help us discover the beauty of life, hidden like a drop of light in the living heart of all things.

Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
Homily for the Second Sunday in Lent
Miami, March 1, 2026

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Detail from a 15th c. icon of the Transfiguration by the hand of Theophanes the Greek currently in the collections of the Tretyakov Gallery. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)

The Second Sunday in Lent

Today’s readings

Perhaps you recall last week’s Gospel reading, in which Jesus, having been baptized by Saint John the Baptist, was prompted and led by the Spirit into the desert for forty days and forty nights. He fasted and prayed and near the end of it, he was tempted by Satan. It’s a vivid image. Today’s Gospel has Jesus, on the way to Jerusalem and his death, take Peter, James, and John up a mountain and is transfigured before them. This is also a very vivid image. These images are so vivid, in fact, that they are presented on the first and second Sundays of Lent every single year. So the Church, I think, is giving us a framework for Lent and the spiritual life to which we should pay attention.

There’s a connection between these two stories, these two images, that I have been reflecting on this week. It’s interesting that Satan waited until the end of the forty days of Jesus’ fast, when the Gospel says Jesus was hungry. That had to be the understatement of the millennium if Jesus fasted forty days and nights! But the point is that Satan waits until we are at a low point, just like Jesus was feeling all the physical and psychological effects of fasting so long. Then he makes his move to tempt us. When we are at a low point, we are more easily influenced by temptation.

And that begins a cycle that I think we can all understand and perhaps relate to. I’m guessing most of us have experienced it ourselves. We are at a low point, so temptation comes to us. Without our strength, we give in to temptation. The Tempter lies to us, and promises things that he ultimately cannot and will not deliver, or tells us things about ourselves that are not true. Jesus was tempted with bread, immunity from harm, and all the kingdoms of the world. Satan has no power over any of this. He has no power, ultimately, over us, because his main weapons, sin and death, have already been overcome by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Satan is a liar, but because we are at a low point, we believe the lies. Then, when we give in to the lies, Satan convinces us of another whopper of a lie, and that is that we are unworthy of God’s love and mercy. Which makes us feel even lower, so we get more temptation, and so on and so on and so on.

But the Transfiguration gives us the foretaste and promise of what God is doing to break this sad cycle. First, as we see in the figures of Moses and Elijah who appear with Jesus Transfigured, God gives us the guidance of the Law and the Prophets. In these days, that means the guidance of the Church, who proclaims the Word and provides access to the Sacraments which provide healing and guidance and life.

Then God takes our brokenness, our sin and transgression, the sickness of our spirit battered by the Tempter, and he transfigures it. He re-creates us into the glorified people we were created to be, so that we can be caught up in God’s life forever and live with him for eternity. Finally, in the Transfiguration, God promises us that we, who are worth far more than the passing things that Satan promises us, have hope of the Resurrection. Just as Jesus’ Transfiguration was a foreshadowing of the glorified body of his Resurrection, so it is for us a foreshadowing of the life of grace that we will inherit if we follow Jesus up that mountain.

The cycle of temptation is a dirty, rotten thing. It eats at us all the time and invites us to lower the bar and accept the lies that Satan offers. But the Transfiguration proclaims that that kind of life is not what we were created for, and frankly a life not worth living. But through the disciplines of Lent, turning back to Christ, letting him interrupt the cycle of sin and shame in our lives, we can be transfigured into glory. That’s our real promise, and it’s made by the One who never lies.

So hang in there on your Lenten promises. If you haven’t started, it’s not too late. All of our penance is turning down Satan’s lies in favor of God’s promises. And God is the One who keeps his promises.

Quote of the day, 1 March: Silvio José Báez, ocd

On this second Sunday of Lent, we continue our journey of freedom and light, of prayer and conversion, towards the Lord’s Passover.

If last Sunday’s Gospel showed us Jesus up on a high mountain—subject to the temptation to abandon the ways of God, reducing his Messianic character to material satisfaction, the manipulation of God, and the quest for power and fame—this Sunday we contemplate him on another mountain, but one filled with light and glory. We see him as the beloved Son of the Father, the one whose voice we must listen and follow.

This Sunday’s Gospel, which was written according to the model of the theophanies (i.e., the divine revelations of the Old Testament), says that Jesus went up with Peter, James, and John to a mountain to pray.

