HE TrANSFIGURAT. M , HAR YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY THE LIBRARY ASSOCIATES Gift of the REVEREND KENNETH W. CAMERON FOUR SERMONS THE TRANSFIGURATION OF CHRIST I'KBACHBD ON The First Sundays in August 1887-1890 Rev. SAMUEL HART, D.D. PBOFESSOR IN TRINITY COLLEGE, HiKTFOED NEW YORK E. & J. B. YOUNG & CO. COOPER UNION, FOURTH AVENUE NOTE. These sermons were preached in St. James's Church, West Hartford, on the Sundays near est the Feast of the Transfiguration, in the years 1887, 1888, 1889, and 1890. The fact that they were not intended as a formal series of discourses, and the further fact that they were preached at intervals of a year, will ex plain some repetitions, and may perhaps be an excuse for the imperfect way in which a great subject has been treated. Kvpte iXetjcrov. REGEM IN DECORE SUO VIDEBUNT OCULI EIUS CERNENT TERRAM DE LONGE ftbe {Transfiguration. THE TRANSFIGURATION. SERMON I 2 St. Peter i. 17. " For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." I. It seems to me that all Churchmen should be glad to have the festival of the Transfigura tion added to the Prayer-Book Calendar and supplied with its proper services. It has long stood in the Calendar of the English Church, but since the Reformation its name only has been retained, no provision having been made for the observance of the day. It has been left for our own Church, in this far-off part of the world and at this late time, to give the feast a place of honor among the few special holy-days kept in our branch of Christendom. There was some question, among those who were specially inter- 4 The Transfiguration. [Serm. ested in the matter, whether the Transfiguration should be commemorated on the sixth day of August — which has for a long time at least been the traditional day — or during the Epiph any-tide, as being one of the great manifesta tions of the Son of God in the flesh, and possibly corresponding to an ancient observance then ; but I feel that we are better satisfied at know ing that the festival is assigned by us to the same place that it holds in the calendars of churches in all other parts of the world. And whether we are able to use the appropriate ser vice in public worship, or must content our selves, when it falls on a week-day, with read ing the Scriptures of the day in private and adding its Collect to our private prayers, it can hardly fail to be a great benefit that once in each year we have brought before us the Epis tle, the Gospel, and the Lessons which tell us of the Transfiguration or help us to understand it, and use the Collect which teaches us to pray that as God the Father did on the mount re veal to chosen -witnesses His only-begotten Son wonderfully transfigured, in raiment white and glistering, so we, being delivered from the dis- L] The Transfiguration. 5 quietude of this world, may be permitted to be hold the King in His beauty. I do not think that I need apologize, my brethren, on the morrow of the first celebration of this festival in the Reformed Western Church — a festival of Christ, like that of Christmas or of the Ascension — for taking my text from the Epistle for that day rather than from the Script ures specially appointed for this Sunday. And certainly it is not amiss to meditate upon the revelation of the honor and glory of the Incar nate Lord, as we are about to draw near and worship Him in the great sacrament of His might and His grace. II. The record of the Transfiguration, given us by each of the first three Evangelists, is cer tainly calculated to arrest the attention of even the careless reader. Full as the Gospel narra tive is of deeds of wonder, showing the power of the Son of God over the works of His hands, yet we feel a special awe as we read how, with but three of His twelve chosen apostles, He went up into a mountain to pray ; how as He prayed the fashion of his countenance was 6 The Transfiguration. [Serm. altered and His raiment became exceeding white as snow ; how Moses and Elijah, the two greatest men of the earlier dispensation, ap peared there, and the apostles heard them talk ing with Christ about His decease which He was soon to accomplish at Jerusalem ; how a bright cloud overshadowed them as St. Peter, not knowing what he said, expressed a wish that they might always stay there ; how there came a voice from heaven, the voice of the eter nal Father witnessing to His well-beloved Son ; and how, when all was over, the apostles were charged to tell no man what they had seen till the Son of Man had risen from the dead. But we are the more impressed with the great fact of the Transfiguration, wonderful as it is in its every detail, when we see the position which, as each Evangelist seems anxious to have us remember, it holds in the Gospel narrative. It was apparently not very far from the beginning of the third and last year of the Lord's minis try — that is to say, after the Passover next be fore that which marked the time of the Passion. The Lord had up to this time been engaged in doing His works of mercy and speaking His I.] The Transfiguration. 7 words of love, in order to teach His own peo ple who He was and to lead them to Himself. They had seen His works and heard His words, but they had not really accepted Him or come to know Him. And so, when at Caesarea Phi lippi He asked the disciples whom men called Him, their answer showed that He was indeed recognized as a prophet, and a great prophet, but that the people called Him nothing more than that. But when He asked them to say whom they themselves believed Him to be, St. Peter, speaking for the rest of the Twelve as well as for himself, "answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." The Lord accepted this profession of faith, and declared that on it He would build His Church, the keys of which, with the privilege of first opening its doors, He would give to the Apostle who had first confessed him thus. And " from that time forth " — so St. Matthew is careful to tell us — " from that time forth began Jesus to shew unto His disciples how that He must go unto Jeru salem, and suffer many things, . . . and be killed, and be raised again the third day." So it was that the great crisis and turning-point, 8 The Transfiguration. [Serm. for such it may rightly be called, in the Lord's earthly life came and was passed. It seemed as if His work among His people had been a fail ure, because that people had not learned to know and recognize Him. He must make a new beginning, and must lay a foundation of His Church with the few who coufessed Him to be the Messiah and Divine, upon their great confession. He must be rejected and die, and through death and resurrection alone He must come to His kingdom. From that time His way was to be shadowed, plainly and evidently, by the Cross ; His work was to be a work of struggle and of sorrow ; and His disciples were all to be taught to tread in the steps which He should mark out. " Then said Jesus unto His disciples " — the words follow at once — " If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me." Thus, after the discouraging answer as to the people at large and after the confident confession of the Twelve, the Lord could speak of the neces sity of His death and of the necessity, too, that His followers should tread the way of the Cross. LJ The Transfiguration. 