This weekend we bring to completion the 12th week after Pentecost. Our celebration is also enhanced with our celebration of one of the major feasts of Our Lord, His Transfiguration. The message of this feast influenced my understanding of the message given to us in the assigned readings.

Our Epistle, taken from Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, is an exhortation to understand the message he preached. That message was: Christ died … and rose on the third day. In other words, Paul preached that Jesus, whose way of living he was sharing, proved the truth of His message by His resurrection and that the Jesus message should be embraced because of this fact.

Our Gospel reading, on the other hand, speaks to us about the danger of riches. The passage we use is presented as Jesus’ response to this question put to Him: What good must I do to possess everlasting life? Jesus’ response was this: If you seek perfection, go sell your possessions and give to the poor. You will then have treasure in heaven.

Now the message of the feast that we celebrate is this: Personal change or transformation is essential if we desire the fullness of life which can only be achieved when we live in the way God intended humans to live when He created them.

God’s revelation to us through the transfiguration of Jesus is this: His Spirit dwells within us – we are the temples of His Spirit. This event in the Lord’s life, His transfiguration, is meant to bring us insight into this important reality of our humanity.

The Transfiguration reminds us and reveals to us that the purpose of this earthly life is to provide us with the opportunities to really change ourselves in such a way that our thinking and behavior reflects our awareness that God is within us.

When we were born, the potential to become more like God was planted in us. The task of life is to actualize this potential by putting on the mind of Christ – to becoming like Him in our thinking and behavior. God proved the truth of this message by raising His Son from the dead.

One of the things that can help us in this pursuit of personal change is true detachment from the things of this world. When the things of this world are not the main focus of our lives, we can more easily attend to the task of becoming more like Jesus.

What profit is it to you if you gain the whole world but lose your very soul?