The mountain is terrain that rises up vertically; it is closest to heaven, the resting place of God’s feet. As the prophet, Amos says: He “treads on the heights of the earth” (Amos 4:13). The mountains are pointing towards the mystery and depth of the cosmos, towards the infinite; they are the land that penetrates heaven. And Jesus climbs a mountain to pray.

Prayer is like climbing a mountain—not physically, but by entering into the depths of our being where we find God’s heart filled with light.

Climbing the mountain means entering within ourselves, beyond feelings and reasons, beyond all the ups and downs of daily life, carrying in our hearts the great problems of the world.

Prayer is about entering within ourselves with our hands full of faces and experiences. When we pray we allow ourselves to be enlightened and transfigured by the loving and peaceful light of God who dwells within our heart, “in its deepest center” (Cf. Saint John of the Cross, The Living Flame Of Love)

Indeed, while Jesus was praying, his face changed appearance. Prayer is transforming: it transforms you into what you contemplate, what you hear, and what you love—and you become like the One to whom you pray. Psalm 34 says: “Look to him, and be radiant!” (Ps 34:5).

Silvio José Báez, o.c.d.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
Homily, Second Sunday of Lent, 17 March 2019 (excerpt)
Our Lady of the Assumption Parish, Managua

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Detail from Icon: The Transfiguration, tempera on panel, first quarter 16th century, Novgorod. From the Feasts Tier collection. Image credit: State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg (Public domain).

Jesus Is the Fulfillment helps youth understand how Jesus brings the whole Bible together. On the mountain, He stands with Moses and Elijah, showing that God’s story leads to Him. ⛰️✨

This lesson invites teens to listen to Jesus and take faith seriously in daily life. It builds trust in Scripture and creates space for prayer, reflection, and honest questions. ✝️

https://young-catholics.com/21693/wednesday-of-the-1st-week-of-lent/

#YouthMinistry #Transfiguration #Faith

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"While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, 'This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!'"

Matthew 17:5 #Bible #JesusChrist #transfiguration

Hesychasm

This comes from the Greek hesychia, meaning “stillness” or “quiet.” This is the theological backbone of the Eastern Orthodox Church. It focuses on the pursuit of theosis – divine union with God. At its core, Hesychasm is a tradition of prayer that seeks to find God through inner silence & the cessation of all thoughts.

The “engine” of Hesychasm is the Jesus Prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.” (We think that even if you aren’t religious/spiritual, we’ve all prayed this prayer before!) Unlike Western meditation, which often involves visualizing scenes from the Bible, Hesychasm is apophatic (negative).

The goal is to strip away images, concepts, & intellectual chatter to reach a state of “pure prayer.” Practitioners (known as Hesychasts) aim to move the prayer from the lips to the mind, & finally, into the heart.

In the 14th century, certain techniques were popularized to help the mind. These include:

• Breath Control:
  • Syncing the prayer with the rhythm of breathing.
• Posture:
  • Sitting for long periods with the chin resting on the chest, eyes fixed on the “place of the heart.”
• The Goal:
  • To achieve a state where the prayer becomes “unceasing,” continuing even while the monk sleeps or works.

The history of Hesychasm is defined by a massive 14th century intellectual “cage match.” On one side, Gregory Palamas, a monk from Mount Athos. On the other side, Barlaam of Calabria, a Western-influenced scholar who thought the monks were essentially deluding themselves with “belly-button gazing.”

Barlaam argued that God is absolutely transcendent & unknowable. Therefore, any claim to “see” God was impossible or heretical. Palamas countered with a distinction that saved Eastern mysticism: The Essence vs The Energies.

The Divine Essence:

God’s inner nature, which remains forever hidden & inaccessible to any created being.

The Divine Energies:

God’s “activities” or “operations” (like Love, Grace, & Light) that permeate the world & can be directly experienced by humans.

Palamas argued that when the Apostles saw Jesus glowing on Mount Tabor (the Transfiguration), they weren’t seeing a metaphor. They were seeing the Uncreated Light of God’s Energies. Hesychasts claim through intense prayer, they too can see this Taboric Light.

Palamas wasn’t just a “cloud-dweller.” He was a brilliant aristocrat who gave a promising career at the Byzantine imperial county to become a monk. When Barlaam attacked the monks’ practices as “superstitious,” Palamas wrote the Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts. He bridged the gap between the experiential “feeling” of the monks & the rigorous theology of the Church.

Palamas was even imprisoned for a time during a civil war. But he was eventually vindicated.

