Sermon Illustrations For Transfiguration Sunday (2017)
Illustration
Exodus 24:12-18
There are moments when I envy Moses. He has such direct encounters with God. There is the call from the burning bush to lead the Hebrew people to freedom. There are the responses to Pharaoh which come directly from God. Now there is the call to come up to the mountain and wait upon the Lord. If truth be told, waiting upon the Lord I don’t envy so much. Often I feel I am waiting on the Lord -- waiting for the answer to prayer, wisdom through discernment, inspiration when I am lost, or comfort when I feel afflicted or deeply challenged.
But as I read this passage I am reminded that God transforms and transfigures us. We are not the same people when we encounter God -- even when the encounter seems a little one-sided, like praying with no apparent response. Prayer changes me. Relying on God’s grace changes me. Seeking wisdom or courage or inspiration changes me, transforms me, and transfigures me. Maybe there is not so much for me to envy Moses about after all.
Bonnie B.
Exodus 24:12-18
We’re told in Exodus that “the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel” (24:17) and that Moses entered into that devouring fire. Moses was transfigured after a fashion, following his close encounters with God’s presence. Aaron Milovic, in his lengthy book on the slim volume known as the Didache or The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,suggests that the prophets who traveled from church to church in the first Christian century were those who had passed through fire themselves -- transfigured by economic misfortune and persecution’s flames. These individuals would travel to a house church and stay only a night or two in order to tell their story. That house church was an island, a group of committed individuals engaged in a shared business, a craft that put food on the table and kept body and soul together. Is that what visitors to our church accomplish, bringing the reality they have experienced that has blasted them into a new, transfigured persona? Are we changed by sharing, if only from afar, the sufferings of others brought to life by traveling prophets? Or are we unchanged by this transfiguring experience?
(Want to know more? See The Didache: Faith, Hope, and Life of the Earliest Church Communiton, 50-70 C.E.)
Frank R.
Exodus 24:12-18
Be thankful that we don’t have to climb that mountain again -- Moses did it once for all. God gave him the basic rules for the faith, but also the general rules for all mankind. People of every faith and of no faith should not commit murder or theft. Those rules apply to all of us on earth. We do not vote on them or make our own rules.
Democracy was a total disaster in the Bible. If the majority won, we would be worshiping a golden calf. Worst of all, the majority voted to crucify Jesus!
The Ten Commandments are not all of God’s requirements, though they are a basic foundation. The Jews have pulled out over 600 commands. The Bible is full of interpretations of the commands of scripture. The most important is the example Jesus set on earth. They go far beyond the “big ten” as well as interpreting them by the way he lived. Jesus transfigured the basic rules of life!
Sometimes we are living in that cloud. We have not yet found the full truth. One of the functions of a church is to help us lift that cloud! It may not be an instant thing -- even longer than 40 days and nights. But we must always seek the One who can lift that cloud for us and never give up.
Bob O.
2 Peter 1:16-21
The movie The Poseidon Adventure is the fictional account of a cruise ship that capsizes, with passengers left to try and escape the best they can. It is a tense drama that I remember watching as a kid in the movie theater. A remake has since been made as well that tells the same basic story. There is a part of the story that I recall well. A minister on the ship is leading a small band of passengers, and they are heading up to the boiler room. As they make their way they run across another group led by the purser, who is going to the opposite side of the ship. The minister is convinced that’s a mistake, but his band is concerned that he might be wrong. He urges them to wait five minutes while he goes to see if water has filled the boiler room. It is a nerve-wracking time. Just as the time elapses and the group is ready to follow the others, he bursts through a door, shouting “I’ve seen it! I know it’s there. We can make it!”
I thought about that as I read through these verses once again. Peter and the other apostles knew the power and coming of the Lord Jesus because they had seen it. They’d been there. They were eyewitnesses of his majesty. What he was teaching wasn’t a myth. It was true. His readers could trust him because he knew. They’d heard the voice come from heaven. They’d been there. We can trust the witness of his word. Will you?
Bill T.
2 Peter 1:16-21
It was 71 years after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima when Barack Obama became the first sitting president to visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial in May 2016. A visit to this historic but tragic site had been on Obama’s agenda since he first took office, and the occasion had all the pomp, ceremony, and planned choreography of a state visit or a leader’s funeral. With thousands in attendance and much of Japan watching on television, Obama walked forward alone at the park and laid a wreath on a white pyramid. He paused before the memorial, his head bowed. Before traveling to Japan, Obama visited Vietnam as a sign of healing past wounds. In a speech that was delivered in a slow and deliberate cadence, Obama said: “Why do we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder a terrible force unleashed in a not-so-far past.” He went on to say of those who perished: “Their souls speak to us. They ask us to look inward, to take stock of who we are and what we might become.”
