“EYEWITNESSES OF HIS MAJESTY”
The Transfiguration of Our Lord
February 7, 2016
Bethel Evangelical Lutheran Church
Glenshaw, Pennsylvania
TEXT:
We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the
power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of
His majesty.
2 Peter 1:16 (ESV)
When it comes to establishing facts, we tend to place a great deal of
importance on firsthand evidence. We consider that kind of evidence
to be the most reliable. I guess we take comfort in knowing that the
things that we accept as true are things that have actually been
experienced, at least to some degree, by reliable witnesses, even if
we weren’t there to see them for ourselves. We seem to value
eyewitness accounts in particular, perhaps because we regard the
testimony of one who actually saw what he is testifying about to be
the most reliable evidence of all.
Eyewitness testimony is especially important to our Christian faith
because Christianity, unlike some of the world’s religions, is a
historical religion. It is not based primarily on ideas or philosophy
or ethics, but on real historical facts--events that actually took
place at some point in time. This is clear from the apostle Paul’s
words to the Corinthian Christians: “If Christ has not been raised
from death,” he writes, “then we have nothing to preach and you have
nothing to believe” (1 Corinthians 15:14 TEV). It is of the greatest
importance, then, that we keep all of the facts straight. That’s why
the Church has always had so much to say about the reliability of the
Biblical record. If we have no source of evidence that we can count
on regarding the historical facts of the Christianity, then everything
that we believe, teach, and confess on the basis of those facts rests
on shaky ground. It has no solid foundation. To guard against that
kind of uncertainty, we will examine on this Transfiguration Sunday
both the source and the purpose of the testimony about our Savior that
we have received from the Peter and others who lived with Jesus.
The Biblical record is precisely what Saint Peter is talking about in
the verse before us this morning. He is no doubt referring
particularly to his experience with Jesus on the Mount of
Transfiguration. And he is not merely speculating about this. He
was, after all, the author of two of the twenty-seven books that we
know today as the New Testament and was a primary source for two
others as well. He was an eyewitness to the events surrounding the
life, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. This apostle assures
those whose faith in the Lord Jesus rests on the Biblical record that
that record is indeed reliable, since he and the other Biblical
writers recorded the things that they saw with their own eyes and
heard with their own ears. What’s more, because “all Scripture is
breathed out by God” (2 Timothy 3:16), the writing of this record is
ultimately God’s doing, not man’s. Just a few verses later Peter
writes: “No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men
spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit (2 Peter
1:21).
Peter is quite emphatic about one thing in particular: “We did not
follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” When the Christian Church was
young, most of the religions that the people of the known world were
familiar with had endless systems of gods and goddesses, myths and
legends. But Christianity was different. This religion wasn’t
concerned with heroic characters or dramatic stories. It was all
about God coming in human flesh as the only perfect Man who ever lived
and being put to death as a common criminal to atone for human sin.
Its message is so simple that any child can understand it, and its
Lord is so humble that anyone can relate to Him. “We were
eyewitnesses of His majesty,” Peter writes. That’s how he explains
the source of his testimony and that of the other apostles. They were
with the Lord. They actually saw the things that they wrote about.
Peter cites in particular the event that we are commemorating
today--the transfiguration of our Lord. We are told here that we can
trust the testimony of the apostle when he says that he was an
eyewitness of Jesus’ majesty because he was “with Him on the holy
mountain” (2 Peter 1:18) when He was transfigured before him and James
and John. They heard the voice of God coming out of the cloud,
declaring Christ to be His beloved Son. All of this establishes for
us the truth and the reliability of the Word that we have
received--the testimony of eyewitnesses given through the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit.
But what does all of this mean to people living some two thousand
years later? There is something for us here--something that is very
important. We read in one of the verses that follows our text: “You
will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place” (2
Peter 1:19). The Word of God is our light through the darkness of
this world. Surely no one would deny that we live in a world of
darkness and sin--a world that offers only problems and no solutions,
only despair and no hope. But in the midst of this helpless, hopeless
world we do see one single ray of hope--the saving Gospel of Jesus
Christ--the Gospel that we have received through the testimony of
eyewitnesses in the Word of God. Without that Word we could never
know who Jesus is or what He has done for us. We could never hear
that wonderful Good News that Jesus lived a perfect life in obedience
to the Law of God, and then suffered and died to make atonement for
our sin, and that God raised Him from the dead to proclaim His
acceptance of His Son’s sacrifice on our behalf. Without that Word of
the Gospel we could never know that Jesus has restored us as God’s
beloved children and receive the blessings of salvation.
That Word is “a lamp shining in a dark place” (2 Peter 1:18) also in
the sense that it enlightens and guides us in our efforts to glorify
God in our lives. The Gospel alone motivates and empowers us to
respond to God’s grace in Christ with a life that glorifies Him and
serves our neighbor, thereby telling the whole world that we are His
redeemed people in Christ. But even with that motivation and
strength, we still need something to show us the way so that we know
how to go about praising God in our lives. This is what the
theologians call the third use of the Law. But above all else, we
must never lose sight of the fact that whatever good works we are able
to do are only our response of thanksgiving for what God has already
done for us in Christ. It is not really we who do them but God who
does them in and through us.
So how important or how valuable are eyewitness accounts? I suppose
that all depends on the importance of what is being reported. Some
things are certainly more important than others. But no matter where
we look or how far we go, we will never find a message as important as
the one that our Lord’s apostles have shared with us. We will never
find a message that gives us so much: the complete forgiveness of our
sins, the sure and certain hope of everlasting life, and a reason for
living our lives here on earth in such a way that God’s name is
glorified and His saving grace in Christ is proclaimed. Through Word
and Sacrament the Holy Spirit gives us the faith that we need to trust
this Word and the wisdom to use the power of its saving message to
glorify our Lord and Savior in all things.
Amen.
May the God who caused light to shine out of darkness cause you to
increase and abound in love toward one another and toward all people,
as His love abounds for us; and may the glory of His Son be manifested
to you and in you, that you may be witnesses to all nations now and
until the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is
faithful, and He will do it. Amen.