The Sunday next before Lent

Sermon preached by Mary Brown, ordinand on attachment.

Today is the last Sunday before Lent. Since Christmas the lectionary has taken us on a whistle stop tour of Jesus’ life. We have been present at Epiphany as the wise men came following the light of a star, we have witnessed as at candlemas Simeon held Jesus and declared that he had come to bring light to the gentiles. We have been at his baptism where we saw the heavens open, the Spirit of God alight on Jesus and a voice declare ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’ We’ve gone with Jesus as he gathered his disciples and taught and healed.

Throughout this time, we have been privy to what the disciples were still discovering. We know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. We know that he is walking through the Gospel of Matthew towards the cross. And through Lent, and into Holy Week though we will enter into the darkness of those days and wait with the disciples in their despair, our despair will not be quite like theirs, because we already know that Jesus rose from the dead.

Because we know all this, I can find it hard to enter into what the transfiguration would have been like for these three disciples. I can brush past it because I have read to the end and have already encountered Jesus glorified. I have to make myself stop and remember that for the disciples this was new.

So I invite you today to join me and walk up the high mountain with Peter, James and John, following after Jesus. Let’s imaginatively step into the scene together and let ourselves be astounded alongside them as we hear a radical answer to the question: Who is Jesus?

I love being at the top of a mountain. In my first draft of this sermon I wrote that I love climbing mountains, but then I realised that that’s not true, I love being at the top, but not so much getting to the top.

I sometimes I spend my holidays visiting cousins who live in Switzerland, and who refuse to believe that I could experience altitude sickness there, but I’m sure that years of living at 10 meters above sea level in Cambridge mean that’s possible, and even if it is not, I’m sticking to that excuse for being incredibly slow.

Slow the point that my cousin tends to run off ahead, and I genuinely prefer to climb a mountain alone, progressing at a snails pace using a technique affectionally named ‘alpine plod’.

When I finally reach the top, my favourite thing to do is to fling my arms wide, and to turn my face into the wind. In the experience of knowing myself to be tiny amongst these mountains, I’m reminded of God’s immensity.

Scripture is full of stories of people encountering God’s glory and his provision on the top of a mountain.

I wonder what the equivalent of being on top of a mountain is for you. Where do you feel God close, experience his glory and provision? Is there a place you wish you could stay? Perhaps it is in the pews here, protected to some degree from the outside world. [Perhaps it is at the altar rail during Eucharist.] Wherever it is, I invite you to tap into that feeling as we look at the rest of this passage.

The context of this mountain journey is a conversation that happened six days earlier. A conversation in which Peter declared Jesus to be ‘the messiah, the Son of the Living God’ but refused to believe Jesus’ teaching that he would suffer and die and be raised again. Though Peter had the right titles for Jesus, he didn’t understand what this meant.

Six days later, Jesus led them up a high mountain. Reaching the top the disciples saw an amazing sight. Instead of seeing the view, they saw Jesus, transfigured before them, his face shining like the sun and his clothes dazzling white. 

Then suddenly Moses and Elijah appeared talking to Jesus. Peter responded by suggesting that he build dwellings for the three of them. Perhaps he wanted to preserve this moment, to keep everyone at the top of the mountain. And perhaps the offer of three dwellings suggests that Peter was still not quite there in who he thought Jesus was, was he thinking of Moses and Elijah as somehow of equal standing with Jesus?

At this moment, to dispel any lingering doubt about who Jesus was, a bright cloud overshadowed them and from that cloud a voice spoke saying ‘this is my Son, the Beloved, with him I am well pleased, listen to him.’

The disciples don’t seem to have been afraid when they saw Jesus transfigured, Peter was still able to stand and speak. But this all changed when they heard the voice. Matthew tells us that they were overcome by fear, falling to the ground. In Exodus God’s glory on top of a mountain is described as a devouring fire. As the disciples recognise this cloud as being the appearance of the glory of God and hear the voice from heaven, fear is a sensible response. I wonder if they have also heard rumours of the words spoken from the cloud at Jesus’ baptism and are moved by the confirmation of what was said then.

The voice provides our first answer to the question Who is Jesus. He is the Son of the Father, he is the Beloved, he is the one with whom the Father is well pleased, he is the one we should listen to. The one who shines with the glory of God. The one who talks with Moses and Elijah. The disciples had every reason to be overcome with fear.

Which makes the second answer to the question Who is Jesus an even greater surprise. The disciples already know Jesus to be full of compassion. Sometimes he has been more compassionate than they would like, feeding crowds they wished he would send away, stopping for a woman who had reached out for healing when an important man was waiting. Now they get to experience this compassion for themselves. This Jesus who has shone with glory, who has talked with Moses and Elijah, who has been declared from heaven to be the beloved Son to whom they should listen, walks over to them, touches them and says ‘Get up and do not be afraid’.

How was it possible for them to stand, unafraid in the face of God’s glory? This is what Jesus goes on to explain to them as they walk back down the mountain. He orders them not to tell anyone what they have seen until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead. He explains again that he needs to suffer and die to be raised. Peter may have wanted them to make camp on the mountain top, but Jesus knew he had to go back down.

The safety of the disciples in the presence of the devouring fire of God’s glory, depended on what Jesus was to do after he came down the mountain. Because the Beloved suffered even unto death, they, and we with them, are accepted in the Beloved.

Whilst Peter, James and John had to walk back down the mountain knowing that Jesus would suffer, we have read to the end of the story, and get to travel down the mountain knowing that the glory the disciples saw in the transfiguration was merely a glimpse of what was to come.

Who then is Jesus: he is the Son, the Beloved, with whom the Father is well pleased, he is the one we should listen to. He is the compassionate one who reaches out to touch us and tell us not to be afraid.

In our epistle reading Peter uses the fact that he saw the transfiguration with his own eyes and heard the voice with his own ears to refute those who were saying that what he taught was a cleverly devised myth. He tells them that the transfiguration is a confirmation of the prophetic message of scripture. He tells them that they would ‘do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in their hearts.’

What might it look like for us to practice being attentive to this? I can’t climb a mountain every day to feel close to God, and however hard I try to make the Bridge on Mill Road feel like a mountain top, it just doesn’t cut it. I wonder if the thing you thought of as your equivalent to climbing a mountain is something you can do every day? Even if it isn’t, there are many ways we can be attentive in our everyday lives.

This might look like coming to church on a Sunday, it might look like attending weekday Eucharist, or evening prayer, or joining one of the mid week groups advertised in Tidings, it might mean setting aside time to read scripture, to pray, to meet with others from the church congregation for mutual encouragement.

Being attentive also means walking in obedience to the voice that came from heaven and listening to Jesus.

And it means listening to what he said to these three disciples, listening as he says to you ‘Get up, and do not be afraid’.