9 But, as the Lord spoke of His destined suf ferings and pointed out to His chosen ones how they were to follow Him, before He entered upon the path which led into the valley of His deep humiliation, there came, both for His sake and for theirs, a revelation of His glory. " It came to pass about an eight days after these sayings, He took Peter and John and James," " and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, and was transfigured before them." III. We see, then, how the place of the Trans figuration in the Lord's life helps us to under stand what it was and why it was. The confes sion, the promise, the prophecy, the glory — then followed the journey to the holy city, that His work might be completed through death. The vision, then, upon the holy mount was a revelation — an unveiling of the glory of Christ. It was as if the brightness of the God head, which had been veiled in flesh, and of which it had been possible as yet to see but some of the effects, had burst forth through that which, even while in part it manifested it, yet seemed in greater part to conceal it. The face shining 10 The Transfiguration. [Serm. as the sun, the raiment white as the light, were what St. John saw again, years after, when in his exile at Patmos he was granted the vision of the ascended and glorified Son of God ; the bright cloud, " dark with excess of light," was like that before which Moses hid his face when he saw the God of Israel ; the voice was the testimony of the Almighty Father to His co- eternal and co-equal Son. And then, besides, the appearance in glory of the great man who had been the human mediator through whom the law had been given, and of the other, perhaps as great, who had restored the law and the worship of God, and who had been promised as a fore runner of the great and terrible day of the Lord, and their talking with Jesus, witnessed to the greatness and the far-reaching import of the work of Him Whose glory was then revealed. Peter and James and John listened and won dered at what they heard ; for in that bright un earthly glory these great saints of the Old Tes tament were talking with the Son of God con cerning His death — His decease or " exodus," St. Luke calls it — which He should accomplish ; and as they listened they learned what was the I.] The Transfiguration. ii nature and the manner of that work which He was to do. The Transfiguration of their Mas ter, the presence of Moses and Elijah, the talk of His death as a means of deliverance for the people of God — all were parts of a great reve lation which could not have been made at all before ; which could be made even now to none but chosen witnesses ; which, even if they could not quite understand it, was an admission of the three to that of which others could not know, and which they were forbidden for a while even to attempt to tell. Said one of them, years after, when he wrote of it in the sure confidence that his own decease was to come suddenly, and he knew not how soon : " We have not followed cunningly devised fables when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of His majesty." IV. When we come to ask more definitely what the purpose of the Transfiguration was, we find a part of the answer implied in these very words. For the three Apostles who were per mitted to see it, it was intended to be the means 12 The Transfiguration. [Serm. of strengthening their faith and enabling them to go safely through the trials and temptations which would beset them as they passed on with the Lord to His sufferings and His death. Only those who in the holy mount had once looked upon His glory could come near to the sight of the agony in the garden and to the sound of the petitions which were uttered there. They could not fail to remember, as they followed the Lord during the short part of His ministry that yet remained, how they had had a proof of which they could not speak, and in which possibly others would not have believed, assuring them that their Lord was more than man and that His work was not for Himself alone. And who can doubt that this memory did help to keep them faithful, or at least to bring them back to faithfulness ? We know lit tle of James the brother of John; but it does seem as if there was in him some special devo tion to his Master, which was acknowledged when he was chosen to be the first of the Twelve to lay down his life for the Master's sake. We remember St. Peter's grievous fall and his recovery and restoration, and how his I.J The Transfiguration. 13 repentance came from the moment when, in. the high -priest's palace, just after his third denial, " the Lord turned and looked upon him." May it not be that he remembered then how he had seen Him Who was then undergoing the most shameful humiliation, in the brightness of the glory of the unclouded Godhead ? and how that face, not hidden then from shame and spitting, had on the mount been bright as with the light of the sun in the heavens ? And as to St. John, ever faithful because ever loving, who, because he knew Christ best, must have seen more and understood more at the Transfiguration than the others could then see and understand, must not the vision have been to him one of the sources of that strength which kept him the sole con fessor of Christ at the time when all others had forsaken Him ; which enabled him to comfort the Virgin Mother in the time of her greatest sorrow ; which made him first of the Apostles at the empty sepulchre, and first of all the dis ciples to believe in the resurrection ; which pre pared him to look upon the full glory of the as cended Lord, and to hear from His lips the revela tion of the history of His Church ? I can well 14 The Transfiguration. [Serm. believe that in days of weariness and disappoint ment, many of which there were even in the ear liest times after the Lord had ascended, and all through the lives of the favored three, that which they had seen and heard in the hoty mount must have come to them as a source of exceeding comfort and strength ; and that the others, to whom they we're permitted to tell it after the Son of Man had risen from the dead, were enabled by it to learn and to believe and to hold fast to the truth in regard to His power and Godhead. And so in all the ages the Transfiguration has taught Christian men to know the Lord in Whom they believe, and has led them to bow before Him in adoration, to confess Him in hymns of praise, and to follow Him in glad and humble obedience. But we do not learn the whole meaning of the Transfiguration until we see that it was for the sake of Christ Himself as well as for that of His disciples. " He received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to Him from the excellent glory." And we need not hesitate t6 acknowledge that for Him as the Son of Man, called to undertake I.] The Transfiguration. 15 alone the heaviest of burdens and to bear alone the most bitter temptations, there was need of special gifts of encouragement and of strength. A voice came from heaven at His baptism when He dedicated Himself for the work of His public ministry, and again a voice from heaven at the end of His ministry assured Him that the way on which He was entering was one in which the Name of the Father would be glorified. The first special assurance came be fore the temptation, the last before the agony. Is it strange, we may reverently ask, that some thing of the same kind should have been given at the great turning-point in the human life of the Son of God, as He was bowing His head for the crown of thorns and taking upon His shoulders the burden of the Cross? " For the joy that was set before Him," we are told, " He endured the Cross, despising the shame." A pledge of that joy which should be His, a glimpse of that glory the way to which now lay through suffering, was given Him in the Trans figuration ; and who can but believe that the re membrance of this and the assured faith in that to which it pointed forward helped to sustain 1 6 The Transfiguration. [Serm. His human soul and carry it through all that it had to bear ? Even so the vision of the Lord in glory upheld St. Stephen as he was called to the speedy and painful end of his work for his Master ; even so to many of the saints of God has there been granted some prevision of glory which has carried them safely and joyfully through agony and death. The Transfiguration, then, was a testimony borne by the Father to the Son Who had become incarnate and had undertaken the great work of man's redemption. His essential glory, which might be concealed but which could never be taken away, was then allowed to shine forth for a short time ; the greatest of the men of Old- Testament times came to talk with Him of His death, the necessity and the meaning of which they could see far better than could any who were then living on earth ; and the voice of God Himself declared that, as when Jesus of Nazareth devoted Himself at Jordan to the work of life, so now, when He turned toward the valley of humiliation, He was the beloved Son in whom the Father was well pleased. The words gave a sanction to that part of the life which was I.J The Transfiguration. ij passed, and showed that it had been accepted ; and they gave a blessing to that part which was yet to follow, and declared that it also would be accepted. And so from the mount of the Transfiguration the Lord went down to continue His gracious works of grace and His words of truth, and to