Date:
February 14, 2010, Transfiguration of Our Lord
Author: The Rev. Dr. James D. Kegel
GLORY TO THE FATHER AND TO THE SON AND TO THE HOLY SPIRIT, AS IT WAS IN THE BEGINNING, IS NOW AND WILL BE FOREVER. AMEN.
This is New Orleans’ year! First, Lutheran youth from all over the country attended youth gatherings in New Orleans—both ELCA and Missouri Synod—thirty-two from Central; then the Saints won the super bowl—and I don’t know about you but when Drew Brees held up his son and held back his tears, it was a wonderful moment—and finally the Disney movie, “The Princess and the Frog” was set in New Orleans. What a great comeback for a town that has experienced trauma and suffering.
Now I suppose “The Princess and the Frog” does not necessarily fit as a theme for Transfiguration Sunday, but it does in the sense that appearance is not always reality. Our children like tales of princes who become frogs and need to be redeemed by a kiss. It is the same with “Beauty and the Beast”—the beast is really a prince cast in a spell, or Cinderella, the char-girl is really the loveliest at the ball. Aladdin is a market thief but at heart a fit partner for Princess Jasmine. And it is not just children’s stories. Mark Twain wrote The Prince and the Pauper and had them change places, the prince to understand the world of his subjects, the pauper to grow to like the pomp and the power; and Pudd’nhead Wilson where slave baby and master’s baby are exchanged. Starting right after the super bowl there was a new television series, “Undercover Boss” where the CEO acts like a worker; it is fun to see how hard for them to do what their employees have to do. We like to think that everyone is the same—that the reality may be far different from the appearance. Some who may be princes look like frogs and some who look like frogs are really princes.
Some year ago I took a continuing education class on religion and popular culture. One of our themes was authenticity. As an example we watched the movie, Housesitter. In the movie, Goldie Hawn is not Steve Martin’s wife but just a squatter who moves into his new house and insinuates herself into the community. She pretends to a past that is not hers, a marriage that does not exist. She even asks local homeless people to pretend to be her family. The thesis of the movie is quite simple—all is not what it seems. There is a reason why Jesus asked his followers not to display their religion. The Pharisees wanted the best seats in the synagogues and would pray on street corners so that all would see their piety. Jesus called them “white-washed sepulchers” who pretended to be godly but whose hearts were far from God. He echoes Isaiah who proclaimed to Israel, “This people honors me with their lips but their hearts are far from me.” We are reminded of God’s Word to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or the height of his stature … people look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” Just this week, we read that Pope Benedict again addressed the clergy sex abuse scandal. So many people who looked upright, leaders in community and church, have not lived lives which adorn the Gospel but just the opposite. In Jesus’ day and today, things are not always what they seem.
And that is the message of the Transfiguration, this strange mountain-top experience where Jesus’ face changed and his clothes became dazzling white. Moses and Elijah appeared in glory with Jesus. Peter, James and John beheld a glory they had not expected. This was not the Jesus of Nazareth, they knew but the heavenly Son of God. Jesus’ appeared to be a rabbi and teacher and healer. He came from Nazareth, an insignificant country town, and based his ministry in Capernaum which was not much bigger. He attracted followers who were simple people, the poor, the outcast. As we heard in the text from last week, so were Simon Peter and John and James, fishers in the Sea of Galilee. These men now saw Jesus in bright raiment and shining countenance. They heard a voice from heaven saying, “This is my Son, my Chosen, my Beloved, listen to him.” Jesus is greater than Moses and Elijah, than the Law and Prophets. He speaks the Word of God and is the Word of God.
The role of the disciples is interesting in this story. They are tired and want to sleep. Last summer our tour group visited Caesarea Philippi which is near the highest mountain in the Holy Land, Mt Hermon. It is a high mountain and the only place where there is a ski resort in Israel. It may have been the setting for the Transfiguration and if so it would have been quite a climb. The mountain traditionally associated with the Transfiguration is Mt. Tabor. It rises 1500 feet from the Jezreel Valley and towers over its surroundings. There is a beautiful church on the top of the mountain built in 1924 over the ruins of a 12th century church destroyed by the Muslims. Mt. Tabor is a pilgrimage site but the mountain is also a place where people gather to fly kites or hang glide because of the winds. It too would have been a fairly difficult climb. No wonder these men wanted to nap. But they stay awake and see the glorious transfiguration of Jesus. Then they want to build booths for Moses and Elijah and Jesus—who wouldn’t want the mountaintop experience to continue? When they are down from the mountain, Jesus is brusque with his followers for not recognizing who he really is. Jesus says, “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you and bear with you?” One of the things that the disciples do not understand is Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem to suffer and die. Moses and Elijah know this—they come to talk to Jesus about his departure, what he was to accomplish through his crucifixion. The disciples do not. They can not understand the glory that comes through suffering. We often do not either. We want resurrection without crucifixion, salvation without suffering.
Appearance and reality, authenticity, honesty. It is hard for us. We put on a happy face even when we are sad, pretend that everything is alright when it is not. A couple of pastors were talking at our text study this week about a congregation that they had both served. One characterized it as “The emperor’s new clothes.” It is a congregation with many gifts but how they think about themselves is far different from the reality. They are living a delusion when they think that the things that attracted people in the 1950s or 1970s are the same things people are looking for today. People joke about this congregation as a “cathedral church” but at this point they are down to one pastor and one service, a hundred and twenty people worshipping in a nave which seats five hundred. We are familiar with the story of Catherine the Great of Russia who made a grand tour of Ukraine and Crimea in 1787. Her Prime Minister Grigory Potemkin decided to build elaborate and beautiful false front villages so that this area of great poverty would look prosperous to the empress. Historians argue whether this was actually the case but it is true that another empress, Dowager Empress Hsu Xi took the money that China had set aside to build a modern navy to spend on the summer palace in Beijing. The closest thing to a ship is the marble barge set in the lake, a pleasure pavilion for the old queen and her court. History is filled with folly after folly, religion with hypocrisy and social life with pretense.
But sometimes we get it right, too. Take Lawrence the Deacon. The pagan emperor Valerian persecuted the Christian Church in the third century and had Pope Sixtus II killed. Lawrence was ordered to bring forth the treasures of the Church. What did he do? He gathered together the poor, the sick, the widows and orphans and brought them to the emperor. These, he said, were the true treasures of the Church. Lawrence was condemned and martyred for his faith. He was roasted alive on a gridiron. St. Lawrence was right—people are the church not buildings and the treasures are not gold and jewels, chalices and artistic masterpieces but the poor. Martin Luther got it right when he said that suffering was a sign of the true church. Along with right preaching of the Gospel and right administration of the sacraments, suffering was a mark of the true Church. When the Son of God came into the world, he came as a rabble-rousing rabbi who said, “Blessed are the poor.” What happened to him? They crucified him and he died. But the reality was far different from the appearance. This is the Son of God and he rose again. He came to proclaim release to the captives, sight to the blind, end of oppression and that is good news for us. We do not need to pretend. We do not need to keep up appearances. We are free to admit that we are sinners and not always kind and caring, celebrating and serving, but we are forgiven sinners. We may look like a prince but we a frog inside anyway. We may look like frogs and just be frogs and never princes. There may never be a glass slipper or a fancy ball. But it is enough to be God’s people and follow Jesus to the cross and then to glory.
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