Grounding Lent on the Mountaintop

A Transfiguration Sermon

We have reached the end of the season of Epiphany. A season which reflects on the manifestation, the revelation, of Jesus to all people. Jesus, revealed at his baptism as the Spirit-Inaugurated Messiah, beloved by God. Revealed at the Temple as Israel’s hoped for Messiah. Revealed as the proclaimer of the kingdom of God and caller of disciples. Revealed through the Sermon on the Mount as the great interpreter of the Law, one who taught with authority. And now, here, on the final Sunday of the season, Transfiguration Sunday, Jesus is revealed, made manifest, in glory.

The Transfiguration is the perfect climax to the season of Epiphany. Jesus made manifest as the beloved one of God - the one whose human life is “shot through with God’s”, who is “carried on the tide of God’s eternal life, and borne towards us on that tide, bringing with him all the fullness of the creator” (Rowan Williams, The Dwelling of the Light). Indeed, the Transfiguration is presented as the climax, the crescendo, of both God’s creative work and God’s dealing with God’s people. First, the narrative begins with the words, “after six days” - an allusion to the creation story in Genesis 1. Jesus’ glorification is taking on the symbolic power of the joy and rest of God when things were very good, and the beginning of the new creation into which we are brought by grace. Second, Moses and Elijah are present (figures of the Law and the Prophets) they are surrounding Jesus, brought forward by the same tide of God’s eternal life, signifying that the whole of God’s dealing with God’s people is also wrapped up and resounding in this moment. In Jesus the fullness of God - and thus the full story of God’s movement in the world - is pleased to dwell. The climax of Epiphany reveals Jesus as the heart of Creation, the one through whom all things came into being and the one to whom all things find their end. The one who makes meaning out of history, the one who gives history its purpose and hope.

The Transfiguration is also the perfect grounding on which to enter Lent. Ash Wednesday is this week, marking the beginning of Lent, a season of penitence, repentance, fasting, and renewal. Transfiguration Sunday comes just days before we line up to remember our mortality, to hear those words of stark honesty - “remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return”. And it is helpful to hold the two together.

It takes bravery to look so squarely at our own fragility, our deaths, at our shortcomings and false steps as disciples of Jesus. It is not an easy road to walk, and if started on the wrong foot can either lead to an unhelpful defensiveness or to an unhealthy self-flagellation. But the image and words of the Transfiguration establish us on the right ground to begin the walk to the cross. The Transfiguration points our eyes to the glory of Christ; the one to whom we are turning in repentance, the one to whom we ask for mercy; and by turning our eyes to his glory we are reminded that we are safe. We are held. We are enveloped in the dependable love of the heart of creation and Lord of time. We are met at the moment we are starkly reminded of our mortality, by the one who lifts our fallen heads and tenderly says, “do not be afraid.”

So we ready ourselves for Lent, ready ourselves to acknowledge our mortality, confess our sin, and turn to God (which is an audacious risk in a world where acknowledging death, fault, or dependance is met with increasing derision and denial). But we prepare ourselves by first looking upon the glory of Christ, who in this moment bursts with the fullness of God, carried on the tide of the eternal life and love of God, pulling all of history into the redemptive activity of God, ushering in the new creation, and reaching out in mercy to all.

Let us have a holy Lent.