February 15, 2026

"We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty. I speak to you this morning in the name of God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. Please be seated.

These moments of great clarity, of a sense of power and a sense of awareness of God's presence in our life are incredibly profound when we have them. And they're often moments that in some ways are unexpected. Even when we seek them out to sort of set ourselves up for this moment, this mountaintop experience, we can very often find ourselves surprised or caught off guard by the ways in which they manifest in our lives. I had just this past week an example of that for myself.

As you all may be aware, there has been a group of Buddhist monks on a 108-day journey from their monastery in Fort Worth, Texas to Washington, D.C. And right at the very end of that journey, as they entered into Washington, they were invited to stop by the National Cathedral. We had a group of members of the Episcopal clergy delegation, our bishop, the dean of the cathedral, and actually a gathering of about 300 interfaith clergy leaders from around Washington, D.C., who all gathered to welcome them. And it was this moment of clarity and insight for me.

As I've shared previously with you all, part of my journey many years ago now—as I realized early on in my college career that I was not the Christian that I had grown up to be, that I did not affirm or connect to the tradition of Christianity that I was raised in—I spent several years in a kind of interlude period practicing a form of Japanese Zen Buddhism. And it was actually through that experience that I came back into my Christian faith. But not only that, I learned in the course of those years the multiplicity of Buddhist experiences that exist around the world. Just like we have all of our different proclivities, denominations, uniquenesses, the Buddhist world too has a number of different lineages and traditions and denominations.

And not only were we gathered this past week at the National Cathedral as a group of interfaith clergy, but the monks had been joined in these final stages of their walk by other Buddhist monastics, other venerable monks from around the D.C. region. There were about a hundred of them from all different traditions, all different lineages. The closest parallel that I can offer to you all this morning would be to suggest that we join with a walking pilgrimage led by, say, Southern Baptists or Presbyterians or other evangelicals that we might have deep theological differences with—and yet we find this moment of commonality in what they are offering, what they are giving to the world.

There was something profound about this message of peace that these monks have been bringing, a message of peace that has resonated with almost every sector of society. The lead monk, Bhikkhu Panakkara, had on his stole or his sash that he was wearing a number of law enforcement emblems—I'm blanking on the term at the moment, but badges that he had been given by sheriff's departments, by other law enforcement agencies—and then a number of other pins representing a variety of different communities and groups. It was this incredible image of recognizing how all sectors of society have been touched by this proclamation of peace that they are offering.

As a Christian, as someone firmly and solidly rooted in my own Christian faith, I saw in their message of peace the reflection of the Prince of Peace, our God, who manifests in Jesus Christ, who is the sole salvific presence in the world, but who expresses that truth throughout all people and in all cultures. As we elevate the Prince of Peace, we see even in brothers and sisters of other faith traditions the permeation of that peace. It is, in a way, a mountaintop experience that helps clarify and enlighten the image of who God is in the world around us.

These mountaintop experiences are complex, though, often because they can be so very fleeting. You know, it's instructive for us not only to hear what we hear in our reading today, but to be reminded in all experiences of this light—this light coming among us, this transforming and transfiguring light. Every human who has ever experienced it has nevertheless, eventually, inevitably, fallen short at some point again in the future.

Our Eastern Orthodox brothers and sisters talk about this transfiguring experience as the uncreated light of God, the uncreated light that is the source of everything. It is the light that was in the beginning that brought forth all other elements of created order. It was the light that permeated the journey of Moses in his life from the burning bush through the experience that we hear referenced in our Old Testament reading today, that cloud of witness on Mount Sinai, Mount Horeb. It was the light that the disciples see in the Transfiguration. It is the light that transforms and radically alters the life of the persecutor Saul who becomes the evangelist Paul. It is the light that permeates us every time we have this great clarity in our own mind, our own being, our own lived experience of God's presence among us.

And then, inevitably, we have that place where that light begins to flicker a little bit, where we start to wane in our attention, our centeredness, where we fall and stumble yet again. We don't live into the fullness of what God is inviting us into. I think it's instructive for us to have this moment of reminder of the Transfiguration at this outset of Lent. This is a reading we have every single year of the lectionary cycle in which we hear the story of the Transfiguration. We are reminded anew that we start on this place of highness, this place of intimacy with God in the fullness of God's light.

