The Transfiguration Of Our Lord (Last Sunday After Epiphany)
Devotional
Water From the Rock
Lectionary Devotional for Cycle C
Object:
... where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
-- 2 Corinthians 3:17
Paul responded to the age-old conundrum of law and freedom. God communicated God's expectations through Moses and the Ten Commandments. The very reception of this gift from God, however, created in people more a sense of guilt than freedom. Consider whether in today's church there is more emphasis on guilt or grace as a motivating factor. Paul was convinced that the law, which he agreed was given by God, had failed to save people. He had discovered the power of the Spirit to do what the law could not do: "... a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (3:6). He drew a sharp contrast between the attempt of Israel to be shaped by the law of God and what he now saw as the freedom of the Spirit of Christ. He used the image of Moses veiling his face in Exodus 34:29-35 as an image of the people's inability to view the truth of God.
The current attempt of the church to legislate a new morality would have astonished Paul. He saw Israel as having been granted the grace of God in the old covenant but having wrapped it in tradition and fear until they missed "the end of the glory that was being set aside" (v. 13). Paul believed that the glory of God's unmerited grace was revealed "when they hear the reading of the old covenant" but "their minds were hardened" (v. 14). The echo of God's hardening the heart of Pharaoh comes to mind. For Paul "when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed..." (v. 16). As we see what God has done in Christ, we "are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another" (v. 18).
The question for the church is whether we have again veiled the new covenant in tradition and fear and pulled back from the freedom of Christ. Is that why we are such a fractured body of Christ that veils the true glory of Christ?
-- 2 Corinthians 3:17
Paul responded to the age-old conundrum of law and freedom. God communicated God's expectations through Moses and the Ten Commandments. The very reception of this gift from God, however, created in people more a sense of guilt than freedom. Consider whether in today's church there is more emphasis on guilt or grace as a motivating factor. Paul was convinced that the law, which he agreed was given by God, had failed to save people. He had discovered the power of the Spirit to do what the law could not do: "... a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (3:6). He drew a sharp contrast between the attempt of Israel to be shaped by the law of God and what he now saw as the freedom of the Spirit of Christ. He used the image of Moses veiling his face in Exodus 34:29-35 as an image of the people's inability to view the truth of God.
The current attempt of the church to legislate a new morality would have astonished Paul. He saw Israel as having been granted the grace of God in the old covenant but having wrapped it in tradition and fear until they missed "the end of the glory that was being set aside" (v. 13). Paul believed that the glory of God's unmerited grace was revealed "when they hear the reading of the old covenant" but "their minds were hardened" (v. 14). The echo of God's hardening the heart of Pharaoh comes to mind. For Paul "when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed..." (v. 16). As we see what God has done in Christ, we "are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another" (v. 18).
The question for the church is whether we have again veiled the new covenant in tradition and fear and pulled back from the freedom of Christ. Is that why we are such a fractured body of Christ that veils the true glory of Christ?