walk along that strange road which he knew to be the way by which He should return to the glory that He had with the Father before the world was. V. Such was the place and purpose of the Transfiguration in the life of our Saviour Christ, and (in part at least) its meaning not only for those who were present with Him but also for Himself. It might seem as if, after the resur rection and the ascension, the permanent glory of these latter events would have obscured the brightness, even if it did not dull the memory, of the former. But St. Peter, writing to as sure His disciples of the reality of the power and coming of the Lord Jesus Christ of which He had spoken to them before, seems to base his faith, and to seek to base theirs, on the Transfiguration. All that he says in the pas- 1 8 The Transfiguration. [Serm. sage which is the Epistle for the feast, and in the verses that follow, is full of word-memories of the hours spent with Christ on the holy mount. He speaks of his tabernacle and of his decease, as there he had wished to build taber nacles and had heard the conversation on the decease of Christ ; he passes on to speak of a light shining in a dark place — for the Transfig uration was almost certainly at night — and of the day-dawn and the rising of the day-star ; so vividly was the whole impressed upon his mind. And perhaps he turned to this, rather than to the later manifestations of glory, because it bore witness to the ever-present realities of Christ's blessed Person — ever present, though but rarely seen. It told him, and he would have it tell his disciples, that in all the Lord's lowly and humble work among men and for them, He was the very and eternal Son of God ; and it assured him of His might, His glory, and His greatness. So, with all else of which this commemora tion reminds us, let us not fail to learn the les son of the reality of the glory and the power of Christ ; let us believe that in faithful obedi- I. J The Transfiguration. 19 ence to Him, and faithful communion with Him, we are drawing near to a brightness and a ma jesty far beyond anything that is as yet revealed to our eyes or to our minds ; and let us so wor ship Him, so believe in Him, and so obey Plini that we may at the last be admitted to be eye witnesses of His majesty. TS ivSo^ay Movoyepel fj Sofja • afi-qv. Gbe Witnesses of tbe transfiguration. SERMON II. St. Luke ix. 30, 31, 32. *' And, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elias : "Who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. ' ' But Peter and they that were with him were heavy with sleep : and when they were awake, they saw his glory, and the two men that stood with him. " I. We began last year the special commemo ration of the Transfiguration of Christ on the sixth day of August, the traditional day of its ancient observance. And as it happens that for several years the festival will not fall upon a Sunday, while yet the day should be held in honor as a festival of our blessed Lord, it seems to me not amiss — -as indeed it was my privi lege to do last year — that I should direct your thoughts this morning to the scene of the Transfiguration, and take my text from the Scriptures which have been designated for to morrow's service. At the same time, it is not 24 The Transfiguration. [Serm. difficult to connect our meditations with the service of to-day.* The Epistle has told us of that simple yet all-embracing confession that Jesus is Lord, and how it cannot be uttered except by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost ; and on the holy mount we see the divine maj esty of the Man Jesus so manifested that we are led to confess Him to be both Lord and Christ. And in the Gospel, while we have been reminded of the humanity of Him Who wept over the city which He loved, so we have seen His power and His authority as He vindicated the insulted honor of the House of God. And as we are about to draw near to Him in that blessed Sacrament in which He specially gives us to know Himself in the majesty of His Person and the might of His redeeming grace, we may well think of that time when, above all others in His earthly life, His glory was manifested and the meaning of His redemption was made known. There is, indeed, a wonder surrounding the Transfiguration which exceeds even that whicli comes from the brightness that overhangs the * The Tenth Sunday after Trinity. II. J The Transfiguration. 25 manger-cradle or from the darkness that en velopes the Cross. They are revelations of mys teries brought down to earth and shown Avith earthly surroundings, differing, we may vent ure to say, rather in degree than in kind from other manifestations of the greatness and the goodness of the eternal God. But as we look at this, we seem to be lifted up above the re gions of earth, and to be in the very brightness of heaven itself, where there is the immediate knowledge of truth and the unveiled manifesta tion of Divine glory. All that we learn as we study the records adds to the wonder which is inspired by the scene. In time, it is, we may reverently say, the turning-point in the human life of the Lord. He had just received from St. Peter's lips the confession of the faith of the chosen few whom He had chosen to be specially near to Him, and who had been persuaded by the testimony of what He did and said that He was indeed the Christ the Son of the living God. He had thereupon begun to teach them of the necessity of His sufferings and His death. And then, after a week in which we are almost obliged to think that the Lord instructed them 26 The Transfiguration. [Serm. more plainly both concerning Himself as they had confessed Him and concerning; the humilia- tion to which He must needs submit, He took three chosen witnesses from among the Twelve and gave them the vision of the glory which was His as the Son of God, the glory to which He was to return through the valley of sorrow and of death. Again, the place of the Trans figuration was almost certainly on the side of Mount Hermon, that snow-capped mountain which guards the northern boundary of the Holy Land, and from which the eye can range over the whole of that goodly heritage to its southern limit, or gaze afar off: on the waters of the Mediterranean, or see where the even ing shadow of the peak stretches out beyond Damascus. There, in the glory of an Eastern night — for such, it seems to me, we must picture to ourselves the scene — between the whiteness of the eternal snows above, and the darkness filling the valleys below, the three who had gone up into the mount with the Lord, and who looked upon His face as He was praying, saw the appearance of His countenance changed and His garments glistering as with lightning II. J The Transfiguration. 27 radiance, exceeding white as the snow of Her- mon. It is no wonder that the Evangelist should have used strange words in describing the scene, or that St. Peter, when he recalled it at the time of writing his second Epistle, should have showed that his memory was filled with the thoughts of that which he had seen and had heard there. Certainly the Transfiguration had a momentous meaning for those who had fol lowed the Lord up to the place of this revela tion of His glory ; it had a meaning hardly less momentous for those to whom they told the vision after the Son of Man was risen from the dead ; it has a like meaning for all of us who through their word believe on the now glorified Lord. " We were eye-witnesses of His majesty " ; so one of them testified of that which was there revealed to them. " That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you " ; so another would bring us to the knowledge of the un veiled glory of the Incarnate Son of God. II. And it was indeed a wondrous company that was there on the mount with the Lord. " There talked with Him two men, which 28 The Transfiguration. [Serm. were Moses and Elias." They were both men who had been admitted while living on earth to behold marvellous displays of Divine glory, who had been charged with special revelations to God's people, and who had ended their earthly life in unwonted ways. The great lawgiver, who had been called to the top of Sinai and seen the God of Israel manifested there, and whose face had shone with the glory on which he had looked, who had proclaimed the ancient law with all its sanctions of majes ty and awe, and the accompanying covenant with all its gracious promises, and who had laid him down, with undimmed eye and unabated strength, to die (so tradition had it) at the kiss of the Lord and to be buried by God Himself, had now come within the borders of that fair land into which he had not been allowed to enter before ; and the mighty prophet of later days, who had been alone on the Lord's side in the court of Ahab and on Carmel, at whose prayer fire had come down from heaven, who had been granted special revelations at Sinai, and who, when his work was done, had been taken away from earth by a whirlwind ac- II. J The Transfiguration. 