SUNDAY SERVICE
Sunday Readings for 10 February 2013 Sunday next before Lent - Year C
Exodus 34:29-35 2 Corinthians 3:12 – 4:2
Luke 9:28-43a
From the beginning of biblical history in the Book of Genesis, God has made himself known to us, revealing himself little by little according to our ability to receive him and to know him. For our Creator made us both to be loved and to know and to love him as our Father, so that we might glorify him and enjoy him forever. But there is such a vast gulf between our fallen nature and the holiness of God, that our mortal flesh is not permitted to see him, for to do so would be fatal for us. Instead he at first r eveals his Wor d to us in holy scripture, in the law handed down to us by Moses, and through his prophets. Moses, who is the leading figure in the Old Testament and a small number of those chosen by God, are enabled by special gifts of grace to glimpse the Lord and to live. In turn the terrified Israelites are permitted to behold the reflected glor y of the Lord that causes the face of Moses to shine, but even this must remain veiled until Moses returns to the presence of the Lord.
It is not a reflected glory that inspir es the ministr y of St Paul but the Holy Spirit, who empowers the Church to bear public and joyful witness to Christ without the need of any intermediar y such as Moses. The veil in the Temple which formerly separated the holy of holies from all except the high priest has now been torn in two, and God is no longer hidden from our sight, indeed he is directly at work in each one of us, for as Paul affir ms, the Lord is the Spirit, and he comes to liberate us fr om the darkness in which we were once confined. Before the coming of Christ we were prevented from seeing God, for our own safety, but now in Christ the veil is removed and we may look with our own eyes upon the glor y of the Lord who has been revealed to us. That glory remains hidden wherever minds remain closed to the gospel, where people look for an intermediar y rather than tur n directly to the Lord. But where the Spirit of the Lord is at work, his people are being renewed in the image of God, something which is not to be hidden away or kept private, not a thing of fear or of shame, but on the contrar y, a powerful sign that the word of God is alive and active within us, proclaiming the truth about Jesus openly and publicly for all to hear.
In the Old Testament God prepares the way for the r evelation of himself in the person of his Son, who is to be Emmanuel, God-with-us, the oneof whom John declares that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and tr uth,“(John 1:14). First comes the Law and then the Prophets, bearing witness to God’s love for his people, providing for them and calling them to repentance in preparation for his coming as Saviour. Moses and Elijah were uniquely privileged to draw near to the Lord, and to reflect his glor y, but Peter, John and James witness for themselves the transfiguration of Jesus, which comes from within him and signifies that he is the Lord. Here on this mountain the types and shadows of the past on Mount Sinai are fulfilled in the person of Jesus, whose authority is immediately confirmed by the voice which they hear from heaven, and dramatically demonstrated the next day in the deliverance of a boy who has been possessed by a violent and unclean spirit.
The Rev Stephen Trott