On this last Sunday of the season of Epiphany, we end as we always do with the story of the Transfiguration. Jesus, like Moses before him goes up to a mountain; Moses went to the mountain alone, at least when he went to meet with God; Jesus takes his three inner circle disciples; Moses emerges from the experience with the tablets of the Law; I think here, we see Jesus giving a glimpse of his role in fulfilling the law of Moses and perhaps even reinterpreting it; certainly being joined by a Moses and Elijah would give the experience credibility, and would show the continuity of God’s law, prophecy, and kingdom coming alive in the person of Jesus. Here too, we have a call to discipleship… the voice that was heard at the beginning of Epiphany at the baptism of Jesus is now heard again; and the message is the same; “this is my Son, my chosen’ and we have the command to “Listen to him”.
The disciples who experienced the transfiguration of Jesus, are being given a glimpse into who Jesus really is; Jesus at this point seems to know that he is about to enter into his journey to Jerusalem that will lead to his death; he warns the disciples not to be afraid… and we know that they will forget his words and they will be, very afraid; but he gives them a gift of being able to see past the fear and terror that is coming; he gives them a vision of Easter; a reassurance that all may not be as it appears and that God’s love will ultimately win. It’s a lesson that we know that they will forget; it’s a lesson we know that we often forget.
This scene on the mountaintop is a call to discipleship to them and also to us. The command to “Listen to him” speaks to us just as clearly as it spoke to them; and I imagine some of our days of listening will be better than others.
Transfiguration means that one’s appearance is changed; usually in some sort of spiritual or glorified sense; certainly, that is what happens to Jesus during this experience; I would maintain that even though his appearance has changed, his disciples still recognize him but are nowgiven an insider’s view to the truth of who their friend and teacher really is…
But I wonder if somehow, the change that took place that day was also a change that was affected upon the disciples who were present, and perhaps now on us as we witness the event.
So my question to us is… what would it mean to be a transfigured church, a transfigured congregation?
I think it’s pretty simple, really… we must be a church both as an individual congregation,a diocese, and as a Christian denomination that preaches the gospel of Jesus Christ… not just preaching it with words… but with the things that we do… things that we do for each other, for the congregation that exists today as well as for the people of God that the Holy Spirit leads us to.
The church is a community that exists to do mission… it does not exist to impress or better itself; in the words of Archbishop William Temple, “The church is the only society that exists for the benefit of those who are not its members.” As the church, we exist to form ourselves into the likeness of Jesus, and as such, we are called to discipleship… and discipleship means we listen to Jesus…
Listening also means that we act… we do the work that he has left for us to do…
I think for us here at St. Michael’s, listening means that we take some risks… think about doing things that maybe we haven’t done before, or perhaps take some leaps of faith in and with each other and think about things differently than perhaps we have in the past. A transfigured church becomes a radically welcoming church; a radically welcoming church embraces all those who walk through it’s doors… we not only welcome them; we make ourselves ready for them as though we were always waiting for them… we do a good job in making spaces for children and their parents, and loving the chaos that comes with them; and as far as our children and youth are concerned there’s always more to do. Being a radically welcoming church means handing a cup of coffee to a new friend; it means inviting people to participate in all that we do… and all of that is just a pretty good start…
Being a transfigured congregation I think means that we believe what we say; when we say, “We believe in Jesus Christ” we proclaim that we believe in the Son of God who lived and died as one of us, and we proclaim his resurrection from the dead; when we believe in Jesus Christ, we believe in the power of relationship; we understand at a primal level that bearing one another’s burdens is not merely a suggestion, but rather, standard operating procedures, because we know that no one should ever suffer alone… A transfigured congregation worships fully and joyfully knowing that today we get a glimpse of the heavenly banquet… A transfigured congregation doesn’t stay stuck in thinking it can’t do something, but rather takes a chance or two knowing that somehow, it can and it will because God’s love always wins…
Peter wanted to capture the experience on the mountain… it’s easy to want that; to want to just stay in the same place because staying in the same place is easy and safe; being a transfigured church isn’t safe and I think we know it isn’t easy… but it is life giving…life giving to us and to those whom we invite to join us in our pews and in the ministry that we will partner in. May we become the transfigured congregation that he has called us to be; may we begin to turn with him toward Jerusalem and the shadow of the cross. May we listen to him and not be afraid, but be transfigured.