29 companied by the symbol of a chariot of fire and horses of fire, now stood in the majestic presence revealed on the heights which looked down upon the land where his life had been passed. The law and the prophets, in the person of the two greatest men of the dispensation now drawing to an end, bore witness and did homage to the Incarnate Son of God. Moses and Elijah had, each in his time, seen somewhat of His glory, had learned somewhat of His will, had pro claimed somewhat of His truth, more perhaps than it had been given to any others to see and know and proclaim ; and now they had come from that world of waiting into which they had entered by strange paths, to bear witness to Him in His human life, to see the glory which was veiled in His humility, to learn from Him how all was to be fulfilled which they had seen but in far-off vision and had known but in outline and in type. For they appeared in glory, the differing glory of one who without a body was awaiting the resurrection, and of one who had not seen death and who yet was in the world of the dead until the great day should dawn ; and they 30 The Transfiguration. [Serm. spake with the transfigured Lord, as Moses had spoken with Him of old when He was revealed to him as Jehovah, " face to face, as a man speak eth with a friend." The subject of their con verse was, so the Evangelist tells us, using words which add to our wonder as we read them, " His decease, which He should accom plish at Jerusalem." They did not speak of His passion or His death or His sacrifice ; the matter which for them then and there dis placed all others was His decease, His going away from earth — the Greek word is His " exo dus." The strange conversation must have in cluded all the mysteries of the passion, the death, and the sacrifice ; but it must have re ferred also to the victory, the resurrection, the ascension, and the return to heaven, and how these could be attained only through the path of the Cross. They spoke of a glory to which the Incarnate Son of God was to come and which was to be His as the Son of Man, a glory like- that which was then unveiled, and yet unlike it in that it was to be gained by and in the vigor of a new life. And to attain this the decease — the exodus — II. ] The Transfiguration. 31 was to be accomplished. Each step of the great work for which Christ had consecrated Himself was to be followed out ; it could not be accom plished if from Mount Hermon He should re turn to the Father, if leaving men who would not receive Him He should put away from Him the cup of suffering and of disappointment which he saw would be offered to Him, and if He should not so value the joy set before Him as to endure the Cross, despising the shame. To accomplish the exodus, each step must be taken in love, in patience, and in faith ; the battle must be fought in order that the victory might be won ; the life must be laid down in order that it might be taken again ; the work of the Son of God who came to earth must seem to end in the darkness of Golgotha in order that it might shine forth resplendent in the clouds that hung over Olivet. And it must be accomplished at Jerusalem, in the sight of men, the Jewish people and the rulers of the earth consenting to the crucifixion of the Lord of glory, a well-known and noted fact in human history, closing the volume of the annals of the ancient world, that a new life might be brought in and 2,2 The Transfiguration. [Serm. a new volume begun with the most stupendous and best-attested fact in history, the resurrection of Christ from the dead. Of thus much we may feel assured from what is told us in the sacred narrative ; but of the words in Avhich the Lord talked with the two great men of old on this momentous subject, the questions Avhich they asked and the ansAvers Avhich He gave, how they saw it in the fulfilment of all that had been revealed to them before, and of even more than they could hope, how he told them of the necessity and of the meaning of it all, we may not know. But that in it all they bore Avitness to Him, and confessed Him to be not alone the eternal Son of God, but also the Mes siah for Whom they had hoped long ago while they Avere laboring on earth, and then during the time of their rest and Avaiting in the abodes of the dead, who can doubt ? The LaAV and the Prophets acknowledged and did homage to the Christ, and confessed the faith of the Gospel. III. As two great representatives of the elder dispensation had come from the world of the dead that they might appear in glory with II. J The Transfiguration. 7>o Christ, so He had taken up with Him into the mount three representatives of the new dis pensation Avhich He was about to found, men as yet but in small part trained for the work which they were to do, surrounded with infirmity, forced to struggle with sleep Avhile Moses and Elijah talked with Jesus. Yet they were there as representatives of the Church Avhich the Lord was about to found, the faith of which was to be the confession that one of them had spoken but a few days before. St. Peter, whose special privilege it was to be that he should open the doors of the Church both to the Jews and to the Gentiles; St. James, who first of the Twelve was to seal his faith with his blood ; St. John, whose life was to be extended past the time when the holy city of the Jews should fall under the hands of the Gentiles, and who was to record his visions of the history of the Church even to the end : these three were the chosen witnesses whom the Lord called to look upon His glory and to hear a part at least of the mys teries of His decease. Doubtless one reason of the Transfiguration was that their faith might be strengthened in coming hours of danger and 34 The Transfiguration. [Serm. of temptation to despair, or that even if their faith should fail, as that of one of them did for a time most grievously, there might be something to help in lifting it up again. They had con fessed Him, Whom men called Jesus of Naza reth, to be the Christ. He had told them that because He was the Son of Man He must suffer many things ; and now Pie gave them a glimpse of His glory, that they might be sure, as one of them wrote afterward, that they had not fol lowed cunningly devised fables when they ac knowledged Him as the Son of God. As they represented the Church, they looked upon the glory of Christ, that from the vision they might gain life and strength to believe and to obey ; as they were to bear witness to others, they were granted the assurance of the truth of that which they were to declare ; and thus upon the holy mount the Church did homage to her Di vine Head and confessed His majesty, while she was taught somewhat of the mystery of His Person and His work. But the Apostles were still encompassed with the infirmities of the flesh. " They were heavy with sleep," so that it Avas difficult for II. J The Transfiguration. 