Sandwiched between baptism and transfiguration is the temptation moment.
Between the two moments of the Father’s assurance that he is beloved to him lies the moment for Satan, the moment to be tested of our faithfulness and of our true mettle. This is the human reality that Jesus undergoes for us. This is the death and resurrection experience in baptism and the rest of our lives. He must leave Nazareth to come to the Jordan. He must leave the verdant banks and the cool waters of Jordan to the arid desert to be alone with the Alone. He must also leave his moments with people - teaching, preaching and healing – to be with his father - to be up on the mountain.
These two moments - desert and mountain top - are our experiences of God:
Sometimes God comes in the ugly, in the tragic. He comes in ways which shake us, cause terror, scathe our souls and crush our hearts. He sometimes comes in ways which leave us angry, hostile, almost on the edge of despair, or on the verge of disbelief.
Sometimes God comes in the beautiful. He comes in ways which impress us, in ways which sweep us off our feet, which fill us with hope and peace. In his beautiful manifestations, God can leave us gasping for breath and gaping in awe.
We all have those transfiguration moments in our lives. We must decide whether those moments will be with drugs, alcohol, internet and women and getting high or with changing our lives and living according to the law and the prophets (Moses and Elijah). What are the moments we call awesome ones in our lives? The father never fails to show us those “beloved” moments, those “aha” times, those glorious moments in our lives. Gandhi, Lincoln, Mandela and Mother Teresa had both the moments in their lives. Arvind Kejriwal, the current chief minister of New Delhi, is the latest example.
Transfiguration is a moment of enlightenment in our lives where we understand better the purpose of trials, suffering, testing and making sacrifices. We enter into prayer with anger in our hearts, we come out in forgiveness; we go to the Lord in confusion, we come out in enlightenment; we go with our struggles and we come away with strength to face them. We go with our doubts and we come back with understanding. How many young people we meet at the confessional who come with shame, fear and embarrassment and go away understood, comforted and empowered to face trails and temptations of life!
Stay with them for a while and come down the mountain to live our lives as ordinary, as simple and as down-to-earth as they can be.
Tony Kayala, c.s.c.