Last Epiphany Year A                                                                          2/19/2023

Exodus 24:12-18; Psalm 99; 2 Peter 1:16-21; Matthew 17:1-9

Rev. Mark A. Lafler

 

Our church calendar is beginning to change…

To Transform… if you will.

Today is the last Sunday after the Epiphany…

Next Sunday is the first Sunday in Lent.

This Wednesday is Ash Wednesday which begins our journey through the season of Lent.

A time where we make special efforts and take more time to draw closer to Christ – through prayer, fasting, reading scripture, and worship…

A more intentional time of devotion to God.

 

A season where some of us are praying and hoping for mountain top experiences…

like the ones we heard about in Exodus with Moses

and in Matthew with the story of the Transfiguration.

 

Some of us will also continue to have experiences in the valley… suffering through tough times…

helping us identify with the sufferings of Christ and endearing us to the season of Lent.

 

Today is also a day of transformation…

Especially in the lives of six of our youth at church.

As we have baptisms today at our 10:00 time of worship.

 

Baptism is a form of transformation…

As we become united to Jesus Christ in his death and resurrection.

As we become members in the Jesus movement…

The church…

The people of God.

 

And as we look at the Holy Scriptures today… our readings…

We find transformative experiences too…

Events that changed the lives of people.

 

In Exodus we heard the story of Moses who obeyed God’s call to climb up a mountain and wait for God there.

It was on top of the mountain that he received the law of God…

It was such a transforming experience in the presence of God that when Moses came down his face was bright like the sun…

The Israelites couldn’t look at him.

They had to veil his face it was so bright.

 

In the Gospel of Matthew, we heard the story of Jesus being transfigured…  also, up on a high mountain.

St. Matthew wrote:

There he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun,

and his clothes became as white as the light.

And suddenly Moses and Elijah showed up…

And then God’s voice said:

This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!

This was a transforming experience for Peter, James, and John.

They remembered this day throughout their lives.

 

You see the theme for today is this – Jesus wants to transform you!

 

This theme was in our opening prayer… our collect… we prayed:

Grant to us that we, beholding by faith the light of his countenance,

may be strengthened to bear our cross,

and be changed into his likeness from glory to glory

 

To be changed into his likeness…

Transformed into the likeness of Jesus.

As St. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians (3:18) –

That we are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

And also, in the book of Romans (12:2) –

Do not conform to the pattern of this world,

but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

 

God wants us to be transformed… into his likeness…

into what he is calling us into…

the more like him we become…

the more we become as we were created to be.

It is not that we just know about God’s grace…

but we are transformed by God’s grace.

It’s not that we just understand God’s love…

it is that we are transformed by God’s love.

It’s not just comprehending the Holy Spirit…

but allowing the Holy Spirit to transform us…

to heal us… to make us whole.

 

I don’t know what brought you to the Christian faith…

Perhaps it was a life experience…

Perhaps it was a talk with a friend or a minister…

I don’t know what your intentions are in your faith.

 

But I do know what God’s intentions are.

And that is… To transform your life in him.

  1. S. Lewis writes in his book Mere Christianity…

Saying:

Christ says “Give me All.  I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want you.

I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it.

No half-measures are any good.

I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down.

I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out.

Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked – the whole outfit.

I will give you a new self instead.

In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours. [1]

 

We might think:

“Oh the Christian faith would be good… that will give some good moral teaching… some helpful ethics.”

But God intends to do much more than that.

He wants to shape us into his very image.

Like clay in the hand of the potter.

To mold us and shape us in the way that he has created us to be.

  1. S. Lewis is helpful here too.

He writes:

Of course we never wanted, and never asked, to be made into the sort of creatures He is going to make us into. 

But the question is not what we intended ourselves to be,

But what He intended us to be when He made us.

He is the inventor, we are only the machine.

He is the painter, we are only the picture.

The job will not be completed in this life;

but He means to get us as far as possible before death.[2]

 

God wants to transform our lives…

Despite our weaknesses… our lack of faith… our struggles…

He wants to heal us…

To make us whole…

To give us hope…

To transform our lives into his very own.

 

He wants to take that small seed of saving faith…

And grow a tree that produces great fruit.

But growth is often painful…

To transform something into something else takes work, takes patience.

For a child to become an adult one must go through the difficult teenage years.

For a seed to become a tree the plant must go through the vulnerable years of a sapling.

For a year to advance to the next year the season of autumn and winter must take place.

Growth for us often has to do with a process of time.

And so often the pain we have in this process…

The struggles,

The depression…

The embarrassing parts of our life…

can be so blinding that we don’t see the larger picture of the transforming work of God.

 

We can look up toward the heavens and wonder…

What are you doing God?

 

And yet… God is transforming our lives…

Whether you see it or not.

That is what he is after…

And that is what he promises to do.

Despite all of these messy parts of our lives…

Jesus is transforming us…

As believers in Jesus…

He is changing us.

 

As St. Paul said in Philippians (1:6) –

…being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

 

Hear this:

Jesus is never giving up on you…

You are never too far away from God that He can’t reach you.

You are never too far from his saving embrace.

His grace is sufficient for you no matter who you are.

 

He loves you and is committed to seeing you become the way he has created you to be.

God is not about accepting any of us the way we are.

He is about transforming us into his image with ever-increasing glory.

 

The lesson from our readings today is transformation.

 

God is transforming us into his image.

May we submit to his ministry and work in our life.

May we yield to the transformative work of the Holy Spirit.

 

And as we enter this week into the season of Lent…

As we feast on Pancakes this Tuesday evening…

And as we fast on Ash Wednesday…

With the imposition of Ashes…

Reminding us of our mortality…

Being beckoned to repentance and prayer…

May we seek God…

And yield to his transforming power.

 

He truly wants what is best for us…

May we trust him.

 

By his grace we are saved. (Ephesians 2.8)

By his wounds we are healed. (Isaiah 53.5)

And by his Spirit we are transformed. (2 Corinthians 3.18)

 

Amen.

[1] C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (San Francisco: Harper, 1952, 2001), 196-197.

[2] C. S. Lewis, 203-204.