35 them to see the brightness of the vision or to hear the wonderful words which were spoken. " But," we are told, " when they were awake they saAV His glory and the two men that stood with Him." This may mean that they yielded for a while to natural infirmity and so lost a part of what they might otherwise have seen and heard ; but it rather seems to me to tell how they struggled against the drowsiness which was settling upon them and kept aAvake * so that they did not lose the bright Arision of the Master. At any rate, in spite of weakness and infirmity, in spite of the fact that they had come from the ordinary life of earth and were soon to return again to the ordinary life of earth, in which they must encounter imperfection and suffering and error as well in themsel\xes as in others, they did not lose the revelation which was made, and they did not fail to make their confession there. The Church of Christ was not as yet proclaimed, and they who were chosen to represent her at the Transfiguration, imperfect men half-overpowered with sleep and half-dazed with wonder, exhibit a strange con- * 8iayfnryo(yfi7 fied to the Christ Who came to earth, and Who, after securing the salvation of His people, re turned to heaven ; and her testimony is com plete only as she bears witness to the glory of His life and His Avork, and as she turns her eyes toward the glory that is yet to be revealed. It has been Avith the Church and all her mem bers, it is Avith us to-day, as it was Avith the three who Avent up into the mount ; it is not easy for us to resist the drowsiness and the weariness of earth, to see the Lord as indeed He is, and to hear and learn His words ; yet, if we will but keep awake, or if, having fallen asleep, we will but rouse ourselves, we shall see and know Him, and hear not only the testimony of all the ages, but the Aroice of the eternal Father, and thus Ave shall ourselves come to a new knowledge of Him. And though we do not look upon the transfigured Christ with bodily eyes, yet as Ave share in His life, the life to which He came through His accomplished decease, and especially as we keep ourselves in sacramental union with Him and realize the value of those unseen and supernatural things which we know to be with us and about us, we 38 The Transfiguration. [Serm. II.] have a revelation of His glory like that which was granted to the chosen witnesses from the company of the Twelve ; and if we believe in these supernatural things, which are, after all, the real things, and guide our lives by them and for them, we shall come to have a vision and a knowledge of Christ as much brighter and greater than that which Moses and Elijah had as the Gospel is brighter and greater than the dispensation of the Law and the Prophets. For each of us, here and now, by faith and sacra mental approach, is called to go up with Christ into the holy mount, that by the brightness which we shall see there — and which must needs be reflected from our faces — we may live until the day of the great revelation of glory and of truth. £be purpose of tbe transfiguration. SERMON III. St. Matthew xvii. 2. "And [he] was transfigured before them." I. We are about to observe again, in its ap pointed place, the feast of the Transfiguration of Christ. The event is one of so great impor tance in the life of our Lord upon the earth, and the recent insertion of the feast-day in our cal endar is a matter of such special interest, that I ask your attention to-day to certain of the les sons which that festival will bring before us. For more than tAvo years our blessed Lord had been engaged in preaching His Gospel and working deeds of wonder and of power ; He had spoken and done that which the Messiah was to speak and to do, and He had called His people to acknowledge Him. But when He asked the Twelve to tell Him what the people, after all this time, had to say of Him, they could only reply that some thought that He 42 The Transfiguration. [Serm. was John Baptist, and some Elijah, and some Jeremiah, or another of the prophets. But though the multitude had failed to see that the Lord was really different from those who had before brought the truth of God to men, the Apostles themselATes had discerned that He was more than the greatest of the prophets of old. To the challenge that they should declare whom they themselves thought Him to be, St. Peter, speaking for all the others, as Avell as for himself, gave the ansAver which confessed the Messiahship and the Divinity of the Master : "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living- God. " The Lord recognized the greatness of the confession and the faith which prompted it, and declared that upon it, as a firm rock, He would build a Church for Himself, and that to the great Apostle, the rock-man, who had spoken it, He would give the honor of opening the doors of that Church, the kingdom of heaATen. But that they might not misunderstand the way in which He was to carry out His work as Mes siah and to build up His spiritual kingdom, He told the Apostles in distinct words — and be cause they had made strong confession of their III. J The Transfiguration. 43 faith He could now tell it to them — that He must be rejected by the people to Avhom He had come, must suffer, and must gain through death an entrance into life. And He told them further, that they, if they wished to come after Him, must deny themselves and carry their cross, and lose their lives for His sake. Then, after they had thus voluntarily and as a matter of conviction confessed their Master to be Christ the Son of God, and after He had thus revealed to them somewhat of the mystery of the Cross, " He took with Him Peter and James and John his brother, and brought them up into an high mountain apart, and was trans figured before them." The vision of brightness could not have been given until after the Apos tles had learned and acknowledged the great ness of their Master, and it was not needed (I think we may say) until after they had been told of the suffering which Avas marked out for Him. To it therefore all the former part of the Lord's ministry led up, and by it all that followed was illuminated and interpreted. It is as thus occupying the central place in the earthly life of our Saviour that Ave must, I 44 The Transfiguration. [Serm. think, study the Transfiguration, if we would understand it aright. II. It seems indeed as if the change in that life which was then made had different mean ings for the Lord Himself and for His Apostles. He turned His back, if we may so speak, on the bright vision of the early ministry, when the people had listened intently to His teaching and looked with wonder on His miracles and had appeared to be filled with a faith in Him which might soon lead them to know and to confess Him as a Divine Saviour. But noAV, after all that He had said and clone, though they did not cease to admire His Avords and His works, they thought of Him as not really different from the prophets of old or from the great preacher of repentance who had been lately murdered by Herod. The Lord's face must now be set toward the Cross; for only through suffering and death could He draw His people to Him self. With the Apostles the case Avould seem to have been exactly the reverse. They had begun by following a teacher and a worker of Avonders ; and they had found that He Whom III. J The Transfiguration. 45 they followed was the Christ who had been promised of old and the Son of the Most High God. Even though we cannot suppose that they fully understood Him or His work, they yet had learned somewhat of the great truth of His character and His Person, and they had come to see in Him somewhat of the greatness which was rightly His. Thus it may be said that the A7ision of glory which was granted in the holy mount had a different meaning for the Lord Himself and for the Apostles who were there with Him. For Him it was the strengthening vision before He should descend into the vale of humiliation; for them it was the strengthening vision which might lead them upward to fuller knowledge and stronger faith. Yet such Avords as these can hardly be spoken without some limitation of their meaning. For the Lord had, of course, always looked forward to His Cross as the only way through which His work could be done ; and the Apostles must have felt convinced from the first that they were following One who was greater than any other among men. But speak ing generally, and from the human stand-point, 46 The Transfiguration. [Serm. we may rightly say, I think, that after the Transfiguration the steps of Christ were turned more directly toward the Cross, and that from the mount the Apostles, or at least the chosen three, departed with increasing faith in the greatness and the glory of their Lord. They were assured, as they had confessed, that He was the Messiah ; He had devoted Himself to that work of the Messiah which could not be accomplished except by suffering. Thus the Transfiguration, occupying the place which it did, was both a revelation and a prophecy. III. It was a revelation, because for a brief space the veil was lifted which concealed the majesty of the Incarnate Son of God. The glory which was then disclosed had been His before the world was, before He had humbled Himself to take the nature of man that He might deliver it ; and it still was His, as in His adorable Person He was the eternal Son, of the same substance with the eternal Father. Men knew, as He lived among them, somewhat of His holiness, and there was a glory which must ever have manifested itself in that which He said III. J The Transfiguration. 