2026-02-15 (Iain)The Light Within
Transfiguration Reflection 2026: The light within
Epiphany is a season, sandwiched between Christmas & Lent, that can easily be overlooked, but its importance cannot be under-estimated – because it is the season where the divine nature of Jesus is revealed – primarily through the metaphor of light, which is what enables us to see.
We started our Epiphany series, with Simon, following the Light of the Christ star, full of mystery, promise and hope. Then Elizabeth, reflecting on Christ’s Baptism, led us in a meditation on our belovedness within the Light of God. I continued journeying with the first disciples, following the Christ Light on the shores of Galilee, and responding to the invitation, ‘Come and see.’ Then at our Christingle service, Jo, with the aid of an orange, red ribbon, candle and sweets, demonstrated Christ as the Light of the World. This was followed by Geoffrey speaking on Seeing the Light, enabling us to be bearers of the Light, and finally last week Simon showed the subversive nature of the light of Christ, shining out from the marginalized, challenging Roman Imperialist Theology that proposed Augustus Caesar was the Light of the world.
And the theme culminates today on Transfiguration Sunday with the Fullness of the God’s light shining in and around Jesus in all its radiance. Celtic Christianity would have called this mountain, where the disciples experience a sense of the Divine, a thin place. Although in reality any thin space between Divine and Human is obliterated in the Transfiguration: the Divine and Human, Sacred and Secular, Spirit and Matter becomes one, embodied in Jesus.
However the Transfiguration is less about a change in Jesus, and more about a change in the disciples’ perception of who Jesus truly is: and this experience of seeing the Light of Christ is central to their transformation or what the Bible calls metanoia – involving a change of heart, mind, way of life, direction of travel, in becoming something new.
Their metanoia involves an ascent (going up the mountain) and then a descent (coming back down the mountain).The way of Ascent involves an encounter with the divine, which awe inspiring, wonderful, terrifying where we sense something bigger than ourselves. During one SacREd space, we meditated on times when we had been touched by beauty & and shared our experiences, both ordinary and extraordinary, and for each one of us it led to a sense of something bigger than ourselves and an inner shift in our hearts and minds.
As Jesus leads the disciples up the mountain he is transfigured before them – his face shines and his clothes become a dazzling white – and they experience the ultimate mystical experience where the Divine and Human fuse together in the person of Jesus himself.
Thomas Merton, a Cistercian monk who himself underwent a profound metanoia – from being an ascetic monk renouncing the world, judging others to one embracing the world and loving others, sees the Transfiguration not only as the revelation of the Divine in Jesus but also the revelation of God in all of us: Merton called it the ‘Pure Diamond’ within, which resided in the Palace of Nowhere.
He says:
‘At the center of our being is a point of nothingness (the Palace of Nowhere) untouched by sin and illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark which belongs entirely to God, which is never at the disposal of the fantasies of our mind or the brutalities of our will. This point of nothingness and absolute poverty is the pure glory of God in us. It is God’s name written in us, as our poverty, as our dependence, as our son and daughtership. It is like a pure diamond, blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It is in everybody, and, if we could see it, we would see these billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish completely...’ And he ends: ‘I have no program for this seeing. It is only given. But the gate of heaven is everywhere.’
On the mountaintop, the disciples not only see the divine in Jesus and Moses and Elijah next to him but hear, like Moses before them, the voice of God telling them: "This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!" God is saying, Jesus is the essence of who I am. If you want to know me, understand me, find me – don’t rail at a distant beard in the sky, look at Jesus, talk to him, base your life on him. Again these words are not only a sign of who Jesus is but signify who we are: We too are beloved cherished sons and daughters of God who God is delighted with.
When the disciples hear these words, they prostrate themselves on the ground in fear and trembling. Then they raise their eyes, and all is gone except one image: Jesus. Their lives now become fully focused and simplified on the person of Jesus back in his full humanity; and Jesus responds to the disciples and us when we are down on the ground, fearful and afraid in four ways.
He comes to us. He came to us in flesh and blood in first-century Palestine and he comes to us through the Holy Spirit today. However fallen, foolish, fragile and fearful we are he comes to us.
He touches us. Touch can be unwelcome – it can be infectious, coercive and abusive but it is amazing how transformative touch is in Jesus’ ministry. When Jesus touches, it is healing, electric, life giving. Barbara Brown Taylor says, in her book An altar in the world, that our faith comes down to: Whose flesh are we touching and why? Whose flesh are we recoiling from and why? Whose flesh are we burning and why? – Jesus is willing to touch and be touched by lepers, prostitutes, tax collectors & he is not concerned with burning anybody. In fact he is prepared to be burnt so others are not.
Jesus then raises us up and tells us not to be afraid, not because bad things won’t happen and we won’t face challenges, sadness, loss, grief and regret; but because he is with us.
He doesn’t allow us to build our shelters, where we may feel safe but accompanies us down the mountain to face the world in all its complexity.
