Transfiguration Sunday

2 Corinthians 4:3–6 —

³ But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled among those who are perishing. ⁴ In the case of those people, the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from clearly seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is God’s image. ⁵ Indeed, we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶ For the God who said, “Light will shine out of darkness,” is the same one who made light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the person of Jesus Christ.    (EHV)

These past weeks we’ve welcomed large number of snowbirds here at church. Why do you think that is? Could it have something to do with warmth and sunshine? I’m just guessing, but I think that may be the reason! 😉

The warmth of the sun lifts the whole spirit and brightens the face, doesn’t it? It gives us a healthy glow. If the sun can do that, how much more the “Sun of Righteousness, that rises with healing in his wings”? Peter, James, and John saw Jesus glowing with the glory that was rightfully His on the Mount of Transfiguration. And in our Epistle Lesson, our sermon text, Paul tells us God has put that same glow into our hearts: “The Glowing Glory of God,” Revealed to Moses at Mount Sinai, Revealed in Christ Himself, and now, Revealed to Us in the Gospel.

Revealed to Moses

A recurring theme in the Old Testament, is that anyone who saw God face to face could expect to die instantly. In fact, anyone who even touched God’s Ark of the Covenant without special permission would be struck dead. And yet there was one man, Moses, who saw God and lived. Throughout their time in the wilderness, God appeared to His people in the form of a billowing, smoking pillar of cloud and fire. The night Pharaoh changed his mind and decided to pursue the Israelites to the edge of the Red Sea … there was God! To the Egyptians He showed Himself dark and billowing, blocking their pursuit. But to His people, God blazed through the night to comfort and protect them. In that form, God led them wherever they went. When the tabernacle was built near the base of Mount Sinai, the pillar of cloud by day and fire by night hovered right over the Most Holy Place, where the Ark of God was placed.

But before that happened, the smoke and fire of God—the Glory of the Lord—enveloped the whole Mountain. Thunder and bolts of lightning came from that cloud. The people were frightened to even be there, as well they should have been, since God warned them that if anyone even touched the mountain, man or animal, he or it would be killed. God’s glory showed His perfect holiness—a holiness that nothing unholy could touch.

And yet God chose and invited one man, Moses, to climb His holy mountain and enter His presence and commune with Him in the midst of the cloud. There God spoke with him directly. He revealed to Moses Who He is and what He would have His people believe and do. God personally carved out the Ten Commandments and handed them to Moses. And when Moses asked to see the face of God, God told him to stand between two sides of a crevasse and passed before him, showing him only his back side. But that was enough. That was all even God’s most holy spokesman could see and not die.

How majestic the glory of God was! When Moses came down the Mountain to deliver God’s Law to His people, his face still reflected “The Glowing Glory of God.” The people were now frightened even to look at Moses. They pleaded with him to wear a veil just so they could listen to him. But the glow alone wasn’t enough to convey God’s glory to the people. That happened through God’s Word which Moses proclaimed to them.

In comparison to the dark and dull and foggy ideas that humans come up with, the blurry and even ugly standards of sinful humans, the truth of God gloriously and radiantly shines in His perfect, righteous law revealed through Moses—and still does! That’s why so many are opposed to the ten commandments being posted where people can see them! It’s too bright! It exposes their sinfulness.

Even brighter, though, shone the promises of redemption, atonement and salvation revealed through the sacrifices God prescribed for His people through Moses in the Old Testament, because they foretold of the perfect sacrifice of atonement that would come one day.

Revealed in Christ

But there was a still brighter and clearer vision of God’s glory He was yet to reveal in the New Testament. That Revelation came in the form of His own Son. Moses had revealed the glorious, sparkling Law of God. Jesus came as the embodiment and fulfillment of the Gospel. The Apostle Paul wrote, just before our text: If the ministry that brought death (which was engraved in letters on stone) came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look directly at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face (though it was fading), ⁸ how will the ministry of the spirit not be much more glorious? ⁹ For if the ministry that brought condemnation has glory, the ministry that brought righteousness has even more glory (2 Corinthians 3:7–9).

Jesus showed that contrast in the most vivid fashion as He stood on the Mount of Transfiguration. What a marvelous event! The disciples had learned to know Jesus, the Son of Man. They had walked with Him, gotten dusty with Him. They had thirsted and hungered with Him, and they ate and drank with Him. He was their brother, and they loved Him that way. But they needed more than a brother; they needed a Savior. They needed one in Whom they could place all their hope. They needed God Himself.

