"O, Say, Can You See?" - Sermon for Transfiguration Sunday

O, Say, Can You See?
Transfiguration – Narrative Lectionary 4
February 11, 2018
Redeemer, Good Thunder, MN
John 9.1-41

For most of my life, being able to see has been important to me. I have had glasses or other types of corrective lenses since I was a young boy. Soon after getting my glasses, I remember reading a book about a young Teddy Roosevelt who was not able to see the large letters on a barn while he was out hunting and I could relate to that experience since I had trouble seeing the blackboard in school. Later on, when I was a young adult, I wore my contact lenses (the old hard ones) too long after a period of not wearing them. When I took them out I scratched both corneas, a very painful experience which landed me in the emergency room.

Then as I neared 40 I was pretty sure that I was going to need bifocals, and I did. At 50 I was pretty sure I’d need trifocals, and I did. Then, let’s just say later, the eye doctor has told me I have the beginnings of cataracts. I love to read and these past few years I’ve come to realize that I am a visual learner and of all my senses, I would miss sight the most.

Being able to see is at the heart of our reading and, as John’s Jesus so often does, the story operates on multiple levels: the physical level of the man born blind who is healed, the intellectual level of the Jews; and for everyone in the story, the spiritual level most of all. John doesn’t have a Transfiguration story like the other three Gospels where Jesus is transformed on a mountain, yet this is a transfiguration story of another sort. Jesus’ glory is manifested in the sign he performs through the healing of the man born blind, and as Jesus does so, people see him anew.

Through various characters and their interactions with each other, we are encouraged to consider where and how we might be spiritually myopic and in need of some corrective lenses. This is not easy because we tend to cling tenaciously to our dearly held beliefs, no matter what evidence to the contrary. In CS Lewis’ book, The Last Battle, part of the Chronicles of Narnia series, there is a final battle between the good guys and the bad, with the dwarves sitting on the sidelines alternately switching sides because, as they say, “the dwarves are for the dwarves.” Eventually, the bad guys prevail and the good guys are tossed into a smelly, dirty hut, including the dwarves. Inside the hut, they are surprised to see that that are in another beautiful country, that the “inside is bigger than the outside, as Lewis says. However, the self-centered still think they are in hut and no amount of talk or proof convinces them otherwise.

We all know someone like that, whose mind will not be changed no matter the evidence. If we’re really honest, we realize we all have these tendencies and fail to see new God things that come our way. Rob Bell calls this “brick theology,” that we build a wall of belief and are afraid that if one of our cherished bricks is removed, the whole wall tumbles down. Instead, Bell says, faith is meant to be like springs on a trampoline. The faith springs of our trampoline life allow us flexibility and the joy of dynamic faith – to see things we might not be able to otherwise.

The transition from the safety of a wall with “brick faith” to a “brisk faith,” from spiritual myopia to clearer vision, is not an easy one but it is rewarding. Children have opened my eyes that when we say all are welcome to Holy Communion we must include them. My eyes have been opened that all people, including LGBT are just as faithful Jesus followers as I am, maybe more so, and that they are simple trying to live authentic lives of faith. What about you? Whom has God brought before you to help you see Jesus in a new way? May God continue to open the eyes of our hearts so that we can help each other follow Jesus. Amen.