47 and did. But all of His purity and brightness and glory had not been disclosed ; and indeed it was impossible that they should be made known except to those who had followed Him closely and had attained firm faith in Him. Now for the first time they were revealed on earth, and two men chosen from those who had believed in Him and served Him under the old dispensation, with three from those who had first confessed Him and followed Him as He came to make the new covenant, were admitted to be eye-witnesses of His majesty. And it was also a prophecy. For the Son of God incarnate had not yet been glorified. He had laid aside His glory when He came to eaTth; there had been reflections of it about His cradle and at His baptism and at other times when His Divine wisdom and goodness were specially shown; it shone forth with dazzling radiance for the short time of the Transfiguration ; but it could not be given to Him, as the Son of Man, in its full and continu ing brightness, until He should have the new life which belongs to the resurrection from the dead. And of this glory, which lighted the 48 The Transfiguration. [Serm. empty sepulchre and streamed forth from the opening heavens — of this glory, in which we look for the ascended Lord to return, the Transfigu ration was a prophecy. It was a prophecy, we may well think, to Him, and one of the ways in which the joy was set before Him that He might with all willingness endure the Cross and despise the shame ; it was intended to strength en the faith of His human soul that He might carry His obedience even to death. And it was a prophecy to the great men of old, who spoke there of His decease, and who were given a proof of what its issue would be ; and to the chosen Apostles, that it might strengthen the faith which they had professed so fully and so sol emnly, that that faith might be lifted up still higher to more exalted ideas of the Lord's greatness and glory, that they might be in some way prepared for the disappointment when the hour of His humiliation should come. IV. It must be to call our attention to this purpose of the Transfiguration that we are told by St. Matthew that the Lord brought the three Apostles up into the mount, " and was transfig- III. J The Transfiguration. 49 ured before them." It was a special purpose, then, which He had, that He might be revealed in His glory to witnesses chosen from among those Avho were companying Avith Him on earth and to Avhom He was soon to leave a special Avork to be done for Him. And though at* the time it was for them alone, yet soon it could be told to all, and its lessons were to become a part of the Gospel Avhich Avas to be preached through out the Avorld. If we see therefore what it meant for them, we shall be helped to see what it means for us. Certainly it gave them an idea of what Christ really was. From His life, His teaching, and His Avorks, and from that influence of which we can think more readily than Ave can put any definition of it in Avords, they had known Him to be the Christ, the Son of God ; but after the A'ision they must have had a more full idea than ever before of all that their confession of Him meant. When, on the morrow, coming down from the mount, they saw the Lord heal the poor demoniac boy, after drawing forth from his agonized father the earnest cry of faith, they knew more of the purpose of the miracle 50 The Transfiguration. [Serm. and of the might in which it was done, than had been the case in regard to any of His ear lier acts of wonder; and when next they lis tened to His teaching, it must have been with feelings of awe, and yet of confidence, such as they had never had before. They had seen something of the power and majesty of the Lord, which could not but make a difference in their estimate of Him. And still further, this vision must have helped them to realize that there Avas a part of the Lord's plan and a part of His Avorkings which was, and which must have been, out of their sight. He was engaged in a great work, of which they could see only that which lay upon the surface ; He was using energies of which they did not knoAv, and moving along Avays that were in the deep and paths that were covered. by the mighty waters. I can well believe that it Avas, in part at least, the memory of the Transfiguration Avhich kept St. John faithful at the Cross, and made him ready to run to see that the sepulchre Avas empty on Easter morning; that the recollection of the glory which St. Peter had seen upon the face III. J The Transfiguration. 51 that turned to look at him after his third- de nial had much to do with opening so soon the flood-gate of penitent tears and calling the Apos tle back to himself; and that St. James was strengthened to lay down his life first of all the faithful Apostles, by the revelation which he had had on the holy mount. All of Christ's Apostles, yes, all of His faithful disciples, must have learned that they had to follow Him in faith ; but these in particular must have had their faith strengthened by what they had seen, and must have believed that, even in what seemed to them most strange, He was accom plishing some great and blessed plan. And also, Avhen in later years they looked back — as indeed I have already in part suggest ed — how the memory of the vision must have been to them a most strong assurance that they had followed a Lord who Avas all-glorious and almighty ! St. James, from the short life in which it may have seemed to him that he had little opportunity to do his Master's Avork ; St. John, from the life so far prolonged that it must have been full of disappointment at the hind rances and delays which that work encountered ; 52 The Transfiguration. [Serm. St. Peter, with the assurance that the end of his life was to come suddenly, and he could not tell how soon ; each, as he recalled the time when he was Avith Christ and saw His glory, knew that, as one of them Avrote, he had not, in belief or in teaching, " followed cunningly devised fables." In St. Peter's mind, as we see from a careful reading of the passage in his second Epistle, the incidents of the Transfiguration and the words which were spoken then Avere fixed past all possibility of their being f orgotten ; and the opening words of St. John's first Epistle and, I may add, the tenor of large parts of his Gos pel, assure us that the Arision had a lasting ef fect on his mind, and was a most precious part of his experience. " This A'oice we heard " ; "that Avhich we have seen and heard declare Ave unto you " ; such is the witness of these men, imparting their convictions to the Christian Church and making the Transfiguration a real thing to us. V. Thus it comes to pass that the witness of the Transfiguration has reached us, and become a part of our Christian teaching and almost of III. J The Transfiguration. 