Transfiguration in Lent
Sermon preached at High Mass, Pusey House, Oxford
Second Sunday of Lent, 7th March, 2004
Readings: Gen 15:5-12, 17-18/Ps 27: 1, 7-9, 13-14/Phil 3:17-4:1/Lk 9:28-36
Mountain walks are what friends sometimes do together. In the gospel-reading which we have just heard, four people are involved; two brothers, another colleague, in company with the lead figure, Jesus of Nazareth. We do not know the identity of the mountain, though it was probably one of the spurs of Mount Hermon, a climb of about 9,000 feet that would have taken around six hours. It is not really a surprise that the five should want to make such a climb; on a clear day, one can see the Mediterranean to the west, Damascus to the east, down the Jordan valley to the Dead Sea, and over Galilee to Jerusalem and beyond. But if clouds get in the way, then these sights are obscured. I’m no great mountaineer, but on those few occasions when I’ve made a long trek with others, I’ve become aware of the sense of solidarity that develops; the fact that silence is sometimes a more powerful bonding force than talk; and the detachment from the familiar world that comes of being up there, and looking down and across unfamiliar vistas.
On the surface, that is the kind of event of which we have just read. But once we begin to take it apart, all sorts of details emerge. Peter, and the brothers James and John, already form something of an ‘inner cabinet’ of Jesus’ followers. So it is not a surprise that these three should be selected, as the first called disciples (Lk 5:1-11), and those who alone are present at the raising of the daughter of Jairus, the synagogue leader, which has just taken place (Lk 8:51). This year, the Sunday gospels are taken mainly from Luke’s gospel, which provides us with some subtle variations in the mountain top experience from the accounts in Matthew and Mark: the purpose of the trek, we are told, is to pray, a characteristic activity for Jesus before significant experiences; instead of describing Jesus as being ‘transfigured’ (as in Matthew’s and Mark’s accounts), his appearance is referred to more simply as being ‘changed’; then when Moses and Elijah appear, Jesus talks with them about his coming death as his ‘exodus’; and the disciples themselves have fallen asleep, and wake to see this startling event, and they themselves enter the cloud. In his book about the glory of God published in 1949, Archbishop Michael Ramsey clearly prefers Luke’s account; and the great Restoration divine, Mark Frank preached a sermon on this version, too, in which he draws out comparisons with the other gospel writers. For Luke, what happens up there has a direct link both to the prayer and the passion of Jesus. That dazzling light, the uncreated light of eternity, leaves its indelible mark on all who are involved, as the inner cabinet threesome are told to listen to Jesus, the Chosen One. Not something to gaze at for long, it nonetheless provides an eternal backdrop for what is to follow. Only a few verses later does Jesus decide to move from the familiar terrain of Galilee to Jerusalem, which he could probably see, that is, until the clouds descended. It is as if the experience to which the mountain trek led has provided strength and context for the conflicts that will eventually result in the condemnation of this innocent man (Lk 23:13-24), over whom the daughters of Jersualem are to weep (Lk 23:27-28), and who goes on not only to pray for those who nail him to the cross (Lk 23:34), but to welcome the penitent thief into his kingdom (Lk 23:42-43).
What are we to make of all this? We are reading this narrative on the Second Sunday of Lent, as part of a course-reading of Luke’s gospel, and not on the more focused occasion of August 6th, the Feast of the Transfiguration. Scripture is for reading publicly in the liturgy, as well as for private (and collective) study! To read a transfiguration gospel in Lent is a tradition that goes right back to the time of Pope Leo the Great, in the fifth century, when Matthew’s version (Mt 17:1-9) was read yesterday, the Saturday before the Second Sunday of Lent. It was not until much later that the Feast of the Transfiguration, which originated in Palestine in the early centuries, gradually travelled West, with some strong Benedictine encouragement. At the Reformation, the feast remained in the calendar of the Prayer Book, but without any readings, though these have reappeared. At the Council of Trent, however, the Saturday Lent reading moved to Sunday, the tradition followed here this morning. As the other readings make clear, the ‘tone’ of today is indeed Lenten, with the promise to faithful Abraham that he was chosen to have faithful descendants (Gen 15:5-12, 17-18), the contrast drawn in the epistle between those whose god is their belly and those whose citizenship is in heaven (Phil 3:17-4:1), the psalm meanwhile providing a note of confidence, in a changing world (Ps 27:1, 7-9, 13-14).
