Devotions for the Week of the Festival of the Transfiguration, March 3 – 7, 2025
The devotions break my usual pattern this week. Ash Wednesday falling in the middle of the week necessitates a bit of a change.
Monday of Transfiguration – prayer of the Week
O God, in the glorious transfiguration of Your beloved Son You confirmed the mysteries of the faith by the testimony of Moses and Elijah. In the voice that came from the bright cloud You wonderfully foreshowed our adoption by grace. Mercifully make us co-heirs with the King in His glory and bring us to the fullness of our inheritance in heaven; through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
I remember a conversation I had a with a young man many years ago. We were talking about his visit to a remote Mexican village. He was appalled by the poverty he had seen there but was particularly incensed by the beautiful chalice he had seen in the Roman Catholic church on Sunday. He knew that such an exquisite piece of art could have been liquidated and provided something like a school or a medical clinic in that place.
I did not have an immediate answer to his outrage. It seemed like another example of the church caring more for its own glory and not enough about the plight of the people it should serve. But at that point, another fellow in the room chimed in. “Who drank from that chalice?” he asked. My older and wiser friend went on to explain. Yes, the chalice could have been sold. That money could, in an ideal situation, have done some lasting good in that village. That is clearly so, but he also urged us not to discount the good it was doing at this moment. The people of that village endured crushing poverty, poor medical care, dismal opportunities for education, but once a week, when they came to church, they drank from a beautiful silver cup, the cup a prince or a king might drink from. They participated in something rich and wonderful. All of them had that opportunity. It was given to all who knelt there. The chalice was not reserved just for a few. Their lives all had one bright moment which connected them to heavenly bliss. It is true, the contents of that chalice could have connected them to heaven in a simple clay cup. Yet, that the contents were reflected in the beauty of the cup, in the jewel encrusted, precious metal which John describes in his pictures of heaven, made it even more meaningful.
In the Transfiguration of Jesus, God has shown us a momentary picture of what Jesus looks like right now and where we headed. We pray in this prayer for what God has promised. We are co-heirs of Christ in his glory. Surely, our lives probably do not reflect that right. Compared to heavenly mansions and eternal life, even the most palatial of our homes are hovels, pest-infested holes. Here we are given a picture and with Peter, James, and John, we taste and see that God is good.
Yes, give to the project to build the school or medical clinic which serves the needy poor. These are good things. We asked the young man what he had done to help that situation. It got a little uncomfortably quiet then. His answer to the suffering he had witnessed would have been to take the one beautiful thing out these people’s lives so he could transform it into what he valued, not necessarily what they rejoiced in. God has much better in mind that we can imagine. Do not seek to constrain Him to your vision.
Tuesday of Transfiguration (Shrove Tuesday) – Deuteronomy 34:1-12
1 Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho. And the Lord showed him all the land, Gilead as far as Dan, 2 all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the western sea, 3 the Negeb, and the Plain, that is, the Valley of Jericho the city of palm trees, as far as Zoar. 4 And the Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, ‘I will give it to your offspring.’ I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not go over there.” 5 So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord, 6 and he buried him in the valley in the land of Moab opposite Beth-peor; but no one knows the place of his burial to this day. 7 Moses was 120 years old when he died. His eye was undimmed, and his vigor unabated. 8 And the people of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. Then the days of weeping and mourning for Moses were ended.
9 And Joshua the son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So the people of Israel obeyed him and did as the Lord had commanded Moses. 10 And there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face, 11 none like him for all the signs and the wonders that the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and to all his servants and to all his land, 12 and for all the mighty power and all the great deeds of terror that Moses did in the sight of all Israel.
He had a granddaughter whom he loved dearly. She was living in a distant city, but they were still close. She was engaged and he was so happy for her and looking forward to seeing her walk down an aisle to stand before a pastor and a congregation to speak to those vows. He had met the young man, approved of him. It was going to be a great day.
Until it wasn’t. Several months before the ceremony he was diagnosed with cancer, a particularly aggressive beast of a cancer. She was devastated and so was he. We all prayed that he would make it. But as the day of her wedding drew nearer, it became increasingly apparent that he would not make it. God can do that to us sometimes. He doesn’t answer prayers on our schedules, nor does he always give us what we want. Some weeks prior to the ceremony, he passed away. He made her promise to get married anyway, to have lots of fun, to celebrate with the sure and certain knowledge that it was what he wanted.
She did. She was young and life stretched out before her. Her friends came and they celebrated. It was not tinged with deep sadness. He would not have wanted it to be so. In one of his last conversations with his granddaughter he reminded her that God had promised that he would see a much better wedding day and she would too. They would laugh and rejoice together that day. Death would cast no shadows that day.
Did Moses chafe at the thought of not setting foot in the promised land? Was he content with the miraculous video he got to see on Mt. Nebo? Did he long for the opportunity to walk the promised land with the children of Israel whom he had shepherded for those long 40 years. His eyesight was not dimmed, his vigor was unabated. He would have still enjoyed it despite his great age.
I do not think so. God did not deny him the promised land, not the real promised land. He was in Canaan on the Mt. of Transfiguration when he spoke to Jesus. But more importantly, he is there in heaven’s glory now. God does that, doesn’t he. What we want is often so small compared to what he gives. My friend who missed his granddaughter’s wedding is not sad. We are because we missed him that day. But our sorrow will also turn to joy, as his sorrow has been replaced by holy and eternal joy.