Application: We are called to speak a prophetic message in our churches, in our communities, and to the world.
Ron L.
2 Peter 1:16-21
There are a lot of myths about Christ which float around in America. A 2015 Barna Group poll found that 44% of Americans do not think Jesus was divine. (Neither did Benjamin Franklin [Works, p. 1179].) Transfiguration and the author of this epistle aim to undercut such myths, to make clear that Jesus is the Son of God, with all the majesty and power of God himself. There is a lot at stake in these convictions.
John Calvin points out why it is important that Jesus is divine. Since he is our Savior, only if Jesus is divine can we be sure that salvation is in Christ and always has been (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol. XXII/2, p. 52). The famed American Puritan Jonathan Edwards nicely explains how much comfort there is in looking at Christ this way, in all his majestic, divine glory: “When we see all the eternal, unchanging divine power in him, then we are reminded how Christ has treated those that have come to him heretofore. Christ in times past has graciously received those that have come to him; he has made them welcome; he has embraced them in the arms of his love.... And he is the same still; he is as ready to receive such sinners now as he was then. Christ never yet rejected any that came to him; he has always been the same in this respect; he is so now; and so he surely will be still” (Works, Vol. 2, p. 953).
Even secular social analysts appreciate with the Church today that we need glimpses of the glory and splendor of God which transfiguration affords. Such experiences are a remedy for anxiety and doubt. Famed critic Alain de Bottom contends that in settings where religion provides stunning beauty in the midst of society’s shared experience, anxieties caused by social distinctions wither (Status Anxiety, p. 250). Together we can all marvel at Jesus’ stunning divine beauty, and in our wonder the social distinctions between us get diminished.
Mark E.
Matthew 17:1-9
Have you ever climbed a mountain and been surrounded by clouds? I have -- and I remember the encompassing nature of the clouds, my unwillingness to move for fear that I might disturb all the cosmos, not just my small part of it. I wanted to hold on to that moment, that still, enveloped moment.
I imagine that Peter, James, and John feel much the same -- something magnificent is happening and they want to hold on to it. Their solution is to build dwellings for the prophets and stay in that moment. Yet even as they say the words, time shifts, the world changes, a voice speaks, and they are alone on the mountaintop with Jesus. There is no holding on to this moment of wonder. Just as the clouds enveloping me on the mountaintop do not remain, so the moment of transfiguration does not remain. But the memory... oh, the memory will never be gone. They, and we, are forever changed by the experience, by the encounter, by grace.
Bonnie B.
Matthew 17:1-9
To me, one of the most intriguing elements of the story of the transfiguration is that the three apostles report that Moses and Elijah were present with Jesus when he was transformed on the mountain. How did they know? We’d know it was Washington or Hamilton by comparing their faces to their portraits on the bills in our wallets or purses. The ancients could not have turned to any official portraits of Moses or Elijah hanging near the city gates of Jerusalem for confirmation. How did they recognize these two ancient dignitaries from the distant past?
In recent years some attention has been paid to the condition known as prosopognosia -- the inability of some people to recognize a face under any conditions. At its most extreme, some people are unable to recognize their own children or spouse. Those with milder cases don’t like to admit that they don’t recognize people who recognize them.
More recently it has been realized that if there are some who can’t recognize friends and family, there are also those at the opposite end of the spectrum who literally never forget a face. In the city of London there is a special police unit consisting of officers who have this gift. Since London has more surveillance cameras throughout the city than most any other city in the world, these officers study footage to spot individuals they recognize from their presence at or near other crime scenes.
How do we recognize Jesus in our lives? Is there a way of looking at the faces around us and recognizing Jesus is in our midst?
Frank R.
Matthew 17:1-9
Haven’t we all heard some who say that they don’t attend church because they can find the Lord better by climbing a mountain? In other words, find him in the wilds and wilderness of his creation? Yes! Sometimes I felt close to God when I was wandering in the wilderness. I even climbed part of the way up Mount Everest and found peace. But it is only one place we sense his presence. We need a foundation in our Lord’s Spirit before we can find him anywhere. We may have found that foundation in his church.
Yes, I have known people who experienced the Lord in amazing ways. I have myself, and it helped me want to build a church on earth for him -- and yes, even for my church leaders or another Christian who brought me to him. When some of our converts on the mission field received the vision of Jesus in their hearts, they helped us build churches in which to worship him. They have become his temple, but they wanted a place where other new believers could come.
We want our worship to be for him alone, and not for all the prophets and pastors to be worshiped. Yes, there are many churches that seem to place other saints before Jesus or equal with him, but as long as they still put him first! Is he first in your life?
