The Last Sunday after the Epiphany-The Rev Melanie Lemburg

Last Sunday after the Epiphany—Year C

February 27, 2022

 

        Last weekend, your vestry and I gathered for a retreat on Saturday morning.  In our time together, we talked about the times in our lives when the Holy Spirit has shown up.  The stories your vestry shared were beautiful and moving and unique and holy.  One vestry member talked about how during the times when the Holy Spirit has showed up in his life it was like a gentle tap on his shoulder and an understanding of  “Hey, maybe I should go do this….”  Others talked about doors opening, about a certain kind of knowing that stole over them that was beyond their own mind or understanding. 

        Then we looked at the story of Moses and the burning bush.  This comes from Exodus 3, much earlier in Moses’s story than our reading for today.  Moses is just kind of hanging out, tending the flock for his father-in-law, and all of a sudden, he notices that there is this bush that is on fire but isn’t being consumed.  He says to himself, “Hmmm, this is interesting, and it may be something I need to pay attention to.  Let me turn aside from what I’m doing and go over there to take a closer look at this curious thing.”  And it’s as if God is waiting for Moses to stop and take notice, because only after Moses approaches the burning bush to check it out does God speak to Moses.  God tells Moses that Moses is going to be God’s agent of deliverance for God’s people who have been enslaved by the Egyptians. 

        In that very first encounter, it took a willingness on Moses’ part to turn aside from what he was doing, to stop and see what the Lord is up to before God speaks to him.  It’s important to remember this history when we encounter our Old Testament reading for today, which has this whole weird thing with Moses talking to God and Moses’s face shining so brightly that he feels the need to wear a veil around the children of Israel unless he is telling them what God has told him.  These regular, super-shiny conversations with God all started with a willingness on Moses’s part to turn aside and look to see what work God was already doing in the world around him.

        Then we have our gospel reading for today.  Jesus takes three disciples up to the top of a mountain, and while there, they witness his transfiguration-the revelation of God’s glory in and through the person of Jesus-along with his conversation with both Moses and Elijah.  Luke is unique in telling us that the disciples are feeling “weighed down by sleep” but that since they manage to stay awake, they are able to see the miraculous events unfold right before their eyes. 

        Are you, too, feeling weighed down these days?  What is it that is weighing you down?  Is it weariness, monotony, the tediousness of the mundane?  Is it fear, anxiety, anger, or frustration?  Is it busyness, the tyranny of the urgent?  Is it a limiting of your physical capacity?  Are you, as the prayer book puts it, “wearied by the changes and chances of this life”?

        Take a moment now to name what weariness you are fighting. 

Now, take a moment to turn aside and look.  Where have you seen a burning bush, the unexpected revelation of the presence of God, in your life or in the world lately?  What invitation might God be extending to you in and through this revelation?