Sermon notes for August 5 - the Feast of the Transfiguration

The story of the transfiguration gives us a few basic lessons:

1 When you spend time with God, you will shine.

2 Learn to see the glory.

3 Jesus is worth listening to.

Number one:

When you spend time with God, you will shine.

Last week we heard about Jesus giving his disciples the Lord’s prayer when they asked him to “teach us to pray.” This week we see what happens when Jesus puts theory into practice. Luke tells us that Jesus took three of his disciples up to the mountain in order to pray. So what happens? [29] And while he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white.

Jesus is transfigured while he is praying.

Everyone knows the old jokes about owners who begin to look like their dogs. And if you hang around someone long enough, chances are you will pick up a few of their habits or vocabulary or way of doing things. What happens when we spend time hanging around with God? It appears that some of who God is will eventually rub off on us.

Spend time with God, and see if it rubs off. Spend time with God, and you will shine.

Learn to see the glory, or Sometimes it takes us a while to see Jesus for who he really is.

The disciples probably learn a little bit more about who Jesus is in this episode. Certainly the event stuck in Peter’s mind – we see him refer to it again years later in his letter. We see Moses and Elijah, representing the Law and the Prophets, talking with Jesus. Luke records that they too “appeared in glory”. They spoke about his “departure in Jerusalem”, which is a roundabout way of referring to this death and resurrection. And they hear a voice from the cloud - God’s voice – declaring again who Jesus is.

So the disciples who went up the mountain with this ordinary looking Jesus get to see him in a different light. They saw the glory in the person of Jesus. And so we too are called to look for the glory in Jesus. And as well, we are called to see the glory in one another. When we see another human being, we are seeing someone made in the image of God. When we look around this morning at church, or tomorrow at work, or when we go shopping, we might think that we are bumping into ordinary people. But the truth is that we are bumping into creatures made in the image of God. We tend to look only at the outside, and fail to see the image of God on the inside of every human being we will meet.

What would our world be like if treated every person as glorious creatures of God?

Learn to see the glory, in Jesus and in everyone we meet.

Jesus is worth listening to.

When the voice of God speaks “from the cloud”, we hear an echo of the words that were heard at Jesus’ baptism. When Jesus came up out of the Jordan, a voice was heard saying “This is my son, the beloved”. The voice heard on the Mount of Transfiguration is like that voice, but with one little addition: “Listen to Him.”

Apparently God thinks that Jesus has some worthwhile things to say. So how do we listen to him today? Well, a good place to begin is simply by reading the gospel stories. You can hear Jesus speak on quite a number of topics. Sometimes we like what he has to say, and sometimes we don’t.

A few nights ago I was in our living room saying something to one of our kids who was in the bedroom. I repeated myself three times, and then I decided to try an experiment. I said “Do you want to stay up late and go to Dairy Queen tonight?” It is remarkable the quick result I got.
Sometimes when we listen to Jesus we can have “selective hearing”.
But everything he has to say has a purpose. It may take time or wrestling to understand, and at other times it may seem obvious.

But Jesus has essentially come to bring us good news: that through him we too are being changed from glory into glory; that we too are beloved sons and daughters of the living God, we too are called to reflect the light of God to the world.