Every Season is a Season of Celebration

St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD

March 2, 2025

Year C: The Last Sunday after the Epiphany

Exodus 34:29-35

Psalm 99

2 Corinthians 3:12-4:2

Luke 9:28-36

Every Season is a Season of Celebration

Let us pray.

O God, whether we are up on the mountaintop or down in the valley, give us the gift of awe, help us to recognize and celebrate your love and your healing at work in and among us.

Amen.

        Well, last weekend, we had a couple of really great days here at St. Thomas’.

On Saturday afternoon, of course, we had our magnificent recital: “A Journey of Song: A Celebration of Heritage and Hope.”

David Marshall dreamed up a beautiful program for us and the musicianship was extraordinary. No surprise there.

But, even more important than the amazing technical skill, there was so much heart – heart that we could all hear in the songs, heart that we could feel here in this old building among parishioners and friends and guests.

For Sue and me, the recital was extra-meaningful because it was a reunion with one of our all-time favorite people, Gail Blache-Gill, who had been the Minister of Music at our church in Jersey City. 

It’s hard to find exactly the right words to describe what it felt like to see and hear Gail sing at St. Thomas’ – it was kind of like weaving together different threads of my life, of our lives, creating something unexpected and new, something that felt just right.

As if that weren’t enough, three of our Jersey City parishioners surprised us by making the trip down to Maryland, transforming the recital into a real family reunion.

So that was amazing.

And then on Sunday we gathered in the Parish Hall for our Annual Meeting.

Meetings can be a drag, believe me I know, but our meeting felt like a celebration – a celebration of your extraordinary generosity, a celebration of all the life-giving ministries that happen here all the time, and a celebration of some big plans in the years ahead:

        We’re going to transform what was formerly the assistant’s house into a home for Afghan refugees.

        We’re going to enclose and memorialize the North Cemetery.

        We’re going to fully rehabilitate the organ, which should continue to serve our church for many decades.

        We’re going to connect to the sewer system (that may not sound glamorous but it’s a big deal!).

        And, lest we forget, we will hire a full-time Assistant Rector so we can do and support even more ministries and help keep me going, too!

        All with God’s help, of course.

        Yes, last weekend was really something – it was a celebration of song and ministry.

        You might even say that, for us, for St. Thomas’, last weekend was a mountaintop experience. 

        And now here we are today.

        It’s the Last Sunday after the Epiphany, the last Sunday before Ash Wednesday and the start of the holy season of Lent.

        And every year on this day in our gospel lesson we hear the story of another mountaintop experience: the Transfiguration.

        As we just heard, Jesus is transformed before their eyes, giving a glimpse of Easter, when Jesus is still himself but also different – a preview of Easter, when Jesus journeys from death to new life.

        In this mountaintop experience, Jesus and his closest disciples, Peter, James, and John, encounter two key figures from Israel’s past, Moses and Elijah.

        On the mountain, Jesus and his friends hear the voice of God: “This is my Son, my Chosen, listen to him.”

        And as suddenly as the mountaintop experience began, it was over.

        It was time to come down the mountain, back into our broken and suffering world.

        Who could blame Peter for wanting to build mountaintop dwellings for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah?

        Who could blame Peter for wanting to stay “up there” forever?

        And then, in the second part of today’s gospel lesson, we get a snapshot of the world’s suffering:

        A father desperately seeking help for his son, for his only child.

        The well-meaning disciples trying to help, trying to fix the situation, but they fail.

        In Luke’s version of this story, Jesus doesn’t explain why the disciples can’t cast out this demon, but in Mark he says that this kind of demon can only be defeated by prayer and in Matthew he says that the disciples just didn’t have enough faith.

        But, far from the mountaintop, in this valley of suffering, Jesus casts out the demon and restores the boy to health.

        Just like for Jesus and his disciples and just like every mountaintop experience, our amazing weekend at St. Thomas’ eventually came to an end.

        We all went back down the mountain to our routines and responsibilities.

        We all went back home to face our challenges and fears.

        At some point, most of us probably turned on the news or doomscrolled through social media, filled with stories of cruelty and violence, suffering and loss. 

        Life is hard in the valley of suffering.

        This is why it is so important for us to be here week after week.

        Now, I’m not going to say that every Sunday is a mountaintop experience, although if our hearts are really open to what’s happening here, then maybe.

        But I will say that, when we’re here together, every season is a season of celebration.

        I came across an interesting quote from Abraham Joshua Heschel, the great 20th century Jewish theologian, philosopher and civil rights activist.

Heschel draws a distinction between entertainment and celebration.

        Entertainment, he says, is a passive state, “it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or spectacle.”

         But “celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation.”  

        So, every time we gather here, it’s a celebration – a celebration of God’s love for us, a celebration of our love of God and our love for one another.

        Every time we gather here – when we hear God’s Word, when we receive Christ’s Body and Blood, when we exchange a sign of peace especially when there’s not much peace “out there” in the world, it’s a celebration.

        Every time we welcome a new Christian in the water of Baptism, that’s a celebration. Obviously. Everybody knows that!

        But every time we gather here after a beloved sister or brother has died, as hard as that is, it’s also a celebration – it’s a celebration because we remember the person we’ve loved and why we loved them and now miss them so much – it’s a celebration because we hold each other up – it’s a celebration because we know that the Transfiguration is a glimpse of Jesus’ future and our own – God will not let go of us, no matter what.

        Even Lent, which maybe doesn’t seem so celebratory, and, considering the grim state of the world, we might even be tempted to skip this year, even Lent is a celebration.

        It’s a celebration to remember that we are dust, totally dependent on our loving God.

        It’s a celebration to repent, to turn around, to be even more loving, more faithful, more generous.

        It’s a celebration to prepare for the biggest celebration of them all – to prepare for Easter.

        It’s at Easter when we learn, when we know, that evil and death do not get the last word – that, even when things look as hopeless as a sealed tomb, even when shadows seem to be blocking all the light, love and life will triumph.

        So, last week we had quite a weekend here at St. Thomas’, days that I know I won’t forget anytime soon.

        And maybe we can’t promise a mountaintop experience quite like that every week.

        But, whether we’re up on the mountain or down in the valley, when we gather here with Jesus and his friends, every season is a season of celebration.

        Amen.