That context is not just a piece of history for its own sake. It says something significant about different ways of ‘reading’ the gospels, with mood and colour, light and shade providing different atmospheres. To read Luke’s account, with the purposeful Jesus intent on praying, his conversation about his death as an ‘exodus’, the all-enveloping cloud on the mountain-top and the disciples asleep, is to draw us into that entire narrative. As we read in what follows, Jesus goes on to heal a young lad who suffered from disturbances; he confronts disciples arguing about who was the greatest by showing them a child; and he then warns them not to be tough on those who are not against them. It is all of a piece: the experience almost drives Jesus on, with a proclaimed identity as ‘My Son, My Chosen’, to the capital in the south, which he may well have glimpsed from the mountain peak. Not that the August festival is isolated from the cross: there is a tradition that the transfiguration took place forty days before the crucifixion, and August 6th is forty days from September 14th, Holy Cross Day. But Lent has a tighter frame, with an inevitable sequence that leads to Holy Week and Easter.
I wonder if the call to ‘listen to him’ in all three gospel-writers has something of a Lenten challenge. The last time Jesus is pointed to in this way is at his baptism; to heed, attend to, obey Jesus is a calling for every one of his followers; that is almost a truism. But the call to ‘listen’ comes in a particular context – a long walk up a mountain, in what was probably an atmosphere of close contact, long silences, and an unexpressed sense of purpose. Only then do time and space stand still, and the cloud envelopes not just Jesus but the other three as well. Do our various Lenten rigours, I sometimes ask myself, always help towards that kind of encounter? One of my predecessors once took the brave decision to cancel all diocesan meetings in Lent – and Portsmouth still managed to survive! To walk down from that mountain, adjusting every muscle in the body for the reverse sort of activity, in order to stop oneself falling, instead of in order to climb higher, is a way of facing the familiar world, with its disappointments, difficulties, and unresolved tensions. ‘Listen to him’, we are told. And yet I doubt Jesus talked a great deal on the walk downwards. If you read the rest of that chapter in Luke’s gospel, when the expedition is over and normal contact with other people resumes, all that Jesus actually says are three things: ‘you faithless and perverse generation’ (Lk 9:41) when presented with the disturbed boy; ‘whoever welcomes this child in my name welcomes me’ (Lk 9:48) when the disciples are discussing the order for the liturgical procession; and ‘do not stop him’ (Lk 9:50) when they are showing signs of that very churchy failing, being proprietorial about the gospel.
Perhaps the Lenten focus of today’s gospel narrative – whether we read it today, or, as in the ecumenical version of the new lectionary, on the Sunday before Lent as a pivotal preparation – not only gives us the promise of the gift of that uncreated light, but also illuminates our lack of faith, our obsession with minutiae, our possessiveness about the things of God. As David Jenkins once said, ‘everyone sins, and religious people sin religiously.’ But whenever we begin to flay ourselves for these shortcomings, it is time to receive proper spiritual nourishment. In 1837, the Danish theologian and educational reformer, Nikolai Grundtvig published a collection of hymns that reflect his ‘Greek Awakening’, a period of study that led him, in the classical Lutheran style, to the Greek Fathers. Only a few years earlier, the great statue of Christ – the Transfiguration Christ – by the neo-classical sculptor, Bertel Thorvaldsen, had been put in position behind the high altar of the newly-rebuilt Church of Our Lady in the nation’s capital. In a hymn of no fewer than fifteen verses, Grundtvig ruminates on the Lucan narrative of this strange mountain-top event, which he describes as taking place in a ‘cloud tent’. There are the disciples, and along come Moses and Elijah, representing the two arms of Jewish tradition, the Law and the Prophets, and they are subsumed by the Word and the Spirit. Each verse ends with ‘it is good to be there’, or ‘it is good to listen’, or ‘it is good to treasure’. In the final verse, Grundtvig nudges worshippers towards the ‘bath and board’ of Christ himself, in order to recall our own baptism and to feed at the eucharistic altar.
Such is our Lenten calling.
+ Kenneth Portsmouth
