8-4-17 - Power and Light

I am intrigued by the physics of the Transfiguration. Did Jesus become filled with blinding light, did he reflect the light of God – or did he become light? My pet theory is that in that moment Jesus let slip the veil of human flesh that contained him during his incarnate life in this world, and manifest the light of which he was fashioned. “I am the light of the world,” he said. Physics tells us that light is one form of energy. God, the essential energy of the cosmos, can manifest anywhere along the spectrum – perhaps in that moment the Son of God became pure, blinding light.

The idea of God as pure energy, the source of all energy, helps to make sense of the miraculous, and aligns with much scientific thinking (not that I understand the scientific thinking well enough to talk about how it aligns… I only know many physicists think so). If I had my druthers, I would refer to what Jesus called “the kingdom of God” as “the energy field of God” – that seems a more descriptive label.

If all matter is really energy, it makes sense that Jesus invites us to tap into the Energy that launched the universe, in which all things are restored to wholeness. That is what we are doing when we pray, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” We are praying ourselves into the energy field of God, and as we become comfortable channeling that energy, we become better conductors of it into the realm of this world.

Of course, energy can be harnessed to destruction as well as growth. The same Sunday when we celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, August 6th, is the day that marks the atomic bombings of Hiroshima in 1945. In that blinding light was unleashed enough energy to flatten a city, turn many of its citizens into walking torches, and poison the survivors with radiation that affected generations. Without arguing the factors that brought about that event, I think we can agree on the tragedy of death and destruction of ordinary people on such a scale. God’s gifts to us can be used to build or to tear down, to give life or to bring death.

God has made us stewards of the power that generated worlds. Even now, God invites us to dwell in his energy field, to become conductors of Holy Spirit power into broken people and systems, governments and communities. Perhaps this power of God, wielded in faith, can even heal the damage we have done to this earth we call home.

Where are you being called to be a conduit of light and energy? God’s Power and light?

Come Sunday, let us grieve the lives lost 72 years ago, and the human ways of dealing with conflict that brought about such an event. And let us celebrate the power Jesus showed for just a moment on that mountain, so his followers would have a visual image of the Life of God that he demonstrated in every word and miracle, even in his death, and certainly in his resurrection. That power is given to us. It is made perfect In our weakness. Let God wield it through you.