Listen and/or watch this service here.
Valentines, Feb 14th, 2021 / Transfiguration Sunday
ANNOUNCEMENTS
– Ash Wednesday this Wednesday at Christ UMC at 7 pm. Live streamed online on their Facebook page and in person.
CENTERING
It is Valentine’s Day! So I thought for our centering and preparing ourselves for worship, we would focus on love.
1 Corinthians 13
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
Lord we think now of the times we said eloquent things, great insights, truths – but did not offer them in love – and our words were discordant, hurtful, and taken wrong.
And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
Lord, we remember all the times we aced tests, were so smart, and so wise. We remember the moments our faith was strong enough to move mountains. We remember God how awesome we are! And… we remember that without love, we would feel like we’re nothing.
If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Lord, we remember love can’t be bought. Our possessions, our money, our bodies, our power – none of it can buy another’s love.
Love is patient;
love is kind;
love is not envious
love is not boastful
love is not arrogant
love is not rude.
Love does not insist on its own way;
Love is not irritable
Love is not resentful;
Love does not rejoice in wrongdoing,
Love rejoices in the truth.
Love bears all things,
Love believes all things,
Love hopes all things,
Love endures all things.
Love never ends.
But as for prophecies? They will come to an end.
We will predict the future wrong. We will make mistakes.
As for tongues? They will cease.
We will misspeak. We will say things wrong.
As for knowledge? It will come to an end.
We won’t know everything. There’s always more we don’t know.
For we know only in part,
and we prophesy only in part;
but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.
So we need love. Love to forgive, and bear, and try again, with ourselves and with each other. We need patience and kindness. We need humbleness. We need truth. We need love for God, love for ourselves, and love for each other. We need love because we are not complete, perfect beings in a complete, perfect world. We are in part. Doing the best we can. And in need of loving grace, loving kindness, loving mercy.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.
Lord, we think we’re adults and have forgotten how to love as children do. Without reservation. Without greed. Let us love like children, speak like children, think like children and embrace each day, each person, as a new beginning and a new friend.
For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face.
When we love we love because God loves us. We see, face to face, God’s love.
Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.
God you know us inside and out. Know us fully. Put your spirit in us. And call us your beloved. We only understand a part of how much you love us. Only a part of how you embrace us – our darkest secrets and our brightest victories. You love US – we are fully known, and fully loved.
And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
For, you, God so love the world you made us, chose us, guide us, come to us, share our humanity, forgive us, save us, make your home with us, and call us your own.
You are love. Amen.
CURRENT PRAYER REQUESTS
Available on our private Facebook page and by telephoning myself or consistory.
SCRIPTURE
Quick refresher here – Elijah is a famous prophet of God – THE prophet great messianic hopes are later draped upon. Elijah calls down God’s fire, resurrects the dead, heals the sick, casts curses on those who curse God, and in general, takes names and kicks derriere for God. Elisha is his beloved disciple. He’s the biological son of a rich farmer who gave it all up to follow Elijah about a decade ago. The two have become like a father and son, and in today’s reading, we hear them confirm this: yes. We are adopted family.
2 Kings 2:1-12
Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah said to Elisha, “Stay here; for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel.”
But Elisha said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.”
So they went down to Bethel. The company of prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha, and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?”
And he said, “Yes, I know; keep silent.”
Elijah said to him, “Elisha, stay here; for the Lord has sent me to Jericho.”
But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.”
So they came to Jericho. The company of prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha, and said to him, “Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?”
And he answered, “Yes, I know; be silent.”
Then Elijah said to him, “Stay here; for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan.”
But he said, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.”
So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the company of prophets also went, and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up, and struck the water; the water was parted to the one side and to the other, until the two of them crossed on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me what I may do for you, before I am taken from you.”
Elisha said, “Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit.”
He responded, “You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it will be granted you; if not, it will not.”
As they continued walking and talking, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended in a whirlwind into heaven. Elisha kept watching and crying out, “Father, father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” But when he could no longer see him, he grasped his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.
…
Our next reading is hundreds of years later, when Elijah appears one again – back from heaven – and with Moses. I wonder – what was that conversation among the greatest great guides of the faith. Passing on advice to Jesus? Getting advice from Jesus? Having a conversation across time where each of them plan how to guide in their own times we pig-headed people into love? No one knows who can tell us today. But the story goes….
Mark 9:2-9
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them. And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He did not know what to say, for they were terrified.
Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus. As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.
SERMON
Transformation and transfiguration are not the same. The first, transformation, is changing something’s essential nature. I transform flour into bread. I have changed it, through sugar and yeast, heat and kneading, into something new. The molecules are changed – the way they align. The nature of the flour has changed. It wasn’t bread all along. It was flour and potentially bread, or potentially papier-mâché, or potentially a cake or pie or prank.