Ash Wednesday – 6:1-6, 16-21
1"Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
2 "Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
5"And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 6But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you...
16"And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 17But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, 18that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
19 "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
It is the first day of Lent. Are you giving something up to mark the season? Will you volunteer to serve the needy? Will you make a special donation to the homeless shelter or some other worthy cause? Will you attend extra services of prayer and devotion? Are all these questions making you feel guilty?
The people of the early church seemed to take their acts of penitence very seriously. So much so that it may be that the bishops and pastors of the early church had to rein in some of these practices. Some people think that Advent and Lenten seasons were created to force people get their repenting out of the way so that they would stop and do some celebrating at Christmas and Easter. Without prescribed, rigorous penitential seasons, some would have just kept on fasting, kneeling, and wearing sackcloth all the time. In fact, the council of Nicaea, the same one which wrote the creed, brought up this very issue. The bishops who gathered said people should stop kneeling while praying during the Easter season. It was time to stand up and own your forgiven status as a child of God. Enough of this groveling already!
Could it be any more different today? Our forebears in the faith, the sturdy Christians of the first generations after Jesus’ death and resurrection, seemed to have a strong urge to repent. I do not find myself reining in the penitential urge, either my own or my parishioners. How will you repent this Lenten season? Will you fast or kneel in prayer? Jesus assumes that you will do something. He urges you to practice your repentance with humility and for God, not so that others might see it.
Most of all, practice it your penitence, however it may be done, as a way to acknowledge our Lord’s sacrifice for you and your great need for Him. Let your practice, your deeds, words, and habits, draw your life into his forgiving light. Don’t have a care for what others think. Have a care for what He has done and said to you.
Thursday after Ash Wednesday – 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10
We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
1 Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. 2For he says,
"In a favorable time I listened to you,
and in a day of salvation I have helped you."
Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. 3We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, 4but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, 5beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; 6 by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love; 7by truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; 8through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; 9as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; 10 as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.
He carefully put the numbers into the calculator and with a grimace hit the equal key for the third time. “Argh!” he groaned; it was still not right. The bank said he only had this much money. But his records showed that he had about $700 more than that. It was not a sum to make or break the national economy, but it was important to this young man who glowered at his check book register with ferocity. Who was right? He knew that if he assumed that the money was there and wrote a check which brought his balance below what the bank said he had, that would not end well. Finances were tight. His account might well run under that $700 discrepancy.
Paul urges us to be reconciled to God. I know that this is a relational word, but it is a relational word because we appropriated it from the language and world of banking and applied it to relationships. Paul is urging us to get our accounts squared away with the venerable banking firm: Yahweh and Son. It is important that this happens. After all, our very existence is a loan from Him. There is a day of reckoning and accounting.
The young man who was struggling to reconcile his checking account finally swallowed his pride and walked into the bank with his register and bank statement and admitted defeat. A young teller took his register and statements and worked through it herself. He squirmed a little as she clucked over his rather shoddy record keeping efforts. Eventually they found the problem, and things got squared away.
Paul is not asking you to solve your accounting issues. You cannot. The chief banker has intervened and the debts and missed payments are reconciled. He made him who knew no sin to be sin for you so that you become the righteousness of God. Paul’s appeal for you to be reconciled is based on the reconciliation which God has worked, not something you have done. It is more an appeal to lay all the debts, all the missed payments, every error in the checkbook out on the table. So that He might reconcile the problems. It is not a time to minimize the problem, but honestly to face it in all its magnitude. The grace of God is enough. Repent already, own up to the problem. God forgives.
Friday after Ash Wednesday – Psalm 51
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin!
3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will return to you.
14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,
O God of my salvation,
and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;
you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
18 Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
build up the walls of Jerusalem;
19 then will you delight in right sacrifices,
in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;
then bulls will be offered on your altar.
We know this psalm of David. After his famous words in the 23rd Psalm this might be his other most famous poem. But we also know it for the occasion for which David wrote these words. The prophet Nathan has accused him, and David has admitted his adulterous affair with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband to cover it up. It is a story which remains familiar to us today. Just a little while ago, a prince of England settled a very large lawsuit brought by a woman who had been so young when they had met. It is a sordid tale. So was David’s
But it is not just royalty and mighty sinners who sing this psalm. It is people like you and me. For sin is not measured on a scale. Yes, of course, some sins seem worse to us, but in God’s eyes the sins we consider great and small are far more alike than dislike. One commentator I read compared our penchant for grading the severity of sin to being at the head of a line of people or somewhere further back. If the line is heading in the wrong direction, you end up in the same place. It doesn’t matter where your place in line really is.
David’s prayer in vs 7 is the prayer of us all. Purge me and I will be clean, wash me and I will be whiter than snow. Create a clean heart in me for this old heart is broken by sin and sorrow. It is not fit for heaven or your presence. It is only fit for the grave and destruction. I need your washing and purging.
The monks of the Benedictine tradition sing words from the psalm every morning. After the last service of the day, they retire to their cells to observe the grand silence. They speak to no one. They are awoken, often before dawn, with a bell. They gather in silence in the church. One of them intones the first half of verse 15 and the rest of them respond with the second: O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. Every day they acknowledge their need for God to open their mouths and for God to fill those mouths with praise. Every day they repent. Repent with David today. God is merciful.