Transfiguration

Feast of the Transfiguration

August 6, 2017

    One of the great jokes about Facebook and other social media platforms, is that it’s a good place to watch cat videos.  Seeing as how the Carroll family has six cats (5 boys and one girl, because we’re crazy),  cat videos are one of my favorite things, and given some of the other craziness that’s on social media, I am all about more cat videos.  Anyway, my daughter sent me a cat video a few weeks ago that I loved so much I actually posted it on my facebook wall.  The video was of an old Tom cat.  You know the type, large, striped, a bit feral, kind of mean; I think he had been adopted or was part of a larger foster home…. He was not friendly, didn’t like to play or cuddle… then one day the unthinkable happened…. Kittens.  A small group of the cutest tiny kittens came to live with this grumpy old Tom.  If you have ever been around little kittens, you know that they are cute, fearless, and annoying.   Well, these adorable little demons would not leave this old cat alone.  They climbed on him, chased his tail, ran into him…. All sorts of kitty shenanigans.  The old Tom cat became a different cat.  Suddenly he began to play, he groomed the babies, taught them how to be cats, slept with them lying all over him…. And he even accepted some human love too.  Poor old cat had never experienced love before.  He most certainly transformed into a completely different cat, because some kittens showed him how to live.

    Today we celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, a feast day of our Lord.  We hear these readings every year on the Last Sunday of the Epiphany, but this year, we also have the Feast day fall on a Sunday.  We know the story well; Jesus and the three disciples that were the inner circle go up on a mountain to to pray.   While they are there, the disciples have a vision of Jesus in shining white clothing, speaking with Elijah and Moses, which ties Jesus to the law and to the prophecies.   The disciples hear a voice from heaven that tells them who Jesus is, and that they should listen to him.  The disciples want to capture the experience by building dwelling places for all three of these holy men; I am sure the disciples also want to stay on the mountain.  But, they can’t.  Listening to Jesus, means coming down off the mountain and getting about the business of the kingdom.  It also means hearing and living through some very difficult events.  Just a few verses after the story of Jesus’ transfiguration, he tells the disciples that he is going to be betrayed and killed.  Listening to him, in that context could not have been easy for the disciples who were on the mountain with him… following him in that way could not have been part of their plans…

    Being transfigured, means to have one’s appearance changed, especially changed to a beautiful and more spiritual state.  Certainly, in the gospel for today, we see that Jesus’s appearance was changed in that way; his outer appearance reflected his inner state.  I always wonder when I read this story about the disciples; I wonder if their inner state was changed, transfigured on that mountain.

    I think, that their inner beings were changed; perhaps slowly, just like the rest of us.  Encountering Jesus, is something that is life changing; what it the proper response to knowing that Jesus is God’s son?  How do the disciples respond to Jesus?  How are we changed by encountering God’s love in Jesus?

    I hope that we are changed, and that like that old Tom cat, I hope that we look and act like different people.  Encountering Jesus in the Eucharist gives us the ability to climb the holy mountain and see and experience Jesus; each time you and I come to the table, we encounter the living Christ whose love for us changes us.  We do not come to the table easily or lightly, especially if we allow ourselves to truly recognize Jesus in the breaking of the bread.  As Annie Dillard says in an essay of hers I read years ago, if we were paying attention to what happens at church we wouldn’t wear our Sunday best, we would wear crash helmets.

    When we come to the table, bread and wine are transfigured  into the body and blood of Jesus, and he reveals himself to us as he did to the disciples so long ago on the mountain; and like Peter and the rest, it can be really tempting to stay on the mountain, or to keep our experience of Jesus to ourselves.  But that’s not how it works, and when we search our hearts, and remember the vows that we took at our baptism, we know that we too must listen to him.  We must go out of this place, our place of safety and knowledge and go into our community and do his work.  When Deacon Tex dismisses us at the end of the service, it’s not a dismissal of “hey we’re done, good for us!”  It’s a continuation of what we have done at the table; it is a mandate to go forth, in the name of Jesus as transfigured, changed people who now will go out and change the world.  Like the disciples, sometimes that sounds really difficult.  Being a Christian these days isn’t always easy, and our identity has been co-opted by some folks I would rather not associate with; but when we are changed by our encounter with Jesus, we ought to look and act different; listening to him means that we heal the sick, feed the hungry, visit the lonely; just for starters.  We do Jesus’s work because when his Spirit lives in us, others see him in us… and we see him in each other.  The only response to perfect love, is to love.

    Peter, James. and John didn’t tell others about what happened on the mountain, at least not at first.  It took them some time to see and experience who Jesus was, and it wasn’t easy for them even after Easter morning.  As Easter people, it isn’t always easy for us, and I hope that we are still learning and experiencing Jesus, and as we do that, I hope that we are continuing to change and become the people of love that God has created us to be.  Love that is truly felt and experienced, will change us.  For us, to love as Jesus loves, is to live.  May we go forth from this place today, as transfigured people.  May we encounter the living Christ at this table, and may his love fill our hearts so that we may be bearers of that love in all that we do.  May we listen to him with our whole being so that the noise and chatter of the empire fades away, and we can truly be people of his kingdom.