So many of us so often live into our Lenten disciplines with a vigor, with a commitment to this kind of transforming life, whatever it is that we feel called to take on in disciplines and in new practices. And yet, without fail, I dare say each and every one of us will slip. We'll have a moment where we didn't quite hit the mark, where whatever it is that we intend to do doesn't quite come to fruition in the way we want it to. And yet, on that great night of the Easter Vigil, at the very end of our Lenten journey, as we hear that ancient homily from St. John Chrysostom, we are reminded that the light continues. No matter how well we have been able to maintain it in our lives, or how poorly we've maintained it, we nevertheless are still invited into the great banquet feast of Christ. The redeeming, transforming, renewing presence of God abounds even when we fail to do exactly what we have set out to do, failed to maintain that mountaintop experience in the depths of the valleys, sorrows, and struggles that we encounter in the world and in our lives living in a world of brokenness.

Today, too, is Scout Sunday. Every February, we honor our connection to the scouts and to the tradition of scouting in the United States. We have, as I think many of you know, both a Boy Scout troop and a Cub Scout pack that we charter here at the church. And so we honor and lift up the experience of scouting every year at this time of year. Scouting, at least in the United States and since the 1970s, has also had a connection to light. At the very end of a young child's journey in Cub Scouts, they go through a ceremony called the Arrow of Light, this passage into the larger scouting tradition that moves into Scouting America and into the different activities and ways in which you continue to grow and nurture your mind, your body, your soul.

I think there's a beauty in recognizing the importance of light playing into that transition, into that movement forward. The great scout oath that every scout, myself included, memorized in our heart, begins: 'I will do my best to do my duty.' There's an honesty in that. There's an honesty in recognizing that even when we have this moment of insight, this great moment of light in our lives, we are only ever capable of doing the best that we can do, recognizing that many times we're going to fall short of that ideal.

But there's another precept in scouting: the motto of Scouting, 'Be Prepared.' It reminds me of our journey back at the beginning of the liturgical year in Advent, where the very first thing we hear every year is 'Stay awake, be alert, be prepared.' This experience of these mountaintop moments so often shape and form us in these deep, rich, transforming ways. But they're so often very fleeting, so very momentary. In the grand scheme and course of our lives, our call so very often is to work on that experience, that practice of alertness, of preparation, of return and renewal when we haven't quite hit the mark. All of that is of a piece. All of that is part of our larger journey as human beings.

So today, as we encounter this great story of the Transfiguration, as we have this moment of mountaintop clarity of Christ's divinity and of God's presence in the world around us, and as we prepare to enter this season of Lent in which we will acknowledge our places of shortcoming and brokenness and commit to working on them, transforming them and renewing them—may we come to that moment of light with a recognition of what it is. A recognition of it being that place of centeredness, that flame that we continue to cultivate and kindle. And inevitably, in those moments where it flickers, where it wanes, where we lose focus, may we come back to it again. May we find in it a source of renewal in this season and time of renewal that we are about to enter.

Bhikkhu Panakkara ended his commentary on each and every stop along the way as they journeyed from Fort Worth to Washington with an invitation for those listening to take on an affirmational practice every morning of getting up and saying to ourselves: 'This is going to be my peaceful day.' As Christians who worship the God who is the Prince of Peace, as we seek peacefulness not only in the world around us but within our very selves, as we enter this time of preparation to acknowledge and receive the world-altering, world-shattering gift of salvation that Christ accomplishes on the cross—may we see in that the in-breaking of peace that is at the very heart of the light of God that comes among us.

In a world that is so chaotic and uncertain right now, may this transforming light be that light of peace that we continue to embrace and feel. And in the times where we forget it, may we be reminded anew of the invitation we have to turn again, to re-embrace it, and to recenter ourselves on the presence of God in this place and in every place, at every time. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."

February 8, 2026

I've mentioned before the great Old Testament scholar, specifically scholar of the Psalms, Walter Brueggemann, who grew up in a Reformed tradition but joined the Episcopal Church. He said that he joined the Episcopal Church because we actually sang all the Psalms. So many traditions will exclude certain of the Psalms because they're uncomfortable or they're too difficult for us to understand. And he said, "You all use the whole of the Psalter, and that drew me to your tradition. But you set those Psalms to such beautiful music that you do not know often what you are singing."

He went on to say—and this is where I was thinking about him again today—that that was true of a lot of our hymnody. He said that we, especially as Protestants, sing so gustily, so proudly, some of these ancient hymns of our Protestant tradition, and yet they have the worst theology. We sing attributes of God that are horrendously misplaced or misunderstood. But today, today we have one of the great hymns of our Protestant tradition that is also incredibly rich in its theology.

"God of Grace and God of Glory" was written by Harry Fosdick, who was a Baptist pastor who lived through the horrors of World War I and penned this hymn in 1930. It was written in that interlude period in the immediate aftermath of the Great Depression in the United States, on the cusp of world tensions and difficulties that people were already peripherally aware of. Fosdick wanted to call our attention to all of those challenges—to recognize where we were as a people and where we were emotively in the moment of so much turmoil and uncertainty.

