This reflection was written by the College’s chaplain, the Rev. Jim Slack, for this week’s Wingèd Ox, a weekly news digest distributed to the college community. You will find reflections from previous weeks here.

In 1995 singer and song-writer Joan Osborne released an album called Relish, the most popular track being One of Us.

The hit song may be best known for the question asked in the chorus:

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Tryin’ to make his way home?

She’s wondering about the nature of God, and perhaps the Incarnation.

My favourite lines come in the second verse:

If God had a face, what would it look like?
And would you want to see
If seeing meant that you would have to believe
In things like heaven and in Jesus and the saints
And all the prophets?

We might ask the same questions of Peter, James and John on the Mount of Transfiguration.   As Jesus’ popular ministry in Galilee was drawing to a close, and he began to talk with his disciples about the betrayal and death that awaited him in Jerusalem, he took three of them up into the hills.  In the Matthean version of the event we read that Jesus was transfigured before them, his face shone like the sun, and his clothing became white as light.  Moses and Elijah appeared with him.

Peter’s first thought was to memorialise the event, but before he even finished making his proposal to build three shrines, a glowing cloud of God’s presence obscured his vision.  And then God spoke, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

That is, “Listen to what Jesus is telling you on the way to the cross.  Trust that this is an integral part of my plan.”

Even so, Peter stumbled forward, through Good Friday, Easter, Pentecost and his vision in Caesarea, still needing further convincing that God’s salvation story was grander than anything the fisherman could imagine.  His experience at the Transfiguration did not erase ignorance or doubt.

Perhaps you pray to see God or to hear God’s voice, as you face one challenge or another.  Would seeing the Almighty, or hearing the Divine Voice take away your freedom to choose; would you be obligated to believe?  Would such experiences nullify faith?

Of course not.  Being forced to believe and obey has never been God’s way.

Faith is trust in the Lord of Life, over time.

Seeing or hearing God in one moment allows us to take one more step.  Like the manna which sustained the Israelites on their way to the Promised Land, our encounters with the Holy One are bits of a life-long encounter, received and renewed each day.  Sometimes these morsels are rich and filling, and at others they seem meagre and unsatisfying.  But whether spectacular or mundane, they are of God.

Not long after the Markan account of the Transfiguration a father, thankful that Jesus had freed his son from an unclean spirit, seems to have spoken on our behalf, saying “I believe; help my unbelief.”  Such is the way of faith, on majestic mountain tops or in shadowed valleys.

Jim Slack
Chaplain