How Will We Ever Be Worthy?
THE LAST SUNDAY OF THE EPIPHANY
Exodus 24:12-18 • 2 Peter 1:16-21 • Matthew 17:1-9
Everything was starting to come together. Things were really moving now. Six days earlier, Jesus had asked his disciples if they knew who he really was, and, even though the crowds still didn’t understand it, Peter had put his finger right on the pulse of Jesus’ identity: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Ever since that moment, Jesus had begun to speak more freely with his disciples about his plans and how God would use him to accomplish God’s saving work in the world.
These last six days had been a whirlwind, and now Jesus had invited Peter, James, and John—his very closest followers—to accompany him up to the top of a holy mountain where they could pray together. They had prayed with each other plenty of times, but this invitation was different. Jesus now seemed interested in allowing these three to join him in his most intimate, most holy spiritual practices. And the disciples were not disappointed.
Suddenly, as he was praying, Jesus’ skin began to give off its own radiant light. As if the sun itself had begun to shine from within him, his face was transfigured from its normal countenance into the very source of light itself. Basked in the stunning brightness emanating from Jesus, Peter and James and John looked up and saw Moses and Elijah standing there on the mountain top beside their teacher. “Can you believe it?” they said to themselves. “Is this really happening to us? How is it that we were chosen to see his glory?”
Peter knew better than to let this moment pass by. Having been given this astounding insight into Jesus’ true nature and glowing with the warmth of this privileged moment, Peter inched closer to Jesus and whispered, “Lord, it is good for us to be here. Only say the word, and I will build three booths—one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah—so that you can dwell here forever.” But, before Jesus could answer, the bright cloud of the Divine Presence descended upon the mountaintop, and the voice of the Almighty thundered at them: “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!”
In an instant, the disciples’ excitement evaporated, and an overwhelming fear gripped them. They fell down to the ground and hid their faces in the dirt, praying that this moment would pass without costing them their lives. They had underestimated the significance of this encounter and their own worthiness to receive it. But, after only a moment, Jesus came and knelt down and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” And, when the disciples dared to look around, everything had vanished. It was just they and Jesus and the empty summit. They had come that close to God and had lived to tell about it—but not until after Jesus had been raised from the dead.
Have you ever been given a gift that you did not deserve—an honor of which you were unworthy—only to discover that the gift itself was so magnificent as to require a response from you which you were utterly unable to give? Imagine being picked out of a crowd and told to hold in your hands something so precious that, if you were to drop it or squeeze it too tightly and crush it, the very light of the world would go out. How long before the privilege and honor of being chosen would give way to the doubt and fear of failure? At what point would the significance of what was being asked of you become so burdensome as to guarantee your inability to fulfill your responsibility?
Jesus Christ is God Incarnate. In him, God became flesh in order that our flesh might contain even the light of the world. Jesus has come to invite you to go up on the mountain with him and to pray beside him until not only his face begins to shine like the sun but until yours begins to shine with that same light as well. When the voice of God Almighty thunders in the cloud and declares, “This is my child, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased,” God is speaking those words to you, declaring that you, too, are God’s beloved child. Because you belong to Christ—to the one who beckons you up that mountain with him—God is handing you the very light of the world so that it might shine from within you and give light to others. But how will you ever stand there and receive it and embrace it and let it shine—all without dropping it and dashing it to pieces?
The truth is that it is easier to fall down into the dirt and hide our face until the light has passed us by. Following Jesus seems like a good idea until it is our turn to bear that light to others for Jesus’ sake. What happens if we’re not good enough or strong enough or holy enough to carry it? And there’s no hiding on that mountain top because Jesus is more than a wise teacher or a holy example worth following. He is the very Son of Man—the divine judge who comes in the glory of God to judge both the living and the dead. We cannot encounter the glory of Jesus Christ without hearing that thunderous voice that goes right through us, shaking us to our core. And yet it is Christ himself who makes us worthy to bear that light with a worthiness we can only behold in his resurrection.
“Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead,” Jesus says to them on their way back down the mountain. Why? Why wait until then? Because none of us is prepared to accept the glory that we have been given or the awesome responsibility that comes with it until we have seen God’s victory in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is our very weakness, our failings, our incapacity, our sin that God has defeated in the empty tomb. Because he is risen, we are worthy to receive that light. Because he is risen, we are able to bear that light to the world. Only because of the resurrection of Jesus are we prepared to journey up the mountain with him and let his light shine from within us.
Contemporary Christians tend to emphasize our role in the story of salvation—what are we supposed to believe and what works are we supposed to do? We hear this story, and we focus on Peter and ask ourselves what we would have done in his place. But the invitation God gives us in Jesus Christ is to allow Christ’s work and Christ’s faith to stand in the place of our own. If our sin is what took him to the cross, then it is God’s victory over that sin that shines forth from the empty tomb. Without the resurrection, we could never be worthy of the gift we have been given, but standing in the light of our own redemption, we know that there is nothing that could ever take it away.
© 2023 The Rev. Evan D. Garner
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church – Fayetteville, Arkansas