Jesus had shown them He was God. He had changed water into wine. He had healed the sick. He had made the blind see and the deaf hear and He had fed thousands in their presence. He did things only God could do. But He still looked like a man. All that changed on Transfiguration Day. Not since the dedication of the temple had the Glory of the Lord visibly been seen on earth. Not since the days of Moses had a man reflected God’s glory so brightly that ordinary mortals had to look away. But as brightly as Moses had shimmered before the Israelites, so much brighter did Jesus shine when He appeared with Moses and Elijah, as the approval of the Father echoed from heaven “This is my beloved Son.” Jesus not only had been doing the works of God, now He even shone with the glory of God.

How important it would be for the disciples to remember this heavenly vision in the weeks and months ahead as the opposition to Jesus and His ministry grew. How important it would be for them to remember what they saw in His Transfiguration as He willingly and silently allowed Himself to be arrested, tried, and condemned by the powers of darkness.

How strong the temptation would be in those days to doubt Jesus, to wonder if He really was almighty God. How unfathomable the mystery of the Son of God Himself dying, seemingly helpless on the cross. But as they saw Him hanging there, they could think back to what they saw with their own eyes and heard with their own ears on Transfiguration Day.

What a mystery indeed, because Jesus Himself referred to His suffering as the ultimate manifestation of the Glory of God. The night before Jesus was sentenced to death, He prayed “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.” For Jesus, His greatest glory was—by human standards—His greatest defeat. Still, it was His glory—His highest glory—when He willingly sacrificed Himself for us! No mere mortal would have dreamed of doing what Jesus did. No mere mortal could do what Jesus did—give His life as the ransom, the atoning blood sacrifice, that paid for our release from death’s grip and Satan’s prison.

To this day, our faces glow as we behold the picture of Jesus dying on the cross. Who of us has not stared at a portrait of the Savior’s passion, and marveled at the wondrous love of God made manifest on Calvary’s hill? And we shout with the thousands of angels in heaven: “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” (Revelation 5:12).

Revealed to Us

Where does that leave us, 3,500 years removed from the glory that shone and thundered from Mount Sinai and two thousand years after Jesus shimmered as the very face of God? Are we out in the dark? Not at all! God still makes His glory known to us today! The world may not see it. Unbelievers may not recognize it—but your eyes and my eyes have seen the glory of the Lord. Paul wrote in our text: But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled among those who are perishing. ⁴ In the case of those people, the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from clearly seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is God’s image. ⁵ Indeed, we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶ For the God who said, “Light will shine out of darkness,” is the same one who made light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the person of Jesus Christ.

God has Revealed to Us His glory by His Word. The Law first spoken to Moses has come down to us. To us as has come the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To us has come all the testimony of the apostles and prophets. Reflecting on his experience at the Transfiguration years later, St. Peter wrote: We were eyewitnesses of his majesty. ¹⁷ For he received honor and glory from God the Father, when the voice came to him from within the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” ¹⁸ We heard this voice, which came out of heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain. ¹⁹ We also have the completely reliable prophetic word. You do well to pay attention to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the Morning Star rises in your hearts (2 Peter 1:16b–19).

The Glowing Glory of the God was transmitted to man by Moses. It was shown to man in Jesus, and it is shining among us today, as we are bathed by the light in Baptism, as we behold God’s glory in His Word, and when we taste His glory in the Sacrament of the Altar. And that Glorious Gospel is transforming us into glowing children of God. It shines in our hearts, and it makes us shine. People need the glory of God. People are searching to see God’s face, but don’t know where to find it. It’s been given to us. Shine and share the Good News! As we gather here today and every Sunday, as we gather around God’s Word in our homes, we glimpse the glory of God. And when we see it, like Moses, it puts a reflected glow on our faces. “How Good, Lord, to Be Here!” Peter said. Like him, we want the experience to continue. And it does! Stay close to God. Let His Word shine on you. Let His Glory richly adorn your homes as you meditate on His Word. And may people look at you, filled with God’s glory and reflecting it to the world and say, “The glory of the Lord shone round about them.” Amen.