✠ Psalmody: Psalm 2:7b; 1; Psalm 110:3, 1; Wisdom 7:26; Psalm 93:1b–2; Psalm 110:3b
✠ Lection: Exodus 34:29–35; 2 Peter 1:16–21; Matthew 17:1–9
In the Name of the Father and of the ✠ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
On this day when we remember the bright glory of Christ shining upon the mount, we first consider the darkness shrouding the Lord at Sinai. Indeed, when Moses entered into the Divine Presence in the Tent of Meeting, he would come out with face all aglow. The elements of light stand in contrast to the conclusion of the first giving of the Ten Commandments when “the people stood afar off, but Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was.” (Exodus 20:21) If in the Lord, there is no darkness at all, if He is the Light of the World Whose glory reflects from his servants’ faces, if God is the very Source of Eternal Light, what is to be made of the thick darkness where God was at the giving of the Law?
Consider the holiness, the brightness of the Almighty, then consider our dark, sinful condition. The severe unholiness of our sin would bring about our destruction if God were to fully reveal His glory to us in our woeful state. Therefore, by grace, He veiled Himself in darkness in the giving of the Holy Law that strikes us dead by revealing the death within. Thus, God shrouded Himself in a merciful cloak, lest the people of Israel perish in their sin as they stood before the Holy and Almighty God in all His brightness and glory. Even this awe-ful sight at Sinai was a glimpse of Christ’s veil of humble flesh on our account. In the giving of the Law, the Lord took measures to preserve man, for there in the loins of the line of Judah was the Promised Seed, awaiting the Anunciation, awaiting the Nativity, awaiting the crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension. The Lord took measures so that His power and might did not destroy all flesh in the wait for the fullness of time to come.
Hallelujah, the King has come. He has dwelt among us. The Word became flesh. He ascended the mount with the three apostles that we may lift up our eyes unto the hills, From whence cometh our help. Our help cometh from the LORD, Which made heaven and earth. Amen, beloved, lift up your eyes unto the hills, unto the mount of the Lord. Lift up your eyes to the Mount of Transfiguration. Lift up your eyes to the Mount of Calvary. Lift up your eyes to the Mount of Olives, for from them comes your Help. Lift up your eyes when they are filled with suffering, be it pneumonia, dementia, anxiety, hearing loss, joint pain and replacement, appendicitis, cancer, heart problems, a bum knee, nerve pain, digestion woes, neck, leg, back, arm pain, grief, unbelief; Lift up your eyes in the simplifying days of just plain old age. Lift up your eyes, for all of these things try to keep them cast down, blinded by despair. Lift up your eyes, for upon the Mount of Transfiguration shines brightly your eternal Hope in the midst of dark, but temporary suffering.
The glorious manifestation of Christ’s splendor up and yonder, His very own emanation of glory shared only among the Holy Trinity, this majestic epiphany of His own inherent glory upon the Mount of Transfiguration was an incomparable event that the Lord’s inner circle of disciples had yet to experience. Moses at Sinai and in the Tent of Meeting didn’t behold such glory as of the only-begotten Son. It was Him, both Christ and Lord, with Whom the apostles ascended the mount that day. It was Him to Whom these three bear witness to you pointing you to Him even in their fear and bumbling response in the moment.
Face shining like the sun, clothes as bright as the light was the Father’s beloved Son, the same at Whose baptism the heavens opened wide and the voice of the Father bellowed from above as the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove. There in the waters, the Son remained veiled in His humble human flesh, bearing only our dull appearance, not only to preserve those near Him from certain death, for He is the Holy Lord of heaven and earth, but to proclaim the Kingdom of His Father, to travel to the mount of Transfiguration, to travel to the mount of shame where He would joyfully submit to His own on your behalf. Such a humble, human veil of the Incarnate, Eternal Son was pulled back at the Transfiguration so that Peter, James, and John could behold the same glory that Moses and Elijah looked upon from beyond this life. Jesus was making His way toward His exodus from this life, toward Jerusalem where upon being lifted up, His greatest glory would shine into the eyes and hearts of those imprisoned in darkness. The fact that Jesus still had this path to travel led Martin Luther to ponder, “For this was something very remarkable, that Christ was transfigured while yet in the mortal body, which was subject to suffering. What then shall it be, when mortality shall have been swallowed up, and nothing shall remain but immortality and glory?” The eternally glorified Christ reigns now in that glorified immortal flesh at God’s right hand. Thus, your hope resides there in Jesus, for in Him your mortality is exchanged for the immortality won and given by Christ. Your pain, aging, suffering shall be cast away, replaced with the glory of Christ forever. In His glorious Transfiguration, all believers can see what awaits; a glory destined and determined to reflect from us in bliss forever; a glory so perfect and holy that none of the woes of this sinful life are able to dwell with it. Stand firm and rejoice that in Christ, this is what awaits you.
