A moment of clarity; Matthew 17:1-9; February 15, 2026

The scene we witness this morning in this passage is a seemingly self-contained story of glory. On a mountaintop far above the business of the surrounding towns and countryside, Jesus becomes unrecognizable to his friends. Suddenly he is joined by Moses, the mighty, God-ordained law-giver, Father of the Torah; and Elijah, the Father of the Prophets in the Jewish religion tradition. Even among these luminaries, Jesus stands out - a voice booms from heaven (again) confirming Jesus’s unique status as the son of God, the Messiah, according to Matthew,  fulfillment of the law and the prophets. 

Peter and Jesus’s other friends are overawed. At first Peter suggests that they should set up camp, stay parked in the midst of the brilliance. After hearing the voice from heaven, however, they cower senseless on the ground.

The shining glory begins to dissipate; Jesus touches the disciples’ trembling shoulders. Restored to his ordinary form, the vision fades, they are left alone together. Jesus often tells onlookers not to regard miraculous signs as the rubber stamp of God’s approval or design; he reiterates this here, cautioning the disciples against spreading this story just yet.

For all the prominent flaring of glory and brilliance, this scene does not occur in a vacuum. In fact, the transfiguration is a break, an anomaly, that occurs in the midst of intense preaching and ministry. 

At this point in the midst of Matthew, Jesus has begun to predict his own suffering and death, which troubles his disciples. Jesus’s disagreements with his fellow scribes and rabbis have begun to sharpen, and within a few verses of the end of the passage we read today, Jesus will rebuke his disciples over their lack of faith with an urgency and an impatience that is understandable, for the road to Calvary’s agony is growing shorter by the day.

Into the midst of turmoil and dread, God’s glory descends, the Divine identity of Jesus is revealed. In the midst of turmoil and dread, God trumpets God’s love for Jesus from a literal mountaintop.

This is good news, for our lives are also fraught with turmoil and dread, and we need a Divine word of glory and of love to break into our circumstances, too.

What swirls around you? What valleys are you slogging through? Perhaps what comes to mind most readily is the communal experience we’re sharing - being beset by unjust laws, unjust law enforcement, or the lack therefore. Perhaps the daily news of cruelty and apathy is taking their toll. Or perhaps the low valley of illness, or mourning, seems endless. There is no path to a mountaintop in sight. It seems the sun cannot reveal itself into such a deep, dark, shadow. 

Friends it is for this reason that we gather each week, not only to encourage each other as humans in beloved community, but to believe that which God has revealed: that Jesus Christ is God’s glorious Son, worthy of our trust, whose speaking moves our listening hearts. As a church we are often consumed with the tasks of life on the plains - commerce and relationship, ethics and service – and rightly so.

Today we remember that as Christians, we leap into faith that Christ is not only our Good Teacher, Good Shepherd, but also the very embodiment of God in human form among us. 

Awe is appropriate – to glimpse the glory of the Divine can be an ethereal experience, one that evades easy language, even as it lingers powerfully in the memory. Do practice awe – but do not be afraid. Do not let your spiritual life get stuck on the mountaintop. An over-fixation with heaven is not the end goal of our lives here on earth.

Practicing awe can look like putting down the streams of horrible news and looking intently for stories that inspire gratitude, wonder, or real laughter. Practicing awe can look like finding or renewing attachment to a creative activity that grabs and holds your attention. Receiving comfort can come when we take the risk of reaching out to friends, community, and loved ones. Receiving comfort can come through intentional attachment to the natural world - beautiful scenery, or playing with a pet. These are human ways of taking God’s embodied, enfleshed love seriously, believing that we serve a God who is always in the business of renewing life on earth, a God who is never defeated by the power of death.

We need the mountaintop glimpses of dazzling beauty, and the outpourings of God’s love and encouragement, in order to descend and dwell in the plains and valleys. Expect God to show up - God has long been faithful. In creation and wisdom, the prophetic work of justice, the Incarnation, the thriving tumult of the church throughout the ages, the incredible comfort of this church, in this day and hour and place these and many more, all signs that God shows up.

Lean into glory, lean into joy. Seek it out and relish it when it bursts forth. God will keep showing up, keep breaking in. So practice faith. Practice celebration! Foster it, so that you can take it with you, into the grief, into the valleys, as fuel for the work, all these dimensions of our lives that require faith and constant renewal.