CHANGE:
It’s a concept we all recognise.
And, it’s a reality that we all accept.
… in theory.
Yet change is something that we inherently resist.
Because we like that status quo – the unchanged.
We are comfortable with sameness and familiarity – even when that sameness and familiarity may not be healthy or good for us.
Because change means engaging with the unknown….
And too often, our humanness doesn’t embrace change as an exciting possibility of something new! – it gets stuck in the limited sense of “we always did it this way before” without considering the creative and creating potential before us of … change.
This morning, our readings are about change: sudden and gradual, extreme and minimal, individual and collective. Change. The scriptures are inviting us to see things with new eyes –
To consider new ways, new joys, new possibilities: in our faith, in our relationships, and in our ministries.
How fitting that these transformative readings of transfiguration come to us on the day of our Annual Meeting, when we will gather to celebrate the past year and commit with hope to the potentials in front of us in the coming year.
And, naming that change is inevitable, we embrace the possibilities with faith.
With prayer.
With confidence that God is with us: guiding, directing, nudging at times.
God brings us into change.
And we have the option to understand this as a good thing. A GREAT thing. A holy thing.
In the Exodus, the change happens for Moses, who has spent time in conversation with God: he has been changed; he goes back to the community: they then see his change, and are drawn to it.
By his change, through his faithfulness, the community themselves changed. They re-engaged with prayer, they trusted the leading of the Spirit, they shared this tradition of faithful communication with future generations.
Connecting with God changed them all.
In the epistle, Paul invites the community into unveiled communication with God, and with each other. He reminds them to put their trust and hope in God, and to be changed by that: to pray fervently, to be honest with themselves and with each other, to reach out to the wider community in new and exciting ways.
It’s a change for them, but one that shines the light of Christ into the world of darkness. It’s a change that declares a confidence in the movement of the Spirit.
And our Gospel: well Peter is the stereotypical human here, in that he reacts, rather than responds, to change.
He sees Jesus changed after his encounter with the divine. Peter’s amazed – obviously! And even in the face of change – where Jesus’s face has changed – Peter wants to keep things as they are – RIGHT then. Because in this change, Peter sees himself benefitting – who wouldn’t like that!
But Jesus’ message is clear for him, in this teachable moment:
Change can be good and holy; and we are always invited to see the change.
That change needs to be recognised, though: our faith invites us to name the presence of the Holy when we see it. And what a gift to make those proclamations!
And then: having seen and named change, Jesus reminds his disciples of the privilege to act upon that change, to bring positive and Spirit-led change into the world. For while it may have been good for them to stay there – as Peter suggested – Jesus knew it was even better for them to continue.
Because even Jesus’ transfiguration was not a one-and-done event. They were never meant to stay on the top of the mountain; it was meant to be a time of teaching and discerning towards new ministry.
To stay where they were would be to deny the richness of possibility in front of them. And, in fact, to minimise it – by inadvertently ignoring others. We so often forget to consider what was happening with the other 9 disciples, at the base of the mountain: a part of the community. Those 9 were not diminished by their absence on the mountain, they simply had other aspects of ministry and evangelism to learn and experience.
What a great reminder for Peter – and us – of the benefit of sharing ministry with the broader community.
When the divine voice speaks on that mountaintop, God is not merely re-focusing the disciples’ attention on the teaching, but also amplifying Jesus’ words of their baptismal calling to minister to the world.
To be ministers: for we all are called to ministry.
And ministry: it involves change.
It adapts, it grows, it morphs.
And the Spirit inspires us to shift into this pattern in our own lives:
To see God, with authentic communication through prayer and meditation and discernment.
To recognise that people are changed through this encounter with the divine: we may not always have words for it, but we know when the core of our souls is drawn to the spiritual presence in another person before us.
And then to BE the change: to bask in the Spirit as she breathes new life around us, to risk trying new things, to be bold in ministering to the world.
SO as the world is journeying forward; as the church is journeying forward; as we individually are journeying forward, I invite us to step with hope and faith into the possibilities of change:
Some things are new, and they are life-giving!
Some will be tried, and discerned not to be effective at this time.
Some things from the past we will discern to have run their course, and we will thank God for their gifts then – without lamenting their end.
And some things from the past will continue to be spiritually nourishing, and we will relish in their continued history.
The point is: we will try.
We will trust.
We will do our best to respond to how God is inviting us forward.
For change can be exciting:
We are on the cusp of new possibilities, new joys, new ministries!
We are in a place where we can ask God to show us the light of Christ shining in our community!
Together, we have the ministry ahead of us to re-enter the world, changed and changing – and embrace those that we know but haven’t journeyed with.
I pray we can: here and now: be empowered through prayer, be inspired by God, be encouraged with one another: that we may BE the change we wish to see in the world.
The world is waiting for us. Let’s go in peace, for the love of God. Amen.
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