Open your eyes and ears this morning to see and hear by the Lord’s Holy Word and Communion that though your time has yet to come, your wait for immortality and glory is not in vain. There are no wasted, worthless days in the lives of God’s children, for they all have their purpose, their care by the Lord above, marching toward the one day when death will no longer, can no longer stalk you; a day when your body and soul shall be purified of all its suffering by the glory of God through the sacrifice of His Son. Place all hope in the Holy One in Whom you live, Whose face shining like the sun and Whose clothes becoming white as light are markers of what all this suffering like Christ prepares you for. Trust Jesus without reservation at all times. Despair not, for from this mount in the blessed Scriptures you see, you hear, you receive the blessing of the Son’s glorious epiphany, His revealing, His shining forth into today and tomorrow’s darkness.
You worship no mere mortal. You trust in no device or scheme of man. You hope not in vain but in certainty. This is the Heavenly Father’s Beloved Son. Hear Him. Hear Him in all things. Hear Him, Who has yet to be fully revealed to your eyes in His full, eternal splendor, yet you have been called by His Gospel, enlightened by His Gifts, and there’s still an eternity more of Him to come. You shall lift up your eyes to Him with joy immeasurable. Upon that mount was the uniting of eternal heaven and broken earth; your future gloriously infiltrating your present. The Old and New Testament promises were united by the presence of Prophets of old, who saw Christ’s humanity for the first time, and the Apostles of new, who gained a glimpse of His veiled divinity for the first time. And the full benefit of both, you now receive in their testimony. Hear Him. Hear Jesus. Hear your Hope.
After He was risen from the dead, death no longer had dominion over Him, and in same resurrection hope you march on, for death and suffering were conquered by Christ once and for all. But on the Mount of Transfiguration, His suffering and death lay ahead of Him, as do yours. Oh, fear not to follow your dear Lord through pain! In all the glory of the revealed Christ and the bright, overshadowing cloud, in the appearance of Moses and Elijah, in the pleased voice of the Father, and in the terror of the three disciples, the fullness of the Lord’s wonder was given in but a glimpse, for Christ’s Crucifixion still lay ahead. The glimpse for the apostles, for you, here, reveals that fullness awaits there in the life to come, for upon this mount, Christ was yet to complete His task. But now, It is finished. He has laid down in the tomb for a three-day rest the veiling shroud of His mortal flesh to shine His glory into your darkness of death that it may no longer threaten to engulf you forever. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
So, the Transfiguration shows what is to come for all who live and dwell richly in Christ. We embark from here into what remains for us in this journey. For some, but a short time remains. For others, longer. To strengthen us all, the Lord leads us down from the mount through Pre-Lent and Lent. As we journey on in our pilgrim lives, we each tread upon unique, challenging paths, yet we are one in Him, together in the bright Body, Hope, and Glory of this same Jesus, for His Gospel unites us in all good and everlasting things. The revealing of the Son’s glory and the wonderful fact that His grace and salvation had already delivered Moses and Elijah unto eternal life out of this one paints the picture of what you will see, of what you will be, and with Whom you will be, fully surrounded by the Lord’s never-fading, glorious Light forever. As you continue in these evil days between now and your time to be taken into His eternal presence, recall the great and certain hope found in the Transfiguration, because your day of change is coming as well. He gives you, in His Word and in His glorified Body and Blood being revealed to you now on the altar, the hope that you need, hope that will carry you to Himself, through your days that remain, however dark or bright, however trying or easy, however many or few. You don’t know what next year, next month, next week will bring, yet you’re not given over to full uncertainty. What you know for sure, without a doubt, is that your Savior is already there, for if it is the Eternal One upon His holy hill to Whom you lift up your eyes, then your Hope will not disappoint. Pick a day, a month, a year ahead of you and He is the Certainty from Whom you will gain all needed Help as you anticipate the celebration of His resurrection at Easter and ultimately your own resurrection on the Last Day. In that way, without a doubt, you know what your future holds. Lift up your eyes unto the hills, From whence cometh your help. Your help cometh from the LORD, Which made heaven and earth.
In ✠ Jesus’ Name. Amen.
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