Transfiguration August 6, 2017
Ex. 1:13-21 Ps.99
2 Peter 1:13-21 Luke 9:28-36
Lectionary Link
Ex. 1:13-21 Ps.99
2 Peter 1:13-21 Luke 9:28-36
Lectionary Link
The Transfiguration is featured at least twice every year on our liturgical calendar. The story of the Transfiguration is always used on the last Sunday after the Epiphany, the Sunday before Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent. But the actual and designated feast of the Transfiguration is an annual fixed date on August 6. And it just so happens, August 6th fell on a Sunday. I think the last time that happen was in 2006. But since it is feast of our Lord, when it occurs on a Sunday, it takes precedence over what would have been the 9th Sunday after Pentecost and Proper 12.
Transfiguration means metamorphosis. The appearance of Christ was changed or transfigured in the presence of three of his student disciples. The disciples of Jesus thought he was special before they climbed the mountain with Jesus but on the mount of the Transfiguration they had a profound confirming experience.
The Gospel writers followed a standard interpretive practice for presenting Jesus. They used a method of presenting Jesus in people and events like those found in the Hebrew Scriptures. The Mount of the Transfiguration is a revisit of the theme of Mount Sinai. God's presence in clouds, fire and light was known on Mount Sinai by Moses when he received the words of the law. In contrast at the Transfiguration, the voice of God the Father confirms Jesus as his beloved Son to Moses, Elijah, Peter, James and John.
As a person who believes that writing has specific purposes for the writer and readers, I want to look at the functional purposes of the account of the Transfiguration within the early community of Christians.
I believe that in the account of the Transfiguration, we can find teaching about Christian metamorphosis, Christian transfiguration, Christian transformation.
We encounter metamorphosis in the cycles of growth. Egg, larva, caterpillar, cocoon and butterfly. If we are asked about our favorite stage in the life of a butterfly, most would say, breaking out of the cocoon and taking flight as a butterfly is the greatest stage. Why do we like the butterfly stage? It is such a stark contrast with the cocoon phase of seeming death. But metamorphosis includes all of the stages equally and so the very process of metamorphosis is greater than any one stage.
The Gospel writers proclaim the abundant life of God as a transfiguring life. And we cannot always see and believe this. If people only knew about eggs, larvae, caterpillar and cocoons then we would never talk about butterflies, we'd only talk about caterpillar and their deaths.
The disciples in the visionary experience of the transfiguration saw Jesus in his butterfly phase of existence before he attained it. What would the resurrection look like before it actually happened? That is what the disciples were able to see. The disciple did not know that Jesus would go down the Mountain and end up on a cross and in a tomb in Jerusalem. It was like Jesus saying, "You need to believe in the metamorphosis of my life because soon I will die before your eyes and be placed in the grave but just as the cocoon is not end of life for the caterpillar, so too the grave will not be the end of me."
What is the wisdom of the metamorphosis view of life? The wisdom is the honesty about all of the phases and appearances as metamorphosis occurs. We may want to hold onto to a particular phase of life as being final for us and for our loved ones. In the experience of death we lose the appearance of our loved ones in a profound way; it is so profound that we begin to believe that the stage of death is greater than the process of metamorphosis. The wisdom of metamorphosis is to learn to believe that everything continues to go on in some way.
I think that the Transfiguration story can be about how metamorphosis occurs in our moral and spiritual lives. Moral and Spiritual metamorphosis occurs when we are able to experience the intervention of the witness of the very best values in our lives. The witness of the life of Jesus set a new standard of excellence. A mountain represents the place where earth meets heaven. The church believed that the earth met heaven in the most complete way in the person of Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ we have been given the hope that the abundant life of God drives the process of metamorphosis in our lives. This metamorphosis is honest to all of the stages and phases of growth.
Can the notion of metamorphosis be useful for us today in providing us insights about our spiritual lives? Sometimes, I think that we can regard perfection to be a stable state of being that somehow we just going to reach and remain in. This is not metamorphosis; metamorphosis included the recurrence of many different stages and one becomes significantly difference as one re-cycles through the phases.
