SERMON @ MASS (with Holy Baptism)
@ ST PETER-IN-THE-FOREST
SUNDAY NEXT BEFORE LENT
– YEAR C
Exodus 34:29-end
2 Corinthians 3:12 – 4:2
Luke 9:28-43a
SUNDAY
10 FEBRUARY 2013
In just a short while, we will admit Patrick and Samuel
to the Church through their Holy Baptism.
Before, we do so, some thoughts about today’s scripture readings and the
themes of this Sunday before we embark on the season of Lent, on a Sunday often
referred to as ‘Transfiguration Sunday’.
And – since Patrick and Samuel’s parents are both
teachers of English and I have the privilege of currently working alongside
Tom, their dad – and because I know him to also share some of my love and
experience of teaching film: I am going to draw on some film materials as I
reflect with you, this morning…
In a scene
in George Lucas’ 1973 film American
Graffiti, the director sets his action in the mid-50s. He is, through the central character Curt
Henderson, played by Richard Dreyfuss, conveying a sense of what it was like in
his own youth to grow up. In a strange
scene, amidst the apparent realism of the scene, of youths cruising the strip
in their winged convertibles, a POV shot sees a mysterious beautiful blonde in
a neighbouring car at the traffic lights mouth ‘I Love You’ to this excitable
late teenager. The film then continues
to explore the goings-on of the last night the guy spends in his home town
before leaving for college. The scene is
a transfiguration. Which of us, also,
can admit to having a reconstructed memory in our minds which remind us what it
was like when we grew up out of childhood and into adulthood?
I think also
of some scenes from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1954 film, Rear Window. It tells the
story of the principal, Jeff, played by Jimmy Stewart, who is a foreign
correspondence photographer resting up his leg which has been broken during a
war shoot. He is confined to his chair,
simply staring out of his ‘rear window’ at his neighbours’ apartments and their
goings-on.
Early in the
film we see Jeff spurning the advances of the beautiful Lisa, played by Grace
Kelly. Soon after, we hear Jeff being
reprimanded by his nurse for being foolish in being so hard on Lisa and so
negative towards her.
And through
such scenes, we soon come to learn that Jeff is a commitment-phobe, scared to
let himself be vulnerable to a woman’s love.
Then, later in the film, together, Jeff and Lisa attempt to expose one
of their neighbours, Thorwald, as the murderer of his wife. A memorable scene from late in the film
shows Jeff watching Lisa through his binoculars, as she rifles through the
belongings in Thorwald’s flat hunting for evidence of the crime. As she lays her hands on the wedding ring,
evidence of Thorwald’s crime, Jeff simulataneously spies the killer approaching
his flat down the corridor adjacent. In
this moment of discovery, Jeff’s heart leaps into his mouth. He realises how much he cares for Lisa, and
he is unable to help her, his broken leg making him both literally and
figuratively unable to come to her aid.
When she signals to him, it is with Mrs Thorwald’s wedding ring, which
becomes simultaneosly Jeff’s exposure and, paradoxically, the sign of his final
realisation that he does wish to be married to Lisa, after all.
Why do I use
these illustrations? Because today’s readings
ask us to reflect on Our Lord’s Transfiguration. Let me take a different tack…
I am sure
you will have had it preached many times before in this church. Each of the four Gospel books in the New
Testament is a little bit like a game of football. A game of two halves!
For St Luke,
this story of Jesus’ Transfiguration marks the turning point from the disciples
witnessing Jesus’ miracles and absorbing his teaching, to being commissioned,
challenged, to go out in mission and do likewise.
This ‘interlude-story’,
if I can call it that – to extend my cinematic metaphors for today! - was
perhaps added by Luke as a bridge to hint at those experiences of life in which
the signs of God’s working and the Christ-rooted reality of God’s dealings with
us are strangely united. The transcendent
experiences which exist to spur us into action.
For notice
what happens – Peter and John and James marvel at the sight of Moses and Elijah
with Jesus, but they then make a fundamental error. They want to build dwellings for them – they
want to stay on the mountainside, construct permanent structures to ‘hold the
moment for ever’. But God does not wish
this. He urges and commands them towards
something quite different. “This is my
Son, my Chosen,” God says from the midst of the terrifying cloud that envelops
them, “Listen to Him!” And then reality
crashes back around.
And then
what? Straight into the next day, and a
story about a distressed and disturbed boy, and an anxious father seeking
healing and wholeness for him. The man
claims, “I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.!” And Jesus reprimands them, declaiming “You
faithless and perverse generation!”
Jesus expects of His disciples to be up and doing what He is doing. Anything short is perversity, less than what
should be, oddly misshapen.
So, if I may
return to our film examples. American Graffitti offers us a
reflection on the option we have – to remain trapped in our memory, real or
imagined, of those moments of glory and transfiguration and revelation that
touch us; to remain in a kind of frozen moment when we remember it, like we’re
stuck at the traffic lights forever; or to use it as an occasion for
thankfulness, but move on straight away to what is next before us. To get the car into gear and move ahead.
Or, thinking
of Jeff in Rear Window, we can allow
ourselves to add extra layers of immobility to those things which may already
limit us. And by doing so, we cannot act
as we need to, with honesty and generosity, until it is too late.
These
lessons from the Transfiguration are for all of us. God’s promise in Jesus is that we have seen,
and will continue to be given visions, of God’s glory. But we are not to get stuck there, or
self-indulgent there, or limited there.
Those moments – and I pray you have had some such moments of revelation
of God’s glory and will continue to look forward expectantly to others in the
future – exist not for themselves, but as a reminder that God wants us in on
the project. That the Transfiguration
may show us that God, in Jesus, is calling all of us, and all of creation, into
the heart of the Divine nature, but meanwhile, folks, there’s work to do! And today, not least - in Patrick and
Samuel’s Baptism – this call is for them, too...
May God be
with you, and with me, as we do the work set before us. In Jesus’ precious name. +AMEN
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