To be a Pilgrim 2 - Glimpses of the past and the future
If there’s one statement about the disciples that makes me slightly uncomfortable it’s when preachers and people describe them as ‘simple, ordinary men.’ I’m not sure, firstly, what that means. I’ve never met anyone who was simple or ordinary! Secondly, whether they were ‘simple’ or ‘ordinary’ rather misses the point. They were open to God’s call in Christ, and they knew their religion backwards. They were well catechised. Proof of this, if we needed it, lies in the kind of questions the disciples ask Jesus throughout the Gospels, which sometimes mirror those of the scribes and pharisees. If we needed more convincing, the Transfiguration scene as reported in the Gospel of Luke (and in Matthew and Mark), shows us that, frightened, and exposed to something so out of this world though they may have been, they still had the religious tools at their disposal for trying to get a handle on things.
The disciples recognise Moses and Elijah. They perceive that God is present, and they try to capture the experience by suggesting that they make tents, in keeping with the tradition of their Feast of Tabernacles, and the whole idea of God dwelling among us. They know that somehow Jesus is a prophet of at least comparison with the great prophetic figures and indeed Moses himself. They instinctively grasp that there is a transition, that something more is on offer. They are open to the voice of God telling them that Jesus is much more than a prophet, he is the Son of God. They may not have been able to make total sense of the Transfiguration, but they had enough background to know that something of huge significance for them and their religion had just happened.
When Peter comes to preach to the Israelites at Pentecost, he makes direct reference to their shared aspirations and hopes. He tries to lead the Jews into accepting the Good News that God has fulfilled his promise, by reminding them of their past and what they already believe. Then he introduces Jesus to them as the one through whom they are redeemed and made new. In other words, he explains something that seems totally different and incomprehensible, the resurrection of Jesus, the coming of the Holy Spirit, by exploring what his listeners already hoped for and believed in.
If you want to know what is going to happen in the future, it is often said that you need to make a careful examination of the past. Yes, Jesus brings the totally new, but he does so by sharing resurrection, not annihilation of everything that came before; transformation, not discarding; transfiguration, not obliteration. As we make our pilgrimage through Lent, we have a lot of clues as to our future destination.
Why not reread Luke 9. 18-36 and ask yourself how you would have tried to make sense of what you see and hear there.
Canon Tom
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