The Transfiguration of Our Lord

2 Peter 1.16-21

January 21, 2024

I’ve never smoked marijuana, and I never will. But I imagine John Lennon’s song God would be more plausible while under the influence of mind-destroying substances. “God is a concept by which we measure our pain,” he sings, followed by a long litany of things he doesn’t believe in. His conclusion? “I just believe in me / Yoko and me / And that’s reality.” It perfectly captures the Zeitgeist, where the only god to be worshiped is the god of self.

Far more interesting musicians don’t necessarily fare better with metaphysical musings. Everybody knows that the greatest band ever is Rush. But their song Faithless is a terrific example of almost Lennon-like ridiculosity:

I don’t have faith in faith
I don’t believe in belief
You can call me faithless
But I still cling to hope
And I believe in love
And that’s faith enough for me

Both Lennon and Peart make the same error found in much of American Evangelicalism: that faith is some shot in the dark, based on wishes and dreams.

Christianity, by contrast, rests entirely on certain objective persons and events. It they didn’t happen, then it’s not true.

A man named Jesus, born of a virgin, suffering under a Roman governor named Pontius Pilate, crucified, died, buried, rising again on the third day, all seen by hundreds of eye-witnesses: did that happen? That question matters. If it’s not true, then the opening of Ecclesiastes is the only truth: Meaningless, meaningless, everything is meaningless.

Today’s Epistle lesson addresses that fundamental question: “Is it true?”

This is St. Peter’s claim: “We did not follow cunningly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Pseudo-scholars argue the Scriptures are just that: “cunningly devised myths.” The NT, they say, is a fable, written long after the time Jesus supposedly lived. In a vacuum of objectivity, all that’s left is emotion and an endless argument over legislation and policy. The only authority is power. The only truths are what the powerful proclaim, even if it’s the opposite of what they said yesterday. “We have always been at war with Eastasia.”

For Christians, Holy Scripture is the supreme authority, and it alone is infallible. St. Peter teaches us still: “No prophecy of scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation.” Christianity rests on evidence. “We did not follow cunningly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.”

Again and again, the Apostles cite the eyewitness testimony to Jesus. Thus St. John tells us, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” “We beheld His glory” – we saw Him, shining upon the mountain, full of splendor and majesty.  Elsewhere St. John says, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life … that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us.” We heard Him, we saw Him, we touched Him, St. John says – and our testimony is true, we are not lying.

Today Peter applies that same eyewitness testimony to the Transfiguration. At the Transfiguration, the Father’s voice spoke concerning Jesus, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  And Peter says, “We ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.”

We don’t have that personal experience, just like we don’t have any personal experience of other things you probably believe, like the existence of the Roman emperors, or Attila the Hun. Did you know we have many more contemporary documentary witnesses to Jesus then we have of Tiberius Caesar, the emperor at the time? He was an emperor, and Jesus was an itinerant rabbi who had no property or political office. Yet the witnesses to Jesus surpass the witnesses to the emperor!

A select few of those writings were consistently read by assemblies of disciples. Those were the writings of the men we call Apostles. That’s what Peter is talking about when he tells us we can rely on something greater than our own experiences.

“We have something more sure, the prophetic word.”  The term more sure refers to an anchor or the roots of a tree – the thing that is sure, certain, firm and steadfast – it cannot be moved. Lawyers in the Greco-Roman world used this term for a valid, legally enforceable last will and testament.  Peter is saying the Holy Scriptures are the valid Word, the reliable Word, the certain Word, the Word that is an anchor, a firm foundation. There’s evidence Peter is specifically referencing here the Gospel of Matthew. You weren’t on the mountain? You didn’t see Him transfigured? Nevertheless you have something firm, valid, reliable. You hear the very words of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew (and, of course, the other canonical Gospels).

Peter continues, “We have something more sure, the prophetic word, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place.” Peter is paraphrasing for us what he heard the Father say on the mountain: “This [Jesus] is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!”, pay attention to Him.

In our dark places, the Words of Jesus are the light. In despair, depression, strife, and conflict, the Word is our lamp shining in a dark place.

An early Christian pastor said, “In comparison with the ungodly, we [Christians] are the very daylight itself.” That is a remarkable statement – he is saying that the difference between Christians and non-Christians is as evident as day from night. Is it so today? The very words condemn us. But then he continues with this word of hope: “But if we compare what we are now with what we shall be … then we are still in darkness and need this lamp,” meaning, we need the Holy Scriptures.

St. Peter is not calling us to passivity. Earlier in the Epistle he says, “Be even more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble.” What things? What things are we to do? Peter lists for us what he heard from Jesus:

Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.

Dear God, remove from us all shortsightedness and blindness! He who purges your sins also gives you work: your vocation to love God and neighbor.

What Jesus is, we are becoming, both in the cross-bearing and, in the end, the transformation to a renewed and glorified body. This is no cunningly devised myth or fable. Believe the evidence. And because of the evidence, believe the promise.