"Lo, the hosts of evil round us scorn thy Christ, assail his ways. From the fears that long have bound us, free our hearts to faith and praise. Grant us wisdom, grant us courage for the living of these days." The fears that bind us—it's so healthy and appropriate to name that. How prescient that same feeling feels in this moment: the feelings of uncertainty, of fear, of the collapse of everything that we thought was so stable and good.

But this experience of that pain and turmoil is not new. We've been in similar places before. And our invitation, beyond our readings today and where we find ourselves in the church here, is to return to the God who sustains and creates and evermore cares for us. We are invited to ask for that wisdom and courage. Those two things are not separate, but intertwined: the wisdom and courage to be faithful livers of this hour.

To be the people of God's compassion and kingdom means engaging in God's work of resilience, restitution, and transformation. It is through that wisdom and courage to stand and speak that we have the ability to move emotionally—to not simply get caught up and taken with the anxieties of the moment, but to be able to respond to them and offer something of value, meaning, and transformation.

One of my professors in seminary often talked about the fundamental character of the gospel as being a comfort to the afflicted and an affliction to the comfortable. The more I have sat with that adage over the years, the more I think it is not simply a truism, but a reality of our complicated lives. Even as individuals, we are often experiencing both of those realities in the present moment. There are parts of our interbeing that are afflicted and in turmoil, where the gospel is a comfort in places of deep distress where we feel there is no light on the horizon. We are given the wisdom of that better future and the promise that all will be made right.

But also, many of us often have those places of comfort, stability, and ease to which the gospel afflicts us. These are the places where we need to have courage—courage to accept that we are being called into a challenging and fraught space. Our faith is not just about a place of grace and comfort for ourselves, but the work of transformation and the good news we are called to share with the world. Both of those things are fundamental to how we move forward as Christians.

Jesus' admonitions in the gospel today are a good example of this tension. He says two different things that we hear in different ways depending on our locations. For some, we hear an admonition to the law—that we are to be abiders of the law. For others, we hear a challenge to the way the law is being lived out, such as the corruption of the law by the Pharisees and scribes. Both of those things are co-equally present in what Jesus says today.

We have to step back and ask what this means for us. This particular gospel passage has been a fundamental aid when we get caught up in trying to structure concrete parameters around how we are to live. Throughout the centuries, we have often fallen into the same pitfall as the Pharisees. We take the law as the landscape of acceptable behavior and the boundary markers for where we can go. Then, we draw even narrower boundaries for ourselves, being even more restrictive to ensure we don't approach a violation.

Yet, what Jesus points to is that the law was never intended to be those boundary markers. From the beginning, the law was intended to be the starting point. It was not a perimeter, but an embarkation. It is the least of what we are to do, and very often, we are called to more. We follow the law as a guidepost to live most fully and expansively into the things God is calling us into: compassion, hospitality, goodwill, and care.

When we look at the world today, we see violence and discord. We see the state of migrants, refugees, and people in our own context who have been left behind by social systems. We find people who need care and love, yet we find a system that objectifies, suppresses, and alienates. The law of abundance we are called to live into is this law of compassion and care in those spaces of brokenness.

I want to acknowledge a practical matter. We sometimes get tied up in knots over whether or not to act because we don't know the implications of our work. Last weekend at our diocesan convention, we passed a resolution to strengthen our efforts to support the migrant and refugee community in Washington D.C. I supported and voted for it because of the labyrinthine challenges they face.

However, someone in my community shared that it's not a black-and-white issue. In responding to the migrant crisis, the District of Columbia has offered greater access to subsidized housing, which has, in essence, further restricted access for existing people who were already trying to receive support. I went back to understand this more fully, and there is truth to it. Affordable housing is at a crisis level. Because of the current political moment, many resources are helping migrants navigate the system, while some who have been long in the system are getting lost.

This made me realize that even in the good we were doing, there is an unintended consequence impacting another community that also needs love. The question for us is not "which option do we go with?" or "what is the lesser of two evils?" but "how might we continually strive to live most abundantly within the law of compassion?" Yes, what we did was a holy thing, but what more can we do?

Our black-and-white, bifurcated ways of viewing the world are insufficient for this moment. I come back to the words of the hymn: in that space of inadequacy where we feel we cannot do enough, we have this plea to be granted wisdom and courage for this hour. Even if it’s messy, even if it doesn't completely hit the mark or fix every problem, may we live with wisdom and courage, doing everything we can to be a people of good news.