Eyewitnesses of His Glory: A Sermon for the Transfiguration
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord my Strength and my Redeemer. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Surely, the Transfiguration is a marvelous event, one where the glory of Christ in his purity is revealed, as it says in Mark 9:3: “And his raiment became shining, exceeding white as snow; so as no fuller on earth can white them.” Somehow, the Old Testament prophets Moses and Elijah also appeared and spoke with Jesus, and their presence was so real that Peter thought he would make them tents. Furthermore, those present heard the voice of how God the Father views his Son: “This is my beloved Son. Hear him.” Theologians have often ranked this as one of the five most important moments in Christ’s ministry, along with his baptism, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and his ascension. What do we learn about Christ through the miracle of the Transfiguration, and what does it mean for our relationship with Jesus?
First, Peter’s account in 2 Peter 1 of the Transfiguration emphasizes the historical nature of Christ’s miraculous life: “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” The word Peter uses here is myths – the myths as found in ancient Greek literature, for example. Now I like myth, I enjoy Homer, Virgil, Ovid, and the rest. But in an attempt to make Christianity more palatable for modern audiences, some writers have tended to characterize Christianity as a myth in the same way that Homer’s Odyssey is. Psychoanalytical writers such as Joseph Campbell in A Hero with a Thousand Faces, perhaps with good intentions, attempt to affirm the wisdom of Christianity by analyzing it with the same psychological tools they analyze other stories. Now of course I agree that there is psychological wisdom in Scripture, but unlike the myths, Peter tells us, the Gospels account a historical event. You know, when a lot of these psychoanalysts interpret stories mythically, they put the human at the center, like how the heretic Pelagius saw Christ as an example for us to live up to. But that man-centered way of thinking is not the Gospel. A psychologist might read the Transfiguration as some metaphor for becoming enlightened within one’s mind. Notice how such a reading takes Christ out of the center of the reading and puts us in the center. Such is the error of those who would use the word myth, even in a positive sense such as how Joseph Campbell used it, to characterize the Gospel. Rather, we would do better to say with C.S. Lewis that in the person of Christ we see the poetic truth within myth become historical fact, or as Tolkien put it, the Gospel account is the place where myth and history meet and fuse together. Only then can we see what Peter emphasizes, that the historical reality of the Transfiguration puts Christ himself at the very center of history and so the central person for all of us to recognize in our lives, as Peter says, “For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount.” The objective sound of the Father’s voice is not merely some metaphor – it was the express purpose of God the Father to vindicate in history the identity of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Another element we see in the Transfiguration is that Christ is the fulfillment of the Old Covenant. Christ himself said in Matthew 5:17, Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. The Old Testament Lesson for Morning Prayer on the Transfiguration is Exodus 34:29-35, part of which I’ll read to you now: “29 And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. 30 And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone; and they were afraid to come nigh him.” Notice the similarity: both Moses and Jesus shine with a holy light, and those who see them in this state feel overwhelmed by their presence. Like Moses and Christ, Elijah also heard the voice of God in 1 Kings 19, the Old Testament Lesson for the Eve of the Transfiguration, where Elijah is commanded to anoint Jehu as King of Israel and Elisha as his successor. Here in real time we see the fulfillment of his prophecy: the succession of the Mosaic Covenant to the Covenant of Christ is witnessed, as we read in Hebrews: “3 Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus; 2 Who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. 3 For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house. 4 For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God. 5 And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after; 6 But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.” With such a high priest as Christ, the greater Moses, we no longer need sacrifice, because the light of the man glorified as God shines upon us, and the rebukes of prophets such as Elijah no longer need light upon us as we dwell in the grace of Jesus Christ.
On this point, the transfiguration also affirms the implementation of the New Covenant established in Christ’s baptism, recorded in Matthew 3:16-17: “16 And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: 17 And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Paul tells us about the covenantal nature of baptism into Christ in Romans 6:3-4: “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” The Transfiguration builds on the foundational baptism of Christ by identifying Christ as the one with whom we walk as our way, our truth, and our life in the new life which baptism signs and seals.
The Transfiguration also affirms Christ’s place in the community of the three Persons of the Trinity, affirmation of Christ’s divinity before His crucifixion. The Father only speaks audibly three times in the New Testament, once in Christ’s baptism, once here at his transfiguration, and a final time as events leading to Christ’s crucifixion are beginning to unfold, in John 12:28: “Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.” How did the Father glorify His own name? Through His Son. And how did He make this glory visible? By the manifestation of the pure light of the Holy Spirit shining from Heaven. The Transfiguration affirms the nature of Christ as the Second Person of the Trinity, God in the flesh, held in the perfect love and harmony with the persons of the Father and the Holy Ghost, and so a pure and blameless and holy and divine man who alone is a suitable propitiation for our sins. This man, who carries within himself the perfect righteousness of the Law and the complete authority of the Prophets and the vindication of the Father and the glorification of the Holy Spirit, is the man who went to the bloody torment of the Cross to bear the burden not only of our original sin but of our every sinful word, thought, and deed.
But we do not just celebrate the covering and blotting out of our sins by the pouring out of the grace of the Transfigured Christ who was crucified. In the transfiguring power of the Resurrection, we participate in a new, glorified life as Christians and will even more so when all things are consummated. As Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3:18, “But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit.” In the Transfiguration, we do not only see the shining holiness of Jesus Christ, we also see a glimpse of the glorified life He will bestow upon us when the Resurrection is bestowed on our bodies. But while that is a glorious promise, we do not need to wait until then to begin to bask in the pure light of Christ’s glorified presence. John 6:35 reads, “Then Jesus declared, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.’” Not into a tabernacle made with hands, but into the tabernacle of your body, the Holy Spirit feeds you with the real spiritual presence of Christ tonight, with His light which pours out to Us from the Father through Jesus Christ, like Peter and John and James, in the Lord’s Supper you are eyewitnesses of His glory. Amen.