This Sunday we hear Luke’s account of the Transfiguration of Jesus…right before the eyes of three of the disciples, Jesus’ true identity bursts forth and in one brief luminous moment , Peter, James and John are themselves forever changed….”transfigured” with a growing awareness of who Jesus really is! I believe that each one of us have our own “moments of transfiguration” ….moments in which we see or feel the very presence of God. They are moments when, deep inside” we come to know with certainty that God is present….that God is real.
These moments of awareness hold the potential to transform our lives into something new…something wonderful. The challenge is to learn “to live out of” these moments… keeping these moments alive in our hearts and minds allowing them to continually transfigure us more and more into the image and likeness of God. Each one of us carries within us experiences of the tenderness, mercy and love of God. So often it is the chaos of our lives that “dim” the luminous moments of encounters with our God…we forget we ever had them in the midst of the rush and busyness of our daily lives.
Not all of these “transfiguration” moments are happy or joyful, some of them come in the midst of great sadness, even in the midst of tragedy and death. I have had such “transfiguration” moments with people as they were dying, luminous in-breakings of Grace that transfigured the dying person, and me as well! These transfiguration moments exist all around us, even in the midst of the political turmoil in which we find ourselves, in encounters with the poor and the marginalized, with the immigrant and refugee, with the one whom we see as “other”… there is God, waiting, wanting us to reach out and take “the other’s” hand and be transfigured.
Lent is a wonderful opportunity to look for transfiguration moments as well as to step back and recall those moments of grace when the fullness of God bursts into our lives…when we realized that we were not alone…that there was something more to life…more than what we can see or touch…more than we can imagine… “God moments”!
When was my last “God moment”? How was I transfigured by that moment? What does that “God moment” call me to do, to be? Whose hand am I being called to reach out and grasp?
Lenten Blessings,
Fr Tim
These moments of awareness hold the potential to transform our lives into something new…something wonderful. The challenge is to learn “to live out of” these moments… keeping these moments alive in our hearts and minds allowing them to continually transfigure us more and more into the image and likeness of God. Each one of us carries within us experiences of the tenderness, mercy and love of God. So often it is the chaos of our lives that “dim” the luminous moments of encounters with our God…we forget we ever had them in the midst of the rush and busyness of our daily lives.
Not all of these “transfiguration” moments are happy or joyful, some of them come in the midst of great sadness, even in the midst of tragedy and death. I have had such “transfiguration” moments with people as they were dying, luminous in-breakings of Grace that transfigured the dying person, and me as well! These transfiguration moments exist all around us, even in the midst of the political turmoil in which we find ourselves, in encounters with the poor and the marginalized, with the immigrant and refugee, with the one whom we see as “other”… there is God, waiting, wanting us to reach out and take “the other’s” hand and be transfigured.
Lent is a wonderful opportunity to look for transfiguration moments as well as to step back and recall those moments of grace when the fullness of God bursts into our lives…when we realized that we were not alone…that there was something more to life…more than what we can see or touch…more than we can imagine… “God moments”!
When was my last “God moment”? How was I transfigured by that moment? What does that “God moment” call me to do, to be? Whose hand am I being called to reach out and grasp?
Lenten Blessings,
Fr Tim
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