Transfiguration is revealing what something was all along, but seeing it differently. Understanding it differently. There are creative images and drawings that are simultaneously an old woman and a young woman; or a man and a dog, a bird and a goat. We are surprised when suddenly our minds see the other image and then – wow! Two things at once! The picture didn’t change. How we understood it changed.
I’ve been thinking about our passages. Jesus’ clothes transform. They go from every day clothes of linen or wool to some kind of fabric made of light. Jesus himself transfigures. The disciples see him with Moses and Elijah and realize he is The Really Big Deal. He isn’t just a cool rabbi or even a pretty big deal like another prophet. The poor disciples don’t even know what to make of it yet. What would you make out of seeing your friend casually standing outside of church one day standing in heavenly light speaking with Jesus? I think I’d babble like Peter and be terrified too.
Today we hear of quite the supernatural transfiguration. But does anything like this happen in our daily lives?
I think… it does.
I remember one day sitting with my father while he played with my daughter. I noticed his arm. It was just his arm – but it wasn’t his arm. It was MY grandpa’s arm. HIS father’s arm. The same loose skin, the same scars from a life of labor, the same watch band tan. But this is my dad. I looked at my daughter. This is her grandfather.
My dad… is a grandpa. Like my grandpa before my dad. My dad is… a… grandpa! Selena will remember him as Papa. She won’t remember him as dad-in-his-20s-and-30s any more than I remember my grandpa like that. I’ve seen those photos, but I remember an old man full of smiles and laughter and arms just like… my dad… now has.
My dad was transfigured to me. He didn’t suddenly become a grandpa. He didn’t age 30 to 60 in 2.5 seconds flat. I didn’t abruptly have a child and become an adult. We are all essentially the same… but in that moment, we were transfigured to me. Revealed. I understood and realized truth about me that had been there all along.
Parents have this transfiguration with their children. One day they are helpless and need you to do everything for them. They literally cannot figure out how to feed themselves. And somewhere, some day, they are the ones bringing us food. Helping us feed ourselves. We teach them all we know… and some day, they come with a new gadget and new technology and research and teach us a whole new world we never taught them.
And it’s Valentines, so I have been thinking about dating. Dating is all about transfiguration and not transformation. Oh, sure, you might be transformed from dating. Might learn confidence or self awareness. But most of it is transfiguration. What DO I want in a spouse? Who AM I? We reveal ourselves to ourselves a lot when dating. And those first couple of dates… it’s all transfiguration of the other. Sure, he or she looks nice… but are their morals compatible with your own? Are they dreaming a future similar to your own? Who are they under their skin?
After all of the political and social strife of the last year coupled with all of Covid-19, I keep hearing people say, “I never knew I knew so many people that…” That were that liberal. That conservative. That selfish. That clueless. I’ve said these phrases or similar myself. And it isn’t that all of us were radically transformed – oh yes, we have changed with the chaos of 2020 stretching into 2021 – but it is a lot more than we have been transfigured to ourselves and each other.
We know a lot more what we truly value, and what our friends, family, and communities truly value. And it is uncomfortable. We want to say the American Dream is possible for any who work hard. And yet, poverty is transfigured. We see how the American Dream is NOT possible for many, many people through no fault of their own. Its uncomfortable to see that truth about ourselves and our society. It is uncomfortable to be transfigured to each other. We’ve generally been raised to not speak about politics, money, or religion because those are fightin’ words. But by never speaking about these things we never learned how to talk about them. We never learned how to love people who think differently about these things than us. We never had our own beliefs challenged and developed a way to state what we believe without being insulted or defensive… reactive. These last 12 months have exposed us to ourselves, and each other, and that’s… … really uncomfortable. It’s like we’re surrounded by strangers – including the one in the mirror.
So yeah. Peter’s babbling makes sense. Actually, building a tent here and camping awhile to get our heads around this makes sense.
But we’re not transformed… who we each essentially are remains the same. We may be a bit older, and we suddenly have a lot of empathy for the Black Plague, but who we are… deep down… remains the same. We are God’s beloved Children. Made in God’s image. We are loved.
All these strangers about me have that same core which means they’re really not strangers at all – they’re siblings. All of these hard truths that are being exposed also come with the hard truth… we’re all beloved of God. And the person I dislike the most God loves as much as God loves me, and God loves Jesus.
And that’s a humbling pill to swallow. And one that transforms a part of me. Makes my heart softer and more willing to love, more willing to extend grace, and more willing to be merciful.
Because in the end, when my body ages and breaks, and eloquent words and intelligence fail… what’s left is faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love.
Amen.
Pastor Whitney Bruno Sermons 