A Lectionary Reflection for the people of Thankful Memorial Episcopal Church for worship from home, February 14, 2021, Year B, Last Epiphany

2 Kings 2:1-12
Psalm 50:1-6
2 Corinthians 4:3-6
Mark 9:2-9

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

On this last Sunday of Epiphany, we celebrate and remember the Transfiguration: some of his disciples see Jesus transfigured on the mountaintop, glowing with a brilliant whiteness, identified by the voice of God and witnessed by God’s spirit in the form of a cloud: an epiphany.  And it is epiphanies—from the Greek word for revelation—that we have been celebrating all along this past month, those manifestations of God in the reality of Christ and in the reality of our lives.  And when those moments, those epiphanies, happen, our first response may be one of utter astonishment and pure praise.  Which is a good place to start.  But we must also remember that such epiphanies are invitations into an intimate relationship with God, through the incarnate Christ, and that demands something more from us.

Peter’s immediate response to the transfiguration is to basically stop everything and fall down before the feet of the divine Jesus.  It is, perhaps, what any of us would do.  But, I think Peter might be missing the point.  For Peter is having an epiphany; he has come face to face with God’s self.  Like the wise men before the baby Jesus, like the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, like the casting out of demons and the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law, this transfiguration of Jesus on the mountaintop is meant to reveal something about God Incarnate.  It is meant to do more than just make us praise God: by this revelation, the Messiah draws all of his disciples, including us today, into a deeper and truer knowledge of God.  

Now, many people read Peter’s next response in this scene, his desire to build three dwellings for Jesus, Elijah and Moses, as an attempt to remain in the thrill of that mountaintop experience, a perpetual moment of knowing God face to face.  But I’m not so sure.  I think Peter is mostly afraid of what may come next if he accepts this invitation into relationship with God in Christ. In fact, I find that Peter’s actions here remind me of a very different character indeed, one not nearly so ancient or so Biblical: Joey Tribiani. 

Perhaps not all of you are familiar with the popular ’90s TV show “Friends.”  For nearly a decade, young adults across the country were pulled into the sitcom friendship of six white 30-somethings living in New York City.  Now, “Friends” didn’t always model a healthy, Christian lifestyle for young people, but, I do think that a large part of the success of that show was due to the fact that its characters were very real and reflect our own human experience. 

One of my favorite episodes of the series was the one in which Rachel discovers that Joey puts his copy of Stephen King’s horror novel The Shining in the freezer whenever it gets too scary.  The two friends decide to exchange their favorite novels: Rachel will read The Shining if Joey agrees to read Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women.  One evening, Rachel comes home to find Joey sitting anxiously at her kitchen table, a copy of Little Women in front of him.  “What?” Rachel asks him.  “Beth is really, really sick,” Joey replies.  “Jo’s there but I don’t think there’s anything she can do.” 

            “Joey,” Rachel says, “Do you want to put the book in the freezer?”

            “Okay” says Joey… and in the book goes.

Joey’s premonition is right, of course.  If he keeps reading, he will come to know something painful and sorrowful.  Everything will change.  And Joey would rather just freeze things the way they are.

As unlikely a comparison as it sounds, I see much of the same motivation in Peter’s words on the mountaintop as Joey’s putting Little Women in the freezer.  There is poor Peter, the same guy who, as we heard a few weeks ago, left his nets in the sea and, with his brother Andrew, decided to follow Jesus.  And they have.  Peter has followed Jesus around from town to town throughout Galilee.  He has seen the miracles and heard the Good News and helped collect leftovers when Jesus fed four thousand from some bread and a few fish.  Peter has himself identified Jesus as “the Messiah.” Then, Peter has heard Jesus prophesy his own death.  Jesus warns his disciples of what is soon to come and tells them that any who truly want to follow him must “deny themselves and take up their cross.”  After all this, Peter and James and John traipse up this mountain and all of a sudden see Moses and Elijah appear beside a “dazzling” Jesus.  Given everything that has happened, everything Jesus has told them, Peter, I imagine, has an awful premonition of what’s about to come next.  And his suggestion to build dwellings and stay on this mountain is Peter’s attempt to put Jesus in the freezer, to stop things right here and now before they have a chance to change, to avoid whatever new knowledge is about to come his way, to postpone the epiphany. 

But he’s too late of course.  Before he has a chance to act on his suggestion, Peter, along with his friends, finds himself standing face to face with God. “This is my Son, the Beloved,” the Voice says, in case there were any doubts to the contrary.  But that’s not all; gaining such knowledge demands a response, requires a personal relationship with God.  The disciples cannot fully know Christ without fully following him as well, wherever that may lead.  This moment on the mountaintop has changed everything forever.  For Peter, it means that there is no turning back, no hope of going home, no chance of ever returning to the quiet life he once knew as a Galilean fisherman.  Having discovered this new knowledge, having gained this epiphany, means having to follow it out to the end, even to the cross; it means growing fully into new life in Christ. 

And the truth is, that’s hard.  Let’s not fool ourselves.  God can and often does ask some pretty crazy things of us.  We might find ourselves called away from a place we love, or towards a place we do not want to go or to just stay put – something we’ve perhaps all experienced this year!  We might discover that we are asked to carry the burden of a sick friend or a tragic loss, a difficult project or a chronic suffering.  God might require us to engage with a neighbor who is always posting the “wrong” opinions on Facebook or forgive someone who has done us deep harm.  Whether the voice is loud and clear or soft and subtle, a life lived in full relationship with God will be demanding and may seem impossible at times. 

But, when the tasks before us seem daunting and the path ahead looks dark, we have the hope of Christ Jesus.  As St. Paul reminds us in his second letter to the Corinthians, the God who calls us to these things is the same God “who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”  As Christians, we have seen the glory of the Lord.  Baptized into the communion of saints, we, like Peter, stand before the full glory of Christ, and through him, are invited into full knowledge of the Father.  And, if we accept that invitation, we, too, will be transformed. 

On this last Sunday of Epiphany, we find ourselves looking ahead to Lent, the path that will lead us through the barren wilderness towards the cross of Christ, the one that perhaps mirrors our own spiritual journeys through the loneliness, suffering and pain of this past year.  Like Joey and Peter, we might be tempted to freeze things as they are in order to postpone growing into a knowledge that asks too much of us.  But if we do so, we miss participating in the saving work of God in the world.  And as challenging as our journey may be, it leads us ultimately to Christ’s transforming love.  Amen. 

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^{Watch the snippet of Joey and Rachel’s conversation here.}