From the first Scripture reading in the Book of
Genesis: “The Lord said to Abram: ‘Go
forth from the land of your kinsfolk and from your father’s house to a land I
will show you. I will make of you a
great nation, and I will bless you.’”
What was asked of Abram sets the stage for us to reflect on
our own cost of discipleship. The
detachment that was asked of Abram is this:
Abram is commanded to leave his country, his kinfolk, and finally his
father’s house, that is, what we would call his entire support system, material
and psychological, the whole deal, and depend on God alone.
Does this not challenge us to reflect on our cost of
discipleship during this Lenten season? Lent’s call to stark honesty compels us to ask
if our discipleship of Jesus is too comfortable. Our Lenten conversion process requires some
measure of detachment from and attachment to values and lifestyle, priorities
and preferences that may be counter-cultural.
The call of Abram who was later named Abraham was to leave
home and settle in a foreign land. God
asked and so Abram went. He had trust
and hope. How do we respond when asks us
to move beyond our comfort zone and to more fully trust in the plan of God for
us? We are all used to what we are used
to. There is the tendency in all of us
to say my way or the highway. But if our
call to discipleship is any way similar to God’s call of Abram, we will need to
revisit that old wisdom. In some way,
the Lord asks of you and the Lord asks of me to let go of some of my comfort
zone and to trust more fully in God’s plan for us.
As I reflect on the ministries I have had as a priest over
the last 49 years, the assignments I have had are not my doing or my
suggestions but I deeply believe they are God’s plan for me. I have always thought that God has a sense of
humor in His plan for my life. My hunch
is that all of us have had curve balls thrown at us that are not of our doing
and in fact we may have resisted what was being asked of us. The truth is nothing happens my
accident. Our call to discipleship, our
cost of discipleship means we need to trust and hope in God’s plan as did
Abram.
The call of Abram is the scriptural set-up for the call of
the disciples – Peter, James and John – in this Transfiguration gospel. Like Abram’s call, the apostles are being
called to go forth from the comfort of their preconceived notions of
Messiahship – and the powerful prestige they imagine will be theirs in Jesus’
kingdom – to a new vision of the kind of Messiah Jesus is and therefore what it
means to be his disciples. Peter, James
and John the same three who glimpse on Mt Tabor their Master’s transfigured
glory will witness in Gethsemane his most abject suffering.
From the Gospel, as the apostles experienced the transfigured
glory of Jesus, Peter says: “Lord, it is
good that we are here.” While he was
still speaking. Behold, then from a cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my
beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased, listen to him.”
Notice these three simple words spoken by God the Father to
the disciples of Jesus: Listen to Him.
To this point, the apostles have been unable to understand
Jesus’ predictions about his upcoming suffering, death and resurrection. They
have not listened. In fact, there was no
need to listen because they already knew what they wanted the Savior to be like
– a successful, prestigious, powerful Messiah.
Now the voice of God commands them to listen.
Jesus message is that his disciples must be willing to join
Him in His passion and death as well. We
too have difficulty listening to Jesus when our discipleship involved dealing
with the crosses of life – the cross of sickness, the cross of the death of a
loved one, the cross of coping with a relationship that has gone wrong.
The apostles were given the vision of the transfigured Lord
to overcome their resistance to listening to Jesus in moments of suffering. What the apostles experienced in this
beautiful Transfiguration experience was like the end of the story appearing in
the middle. Why? The apostles needed their faith to be
strengthened to have a faith and hope in accepting their Savior as one who was
going to be crucified in his journey to resurrection and new life. The apostles
had balked at the future Jesus was insisting upon. The privilege of witnessing Jesus’ Transfiguration
was for the purpose of confirming Jesus as someone to whom they must listen to. They have, as of yet, not understood the
mission of Jesus. They must open themselves
up to what Jesus is saying about his suffering, death, and resurrection.
The real action of discipleship is not just on the mountaintop
but in the upcoming events of death and resurrection in Jerusalem. As we pray over this Transfiguration Gospel,
know that the message for us is not just the identity of Jesus in his
transfigured glory but it is a story for us to reflect on what it means to be a
disciple of Jesus. In the words of the
Father: Listen to him. As with the first disciples, we need to let
go of old notions of discipleship that get in the way of listening to the
message of Jesus. We need to accept the
cross in our own lives and to trust more fully in God’s plan for our lives.
Please God we all can identify with Transfiguration events
that put us in touch with the glory of the Lord. For me the glory is revealed in the
sacredness of the ocean as well as on the mountaintop. The glory of the Lord is revealed in the
friendships of my life that are so life giving and I so deeply treasure and
need. The glory of the Lord is revealed
in sacred moments of ministry. Recently
I vividly recall being in the hospital room at Strong and praying with patient
who was about to go home to the Lord. I
was praying with his wife and son as well.
It was apparent to all that God was with us and all will be well.
We all need those treasured moments of faith to strengthen
us for the times we will be vulnerable and fragile and wonder why God is asking
to embrace this cross in our life. The
crosses in life we will experience as individuals, as families, as the faith
community of the Church of the Holy Spirit, and as a nation. There will be no dimension of our lives in
which we get a free pass from the cross.
May our journey of faith have those beautiful
Transfiguration in which we say with the apostle: “Lord, it is good we are here.” And may we be
able to listen to the call of God in our journey of faith when we need to lead go
of our familiar comfort zones and embrace the cross and Gethsemane in our
lives.
Have a blessed day.
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