Fr Peter Helman

“O God, who on the holy mount didst reveal to chosen witnesses they well-beloved Son, wonderfully transfigured, in raiment white and glistening: Mercifully grant that we, being delivered from the disquietude of this world, may by faith behold the King in his beauty; who with thee, O Father, and thee, O Holy Ghost, liveth and reigneth, one God, world without end.” (Collect for the Feast of the Transfiguration, BCP 191)

The Daily Office reading this morning from the Gospel of John (12:27-36) is curious when we read it in view of the holy day the Church observes and celebrates today, the feast of the transfiguration.

As you’ll recall, the feast of the transfiguration commemorates that moment in the life of Jesus when his divine glory is revealed to his closest friends and disciples, Peter, James, and John. Jesus leads them up a mountain to pray, and while he prays, “the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became dazzling white. … A cloud came and overshadowed them; and they were terrified as they entered the cloud. Then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my Son, my chosen; listen to him’!” (Luke 9:29, 34b-36a; see also Matthew 17:1-8; Mark 9:2-8; 2 Peter 1:16-18).

It is a wonderous episode!

Traditional Orthodox iconography depicts the transfigured Jesus circumscribed by superluminous radiance emanating, as it were, from within and behind and beyond Jesus. The fullness of the godhead dwelling in Jesus suddenly bursts the seams of his mortal body, overshadowing the mountain top. The disciples, shaken with terror, fall prostrate.

The reading from the Gospel of S. John appointed for this morning is curious, then, insofar as it references not the transfiguration at all but a rather different manifestation and a rather more grave heavenly utterance. In the presence of many bystanders, on the eve of Passover, Jesus indicates the sort of death he will die six days hence (“…when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself”). A thunderous voice from the sky speaks to Jesus of the glory to be revealed in his passion and crucifixion. He will be put to death, and that death will glorify God and become for you and I the medicine of immortality.

How can it be that the gospel (i.e., the "good news") links the meaning of the transfiguration, the revelation of the divine glory of Jesus, with the purpose of God to become a sacrifice for the life of the world?

Indeed, this is the saving truth of Christian faith, that the eternal glory of God did and does something in Jesus, that what was far off, the glory of God dwelling in unapproachable light, has become unbearably close and, what is more, meets us in the form of weakness—a suffering man, a dead man. And that death is the road to awe. Death is the gate through which we pass with the crucified and risen Christ into newness of life. By death God put death to flight, transfigured darkness, and brought life and immortality to light.

Beloved, God is at work in you today, drawing you close to the heart of Jesus, loving you with unconditional love, transfiguring your heart so that you can be in this world, for others, a source of divine light and love. The superluminous light of grace dwells within you, so go forth and reveal it to the world God so loved. With your very lives tell out the good news that death and darkness have been vanquished by our eternal God.

Sincerely yours in Christ,

Peter