If metamorphosis is an insight for our spiritual lives where are we right now? What are you feeling like in butterfly terms? An egg, larva, caterpillar, cocoon or butterfly? Spiritual writers who have traced and written about their own spiritual journey have written about the recurring cycles. New birth and excitement. Curiosity. Good fellowship and community. Agreement and being insync with the lives of other. But there are also the phases of apparent clouds, darkness aloneness, loneliness and even death. St. John of the Cross wrote about the "Dark night of the soul." Doubt, self disillusionment, disillusionment with others, doubt about one's ability to be usefully in sync with the lives of other in community. What good am I if can cannot know how I can be winsome with others? We may prefer to be in a spiritual state of mind of knowing God's presence and blessing to be obvious and apparent; who doesn't want that? We may actually resent the process of metamorphosis, but do we want to be naïve, innocent Pollyannish, optimists who have not learned to appreciate the wisdom of living through the fullness of the cycle of metamorphosis?
The Transfiguration of Jesus happened before he was arrested, tried, beaten, killed on the cross, buried in the tomb and appearing in his resurrection body. The Transfiguration was an event of assurance for the disciples to be able to hold on through the phases in the life of Jesus that they were going to have to experience.
Where are we in our spiritual metamorphosis today? Wherever we are, remember we need to make an intentional spiritual effort. The mountain is there; we'll never see the view at the top unless we climb and make the effort. Jesus invites us to make an effort in the spiritual climb of life. It may be difficult. It may be mysterious. Life throws us lots of clouds. We can be blinded by the mystery of everything that we don't know about why things happen to us. But even in the clouds of mystery of everything that we don't know we can have an experience of light. We can have an experience in finding the superlative direction for our lives. In our experience of light, we can discover how our past events have been woven into the current providence of our lives. Moses and Elijah appeared with Jesus to indicate that past life of Israel supported and affirmed the new revelation known in Jesus Christ.
After climbing the Mount of Transfiguration, we have to go back down the mountain to the other phases of metamorphosis. But we know that Christ will at future times and in different ways call us back up to the mountain when we can have our creative advance in our spiritual lives confirmed.
May God give us the grace and wisdom to embrace metamorphosis as honest to spiritual growth in our lives. And may we have enough of the moments of the transfiguring light so that we can tolerate the phases in spiritual metamorphosis when light does not seem so apparent. May God help us embrace Transfiguration as the very principle of our spiritual lives today. Amen.
The Gospel writers followed a standard interpretive practice for presenting Jesus. They used a method of presenting Jesus in people and events like those found in the Hebrew Scriptures. The Mount of the Transfiguration is a revisit of the theme of Mount Sinai. God's presence in clouds, fire and light was known on Mount Sinai by Moses when he received the words of the law. In contrast at the Transfiguration, the voice of God the Father confirms Jesus as his beloved Son to Moses, Elijah, Peter, James and John.
As a person who believes that writing has specific purposes for the writer and readers, I want to look at the functional purposes of the account of the Transfiguration within the early community of Christians.
I believe that in the account of the Transfiguration, we can find teaching about Christian metamorphosis, Christian transfiguration, Christian transformation.
We encounter metamorphosis in the cycles of growth. Egg, larva, caterpillar, cocoon and butterfly. If we are asked about our favorite stage in the life of a butterfly, most would say, breaking out of the cocoon and taking flight as a butterfly is the greatest stage. Why do we like the butterfly stage? It is such a stark contrast with the cocoon phase of seeming death. But metamorphosis includes all of the stages equally and so the very process of metamorphosis is greater than any one stage.
The Gospel writers proclaim the abundant life of God as a transfiguring life. And we cannot always see and believe this. If people only knew about eggs, larvae, caterpillar and cocoons then we would never talk about butterflies, we'd only talk about caterpillar and their deaths.
