Obsessions

Tomorrow I have to do a devotion in staff meeting with my colleagues. This involves selecting a passage from the bible, and reflecting on it for the benefit of the rest of staff. Sort of like a biblestudy, but much briefer, and more personal in content.

We've been studying the book of Luke in some of the students' bible study groups, so it's a case of 2 birds and 1 stone that we've also been using it as the scripture text for devos. I've been encouraged enormously by the ones that the other staff have done. They've taken the parables of Jesus, and challenged me enormously on my use of money, my trust in God's mercy for the day's bread and work, my passion for the spread of the gospel, in light of the reality of judgment.

So what am I going to talk about? I have no idea. I'm reading through Luke now, trying to gain a whole picture of the text. Partly this sense of empty-headedness comes from not knowing my scripture well enough, nor applying it hard enough in my life. One lesson I've learnt from one of my colleagues is the practice of looking at my life - examining the minutae, for it isn't mundane to God. She is adept on reflecting, as the Psalmists do, on the past mercies of God in her life, and drawing upon them, as from a well-spring, when she's dry.

But thinking about Luke, and the Gospels in general, the story that immediately comes to mind is the Transfiguration. I realised that I am a bit obsessed with the Transfiguration story. It is such a strange story. In a book that feels functional - full of parables that need to be worked out, like puzzles, it's a conudrum of a different kind. Why is it there? Why does the disciples witness it? Are not the miracles of Christ enough? Why the blinding light? The glory?

Perhaps it's there to remind the disciples that Christ is beautiful. That the future is bright. That eternity is beckoning. It's to pull the curtain aside for one moment, and see who Christ is.

That glory is not just revealed in deed, but on the imagination.