Saint Margaret’s Anglican Church Budapest, Hungary Exodus 34:29-35; 2 Peter 1:13-21; Luke 9:28-36; Psalm 99 or 99:5-9

Saint Margaret’s Anglican Church Budapest, Hungary Exodus 34:29-35; 2 Peter 1:13-21; Luke 9:28-36; Psalm 99 or 99:5-9 It is good for us to be here. Theologians and sages have pondered the meaning of Christ’s Transfiguration for centuries. What to make of it…? What on earth, or in heaven, is going on…? What is it about…? As an event in the life of our Lord, the Transfiguration is recorded in all three of the so-called Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke; each with its own unique notes and details. The Gospel of John omits the story altogether for reasons unknown. To the best of my knowledge, the Second Letter of Peter, from which our second Reading this morning is taken, is the only other Scriptural reference to the event. The Gospel account of the Transfiguration which we just heard moments ago comes from the Gospel of Luke, in which the Evangelist places the event roughly at the mid-point of our Lord’s public ministry and shortly after the Apostle Peter unreservedly declares Jesus to be the “Messiah of God.” And that declaration may itself be the key to understanding the Transfiguration. For, Christ is the Messiah, and more than that still. The Transfiguration event is set upon an unnamed mountain in Galilee, traditionally called Mount Tabor although the place is not specifically named in Scripture. As Jesus is praying, his visage and appearance are altered, and he is suddenly flanked by Moses and Elijah, the great lawgiver and prophet, respectively, of ancient Hebrew Scripture and history. The event thus serves as a tangible demonstration of Jesus’ divine, and human, natures, of both his glory and great humility. The Transfiguration transports us in a sense to the edge or borderland between time and eternity, the here-and-now and the then-and-forever, the past and present and future, life and death. It is indeed good for us to be here. Some scholars have seen the Transfiguration as a kind of misplaced post Resurrection appearance story, if you will; that is, a story originally about the Resurrection of our Lord but which over time somehow ended up in the Gospels where it is today. Could be, I suppose. Others consider it a genuine account of a vision similar to those found throughout the Hebrew Scriptures. Our first reading this morning from the Book of Daniel, for instance, recounts a vision which dramatically emphases the absolute sovereignty and glory of God. Our Psalm this morning strikes a similar theme of God’s majesty and might. In any case, the Transfiguration is one of the great mystical mysteries of Scripture and, for that matter, of our life in faith. It is the only miracle not wrought by Christ but in Christ. In revealing his own divine nature, our Lord draws humanity back to the divine, back to God. The horizon of our everyday humdrum existence becomes in a sense the vehicle of our spiritual ascent, much like Moses journeying to the mountaintop and Elijah’s own fiery ascent to the heavens. The disciples, drowsy though they may be, are nevertheless witnesses to this on our behalf, as uncomprehending and inattentive as we in turn at times are as well. Meanwhile, Peter’s charming, if ultimately foolish, suggestion that he and his companions build three dwellings for our Lord and the ethereal visitors from the past serves to remind us of our own all too human urge to grasp the ungraspable, to package it, house it, and keep it as an earthly treasure, to tame and manage the ineffable, and so to control God; ultimately of course an impossible task. Though surely not for lack of trying. Politicians and even some ecclesiastics, who should know better, are still keen to use God and the sacred for their secular gain. The disembodied voice from the cloud which envelopes the disciples ironically brings them back down to earth, back to the task at hand, telling them, “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him,” confirmation in itself of Péter’s intuitive declaration of Christ’s Messiahship. And reaffirmation as well of the message from heaven at our Lord’s Baptism, “You are my Son, the Beloved.” The temptation of this day might be to think of the story of Christ’s Transfiguration as somehow a metaphor or parable of our own need for inner transformation and change, but that would be only partly true. It is about us, but only because it is quite literally beyond us, beyond our own frail and mostly futile attempts at transformation. Christ’s Transfiguration gives us a glimpse of realities the meaning of which we scarcely can comprehend, yet realities which are more genuine and true than anything we now can touch and see and hear; realities which bring salvation and life. Our transformation is but a shadow of Christ’s Transfiguration. No wonder, the disciples “kept silent and in those days told no one any of the things they had seen.” They had a lot to think about, a lot to ponder. And who would have believed them anyway…? Except maybe us... All these centuries later. So, it truly is good for us to be here. And Peter’s advice in our Reading from his Second Letter, is as cogent today as it was when first written, “be attentive to this [truth] as to a lamp shining in a dark place; until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.” In other words, listen to him.