53 our Christian experience. It is to us a revela tion and a prophecy : a revelation, as it lifts the veil in which the Lord was clad while He sojourned on earth, and helps us to know the majesty and glory which were, the foundation of that which He said and did ; a revelation, as it helps us to understand the life and the passion, the resurrection and the ascension, the absence and the return ; and a prophecy, as it enables us to look on Avith confidence for the day Avhen His glory shall be fully revealed and His faithful ones shall see Him as He is. It teaches us, as it taught the Apostles, that there is in Him, and in all that He says and does, a truth and a power which we cannot noAv see, for the sight of Avhich our eyes are not yet prepared. It helps us to know that there is a reality in His Word, in His Church, and in His Sacraments, which we cannot define, even though at times we may begin to know it ; it helps us to believe that there are mysteries of truth and of grace, which we cannot now do more than apprehend ; and it bids us not be discour aged or surprised if we do not always knoAv the manner of His working or enter into the 54 The Transfiguration. [Serm. III. J full meaning of His words. Still more, it helps us to be content with our Lord's personal deal-. ing with ourselves, in the assurance that what He does we cannot always know now, though we may hope that we shall know it afterward ; it teaches us that beneath the joys and the sor rows, the encouragements and the disappoint ments, of our little lives, there is hidden for a time the glory of our Master, and that when we shall see that glory we shall be well satis fied with Avhat it has appointed for us. And so, as Ave study Christ's Word, as we live the life of faith in His Church, as we draw near to Him in holy ordinance and in Sacra ment, as Ave follow Him and try to serve Him as well in the darkness as in the licht, He is in divers Avays transfigured before us ; Ave know Who He is and what He is doing, how He can help us and how implicitly we can trust Him ; and the brightness on which we look may Avell be our guide, enlightening our path more and more unto the perfect day. AvTm Traaa fj 86ija • aiitfv. Gbe transfiguration tbe IRevelation of a fll>sster& SERMON IV. 2 St. Peter i. 16. " But were eye-witnesses of his majesty." St. Luke ix. 36. " And they kept it close, and told no man in those days any of those things which they had seen." I. In the sacred observances of the year we have come again to the Sunday nearest the feast of the Transfiguration. And as our thoughts are about to be turned to that Avonderful scene on the holy mount Avhen, in the presence of chosen Avitnesses, the Lord was revealed in glory, I ask you to-day to think of one aspect of the Transfiguration which the words just read, taken from the Epistle and the Gospel for the day, unite in presenting to us. It was, as St. Peter and St. Luke tell us, a revelation of a mystery. The Lord's ministry, as you will remember, had continued for more than two years, Avhen the Twelve, in reply to His demand that they 58 The Transfiguration. [Serm. should declare whom they believed Him to be, confessed Him as the Christ, the Son of the liv- ing God. The confession, though uttered by the lips of St. Peter, was made in the name of them all, and to it they all assented. Therefore it Avas to them all, as strengthened by this faith, that He could tell how the path to His glory Avas to lead through shame and suffering and death, and how, if they were to follow Him, they must follow in the way of self-denial and the Cross. But " about an eight days after these sayings " He took three only of the Twelve — Peter and James and John — into the mount, and, unseen by the eyes of others than the three Apostles and the two great men of the elder days who then came back to earth, His glory was revealed and " Pie Avas transfigured before them." The bright vision soon passed, and the Lord and His chosen witnesses came down from the mount to the world of suffering and sin, of labor and disappointment. But as they came doAvn He charged them that they should tell the vision to no man until He, the Son of Man, should have risen from the dead. They won dered at His words, and questioned one with IV.] The Transfiguration. 59 another what the rising from the dead should mean ; but they obeyed the command ; and though there was something wonderful in the Lord's appearance which must almost have challenged questionings on the part of others, we are assured by St. Luke that " they kept it close, and told no man in those days any of those things which they had seen." Many years later, one of those who saw the glory of the Transfiguration, writing toward the end of his life to some of his disciples, and knowing that his departure would be a sudden one and might come at any moment, referred to what he had seen as a proof to him of the truth of that which he had taught. " We have not," said he, "followed cunningly devised fables, when we made knoAvn to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye witnesses of His majesty." He ventured, that is, to speak of an assurance which he himself had, on which he could rely, and which he could communicate to those who heard his teaching. He declared that he was admitted to be an eye witness of the majesty of Christ, Avhen on the holy mount he heard the voice which came to 60 The Transfiguration. [Serm. Him from the excellent glory. The Avoid which St. Peter used* is a word which was employed of those who were, as the phrase ran, "initiated" into the ancient mysteries, and Avho thought that they learned truths which were not taught to others, and perhaps that they had visions Avhich others could not see. Now I think it more than probable that there were in the religious mysteries of the nations remnants of divine truth which had not become debased or lost, and that the eye-witnesses did learn something about God and right which the common people were not permitted to under stand. But be that as it may, the Apostle used a phrase which would be well understood, when he told how it had been his privilege to look upon a majesty the sight of Avhich was veiled from others, and to hear a voice Avhich others did not hear. He had had entrusted to him as a secret a great truth, something to believe and to live by ; and noAv he could speak of it, as indeed evangelists had already spoken of it, and tell hoAv it strengthened his own faith and emboldened him to confirm the faith of others. * broTTTCU. IV. ] The Transfiguration. 6 1 So it was that the Transfiguration was a revelation, a revelation of a mystery, and that those who saw it gained from it reasons for faith and obedience of which they could not tell for a time. St. James, the first of the Twelve to die the martyr's death, perhaps never spoke of it on earth ; St. John alluded to it in an Epistle, and thoughts of it must have mingled with his apocalyptic visions ; but St. Peter told in express words of all that it had meant to him, and of the influence from it which he wrould fain transmit to his disciples. He could tell of the vision then, and could testify of what he had seen and heard, that we might know that it was impossible that his Avitness should have been untrue when he told of the majesty of his Master. II. In speaking, however, of the mystery of the Transfiguration, it is necessary that we should remember the accurate and scriptural use of the word. A mystery does not rightly mean something mysteriously strange, startling, if not incredible, and surrounded with elements of wonder and made a matter of impenetrable 62 The Transfiguration. [Serm. secrecy. Rather it means a great and impor tant truth, which could not be known apart from a special revelation, but as to which a revelation has been made. Thus a mystery is, if we like to use the phrase, a secret which has been disclosed. The mysteries of the heathen professed to be made known only to a few, and their knowledge was to be kept by that few ; the mysteries of the religion of Christ were, of course, revealed to chosen witnesses at the first, but it was that they might in due time be made known to all men. Thus St. Paul, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, speaks of one great and all-important truth, which indeed he calls " the mystery of the Gospel " ; but it is not some obscure fact, some truth difficult to under stand and having no concern with the living in terests of men ; it is the fact that the Gentiles were in God's design to be " fellow-heirs " with the Jews, " and of the same body, and partakers of God's promise in Christ by the Gospel." It was a great plan of divine action, Avhich could not possibly have been known if it had not been reATealed, but which, having been revealed, became a matter of practical personal concern to IV. J The Transfiguration. 