So Jesus leads his disciples up the mountain to experience in a very tangible way the divine, showing them who he is and who they are in God; then Jesus touches them, raises them up, and accompanies them - That’s is the gospel in a nutshell.
But Jesus is quick to lead the disciples back down the mountain, embarking on the way of descent, the second part of Metanoia – back into the ordinary everyday mosaic of their lives, with all its complexity and messiness.
This moment of transfiguration—this revealing of God’s glory—on the mountaintop serves as a turning point because Jesus, now turns his face toward Jerusalem, ready to start down the road to the cross, of sacrifice and suffering.
As Simon said last week the Gospel writers set Jesus up in opposition to Roman Imperial theology. The Roman Gods resided on Mount Olympus & Roman Emperors were bestowed with the title Son of God, Light of the World, Saviour of the world: So here we have on a mountaintop the Beloved Son challenging the Imperial Son of God: the whole event is politically charged and a direct challenge to Roman Imperial Theology, demonstrating the displacement of the powers and principalities of this world by the true beloved Son of God, who will usher in a very different new Kingdom/Queendom.
And the disciples have a decision to make. Will they keep following Jesus on this new leg of the journey, where the light will be hidden? The transfiguration is also a turning point for them and us. It is positioned between Epiphany, a season characterized by light and revelation (mountaintop experiences of the divine), and Lent, a season of continued metanoia involving descent, as we too journey down the mountain on the rocky, windy road to Jerusalem and the cross, where the divine light is so much more deeply hidden, and ends with Jesus opening his arms, stretched out on the beams of the cross to embrace the world with love; a day where the radiant light of Christ is almost extinguished.
It is on this road down the mountain, on the anvil of suffering where rough edges are knocked off and where our true authentic selves emerge, and where metanoia continues to change us into the likeness of Christ.
The Transfiguration, acting as a bridge between Epiphany and Lent, between seeing the Light and bearing the Light, between ascent and descent invites on a journey of transformation, of metanoia, ‘Of having our hearts, minds, and direction of our lives changed.’ This transformation needs to begin with a high view of our humanity and one another’s humanity, that we are beloved sons and daughters of God who have a divine spark/seed within us and in each other.
We need to allow time, this Lent, to slow down & seek quiet reflective, prayerful space, whether in church, home or in nature so that we might get glimpses, feint touches, still small voices of the Divine presence of Christ within.
But we also need to follow Jesus down the mountain and be bearers of Light within and to our community, and be a community that has the courage to challenge the elites, the empires, the unjust structures, the powers that enslave in our world – never is this more needed than today. Amen.
Epiphany is a season, sandwiched between Christmas & Lent, that can easily be overlooked, but its importance cannot be under-estimated – because it is the season where the divine nature of Jesus is revealed – primarily through the metaphor of light, which is what enables us to see.
We started our Epiphany series, with Simon, following the Light of the Christ star, full of mystery, promise and hope. Then Elizabeth, reflecting on Christ’s Baptism, led us in a meditation on our belovedness within the Light of God. I continued journeying with the first disciples, following the Christ Light on the shores of Galilee, and responding to the invitation, ‘Come and see.’ Then at our Christingle service, Jo, with the aid of an orange, red ribbon, candle and sweets, demonstrated Christ as the Light of the World. This was followed by Geoffrey speaking on Seeing the Light, enabling us to be bearers of the Light, and finally last week Simon showed the subversive nature of the light of Christ, shining out from the marginalized, challenging Roman Imperialist Theology that proposed Augustus Caesar was the Light of the world.
And the theme culminates today on Transfiguration Sunday with the Fullness of the God’s light shining in and around Jesus in all its radiance. Celtic Christianity would have called this mountain, where the disciples experience a sense of the Divine, a thin place. Although in reality any thin space between Divine and Human is obliterated in the Transfiguration: the Divine and Human, Sacred and Secular, Spirit and Matter becomes one, embodied in Jesus.
However the Transfiguration is less about a change in Jesus, and more about a change in the disciples’ perception of who Jesus truly is: and this experience of seeing the Light of Christ is central to their transformation or what the Bible calls metanoia – involving a change of heart, mind, way of life, direction of travel, in becoming something new.
Their metanoia involves an ascent (going up the mountain) and then a descent (coming back down the mountain).The way of Ascent involves an encounter with the divine, which awe inspiring, wonderful, terrifying where we sense something bigger than ourselves. During one SacREd space, we meditated on times when we had been touched by beauty & and shared our experiences, both ordinary and extraordinary, and for each one of us it led to a sense of something bigger than ourselves and an inner shift in our hearts and minds.
As Jesus leads the disciples up the mountain he is transfigured before them – his face shines and his clothes become a dazzling white – and they experience the ultimate mystical experience where the Divine and Human fuse together in the person of Jesus himself.
Thomas Merton, a Cistercian monk who himself underwent a profound metanoia – from being an ascetic monk renouncing the world, judging others to one embracing the world and loving others, sees the Transfiguration not only as the revelation of the Divine in Jesus but also the revelation of God in all of us: Merton called it the ‘Pure Diamond’ within, which resided in the Palace of Nowhere.
