Homily Notes Second Sunday of Lent 2019
2nd Sunday of Lent, “God Has the Power to Transform”
People have always struggled with the mystery of the Incarnation. How can a human be God? For many it seems impossible.
Thomas Jefferson was one person who had difficulty with this whole idea. He was so bothered by the thought of a divine being in the world that he embarked on a special project. After a busy day as president he would sit down at his desk to create his own translation of the Bible. He used a razer and two Bibles. He would cut out the passages he liked. He would then paste them in a specially bound tablet. What he did not like were the things that could not be explained by reason.
When he got to the Gospels, he cut out everything, but the preaching of Jesus. Miracles ended up on the cutting room floor. He viewed Jesus as a wise man, a very gifted philosopher, but he did not see Jesus as God. We can only imagine what happened when he came to the story of the Transfiguration that we just read in the Gospel.
What was the purpose of the Transfiguration? Obviously, the church considers this very important because every year on the second Sunday of Lent we read an account of this episode of Jesus’ life in the liturgy. The story comes in the middle of the Gospels. Usually it happens after Jesus predicts his passion. In the Gospel Luke, Jesus tells his disciples that each one of them would have to endure the cross if they followed him. He told them, in fact, that they could expect a very humiliating death.
But then at the end of the prediction, he says, “I assure you there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the reign of God.” How are we to take that sentence? One way to interpret it is that death will not have the last word with any believer.
Immediately after these words, Jesus takes his disciples to the Mountain where he is transfigured before their eyes. Does this Transfiguration say something about Jesus? Yes, but it also says something about us. Perhaps we get a clue in the two figures who appear with Jesus during the Transfiguration event; Moses and Elijah.
Some would say that Moses and Elijah represent the two parts of the Hebrew Bible, the law and the prophets. But these two men also had other things in common. One other thing, that they had in common is that they had both been transfigured in their life time.
In Exodus 34:27 we read how Moses’ face becomes radiant. He goes to the mountain to receive the law of God. He is so close to God he becomes he absorbs the essence of God. When he comes down from the mountain his face is radiant, so radiant, that no one can look at his face without being blinded. From that point forward, Moses must wear a curtain over his face when he speaks to anyone.
In 2 Kings 9 we read how Elijah passes on his prophetic ministry to Elisha. When he does, a fiery chariot comes down from heaven. Elijah gets in. He is taken away in this ball of fire to be with God for all eternity.
The most significant thing that Elijah and Moses have in common is that they never taste death. Moses simply disappears before the people go into the promised land. No mention is made of his death. Elijah, again, rides his chariot into glory.
What does all this mean for us? What it means is that what Moses experienced, what Elijah experienced, what Jesus experience at the Transfiguration and Resurrection, we will experience. And that is what gives us hope. If we seek to be ever closer to the Lord, we can be transfigured. The transfiguration started with our Baptism when we were told that we are beloved Sons and Daughters of the Lord.
During this week when airliners have plunged out of the sky. In these days when we have seen another hate crime where 50 people were killed at a mosque in New Zealand where they were peaceably worshiping. The reality of the cross is all about us. We need a sign of hope. And that sign today is the story of the Transfiguration. We need that sign. We cannot be sustained by the reasonable Jesus alone. We can only be sustained by the transforming love of Jesus. And is that reality that we remember today.