63 a large part of mankind and one of the founda tion principles of the Christian Church. And to reveal a mystery is to unveil the truth which it contains, to bring it to light, and to show it to those whom it concerns, or at least to those who are capable of receiving it. So the Lord's Transfiguration was the revelation of a mys tery ; it lifted the veil for a moment from that majesty and glory which were essentially His as the Son of God incarnate in the nature of man ; it enabled a few of those who had con fessed His authority and His divinity to catch a glimpse of that on which His authority rested, and to see somewhat of what His divinity really was ; it showed on earth Avhat that was of which He had vouchsafed to empty Himself when He took upon Him to deliver man. And for this rea son it came to strengthen the faith of the three Apostles at a time when that faith had reached a great climax and had met a great trial. The mystery of the glory of the Incarnate God was revealed upon the mount of the Transfiguration. III. I do not need to say, of course, that this was not the only revelation of the mystery of 64 The Transfiguration. [Serm. the glory of Christ. There were revelations which had preceded it, as at the Nativity and the Baptism ; there were others Avhich fol lowed, as at the Resurrection and the Ascension. But the special place which the Transfiguration holds shows it to be a matter of great impor tance, and I think that we may rightly say that it was then for the first time that men knew that the Man Jesus was, in the fullest sense, the Son of God. This truth, partially apprehended and partially confessed, was proved then, being unveiled and revealed in the sight of witnesses. And I think that we can see that this revela tion must have been made to a f eAv. There were not many who were ready to receive it ; after so much of the Lord's ministry had passed, none of the people Avould confess Him to be more than a great Prophet, and therefore none were ready to see His divine glory. And there must have been a reason Avhy, out of the num ber of the Twelve, in the name of all of whom the great confession had been so lately made, three were chosen to go up with Christ into the mount. They must have needed, and they must have been ready for, the vision which was there IV. J The Transfiguration. 65 vouchsafed to them ; the eyes of the multitude could not have understood it at all, even if they could have discerned it ; and the other Apostles Avere not, Ave may be sure, prepared for it as Avere Peter and James and John ; nay, these could not even tell it to the others ; they must keep it secret, and that, I suppose, for the sake of the others rather than for their own. May we not venture to say further, that it must have been that, among all the people of God and all the saints of the older days who had passed from earth, there were but two who could as yet look upon the vision and know the glory of the Godhead of the Son of Man — Moses, who in Sinai had seen the God of Israel, and Elijah, who in the same mount had stood before the Lord to know His majesty and His will ? It seems to me that we may be well assured that the revelations of God are made to all who are competent to receive them ; and that the three Apostles and the two Prophets were all who could see the glory of the Trans figuration. For thus it is : some see more of God and know more of God than others, even when there appear to be for all the same out- 5 66 The Transfiguration. [Serm. ward circumstances of revelation. When the voice from heaven came to the Lord close at the end of His ministry, the people that stood by said that it thundered ; others said that an angel spake to Him ; St. John appears to have heard the Father's words; the Lord Himself knew why they were spoken and what they meant. So when the risen Lord appeared in His glory to Saul the persecutor Avhom He was calling to be an Apostle, the men that were with him saw the light and heard a sound, but they did not see who Pie was that spoke, nor did they catch His words. The time came when the vision could be told to men ; when the Apostles could speak on earth of the proof which they had had of Christ's glory, and the Prophets (I venture to add) could tell in para dise of the majesty of the Saviour for whom the ages had been Avaiting. And indeed the revelation Avas for no selfish purpose ; no one, in God's design, is blessed Avith a knowledge of truth except that he may help others to knowT and obey it ; but it must come to men as they are ready for it, and each lesser revelation rightly used is a help to the gaining and the I V.J The Transfiguration. 6j using of something greater. The evidence is at the first for those who are competent to re ceive it and to use it, that it may at last be of ser vice to all. The Transfiguration soon became a revelation to the Avhole Church, and it is a revelation to all of us, though its bright glory was at first seen by few. And is it not true that some of us, here and now, see more of that brightness and enter more fully into its mean ing, according as our hearts are more fit to be with Christ and to behold Him as He is \ IV. For in differing degrees we all, admitted to the mysteries of Christ and taught concern ing God and ourselves great truths which we could never else have learned, are eye-witnesses of His majesty, as it is revealed in His Church and in the souls of His people. And there is a sense in which we must and do keep these things close, and cannot tell other men of what Ave have seen. We are justly suspicious of the words into which some try to put the story of their religious experiences ; for we know that the best and the truest of them all cannot be expressed in words, and that any attempt to ex- 68 The Transfiguration. [Serm. press them is but to misrepresent them. We cannot tell all that we knoAV of God's forgiving grace, of our personal allegiance to Christ, of the strength which has come to us from the Holy Spirit ; our knowledge of them cannot be formulated, even to our own thoughts. St. Paul did not tell of the most wonderful of his visions till some fourteen years after it had been granted to him, and then only under a kind of compulsion and in halting and confused words ; and he had no confidence of salvation, such at least as to speak of it, until he was writing his last Epistle as he awaited the sum mons to execution. And the nearer Ave are to having the visions and the assurance of the saints, the nearer will our experience be to theirs. It is, then, not an unreasonable thing — rather it is in accordance with the highest exercise of our reason — that we should affirm that we have grounds for our faith and our obedience, which are of the greatest possible weight and value for ourselves, but which would have little power in persuading others if Ave should speak of them, if indeed we could presume to speak I V.J The Transfiguration. 69 of them at all. They are of the same kind as those on which we rest the strongest of our confidences and affections in and toward each other, and those instincts of right which we can trust even if we cannot justify. It Avas no ar bitrary command which forbade those who had been made eye-witnesses of the Lord's majesty to tell the vision before He had risen from the dead ; they could not have told it aright, and others could not have understood it ; but they had seen that majesty, and thereafter they could not be as if they had not seen it. Was there not, we may ask, some radiance from their faces which showed that they had been with Christ in His glory, even before the time came when they could tell to ears that were prepared for it the story of the vision ? And when at last it was told, it came as a strong confirmation of faith, and was handed on down the ages, that we might be assured of that in Avhich we have be lieved, and know that our profound convictions and our deep experiences — our visions of the Godhead of Jesus Christ — are no mere fancies or delusions ; they are the most real, the most precious, of all the things which we can knoA\r. 70 The Transfiguration. [Serm. IV. J Nor is it ourselves alone to whom they have been granted. All Christian men, as they have drawn nearer to Christ, have seen and known Him bet ter. And nowhere has there been the nearer approach, and therefore nowhere the brighter and more satisfying Arision, than in this blessed Sacrament to which we are about to draw near. For there, in proportion to the strength of our faith, Ave all, with open face, behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord ; and seeing this we are changed into the same image from glory to glory. "They are things wonderful which he feeleth, great which he seeth, and unheard of which he uttereth, whose soul is possessed of this Paschal Lamb and made joyful in the strength of this new wine." Eye-witnesses of His majesty, it is for us to live as in its bright ness, it is for us to carry its radiance with us, it is for us to await the day of its perfect revela tion. SCIMUS QUONIAM CUM APPARUERIT SIMILES EI ERIMUS QUONIAM VIDEBIMUS EUM SICUTI EST YALE UNIVERSITY L I 3 9002 08540 2312 ft _j: