In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Today is one of the more celebratory--and poignant--days of the church year.

We blast out our last alleluias--please sing with gusto cause we’ll not have them again for a long while. We baptize a child, Bradley Shea Wichman--and that is always a delightful thing to do, to welcome a new little member of the Body into the family of Christ. We celebrate the transfiguration of Jesus on the mountaintop even as we chuckle at the inappropriate and silly comment of Peter in reaction to the whole thing.
And we also remember that after today we slide into the season of Lent, a more somber, reflective time of discipline and growth. We slide, too, toward the seminal and glorious events of Holy Week, including the death of Jesus -- a thing we dread re-living.
So here we are in this pivot point of the year, celebrating with awe and wonder, and holding back just a little because we know what’s just around the corner.
Our gospel takes us up the mountaintop with Jesus and Peter, James, and John, his closest friends and disciples. And Jesus is revealed in the glory of divinity--his face shines, his clothes become dazzling white, the voice of Abba comes out of the cloud -- “This is my son, my Chosen; listen to him!”
He is transfigured. Changed. The divinity of Jesus is obvious here in this story.
And as I was thinking about an example we could give of transfiguration--something we could all relate to--I couldn’t help but think of the cabinets in the kitchen. Think back about how they were transfigured. Ian, our master craftsman and artisan, took all the gunk and old veneer off of their surface. He took them down to their true essence, the wood beneath, which is really quite valuable--so valuable that if we were to buy new cabinets we’d be wasting our money. This quality wood was then stained with loving care and made glorious. The integrity of the wood shines through unmistakably, and these cabinets are gorgeous. They have been totally transfigured.
The process took lots and lots of time--more that I would have thought it needed. And Ian had to have lots and lots of patience in refinishing them, because they presented some really big challenges.
And now the essence of the wood shines through. And nobody can believe they’re the same old cabinets that were there all along--they’ve been “miraculously” restored so that their beauty can be seen and appreciated by everyone.

Now, stay with me here -- how might we ourselves be called to submit to a process like the one that restored our cabinets? How is every one of us called to submit to the master craftsman--Jesus--as he asks us to participate in taking off the facades and veneers of our lives so that we allow our true selves to come forth and to shine forth?
Each one of us is covered with veneers or layers of paint that have accumulated over the years. The layers usually come from our desire to protect ourselves from hurtful people or circumstances--or they come from how we buy into our culture’s incessant invitations to buy, buy, buy, or to be busy, busy, busy. Whatever our own veneers or layers of old paint--they are there, coating all of us.
How important to submit to the process of allowing the voice of God to guide us in stripping off the old layers, to get down to the beauty within us--our true nature as children of God. What Bradley still has now--no layers on yet--his true nature as a child of God. What we strive for is what he has now -- in spades.
And then once we can touch again our nature as children of God, then we can submit to a new process--being stained by God, coated with a new set of priorities and values--that reflect God’s will for us. No one else’s. No more buy, buy, buy. No more busy, busy, busy.
And this process can be really painful, and it takes our whole lives long to be accomplished.
It’s our choice to allow the veneers and old layers of paint to get stripped off our souls and to get down to what’s really important. To get back to a place closer to where we were when we were baptized. And it’s our choice to be stained again with God, to be baptized as it were again, so that what shines through is good and holy and reveals who we really are.
It’s our choice. It’s not the easiest choice to make--it’s a lot easier to remain in our comfortable behaviors and beliefs. And it’s hard to allow ourselves to be changed. But there’s one truth above it all: to move in this direction is to arm ourselves for whatever life throws at us, the good, the bad, and the tragic. It’s to prepare ourselves for what lies in wait, for what has the potential to hurt. And it makes us strong spiritually, better able to face the hurts and the sufferings, and better able to give words of hope and comfort to others in their own times of testing.
As we slide this week toward Lent, let’s consider opening our hearts more fully and allowing God to continue the process of re-finishing and transfiguring us, by renewing us and transforming us to be God’s light in the world.
Amen.