Sermon manuscript:
Our epistle reading today is from a letter that the apostle
Peter wrote. No doubt the reason why this was chosen as the reading for today,
Transfiguration, is because Peter speaks about his own experience when Jesus’s
appearance was changed.
He says, “We weren’t making it up when we made known to
you the powerful appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ. We, Peter, James, and
John, were eyewitnesses of his majesty. He received honor and glory from God
the Father, when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory saying, “This is
my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” We heard this voice, Peter
says, which came out of heaven when we were with Jesus on the holy mountain.”
Here we see one of the most important things that the
apostles were given to do. They were to act as witnesses. They were witnesses
of the signs that Jesus performed. They were witnesses of the words that Jesus
spoke. In this portion of Peter’s letter he is giving witness both to what he
saw and what he heard.
Perhaps the most important testimony that the apostles were
to provide was that they saw the resurrected Jesus. This was after he had been
crucified, died, and been buried. He did not stay dead. His appearance was
changed when he was resurrected also. His divine nature was no longer as hidden
as it was before Jesus had completed his redemptive work. Perhaps something of
his appearance at the Mount of Transfiguration is now apparent in the glorified
and resurrected Jesus.
The impression that Jesus made on these apostles was such
that they were willing and eager to suffer the loss of everything just so that
they could continue to tell people that Jesus is the Savior. Nearly all of
these men died violent deaths because they refused to be quiet about what they
had seen and heard.
The reason why they were put to death, though, was not
merely because they witnessed something unusual or some spectacle. We are
witnesses to things that happen every day, and nobody gets upset about our
witnessing events. It is when meaning is attached to our witnessing of
something—that is when things can get dangerous.
For example, if someone sees something that does not line up
with the official story, then there can be trouble. If powerful people are
saying one thing, and you witness something else, all of a sudden you are a
threat to them. Their version of events is no longer taken for granted. Whistle
blowers can end up dead, because their witness contradicts how powerful people
might want the story to go.
There is no other way to explain the deaths of the apostles
except that they were contradicting the official version of reality that others
wanted to impose on people. Some powers that be wanted the people to think, to
believe, and to live in a certain way. The apostles were teaching people that
they should think, believe, and live in a different way. The powers that be
wanted to stop this alternate view of reality, and it seemed good to them that
stopping these witnesses from testifying by killing them was the best way to do
that.
So what was the threat that Peter’s witness posed for the
powers that be? Before we can answer this, we need to know what the meaning of
Peter’s witness is. Our reading speaks to this. The whole letter of 2 Peter
speaks to this. Right at the beginning of this letter Peter says, “[Jesus’s]
divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through the
knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence. Through these
he has given us his precious and great promises so that through them you may
share in the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that sinful lust
causes in the world.”
Let’s unpack this a little bit. Peter says that Jesus has
divine power. Through that divine power he has given us everything we need for
life and godliness. This is quite a claim, if you think about it and take it
seriously. Salesmen, when they are trying to sell you something, might say that
their product has power. They might say that their product harnesses the power
of technology, or of some natural law. Peter says that Jesus has divine power,
God’s power. The salesman might give you a pitch for how their product will
improve this or that aspect of your life. Peter says that Jesus has given you
everything you need not only for life, but also for godliness. Not only does
Jesus make you survive, he also makes you thrive in the sense that you will be
godly, pious, that is, a good person.
How does Jesus, with his divine power, give you everything
that you need for life and godliness? Does he give us some new commandments?
Some new sacrifices or worship practices? Some new strategy for how we can
become our best selves? No. Peter says that Jesus gives you everything you need
for life and godliness simply by a knowledge of Jesus. Knowing Jesus makes all
the difference. By knowing him, by being told of Jesus, you have everything
that is needed for life and godliness. For by knowing him, you are called to be
one with him. That means that in your being exposed to the knowledge of Jesus,
Jesus is saying, “Hey you, come here.” Then he gives you his own glory and
excellence.
Now we have perhaps the most shocking statement, as well as
the statement that has to do with Jesus’s transfiguration. Peter says that
Jesus calls you and gives you everything that is needed for your life and
godliness so that you may share in the divine nature. You—a poor, miserable
sinner—have been and are called to share in the divine nature. Jesus shares
everything with us. We hold all things in common with him. Therefore we even
share in Jesus’s divine nature.
The glory of the transfiguration is not just for Jesus. You,
too, will shine. When you see him, you will be like him. Your resurrected body
will not be like the shriveled seed that we know of as our bodies in this life.
