Transformational Experience
Second Sunday of Lent Scripture Readings
How do you go about describing a transformational inner experience to others who haven’t experienced it? Not only the gospel writers but Peter, John, and James also had that difficulty. This event as described in today’s gospel was pivotal for Jesus and the disciples in a way similar to Jesus’s baptism by John in the Jordan river. At his baptism, Jesus was revealed as Son of God and commissioned to exercise the ministry of salvation to the people of Israel: as Isaiah wrote, “To open the eyes of the blind, to bring out prisoners from confinement, and from the dungeon those who live in darkness.” [Isaiah 42:7] However, this time, at the Transfiguration, Jesus’s ministry takes on a new and different form. As they discuss his Exodus, he is identified as the Suffering Servant whom Isaiah wrote about, saying, “He was spurned and avoided by all, a man of suffering, knowing pain, like one from whom you turn your face, spurned, and we held him in no esteem. Yet it was our pain that he bore, our sufferings he endured.” [Isaiah 53: 3-4a]
All the features used to describe the Transfiguration refer us back to the Hebrew Scriptures. The mountain is the place of encounter with Yahweh God. Elijah went up the mountain to meet with God face-to-face. [1 Kings 19:10-13] He experienced a whirlwind, fire, and earthquake, but recognized God in the still, small voice he heard there. Moses, too, went up the mountain to speak to God face-to-face. In that encounter, Moses’s appearance was changed and his face shone so brightly that none could bear to look at him. [Exodus 34:29-30] By putting Elijah and Moses together, Luke gives us a clear reference to the Law and the Prophets providing their testimony to Jesus as the one who was to come. And, beyond that, there’s the direct reference to the Exodus. Jesus, the new Passover lamb, faces his death and passes over—for himself and for us—from slavery to death to the promised land of eternal life.
Peter, John, and James, semi-conscious though they were, nonetheless experienced this moment when the Law and the Prophets bore witness to Jesus, the Messiah, Son, and Suffering Servant of God. Peter, ever the impulsive one, wanted to provide tents as dwelling-places for Elijah, Moses, and Jesus, as if that spiritual experience could have been captured and frozen in time for the disciples to experience at will. Obviously, this was not to be, as all spiritual experience is uniquely of the moment and can neither be made permanent nor repeated. Yet, like the disciples, we’re meant to carry such experiences with us and allow them to transform our thoughts, words, and deeds.
The cloud that covered them on the mountain and plunged them into a still-deeper fog was the one that always accompanied a theophany in the Scriptures. It covered Mount Sion, it covered the meeting tent and the ark of the Covenant, and it covered the Holy of Holies in the Jerusalem temple. The cloud both reveals God’s presence and hides him from those to whom he’s revealing himself. In this case, the theophany comes in the form of a voice that does two things: first, it identifies Jesus once again as God’s “chosen son;” then, it commands the disciples to “listen to him.” At that, Elijah and Moses are seen no more. We interpret that to mean that Jesus himself and his words have fulfilled and supplanted those of Elijah and Moses, the Law and the Prophets.
What message does the gospel story of the Transfiguration have for us? First, we’re given a reminder to keep exposing ourselves to the Scriptures. It’s through their words that the Word of God comes to enlighten us. Still, we mustn’t hold on to the words of God like sacred idols. Worshipping every word of the Bible as if God dictated them personally is a form of idolatry. The words of God are not meant to obscure the Word of God but to reveal him. The true Word of God is living and active, always challenging us and ever new. When we build tents for the Law and the Prophets, and even for Jesus, we miss the still, small voice from the cloud of unknowing, which is how the Father speaks to us. Finally, we need to remain aware that the Exodus comes in many forms. We’re continually being called to leave the comfortable mountain where we were in slavery to people, places, and things and embrace the uncertainty of life without all the props.
We can take this meditation on the Transfiguration as our Lenten reminder that we are dust and to dust we shall return. We’re called to remember that life is nothing but a school for love, teaching us at every step of the way to let go and let God. Whatever we cling to in this world holds us back from loving fully: loving God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength, and loving our neighbor as ourselves. This is our reminder that loving is not optional, but, rather, it’s our destiny. Loving means letting go of anything in this life we imagine that we depend on. We either live the Exodus now, day by day and voluntarily, or it will catch us one day unprepared. What Moses and Elijah whispered to Jesus about his Exodus on the mountain of Transfiguration, Jesus now whispers to us: let the Transfiguration envelop you, trust God, and let go.
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