by Fr. Bill Garrison
Please note that the following sermon text was provided prior to the audio recording. The two versions may differ substantially.
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”
—Matthew 17:1-9 (NRSV)
When last I visited with you I talked about catfish. I also talked about the cacophony of noise we endure daily, all the advice and direction we are given to help run our lives. Some of it is well meaning and some not so much. I called it outside-in thinking.
But then I introduced the idea of inside-out thinking into our conversation. Inside-out thinking emanates from our very being, our very essence or soul if you will. This is the part of us that is in constant relationship with God, ever in communion with our creator. And I posited last time to all of us that inside-out thinking is far superior to outside-in thinking since it takes into account who we are, and whose we are.
Here is a story that builds on that idea, one I haven’t told in a few years.
This is a story is about a little boy and his father. They were walking along a road when they came across a large stone. The boy looked at the stone and thought about it a little. Then he asked his father, “Do you think if I use all my strength, I could move that rock?"
Photo by Yogendra Singh from Pexels
The father thought for a moment and said, “I think that if you use all your strength, you can do it."
That encouragement was all the little boy needed. He ran over to the rock and began to push and pull on it. He pushed so hard. Little beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. But the rock didn’t move — not an inch, not half an inch, not even a little.
After a while, the little boy sat down on the ground. His countenance had fallen. His whole body seemed to be just a lump there on the earth. “You were wrong," he told his dad. “I can’t do it."
His father walked over to him, knelt beside him, and put his arm around the boy’s shoulder. “You can do it," he said. “You just didn’t use all your strength. You didn’t ask me to help you."
When we are using inside-out thinking we are including God in our efforts to move the stones we encounter so very often, the ones we and our culture believe we can’t move no matter how hard we try.
I have had the honor of being the rector in this place for a good chunk of time now. We will be holding our 9th Annual Meeting since I arrived after this service. Together we have accomplished a lot in these last few years. We will be outlining some of those accomplishments in the meeting. But now is not the time to talk about accomplishments.
Now is the time to think about how to move the rocks we think are impossible to move.
It took me thirty years to follow God’s call to priesthood. And I had good reasons to resist. I had done a great deal of outside-in thinking on the subject. As a result I knew clearly what some of my many deficiencies were. You see I am not holy enough to do this job. I am not smart enough. I don’t have enough patience, understanding, or compassion. My prayer life is not up to par. Sometimes I can be lazy. I certainly don’t have the right sort of background since I avoided church as much as possible as a kid. And I have been around experienced a whole lot of clergy in action and I knew for sure I didn’t stack up to their standards.
But somewhere along the line I started thinking inside-out. I got over the fear of wearing a collar around my neck. I got over the implications of becoming a priest as I understood them to be. I stopped over-worrying (yes I still worry some) about what everyone else thought about the fact I was going to be a priest and about other people’s expectations of me.
Instead I turned inward to my being and my God. From that point everything began to change. I saw the world about me in a different way. I saw the process to ordination in a different manner and from that time on had a wonderful time enjoying the road I traveled. And I have learned since that outside-in thinking gets me in trouble and inside-out thinking never does, but in fact is my most certain source of information.
Transfiguration, Duccio di Buoninsegna - Web Gallery of Art
I suppose the Apostles are the best examples of this transformation in thinking. Considering specifically about today’s gospel we heard Peter suggest during the Transfiguration that they build booths for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah. You see he was intellectually and spiritually lost and had no idea what to do with what he was seeing. So he did what the world might have suggested. Build some dwelling places for these incredible men. Inside-out thinking would never have brought him to the same idea.
I join with many Bible scholars who suggest that the transformation the disciples made from wild men to Apostles is one of God’s great miracles. As we think about it we realize the miracle happened along the way as they walked with Jesus. They were transformed in their thinking from outside-in to inside-out. As a result the door was open for them to be changed fundamentally.
We here at St. Matthias have experienced a renaissance of sorts over the last few years. There’s a lot of life here and a lot of new Christ Centered programs. It didn’t just happen. Like every person and organization we do our share of outside-in thinking. We can’t help it and it’s necessary. But we also spend a lot of time inside-out seeking guidance from our partnership with God. This is when the growth, the life, happens.
And so I think our invitation is to continue to consider from whence we receive our most important and effective guidance. Where do our clearest ideas about who we are come from? I submit they are from within. It doesn’t mean we stop listening to those around us. But it does mean we be more aware of who and whose we are, listening to the inner voice that speaks our own truth, a truth we cannot receive any other way.