Homily - Transfiguration

 This may seem like an odd way to start a sermon on this great and glorious Feast, but let me ask us all individually a question:

 Who is your God?

 I don’t pose this question to be argumentative, nor to simply be rhetorical.  Really – Who is your God?  Who is MY God?

 As I look at my own life, I can see phases in my life when my “God” was my job, my house full of nice things, my education, my pleasure….  There have been quite a number of “things” that I’ve allowed to creep into my life and become, at least for a time, my “God”.

 The First Commandment says, “I am the Lord your God.  You shall have no other gods before Me.” (Ex 20:1) So, clearly, I have sinned, I have violated God’s law, and I have shared in Adam’s failings by not obeying what is a rather simple set of rules for life.

 But to answer the question, “Who is your God?”, we must first, I think, define the characteristics of God, so that when we encounter Him, we recognize Him.  What are the characteristics of our God, so that we can know Him?

 First, there are a number of items that we should describe as “natural attributes.”  These things we ascribe to God from our own limited conception of creation, with God being outside space and time.

 Natural Attribute #1 – God is at all times and in all places present.  He is not confined in space.  And He is everywhere at all times.  In Acts 17:27, we are told “He is not far from each one of us.” 

 Natural Attribute #2 – God is eternal, and it is by way of this characteristic that we can in some limited fashion understand His ability to be in all places at the same time.  2Peter 3:8 teaches us that, “With the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”  Since God is eternal, we also come to understand Him as ‘unchangeable’.  This is a very difficult concept for us as humans, for we as beings constrained by time know things are constantly changing, different.  Tomorrow will not be like today.  Tomorrow even I will not be like I am today.  Yet, for One who is eternal, there is neither tomorrow nor today.  There is no time.  And therefore, if there is no time, then there can be no change, for change is something measured as a function of time.

 Natural Attribute #3 – God is almighty.  Luke Chapter 1 Verse 37 teaches, “For with God nothing will be impossible.”  Hebrews 1:3 teaches, “The universe is upheld by His word of power.”  Now, I know that skeptics offer absurd arguments, “Can He create a rock so large that even He cannot move it?”  But such questions are not in line with the meaning of this attribute.  God can do whatever He WILLS.  He does not do whatever He can.  Saint John of Damascus teaches that God CAN destroy the universe, but He does not WILL to do so, and so He upholds it by His will. 

 God also has what we can describe as “logical attributes.”  These include:

 Logical Attribute #1 – God possesses all knowledge.  From the book of Job (28:24) we learn, “God sees everything under the heavens.”  And from Psalms (94:11) we learn, “The Lord knows the thoughts of man.”  This applies to things that we see as in the past, but also those things that we will see in the future.  This characteristic is often described by those same skeptics as “pre-destination”.  Their thesis is that if God already knows you’re going to do something, then He must have somehow “made” you make that choice.  But nothing could be further from the truth.  The fact that His Natural Attributes show Him to be in all places and at all times indicates that we continue in time to have our own “free will,” but in His timelessness He knows what paths we have taken, even before we choose those paths.

 Logical Attribute #2 – God possesses all wisdom.  From Proverbs (3:19) we learn, “The Lord by wisdom founded the earth; by understanding He established the heavens.”  Wisdom indicates that God knows the most excellent of means by which to effect His excellent purpose.  The greatest display of this wisdom is in His effecting our salvation through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. 

 God also has what we can describe as “ethical attributes.”  These include:

 Ethical Attribute #1 – God is holy!  From Isaiah (57:15) we hear, “Thus says the Most High, who dwells on high forever.  Holy in the holies is His name, the Most High resting in the holies.”  Holy means one who is totally separated from that which is unclean and/or sinful.  It coincides with that which is totally good.  His holiness binds His will to His goodness. 

 Ethical Attribute #2 – God is love!  From 1John (4:7-8) we hear, “For love is of God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God.  He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”  Love shows that God gives takes that which belongs only to Him and gives it to His creation, and especially to humanity.  Love gives its riches to someone else.  Love is meaningless without giving, regardless of the recipient.  It is the antithesis of selfishness.  Love is a living part of God’s essence.  It is within love that we come to fully understand all of the other attributes ascribed to God.

 Natural, logical, ethical – these are the terms we’ve just used to in some fashion try to describe our conception of God.  Yet, there is one more that somehow doesn’t fit even into these categorizations.

 God is Trinity, three Gods are in fact One God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  These are separate and distinct, and yet unity, undivided.  This as a concept is even more difficult for the human mind to comprehend than His timelessness and His eternal nature.  And so, the best we can do is to relegate these characteristics to the category of “mystery” – things that, while we believe them to be true, we have no way within our human frame to understand, except in imperfect analogies. 

 And, this is our God! 

 Now, why are you focusing us on these attributes today, Father, as we are here witnessing the Transfiguration?

 Let us look at Christ on this day.  What do we see with the senses He has given us?

