Exodus 24:12-18 Psalm 2 2 Peter 1:16-21 Matthew 17:1-9
Last week Craig and Kennie and I were on holiday down in Denmark — wow, what a glorious place that is, in the truest sense of the word. Enormous ancient trees, so much green, the granite rocks and surely some of the most stunning beaches in the world. What a gift that was.
There was one moment that will stay with me for a long time. We were wading through a crystal-clear river, moving so quickly it carried us along or held us back, and as we walked the banks widened and we could see the whitest sand ahead — where the river met the ocean and the banks became beach. It was incredible. Take-your-breath-away beautiful. I said to Craig, “this is a moment right here.”
The Creator’s fingerprints were all over it. I’m sure it was the Holy Spirit’s breath I felt — not a gentle breeze at all. A mountaintop experience indeed. It belonged with Moses… and Peter, James and John… for sure.
But life isn’t always like that, is it? If we are honest, life as a follower of Jesus is much plainer, more ordinary — sometimes more painful and lonely — than these readings express today. Most of life happens not on mountaintops or in crystal rivers.
It happens on the ground.
But did you notice the strange thing about both mountains in today’s readings? It’s not what happens on them — it’s what doesn’t. Moses doesn’t stay. Jesus does not stay. No shrine is built, despite Peter’s enthusiasm. No one captures the light or preserves the moment. They go down. And that — more than the shining — is the revelation. Because glory is easy to believe in when you’re standing inside it. Anyone can trust God when the air feels thin and holy and everything makes sense. Anyone can sing Alleluia when the veil between heaven and earth feels gauze-light.
But on Wednesday we enter Lent, and if these readings give us food for the journey it is this: Lent begins when you walk back down the track. Lent is the descent.
It is the refusal to live only in peak moments — the holiday high, the answered prayer, the brief season when life feels held together.
Lent asks: will you still follow when the light fades?
Because the road down the mountain leads somewhere very specific.
It leads to hospital corridors where the news is not good.
To grief that feels like it might swamp you.
To marriages that fracture and injustice that deepens.
To doubt and boredom and bloody-minded determination, where faith looks less like light and more like stubborn presence — showing up again, and again, and again.
The mountain reveals who God is.
But it is in the valley that reveals where God is.
And the gospel insists: God is not only in the shining. God is in the descending.
This is the part we resist. We love a God of radiance. We struggle with a God who walks steadily — willingly even — toward suffering. But Jesus does not come down reluctantly. He walks with clarity. Because what looks like loss… what looks like failure… what looks like the light going out… is, in the strange economy of God, the way glory travels — winning while looking like you’re losing.
We know the road of Lent leads to Passiontide, Holy Week, crucifixion. The cross will look like defeat. Silence like abandonment. Burial like the end of glory. But the disciples are being prepared — even here — to understand:
The light does not disappear on the way down the mountain. It relocates.
Into broken bodies. Bread torn open. Forgiveness spoken late.
Courage that only appears in the dark. The Transfiguration is not escapism. It is equipping for all God’s disciples – then and now – for all that lies ahead.
And before that road through Lent begins again, today we take part in the ancient practice dating back to some time in the 10th century of burying the Alleluia — laying it down in the ground, silencing it for a season, trusting it will rise again at Easter dawn.
As I prepared, so I realised, some of you haven’t been here for this before, and may not know the story of our own miracle, birthed and witnessed here in 2022.
It was the first time we buried the Alleluia together. At the time many of us were deeply involved with detained asylum seekers — visiting detention centres, lobbying government, particularly supporting three remarkable men: Javad, Ned and Aref.
On one visit, Aref gave me his lunchbox — his only Christmas present — his name written along the side, plain crackers inside. He said to me, ‘take this and you’ll remember me every time you use it’, so we buried the Alleluia in Aref’s lunchbox.
We buried it as a prayer for those whose lives felt utterly devoid of glory. And we committed to praying for them throughout the 40 holy days of Lent.
And when we dug it up on Easter morning, Aref was here — free — standing among us, and that day became his literal baptism. I cannot explain what happened in those forty days. But somehow, we witnessed something close to resurrection.
And so today, in some trepidation, we bury the Alleluia again. And its absence becomes our prayer, or our nudge to pray, because every time we notice our church, our lives, or our world is less than glorious — less dazzling than we dream — that becomes our prayer.
We bury the Alleluia not because it is gone… but because it is waiting. Waiting in the dark. Waiting in the soil. Waiting in every place where light feels absent. Because the promise of our faith is this: What is buried with love…what is entrusted to God…what is laid down in hope……will one day rise singing. And until then, we walk the road down the mountain and through the valley together. Amen.
Holy Adventures 