The disciples in the visionary experience of the transfiguration saw Jesus in his butterfly phase of existence before he attained it. What would the resurrection look like before it actually happened? That is what the disciples were able to see. The disciple did not know that Jesus would go down the Mountain and end up on a cross and in a tomb in Jerusalem. It was like Jesus saying, "You need to believe in the metamorphosis of my life because soon I will die before your eyes and be placed in the grave but just as the cocoon is not end of life for the caterpillar, so too the grave will not be the end of me."
What is the wisdom of the metamorphosis view of life? The wisdom is the honesty about all of the phases and appearances as metamorphosis occurs. We may want to hold onto to a particular phase of life as being final for us and for our loved ones. In the experience of death we lose the appearance of our loved ones in a profound way; it is so profound that we begin to believe that the stage of death is greater than the process of metamorphosis. The wisdom of metamorphosis is to learn to believe that everything continues to go on in some way.
I think that the Transfiguration story can be about how metamorphosis occurs in our moral and spiritual lives. Moral and Spiritual metamorphosis occurs when we are able to experience the intervention of the witness of the very best values in our lives. The witness of the life of Jesus set a new standard of excellence. A mountain represents the place where earth meets heaven. The church believed that the earth met heaven in the most complete way in the person of Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ we have been given the hope that the abundant life of God drives the process of metamorphosis in our lives. This metamorphosis is honest to all of the stages and phases of growth.
Can the notion of metamorphosis be useful for us today in providing us insights about our spiritual lives? Sometimes, I think that we can regard perfection to be a stable state of being that somehow we just going to reach and remain in. This is not metamorphosis; metamorphosis included the recurrence of many different stages and one becomes significantly difference as one re-cycles through the phases.
If metamorphosis is an insight for our spiritual lives where are we right now? What are you feeling like in butterfly terms? An egg, larva, caterpillar, cocoon or butterfly? Spiritual writers who have traced and written about their own spiritual journey have written about the recurring cycles. New birth and excitement. Curiosity. Good fellowship and community. Agreement and being insync with the lives of other. But there are also the phases of apparent clouds, darkness aloneness, loneliness and even death. St. John of the Cross wrote about the "Dark night of the soul." Doubt, self disillusionment, disillusionment with others, doubt about one's ability to be usefully in sync with the lives of other in community. What good am I if can cannot know how I can be winsome with others? We may prefer to be in a spiritual state of mind of knowing God's presence and blessing to be obvious and apparent; who doesn't want that? We may actually resent the process of metamorphosis, but do we want to be naïve, innocent Pollyannish, optimists who have not learned to appreciate the wisdom of living through the fullness of the cycle of metamorphosis?
The Transfiguration of Jesus happened before he was arrested, tried, beaten, killed on the cross, buried in the tomb and appearing in his resurrection body. The Transfiguration was an event of assurance for the disciples to be able to hold on through the phases in the life of Jesus that they were going to have to experience.
Where are we in our spiritual metamorphosis today? Wherever we are, remember we need to make an intentional spiritual effort. The mountain is there; we'll never see the view at the top unless we climb and make the effort. Jesus invites us to make an effort in the spiritual climb of life. It may be difficult. It may be mysterious. Life throws us lots of clouds. We can be blinded by the mystery of everything that we don't know about why things happen to us. But even in the clouds of mystery of everything that we don't know we can have an experience of light. We can have an experience in finding the superlative direction for our lives. In our experience of light, we can discover how our past events have been woven into the current providence of our lives. Moses and Elijah appeared with Jesus to indicate that past life of Israel supported and affirmed the new revelation known in Jesus Christ.
After climbing the Mount of Transfiguration, we have to go back down the mountain to the other phases of metamorphosis. But we know that Christ will at future times and in different ways call us back up to the mountain when we can have our creative advance in our spiritual lives confirmed.
May God give us the grace and wisdom to embrace metamorphosis as honest to spiritual growth in our lives. And may we have enough of the moments of the transfiguring light so that we can tolerate the phases in spiritual metamorphosis when light does not seem so apparent. May God help us embrace Transfiguration as the very principle of our spiritual lives today. Amen.
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