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Second Sunday of Lent
March 1 2026
The Lord said to Abram:
“Go forth from the land of your kinsfolk
and from your father’s house to a land that I will show you.
“I will make of you a great nation,
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
so that you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you
and curse those who curse you.
All the communities of the earth
shall find blessing in you.”
Abram went as the Lord directed him.
R. Lord, let your mercy be on us, as we place our trust in you.
Upright is the word of the Lord,
and all his works are trustworthy.
He loves justice and right;
of the kindness of the Lord the earth is full.
See, the eyes of the Lord are upon those who fear him,
upon those who hope for his kindness,
To deliver them from death
Our soul waits for the Lord,
who is our help and our shield.
May your kindness, O Lord, be upon us
who have put our hope in you.
Beloved:
Bear your share of hardship for the gospel
with the strength that comes from God.
He saved us and called us to a holy life,
not according to our works
but according to his own design
and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began,
but now made manifest
through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus,
who destroyed death and brought life and immortality
to light through the gospel.
Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother,
and led them up a high mountain by themselves.
And he was transfigured before them;
his face shone like the sun
and his clothes became white as light.
And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them,
conversing with him.
Then Peter said to Jesus in reply,
“Lord, it is good that we are here.
If you wish, I will make three tents here,
one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”
While he was still speaking, behold,
a bright cloud cast a shadow over them,
then from the cloud came a voice that said,
“This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased;
listen to him.”
When the disciples heard this, they fell prostrate
and were very much afraid.
But Jesus came and touched them, saying,
“Rise, and do not be afraid.”
And when the disciples raised their eyes,
they saw no one else but Jesus alone.
As they were coming down from the mountain,
Jesus charged them,
“Do not tell the vision to anyone
until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”
>"All the communities of the earth shall find blessing in you.” Abram went as the Lord directed him.
>He saved us and called us to a holy life, not according to our works but according to his own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began, but now made manifest through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus...
“This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”
We began Lent last week with the figure of Jeshua in his most human form, alone, hungry and tormented with Satan's very attractive offers of easy times ahead. Who does not know how such prospects would make you feel. Hard to resist!
Today, in Act II, the figure of the Saviour is transfigured. He is declared not just another human but the Father's beloved son.
As a whole, the selection of readings offers on a wide canvas for us to see what it all means. The central message is one to which, in our discussions about religion, we may not always give full weight. Yet it is the most fundamental of all.
Whether you are Jewish, Christian or Muslim, your starting point is, and must be, that God has spoken to his people. God has intervened in human affairs. We may well say that all religions are man-made, and I agree, but here we find ourselves involved in something that is far more than any man-made religion, something of divine origin.
What does it mean to say that God called a man named Abram to be the first human person in a new life-experience destined to embrace the whole of humanity? In this first moment of Abram sensing a divine call human evolution reached a new high point. Person to person communiaion is no longer limited to signs and sounds shared between bodily companions; the Spirit - the Creator Spirit - is initiating a parent to child dialogue with a thoughtful and responsible adult. Human life is opened to a new dimension.
The only response available to Abram is Yes or No, for he knows nothing beyond the fact of being called. And Yes is the expected, the essential requirement to move on to the next stage.
That is the starting point of the spiritual journey for everyone - that Yes to the Father. It is called a Yes of faith, but here faith means trust, for Abram has no idea of what's going on other than the sense of being called. But he does become convinced that he is called for the start of something big. As the story goes: "All the communities of the earth shall find blessing in you.”
And then the vital key in extraordinary understatement: Abram went as the Lord directed him.
Is it any wonder that such an act of faith/trust would be reckoned as justifying him (making him holy and pleasing to God), as Paul says. The Prophet of Islam, Muhammed, saw in this the key to life itself - that we surrender to God, that we say Yes to the Holy One's call to 'be holy' as He is holy.
And here, on this holy mountain, with the three disciples bowing their heads to touch the ground, the voice comes from the cloud enshrouding the Divine Presence: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”
Note there are two parts to this: the one affirming the identity of Jeshua; the other his mission. He is a teacher, showing us the Way to God: "Listen to him!"
We are moving along our annual pilgrimage in the footsteps of the Saviour as he walks resolutely towards Jerusalem and his great ordeal. We will not, we cannot, go the whole distance with him, choosing to submit to a very nasty end. But we can listen to him as he says on that fateful night: "Father, not my will but thine be done."
We may close with Paul's insightful words pointing out that this is the Father's planned design from the beginning. It is not our doing but we are recipients of God's free gift, manifest in the Saviour Christ Jesus who is the Father's beloved Son
He saved us and called us to a holy life, not according to our works but according to his own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began, but now made manifest through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus...
Paul writing to his own disciple and friend, Timothy,