 Natural Attribute #1 – He is everywhere at all times.  We see Christ on Mount Tabor, with His Apostles, and yet also fully with Moses and Elijah.  Neither Moses nor Elijah knew one another as they walked this earth.  And yet by this power of God, the old and the new are united, here on earth, His creation, His handiwork, by virtue of . . .

 Natural Attribute #3 – His might.  Our Lord works this miracle to bring joy to His Apostles, to sustain them AND US through the Cross, through the Resurrection, and through the years until we await His Glorious Second Coming.  He works this gift by His nature as almighty and…..

 Natural Attribute #2 – His eternal nature.  If the Lord Himself were not eternal, He would have no ability to connect past to future, to bring Moses together with Peter, to show Elijah to John and James.  He does this because…..

 Logical Attribute #1 – He possesses all knowledge.  He knows that without this gift, His Apostles will lose heart at His crucifixion, that they will have no glimpse of Him in His glory as God, and thereby be subjected to greater temptation to lose their own faith.  In His….

 Logical Attribute #2 – Wisdom.  In His wisdom He grants this gift to them as a sustaining element of their faith.  And it not only sustained them, but it continues to sustain us, as we await His return.  He could do none of this if He were not…..

 Ethical Attribute #1 – Holy.  In His holiness, His goodness effects His will.  And because He ……

 Ethical Attribute #2 – Loves.  Because He loves us, He gives to us freely that which is His alone.  He shows to us, as far as we can come to understand, His glory.  This is His alone, and yet He shares it with us, showing us the level to which He calls us through His love for us.  He fully reveals Himself to us as…..

 God in Trinity!  The Father’s presence is known in His voice.  The Son is Transfigured and we see Him in His glory.  The Spirit is known in the Radiant Light that illumines Tabor.

 THIS is our God.  THIS is whom we serve.  THIS is the God who supplants all those things that tear at us from this life, which attempt to bind us to this earthly life so that we ignore and thereby lose our way to our own eternal life.

 And that eternal life is a gift of love, of wisdom, of knowledge, and of every other attribute we’ve named. 

More On Prayer

 [From Archimandrite Sophrony, "His Life is Mine," Chapter 6, SVS Press, pgs 55-56]

Of all approaches to God, prayer is the best and in the last analysis the only means.  In the act of prayer the human mind finds its noblest expression.  The mental state of the scientist engaged in research, of the artist creating a work of art, of the thinker wrapped up in philosophy - even of professional theologians propounding their doctrines - cannot be compared to that of the man of prayer brought face to Face with the Living God.  Each and every kind of mental activity presents less of a strain than prayer.  We may be capable of working for ten or twelve hours on end, but a few moments of prayer and we are exhausted.

"What Do I Have to Do With You, Jesus?"

 

The Multitudes Become Prophets

 The Gospel for today picks up where we left off last week—Jesus is back in the boat crossing the Sea of Galilee, returning to His home.

As has become the case with our Lord, people have come to seek Him out, for they’ve learned that benefits follow Him everywhere.  And so now they bring to Jesus a paralytic lying on a bed.  St. Mark details this event as the one in which these friends of the paralyzed man open the roof of the house where our Lord is preaching because they can’t get near enough because of the crowds.

And we know the story.  Jesus heals again with His word.  “Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you.”

And just as the sheep have gathered in their faith, the wolves are also gathered.  “This man blasphemes,” say those of the scribes who are present.

What is it that brings this miraculous healing?  Is it the faith of the one who is paralyzed?  We can’t say that this is not PART of the story.  But St. Matthew records, “When He saw THEIR faith…”  Who is it that is described by the word THEIR?  Since we’ve become focused on pronouns, let us be attentive.  THEIR is plural!  What is being referred to here is the faith of those friends who carried this poor unfortunate to come before Jesus.  It is THEY who have believed sufficiently to have THEIR faith rewarded.

The Study Bible reveals that three components of our Lord’s divinity are on display in this account. 

First, He knows the hearts of men (2Chron 6:30—Then hear from heaven Your dwelling place, and forgive, and give to everyone according to all his ways, whose heart You know (for You alone know the hearts of the sons of men)).

Second, He grants forgiveness of sins (Ps 103:12—As far as the east is from the west, so far does He remove our transgressions from us).

Third, He heals simply by the power of His word (Ps 107:20—He sent His Word and healed them).

St. Matthew ends today’s lesson by describing the crowds assembled.  Now when the multitudes saw it, they marveled and glorified God, Who had given such power to men.

And herein lies the mentioned “prophecy”!

The crowds see Jesus as a “man”.  And they see in part rightly, for we Orthodox know Him simultaneously as both God AND Man!

But their vision is imperfect.  In this case it is not a “man” who has this power to heal by His word alone.  It is THE “Man”, the God-Man Who does this.

So why are the crowds words prophetic instead of just being “wrong”?

It is because our Lord promises His Apostles, Verily, verily I say to you, he that believes in Me, the works that I do shall he also do; and greater works than these shall He do; because I go to my Father.” (John 14:12)

And so from the very lips of our Lord we find the crowds words, although not by their choice intended to say so, but saying nonetheless that God gives such authority, such power, to men.  It has been proven through all generations of the Church!