In 1351, his theology was officially adopted by the Orthodox Church. To this day, the Second Sunday of Great Lent is dedicated to him. He’s the reason Eastern Orthodoxy views God not as a distant object of study. But as a personal presence to be participated in.

For centuries, Hesychasm was mainly confined to monasteries like Mount Athos. In 1782, a massive anthology called the Philokalia (“Love of the Beautiful”) was published. It collected the writings of the desert fathers & Hesychast masters from the 4th to the 15th centuries.

This book sparked a massive revival. In Russia, it was translated into Slavic (The Dobrotolyubie), fueling the “Elder” (Starets) tradition seen in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. In the 19th century, a tiny book called The Way of a Pilgrim (about a wandering Russian peasant practicing the “Jesus Prayer”) became an international sensation introducing the “Jesus Prayer” to millions of non-Orthodox Christians.

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Glory [Sermon]

In Celtic traditions there is an idea of thin places: actual physical places where the visible and invisible universe are so close that sometimes there is communication, or even movement, between the places.

The idea is older than the Celts.

But thin places are revered because they are places of mystery and power. Thin places are feared because they are places that connect with the unknown.

Such spaces are sometimes called “liminal,” leaning boundary or threshold. There are liminal times, too: often during rites of passage into adulthood, or membership, or other changes in a person’s life. When someone gets a diploma, the person may experience it as a liminal moment, especially if their academic path was complex or difficult.

Liminal spaces and times can become milestones in our development.

Let’s go to God in prayer.

God of wisdom, may the words that I speak, and the ways they are received by each of our hearts and minds, to help us to continue to grow into the people, and the church, that you have dreamed us to be.

Amen.

What eally happened on the mountain?

Our Gospel reading tells us

Six days later, 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 bright as light.

3Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him.

Matthew 17:1-3, NRSVue

If we are to take the text literally, Jesus started generating light, and Moses and Elijah appeared.

Some would say

The Bible said it, I believe it, that settles it.

Others would say

I have questions.

For instance, was Jesus really radiating out light? Where did that energy come from? And how did the disciples recognize Moses and Elijah? They didn’t have photographs to compare them.

And then a voice from a bright cloud said

“This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”

Matthew 17:5b, NRSVue

The obvious implication is that this is all supernatural, that is, beyond what is natural.

God can do anything, so why not this?

But why this?

The mountain represents a liminal space: God is often though of as “up” in heaven:

• The tower of Babel was an attempt to reach into heaven.
• The ten commandments are given to Moses on a mountain.
• Elijah was taken up to heaven in a whirlwind.

So being up on a mountain represents being closer to God.

The light coming from Jesus, and the appearance of Moses and Elijah, represent a liminal time.

Jesus was not shining before or after this. Moses and Elijah were not traveling with Jesus and the disciples after this event.

So this moment is a threshold time and place, but for what?

In the previous chapter, Peter proclaims about Jesus

“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

Matthew 16:16b, NRSVue

and then Jesus says he will be tortured and killed.

This is a turning point from “Jesus the popular but controversial teacher” to “Jesus who will be crucified.”

So the glory that comes to Jesus here is not at all random, but because of his own discipline in following the path laid out for him. Whether or not we believe Jesus literally shown light from his face and clothes, we can see this story as a moment when glory came to Jesus. Whether or not we believe that Moses and Elijah were literally with Jesus on the mountain, we can see this story as a place where Jesus was placed among the most important people in Judaism.

We, too, will have our liminal moments.

Maybe it’s when we made a tough decision, and suddenly a beam of light fell on us. Maybe it’s when we’re having doubts about our path, and a person drives her car off the street into a driveway, gets out, comes up to us and says

“God wanted me to tell you to keep doing what you’re doing.”

(this actually happened to me.)

We might dismiss these events as mere coincidence. And they may be. But if those places and moments seem meaningful to us, if they inspire us, if they help us to continue to grow into the people God has dreamed us to be, we ought to embrace them.

My challenge to us all this week, as we move through Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday into Lent, is to watch for those liminal times and places.

Linger in them.

How do you feel?

What does this mean to you?

How can this moment help you to move forward in faith?

Don’t fear the thin places.

Rejoice in the glory of them.

Amen.

Let’s sing NCH 183 Jesus, Take Us to the Mountain

* Scripture quotations marked NRSVue are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. https://www.friendshippress.org/pages/about-the-nrsvue

* Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James version of the Bible.