Bob O.
There are moments when I envy Moses. He has such direct encounters with God. There is the call from the burning bush to lead the Hebrew people to freedom. There are the responses to Pharaoh which come directly from God. Now there is the call to come up to the mountain and wait upon the Lord. If truth be told, waiting upon the Lord I don’t envy so much. Often I feel I am waiting on the Lord -- waiting for the answer to prayer, wisdom through discernment, inspiration when I am lost, or comfort when I feel afflicted or deeply challenged.
But as I read this passage I am reminded that God transforms and transfigures us. We are not the same people when we encounter God -- even when the encounter seems a little one-sided, like praying with no apparent response. Prayer changes me. Relying on God’s grace changes me. Seeking wisdom or courage or inspiration changes me, transforms me, and transfigures me. Maybe there is not so much for me to envy Moses about after all.
Bonnie B.
Exodus 24:12-18
We’re told in Exodus that “the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel” (24:17) and that Moses entered into that devouring fire. Moses was transfigured after a fashion, following his close encounters with God’s presence. Aaron Milovic, in his lengthy book on the slim volume known as the Didache or The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,suggests that the prophets who traveled from church to church in the first Christian century were those who had passed through fire themselves -- transfigured by economic misfortune and persecution’s flames. These individuals would travel to a house church and stay only a night or two in order to tell their story. That house church was an island, a group of committed individuals engaged in a shared business, a craft that put food on the table and kept body and soul together. Is that what visitors to our church accomplish, bringing the reality they have experienced that has blasted them into a new, transfigured persona? Are we changed by sharing, if only from afar, the sufferings of others brought to life by traveling prophets? Or are we unchanged by this transfiguring experience?
(Want to know more? See The Didache: Faith, Hope, and Life of the Earliest Church Communiton, 50-70 C.E.)
Frank R.
Exodus 24:12-18
Be thankful that we don’t have to climb that mountain again -- Moses did it once for all. God gave him the basic rules for the faith, but also the general rules for all mankind. People of every faith and of no faith should not commit murder or theft. Those rules apply to all of us on earth. We do not vote on them or make our own rules.
Democracy was a total disaster in the Bible. If the majority won, we would be worshiping a golden calf. Worst of all, the majority voted to crucify Jesus!
The Ten Commandments are not all of God’s requirements, though they are a basic foundation. The Jews have pulled out over 600 commands. The Bible is full of interpretations of the commands of scripture. The most important is the example Jesus set on earth. They go far beyond the “big ten” as well as interpreting them by the way he lived. Jesus transfigured the basic rules of life!
Sometimes we are living in that cloud. We have not yet found the full truth. One of the functions of a church is to help us lift that cloud! It may not be an instant thing -- even longer than 40 days and nights. But we must always seek the One who can lift that cloud for us and never give up.
Bob O.
2 Peter 1:16-21
The movie The Poseidon Adventure is the fictional account of a cruise ship that capsizes, with passengers left to try and escape the best they can. It is a tense drama that I remember watching as a kid in the movie theater. A remake has since been made as well that tells the same basic story. There is a part of the story that I recall well. A minister on the ship is leading a small band of passengers, and they are heading up to the boiler room. As they make their way they run across another group led by the purser, who is going to the opposite side of the ship. The minister is convinced that’s a mistake, but his band is concerned that he might be wrong. He urges them to wait five minutes while he goes to see if water has filled the boiler room. It is a nerve-wracking time. Just as the time elapses and the group is ready to follow the others, he bursts through a door, shouting “I’ve seen it! I know it’s there. We can make it!”
I thought about that as I read through these verses once again. Peter and the other apostles knew the power and coming of the Lord Jesus because they had seen it. They’d been there. They were eyewitnesses of his majesty. What he was teaching wasn’t a myth. It was true. His readers could trust him because he knew. They’d heard the voice come from heaven. They’d been there. We can trust the witness of his word. Will you?
Bill T.
2 Peter 1:16-21
It was 71 years after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima when Barack Obama became the first sitting president to visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial in May 2016. A visit to this historic but tragic site had been on Obama’s agenda since he first took office, and the occasion had all the pomp, ceremony, and planned choreography of a state visit or a leader’s funeral. With thousands in attendance and much of Japan watching on television, Obama walked forward alone at the park and laid a wreath on a white pyramid. He paused before the memorial, his head bowed. Before traveling to Japan, Obama visited Vietnam as a sign of healing past wounds. In a speech that was delivered in a slow and deliberate cadence, Obama said: “Why do we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder a terrible force unleashed in a not-so-far past.” He went on to say of those who perished: “Their souls speak to us. They ask us to look inward, to take stock of who we are and what we might become.”