In this life our flesh is grass and our glory is like the wildflower in the
countryside. The grass withers, the flowers fall, when the breath of the Lord
blows upon them. But when we are raised with our resurrected bodies, we will be
transfigured. Having died to sin, having died to death, when our Lord Jesus
Christ died, we will never die again.
This stands in the sharpest possible contrast to all other
alternatives. In Jesus you share in the divine nature. Thus you are
transfigured and incorruptible. Outside of Jesus there is only corruption,
decay, rottenness, passing away. Peter puts it this way: “When you share in
the divine nature, you escape from the corruption that sinful lust causes in
the world.” That word, “corruption,” is important to understand. It means
“to rot, to decay.” Outside of Jesus, outside of his promised resurrection to
eternal life, there is only death. Folks might fight against this rottenness
with all their might. In olden days the Egyptians made mummies. In modern times
people design fancy grave stones. But we all know that mummies are dusty, moldy
absurdities—far from being alive. Gravestones erode over time so that they
become unreadable. Regardless, people quit visiting them. There is no way for
us poor mortals to make a lasting mark on the world. All flesh is grass, but
the Word of our God remains forever.
Now we have enough to know why Peter’s testimony about Jesus
was so hated by the powers that be. They hated it so much that they thought it
was best to silence this whistle blower. All that is needed for life and
godliness is given with the knowledge of Jesus. By Jesus being made known we
are called into his glory and into his excellence. We are made partakers of
Jesus’s own divine nature. Everything else, inevitably, necessarily, is going
to rot and pass away.
The powers that be will not tolerate the telling of these
truths. The powers that be do not want you to believe that you already have
everything that is needed for life and godliness in Jesus. They do not want you
to believe that you have everything that you need because they want to sell you
stuff. Who is going to buy all their stuff that is supposed to make the one who
buys it happy? The advertising industry is built on the foundation of making
you believe that you don’t have everything you need. What you need is to buy
this or that—then you will be happy. Or, we could use the older, more religious
way of saying that: “Then you will be blessed.”
The powers that be will not tolerate you believing that you
have everything that you need in Jesus because then what would happen with all
our progress? The powers that be openly acknowledge that we can’t stay on this
old world forever, and so they say that we need to work towards colonizing the
stars. We can achieve immortality for the human race in some sense, we can
somewhat escape corruption, by hopping from solar system to solar system. But if
someone believes that he or she has everything that is needed for life and
godliness in Jesus, then they won’t be sufficiently motivated to sacrifice
everything for the progress of mankind.
The powers that be will not tolerate you believing that you
have life and godliness in Jesus because they want you to use their professors,
their priests. They want you to learn from their textbooks, their bibles. They
want you to support and affirm their way of life.
At the time of the apostles the Jews who refused to believe
in Jesus could not stand the apostles’ testimony, because nobody but them was
allowed be orthodox. Nobody but them was allowed to be right. And here there
were Christians who knew the Scriptures better than them.
In our times there is a new ruling class, with a new
ideology. Anybody who does not fall in line with what they say is true and
false, right and wrong, will soon feel their wrath. They won’t be able to get a
job. They won’t be able to get air time or to get their message out. They will
be blocked. They will be cancelled.
All of these ways of thinking, believing, and living—ancient
and modern—have something in common. (And, of course, we could give countless other
manifestations of the same kind of thing.) What all these things have in common
is that they do not believe that Jesus is the Christ and that there is life in
his name. They do not believe that everything outside of Christ is subject to
rottenness and decay. They demand recognition of the enduring power of whatever
it is that they might believe in. They want to believe that something else
besides Jesus shines eternally.
Peter, and all true Christians together with him, blow the
whistle on this party line. Memories won’t last forever. Money won’t last
forever. Even the heavenly bodies like the sun, moon, and stars, won’t last
forever. They will melt as they burn. But the Word of God will last forever.
What God has revealed to us, his will, in both the Old Testament and the New
Testament, will last forever.
And what God reveals to us is not burdensome or terrible. It
is incredibly friendly. Nobody is excluded from the glad tidings of great joy.
They are for all the people. God has revealed to us that he has sent his only
begotten Son to redeem us from all sin, from death, and from the power of the
devil. Therefore, whoever believes in him, whoever gains knowledge of him, is
saved. We are made partakers of the divine nature. We will shine with glory,
just as Jesus shined before Peter, James, and John. We will live forever,
because Jesus lives forever, and we and he are one.
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