It’s almost Lent. Wednesday next week will be Ash Wednesday. And so we close out this season after Epiphany with this familiar reading of the transfiguration. Jesus goes up a mountain and takes with Him, not all of the twelve, just three – Peter and James and John – and He is transformed before them. And they see Him speaking with Moses and Elijah in a vision. The signs of the law are represented by Moses and Elijah speaks for the prophets. They are the two great poles, the two great themes around which the Hebrew scriptures are organized. Jesus sits there in the center as the fulfillment of all the great Old Testament prophecy. And, of course, the disciples are terrified. They don’t know what to make of this. Here they are in this strange and eerie place with this extraordinary vision. Then they hear the great and powerful voice which takes us right back to the beginning of the season which we are now concluding.
Several weeks ago we celebrated the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist in the river Jordan. The spirit descends upon Him in the form of a dove and the voice is heard: “This is my Son, the beloved, in whom I am well pleased.” Now today there are words added to this: “This is my son, the beloved. Listen to Him.” As they come down Jesus charges the three apostles to observe strict silence about this, not to say anything about it. This is rather like the great messianic secret that we hear about in Mark’s gospel where everywhere He goes He says He may be the messiah but don’t say too much about this. And why this secrecy - particularly with regard to today’s vision? He does not tell them they cannot talk about it ever. He said you cannot talk about it until after the Son of Man has risen from the dead.
I suspect that one of the reasons they are not to say anything about this (some of the ancient commentators seem to back me up on this) is the people will misunderstand if this extraordinary event is spoken about too soon. What was being expected at this time in the first century when the Jewish people were laboring under Roman oppression? They were expecting a messiah, a deliverer. They were expecting God to come in glory and to smite their enemies. We know now what’s going to happen.
Right after this is the point at which Jesus starts to speak about His impending death. He’s about to journey towards Jerusalem and we are about to begin the season of Lent when we journey with Jesus. Then on Good Friday we will remember His confirmation as a messiah in the crucifixion with nails through His hands and through His feet. So we can see a great arc traveling here from the beginning of the season now ending. The baptism in the Jordan was essentially the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. His vocation had been prepared for a long time and this was the culminating sign when He goes out and shares John the Baptist’s message: “Repent, repent for the kingdom of God is at hand.” He was healing and preaching the good news of God’s forgiveness, the reconciliation and the coming of God’s kingdom. If the disciples had spoken too soon about the glory everyone could have missed the point. They have to see the glory. Otherwise they are not going to understand later on. They won’t understand what the crucifixion is all about. The crucifixion in John’s gospel is said to be the glorification of the son of God. As He is lifted up high above the world it is His glorification because it is the fulfillment of His mission that begins in the baptism in the Jordan river.
It is, in fact, through the baptism that we all come into our vocation. All of us who are baptized are baptized in Christ’s death and resurrection. And we receive our mission there, our charge to go out and bear witness to Christ in the world. And if we think too soon about the glory we will forget that fulfilling our vocation in whatever form it is that God has given to us is going to involve a certain amount of suffering and pain. There is no way through this life without some degree of suffering in pain because we are sent out to bear witness to God’s love and as soon as we open our hearts to love. As soon as we begin to love others we are going to start to share the sorrows and pains of the world. As soon as we come into our baptismal vocation we are plunged into the depths with Christ. If we think about the glory too soon we may try to run away from it and close ourselves off from those depths. But when we close ourselves off from the pain we close ourselves off from love and from our true vocation.
This is not to say that we should go about beating ourselves with penitential whips or taking on false penances. The season of Lent which we are about to enter into is not about that. Lent began anciently as a period of preparation for baptism. When we give things up in Lent it is, so to speak, to clear the decks, to simplify what’s going on around us so that we may focus on the true thing, the one true thing, which is opening our hearts to the love of God. But then once we do that the transfiguration tells us that entering in to the pain and suffering of the world is in itself glorious. The glory of God is found there when we reach out to others in need. There is the glory of God made manifest. When we are buried with Christ we also rise with Christ. And that glorication will find its consummation on the last great day where, as the prayer book says in the burial rite, there will be no sorrow nor pain. Every tear will be wiped away. Then it will be unalloyed splendor. Then it will be pure glory.
But the glory in this life always has its admixture of difficulty and necessary patience and walking the way of the cross. And so, we remember both of these things as we prepare to enter the season of Lent, as we prepare to receive ashes on Ash Wednesday, to repent of our sins and put away all those things which draw us away from the love of God. We remember the sorrow but we remember the glory too. We remember just as Christ was transfigured we who are baptized into Him will be transfigured.
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