Sunday readings in brief: The Transfiguration
Daniel 7:9-10,13-14; Psalms 96(97); 2 Peter 1:16-19; Mathew 17:1-9
The glory to come
Dear friends, today we celebrate the feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord on the mountain. It was after Jesus had begun to reveal to his disciples that the time had come for him to go to Jerusalem and be subjected to suffering from the elders and priest and to be killed (Mt. 16:21). This must have depressed them so much. They did not understand the reason why Jesus had to suffer while he was gathering a lot of popularity. Some of them had thought that he would go to Jerusalem to overthrow the colonial Romans and restore the kingdom back to the Israelites. Later, James and John would ask him to be granted positions one at his right and another at his left. Surely, they must have thought of political positions.
From the Old Testament, we have the prefiguration of the Son of Man who would come to restore Israel. Many prophets had spoken about him and the people were so eager to behold his days. In today’s first reading, the Prophet Daniel paints a picture of him receiving all sovereignty, glory, and kingship.
After the episode on the mountain, as they were coming down, Jesus ordered them not to reveal what had transpired to anyone until he had risen from the dead. It was a weighty secret for them to keep all this time. Peter, who was one of the disciples with Jesus at the time of the transfiguration reveals that it was not an invented myth but something that they witnessed in person.
The main reason why Jesus gave the foretaste of his Glory to his closest disciples was to strengthen them during the most trying and darkest moment of his life – the passion and death. He wanted them to remember that when the time came.
As Christians, the biggest Good News that we have is that our salvation has been assured through Christ Jesus. All we must do is remain steadfast in our faith until the end. Is it not heart-soothing to be confident that the end will be well despite all the struggles? However, there is a lot of misleading prophecy in modern-day worship about future glory. Some would like to have it here and now but also later, others would want to accelerate the future in order to attain it as soon as possible.
This is seen also in the attitude of Peter who asked Jesus if he could build tents for Him, Moses, and Elijah. Peter did not want this moment to pass, he wanted to remain there rather than go down the mountain to face the suffering and death of his master. He knew very well that want would befall his master most probably would be his fate as well.
Today, many worshippers would like to live in perpetual ecstasy and not have to struggle to live the tenets of faith in day-to-day life. The promised glory for Christians comes through the hard work of living the values of the Kingdom of God in a world full of evil. The easy way leads to doom. Jesus advised his followers to enter by the narrow gate that leads to life rather than the wide one which leads to damnation. Today many people are looking for the easiest way to do everything. We want to get rich without sweat, we want to gate good grades without having to follow long lectures and write difficult papers and examinations, we want to achieve greatness without climbing through the ladder and some even want to go to heaven through the shortcut.
Dear friends, the principles of nature itself clearly demonstrate that to achieve genuine accomplishments, there must be hard work. The heavenly glory will be the reward of those who persevere in the race to the end. I would like to invite us today to introspect and see if there is in us even the weakest sign that we are inclined towards easy things and see how we can reorient our lives towards the love of hard work. This will be our true transfiguration today.
Have a blessed Sunday
Fr. Lawrence Muthee, SVD
SVD JAMBO KENTAN 