He says:
‘At the center of our being is a point of nothingness (the Palace of Nowhere) untouched by sin and illusion, a point of pure truth, a point or spark which belongs entirely to God, which is never at the disposal of the fantasies of our mind or the brutalities of our will. This point of nothingness and absolute poverty is the pure glory of God in us. It is God’s name written in us, as our poverty, as our dependence, as our son and daughtership. It is like a pure diamond, blazing with the invisible light of heaven. It is in everybody, and, if we could see it, we would see these billions of points of light coming together in the face and blaze of a sun that would make all the darkness and cruelty of life vanish completely...’ And he ends: ‘I have no program for this seeing. It is only given. But the gate of heaven is everywhere.’
On the mountaintop, the disciples not only see the divine in Jesus and Moses and Elijah next to him but hear, like Moses before them, the voice of God telling them: "This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!" God is saying, Jesus is the essence of who I am. If you want to know me, understand me, find me – don’t rail at a distant beard in the sky, look at Jesus, talk to him, base your life on him. Again these words are not only a sign of who Jesus is but signify who we are: We too are beloved cherished sons and daughters of God who God is delighted with.
When the disciples hear these words, they prostrate themselves on the ground in fear and trembling. Then they raise their eyes, and all is gone except one image: Jesus. Their lives now become fully focused and simplified on the person of Jesus back in his full humanity; and Jesus responds to the disciples and us when we are down on the ground, fearful and afraid in four ways.
He comes to us. He came to us in flesh and blood in first-century Palestine and he comes to us through the Holy Spirit today. However fallen, foolish, fragile and fearful we are he comes to us.
He touches us. Touch can be unwelcome – it can be infectious, coercive and abusive but it is amazing how transformative touch is in Jesus’ ministry. When Jesus touches, it is healing, electric, life giving. Barbara Brown Taylor says, in her book An altar in the world, that our faith comes down to: Whose flesh are we touching and why? Whose flesh are we recoiling from and why? Whose flesh are we burning and why? – Jesus is willing to touch and be touched by lepers, prostitutes, tax collectors & he is not concerned with burning anybody. In fact he is prepared to be burnt so others are not.
Jesus then raises us up and tells us not to be afraid, not because bad things won’t happen and we won’t face challenges, sadness, loss, grief and regret; but because he is with us.
He doesn’t allow us to build our shelters, where we may feel safe but accompanies us down the mountain to face the world in all its complexity.
So Jesus leads his disciples up the mountain to experience in a very tangible way the divine, showing them who he is and who they are in God; then Jesus touches them, raises them up, and accompanies them - That’s is the gospel in a nutshell.
But Jesus is quick to lead the disciples back down the mountain, embarking on the way of descent, the second part of Metanoia – back into the ordinary everyday mosaic of their lives, with all its complexity and messiness.
This moment of transfiguration—this revealing of God’s glory—on the mountaintop serves as a turning point because Jesus, now turns his face toward Jerusalem, ready to start down the road to the cross, of sacrifice and suffering.
As Simon said last week the Gospel writers set Jesus up in opposition to Roman Imperial theology. The Roman Gods resided on Mount Olympus & Roman Emperors were bestowed with the title Son of God, Light of the World, Saviour of the world: So here we have on a mountaintop the Beloved Son challenging the Imperial Son of God: the whole event is politically charged and a direct challenge to Roman Imperial Theology, demonstrating the displacement of the powers and principalities of this world by the true beloved Son of God, who will usher in a very different new Kingdom/Queendom.
And the disciples have a decision to make. Will they keep following Jesus on this new leg of the journey, where the light will be hidden? The transfiguration is also a turning point for them and us. It is positioned between Epiphany, a season characterized by light and revelation (mountaintop experiences of the divine), and Lent, a season of continued metanoia involving descent, as we too journey down the mountain on the rocky, windy road to Jerusalem and the cross, where the divine light is so much more deeply hidden, and ends with Jesus opening his arms, stretched out on the beams of the cross to embrace the world with love; a day where the radiant light of Christ is almost extinguished.
It is on this road down the mountain, on the anvil of suffering where rough edges are knocked off and where our true authentic selves emerge, and where metanoia continues to change us into the likeness of Christ.
The Transfiguration, acting as a bridge between Epiphany and Lent, between seeing the Light and bearing the Light, between ascent and descent invites on a journey of transformation, of metanoia, ‘Of having our hearts, minds, and direction of our lives changed.’ This transformation needs to begin with a high view of our humanity and one another’s humanity, that we are beloved sons and daughters of God who have a divine spark/seed within us and in each other.
We need to allow time, this Lent, to slow down & seek quiet reflective, prayerful space, whether in church, home or in nature so that we might get glimpses, feint touches, still small voices of the Divine presence of Christ within.
But we also need to follow Jesus down the mountain and be bearers of Light within and to our community, and be a community that has the courage to challenge the elites, the empires, the unjust structures, the powers that enslave in our world – never is this more needed than today. Amen.
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