Application: We are called to speak a prophetic message in our churches, in our communities, and to the world.
Ron L.
2 Peter 1:16-21
There are a lot of myths about Christ which float around in America. A 2015 Barna Group poll found that 44% of Americans do not think Jesus was divine. (Neither did Benjamin Franklin [Works, p. 1179].) Transfiguration and the author of this epistle aim to undercut such myths, to make clear that Jesus is the Son of God, with all the majesty and power of God himself. There is a lot at stake in these convictions.
John Calvin points out why it is important that Jesus is divine. Since he is our Savior, only if Jesus is divine can we be sure that salvation is in Christ and always has been (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol. XXII/2, p. 52). The famed American Puritan Jonathan Edwards nicely explains how much comfort there is in looking at Christ this way, in all his majestic, divine glory: “When we see all the eternal, unchanging divine power in him, then we are reminded how Christ has treated those that have come to him heretofore. Christ in times past has graciously received those that have come to him; he has made them welcome; he has embraced them in the arms of his love.... And he is the same still; he is as ready to receive such sinners now as he was then. Christ never yet rejected any that came to him; he has always been the same in this respect; he is so now; and so he surely will be still” (Works, Vol. 2, p. 953).
Even secular social analysts appreciate with the Church today that we need glimpses of the glory and splendor of God which transfiguration affords. Such experiences are a remedy for anxiety and doubt. Famed critic Alain de Bottom contends that in settings where religion provides stunning beauty in the midst of society’s shared experience, anxieties caused by social distinctions wither (Status Anxiety, p. 250). Together we can all marvel at Jesus’ stunning divine beauty, and in our wonder the social distinctions between us get diminished.
Mark E.
Matthew 17:1-9
Have you ever climbed a mountain and been surrounded by clouds? I have -- and I remember the encompassing nature of the clouds, my unwillingness to move for fear that I might disturb all the cosmos, not just my small part of it. I wanted to hold on to that moment, that still, enveloped moment.
I imagine that Peter, James, and John feel much the same -- something magnificent is happening and they want to hold on to it. Their solution is to build dwellings for the prophets and stay in that moment. Yet even as they say the words, time shifts, the world changes, a voice speaks, and they are alone on the mountaintop with Jesus. There is no holding on to this moment of wonder. Just as the clouds enveloping me on the mountaintop do not remain, so the moment of transfiguration does not remain. But the memory... oh, the memory will never be gone. They, and we, are forever changed by the experience, by the encounter, by grace.
Bonnie B.
Matthew 17:1-9
To me, one of the most intriguing elements of the story of the transfiguration is that the three apostles report that Moses and Elijah were present with Jesus when he was transformed on the mountain. How did they know? We’d know it was Washington or Hamilton by comparing their faces to their portraits on the bills in our wallets or purses. The ancients could not have turned to any official portraits of Moses or Elijah hanging near the city gates of Jerusalem for confirmation. How did they recognize these two ancient dignitaries from the distant past?
In recent years some attention has been paid to the condition known as prosopognosia -- the inability of some people to recognize a face under any conditions. At its most extreme, some people are unable to recognize their own children or spouse. Those with milder cases don’t like to admit that they don’t recognize people who recognize them.
More recently it has been realized that if there are some who can’t recognize friends and family, there are also those at the opposite end of the spectrum who literally never forget a face. In the city of London there is a special police unit consisting of officers who have this gift. Since London has more surveillance cameras throughout the city than most any other city in the world, these officers study footage to spot individuals they recognize from their presence at or near other crime scenes.
How do we recognize Jesus in our lives? Is there a way of looking at the faces around us and recognizing Jesus is in our midst?
Frank R.
Matthew 17:1-9
Haven’t we all heard some who say that they don’t attend church because they can find the Lord better by climbing a mountain? In other words, find him in the wilds and wilderness of his creation? Yes! Sometimes I felt close to God when I was wandering in the wilderness. I even climbed part of the way up Mount Everest and found peace. But it is only one place we sense his presence. We need a foundation in our Lord’s Spirit before we can find him anywhere. We may have found that foundation in his church.
Yes, I have known people who experienced the Lord in amazing ways. I have myself, and it helped me want to build a church on earth for him -- and yes, even for my church leaders or another Christian who brought me to him. When some of our converts on the mission field received the vision of Jesus in their hearts, they helped us build churches in which to worship him. They have become his temple, but they wanted a place where other new believers could come.
We want our worship to be for him alone, and not for all the prophets and pastors to be worshiped. Yes, there are many churches that seem to place other saints before Jesus or equal with him, but as long as they still put him first! Is he first in your life?
Bob O.
