Transfiguration Sermon – Transforming Through Prayer
Feb. 10th 2013
PREACHER: Pastor Paul Cannon
Exodus 34:29-35
Luke 9:28-43
Good morning everyone!
I’m glad to see your smiling faces here this morning. In the Church season, today is
Transfiguration Sunday, so we’ve heard two stories about people going up
mountains to pray and then being transformed in some way. And both of these stories, of Moses and Jesus
with his disciples, mark the beginning of something significant in faith lives
of the people.
The first story tells us about Moses hiking up Mount Sinai to
talk with God. And whenever he came down
from the mountain, his face would be glowing from his encounter. When Moses journeyed up there, he would come
back down with instructions or laws or messages from God to the people. In this particular part of the story, he’s
bringing back two things: new tablets of the covenant and instructions on how
to build God’s new Tabernacle.
But as anybody who was on the building committee for this
worship space will tell you – the construction of a new building is a pivotal
moment in the life of any community. A
place of worship isn’t just a building.
It’s is a statement about who you are and who your God is. So what you
have in the story is essentially Moses coming before God in prayer – and God
transforming the faith lives of his people.
Jesus transfiguration moment also began with prayer. Jesus hikes up a mountain with Peter, James
and John and the three of them begin to pray.
And in this moment, Jesus face starts to shine and his clothes turn into
a dazzling, blinding white. And then
Elijah appears with Moses and the experience is so moving - it’s so incredible
- that Peter states that he wants to pitch some tents and stay up on this
mountain top!
Then as Peter suggests this, a cloud comes and envelopes
everybody on the Mountain, and from that cloud comes the voice of God who says
“This is my son, my chosen. Listen to
him.” … Listen to him … And after God spoke those words everything flashed back
to normal, and they were alone again.
And that’s pretty much the whole bizarre, incredible story –
a story that starts with prayer and ends with a command to listen. But instead of instructions to build a
temple, when Jesus walks down this mountain, it’s towards Jerusalem – the place
where he is crucified.
Now, both of these stories are pivotal moments in the history
of Christianity and Judaism. They are stories that mark that something dramatic
is about to happen. Not only are Moses and Jesus transfigured, but I think it’s
no exaggeration to say that the entire course of human history is changed by
these events. And today, I want to
suggest to you that the catalyst, the spark, of all this renewal and
transformation begins with prayer.
At this point, I think that we all have to confess
something. Not a personal confession –
I’ll spare you that much at least – but a confession that we need to make as a
whole. And what we need to confess is
this: we are really bad at prayer.
I hate to paint with such broad
strokes, but I think that in general, that statement is true. If you don’t
believe me, just get a group of Lutherans together and ask if anybody is
willing to say a word of prayer and listen to the crickets that will inevitably
follow. Typically in a group of 100 Lutherans together, you might find one
person willing to speak up – unless the Pastor is on vacation.
And I think we’re uncomfortable
with prayer because few of us take time out of our busy days to actually
practice it! The same could be said for any number of things that we struggle
with. For instance – and this might come as a shock to hear this, so I’m glad
you’re all sitting down – I am not good at break dancing … And not to stereotype, but I’m guessing none
of you are either.
Now, there might be some of you that are thinking to
yourselves at this moment, “Now wait a minute Pastor, don’t we pray every
Sunday?” And my response to that is that yes, we pray every Sunday, and it’s
usually the second most slept through part of the
service…I’m glad that there are some of you awake to hear that joke.
But if you allow me to get on my soap box for a moment, I
often wonder if our time for prayer during the service – the prayers of the
people – end up being the prayers of the pastors, or at the best, the prayers
of the people who speak up.
And too often, I think our personal prayers – our daily
concerns, our joys, our guilt and our praises – I wonder if they too often go
unspoken because we have no idea how to pray or even why we do it.
It all starts with that question “Why?” Why do we pray? At Theology on Tap the other night, somebody
asked that very same thing. This person
was wondering if we pray more for what happens here on earth or for God to save
our souls for heaven.
And after thinking about it for a moment, my response was
“Neither.” The reason we pray is
relationship. We pray because in prayer,
God opens us up to encounter him.
And the more you dig into the Bible, the truer this seems to
be – that prayer is about entering into a relationship with God. Right before
our story of Moses today, I came across a passage saying that Moses would speak
to God quote, “face-to-face as one would speak to a friend.” And if that’s what prayer is about - being in
a relationship with God like you would be with a friend - then I think that
changes everything.
With a friend, you can be honest – you let them in on what’s
really going on in your life. Which means that in prayer, you can be real with
God and not pretend that everything is perfect.
So if your child isn’t doing well in school, your prayer might be “God,
I’m so anxious about their future.” Or if you’ve lost a loved one, your prayer
might be “God, why did you take them from me?” Or if you received a promotion
at work your prayer might be one of joy and praise, “God, thank you for this
opportunity!”
And just like in any relationship, it’s not all about what
you have to say. Part of being a good
friend is being able to listen. On the
mountaintop, God addresses Peter, James and John saying, “This is my son. My chosen.
Listen to him.” Sometimes it’s easy to forget how important listening
is.
At our annual council meeting for instance, we had a
visioning session. And we asked the
question, “Where do you see Bethany 10 years from now? How do you want to see
Bethany transformed?” Council members
were throwing out really awesome suggestions like “We should have a community
center!” Or “I’d really like to see Bethany’s community garden grow into a
project that could really feed people who are experiencing homelessness.”
And as we broke down the steps to achieving each of these
dreams, we realized that the first thing to do in every single case was to
first listen to the needs of the community and to where God was calling
us. So before we decide to build a
community center, it might be good to first ask, “What does our neighborhood
need?” Or before we decide to feed
people experiencing homelessness, maybe we should ask them if they are hungry.
Maybe in asking those questions we realize that Crystal Lake
is more in need of supportive job programs or low-cost day care. It could be
anything. The point is, that you’ll never know until you ask and then actually
listen for the answer.
So here we are. We’re in the midst of the year of renewal,
where our theme verse from Romans tells us “Do not be conformed but be
transformed.” We are three days from
Lent where our Lenten theme will be transformation.
And today, on this Transfiguration Sunday – a day where God
set about changing the faith lives of the Israelites and all of Jesus
followers, we find that this process of being changed by God begins with
prayer. It begins by entering into
relationship and encountering the living God.
And that brings me to a very
non-Lutheran challenge: I want you to do something. Take time every single day during Lent to
pray. Pray out loud. Pray with your family. Talk to God like you would talk to a
friend. One thing we often do in
Confirmation is to lift up our roses and thorns (highs and lows) for the week
or the day, and I think that would be a great place for you to start. Tell God what’s going on in your life. And then ask him where he wants you to go
next. Or if you don’t have the words,
then simply say the prayer the Lord’s prayer.
And finally, listen to what God has
to tell you. Listen to the people and the community around you, and discover
the kinds of change that God has in store for you and for this church this
year. It won’t make you a holier person,
it won’t make God love you any more, but it will draw you into a closer
relationship with the living God – and that, we know, has the power to
transform the world.
Amen.
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