Second Sunday of Lent, Year B


Genesis 22:1–2, 9a, 10–13, 15–18

Psalm 116:10, 15, 16–17, 18–19

Romans 8:31b–34

Mark 9:2–10


“This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.’ Suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone but Jesus alone with them.”

Jesus shares an intimate moment of prayer with Peter, James and John. The transfiguration is a trinitarian moment, where Jesus is identified as the beloved son. Throughout the public ministry of Jesus, He has taken time out of his busy schedule of encounters with those who follow him or who come to find him because they have heard of him to pray in deserted places and up high mountains. Epiphanies are described throughout the Scriptures and this moment of encounter is the greatest among them. It reveals Jesus for who he is and it serves to give strength both to Jesus and to his disciples as they enter into the passion.

The second Sunday of Lent gives us all a glimpse of the power of God at work in human nature. When the world seems to be headed only for destruction, we are reminded that God is still in charge.

Abraham listened to God’s voice to “lift up his son as a holocaust” before him and, in the culture of the time, he thought it meant to sacrifice the boy as a burnt offering, as was the custom of many people seeking to placate their gods. Mercifully, God’s angel intervened and made known that what God wanted was not the physical sacrifice of the child by removing him from the world but the release of him and his future that Abraham had to make.

The child so long desired to be his heir, the fulfillment of the promise God made to Abraham and Sarah, was God’s, not theirs. The true promise, yet to be revealed, was God’s own son who would be the sacrifice. The ram, found in a nearby bush, stood in for the sacrifice of Abraham’s son. Abraham’s faith and willingness to respond to what God asked of him are a reminder of the dedication God asks of us.

Last week, we were invited to see the weakness of our humanity as we contemplated the temptation of Jesus in the desert. This week, we are called to see the glory promised to us when we willingly submit ourselves to God’s direction of our lives.

There is a cost, in relation to the world, that must be paid. We are not our own. God has a “prior right” in our lives that includes our full human nature.

Body, mind and spirit, heart and soul, we are free to give ourselves to the world and its direction which at times is all too clear.  But we are invited to “lean in” to our relationship with God, to respond to His call, even though at times it can be obscure and beyond our understanding.

Peter, James and John knew what they witnessed was a real encounter with God. They did not yet realize the implications of the full gift of the humanity of Jesus and their own humanity to God.

Jesus spoke to his disciples of his coming passion and death, and of the resurrection, and told them not to speak of it “except when the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what rising from the dead meant.”

Now, all has been revealed, and yet we still often live in obscure awareness of what is happening. We are meant to respond with the faith of Abraham and with the trust of Peter, James and John, even as we question the meaning of it all.  

The transfiguration reminds us to keep our eyes and hearts fixed on the promise of glory in our own humanity. “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son but handed him over for us all, how will he not also give us everything else along with him?”