Luke 9:28-36
Transfiguration Sunday
Year C
The longer I stay in ministry, the more quickly the calendar turns over. Some of the days remain quite long, but the years have gotten short, the seasons pushing against each other more and more each time they come around. It was only just Advent. This year, even though Lent is late on the calendar, it feels once again like it has arrived prematurely. It couldn’t possibly be here already. It couldn’t possibly be Transfiguration again, could it?
For the preacher fighting a losing battle with time, the Gospels don’t offer much help when it comes to innovative preaching the Transfiguration year after year. The varying accounts of Jesus’s mountaintop revelation barely differ. The distinctions are in the details, not in the headlines. This means Transfiguration Sunday can be somewhat daunting for regular preachers. What new thing could we possibly say? What new breath could we possibly find?
Is anyone else just a little tired of Transfiguration?
Other than the disciples, I mean. They are, apparently, exhausted. It’s one of the small details of Luke’s account – but uniquely his contribution to the story – that our disciples are dozing off on the mountaintop just when the scene gets good. Different translations parse the complex Greek in different ways: maybe they’ve already fallen asleep; maybe they’re just resting their eyes; maybe they’re fighting it off with every ounce of their remaining energy — but the particulars seem less important than the impact. Even in the presence of the astounding miracle of Transfiguration, these disciples have gotten a little tired.
It’s understandable. They’ve been working hard. Ministry is toughgoing; these disciples have been on their feet for weeks. Just that morning, they climbed a whole mountain. Certainly, we could forgive them a nap. But I’m not sure that’s what Luke wants from this moment.
For the writer of Luke-Acts, the parallel comes in Acts 20, when a young disciple named Eutychus falls asleep during Paul’s sermon and tumbles out of a third-story window. In both cases, the Greek paints sleep as a kind of active force in the story: sleep overcomes the disciples; sleep weighs down poor Eutychus. In both cases, God is doing a thing (a miracle, a sermon), but sleep is winning the battle.
The call, therefore, is to wake up. Wake up!
Wake up, disciples! They’d hiked a long road, but the journey wasn’t the destination. This is the destination: Jesus, revealed; Jesus, transfigured; Jesus, with Moses and Elijah at his side, standing in the threshold space between this world and the next world. This is it. They’ve known Jesus the teacher, Jesus the preacher, Jesus the miracle-worker, but nothing in his ministry has yet prepared them for the reality of who he is as the incarnate son of the Creator of all things. This is the moment! This is when the full force of the power of the Gospel lands for all who have eyes to see and ears to hear and stamina enough to stay awake! Wake up, disciples!
And wake up, preacher! I know you just preached this almost identical passage not 52 weeks ago. And I know you’ve done a few things since then. I know it feels like Advent was just yesterday. I know you’ve had a few other things on your plate, too — you passed a budget, you chartered a committee, you buried a few saints, you sat with the people of God in the trembling apprehension of the broken world. It’s been a long road. I know you just hiked up a mountain. And I know Easter’s coming and you’ve got to save your strength. Even so. Transfiguration offers no rest for the weary.
This is the moment! Wake up, preacher!
Moreover, wake up, church! God is working! Jesus is alive! Peter wants to bottle it, of course — let’s build houses, he says, so maybe he can just fully appreciate it in the morning once he’s rested. But Transfiguration comes and goes in a flash. God has other places to be. Jesus has other work to do. It will be 52 long weeks until we are on this mountaintop again together, and you do not want to miss the chance to see what God will do. So sound the alarm. Hire the trumpet. Put the organ on full blast. Wake up, church! It’s Transfiguration!
Questions for reflection on Luke 9:28-36
- Do you ever get tired of the routines of church life? How might you breathe new life into old rhythms?
- How does your faith community celebrate Transfiguration? What do you do – or what could you do – to help the day feel as important as it should?
- How can we pay attention to what God is doing – especially when so much of the news is difficult to watch?
View the corresponding Order of Worship for Transfiguration Sunday
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