The Transfiguration gets a remarkable amount of attention in the lectionary. Someone should write a paper on it someday… No matter.
On the Last Sunday of the Epiphany, we enter a contemplation of this amazing revelation of Jesus in the few remaining days before Lent. Luke 9:28-43 has all the features—Jesus and his intimate circle of friends, the conversation with Moses and Elijah, the affirmation of the Father for the Beloved Son, being left with only Jesus, the hiddenness of this revelation, and Jesus’ deliverance of the boy waiting for him at the foot of the mountain.
Well, it’s worth looking at the topic of conversation. Moses, Elijah, and Jesus have a conversation about his departure. Most English translations give you a footnote in order to signal the opportunity there is to geek out. The word here translated departure is very specific. It’s exodos. The same word for God’s deliverance of Israel from Egypt. The redemptive work that Jesus is about to accomplish in the cross and resurrection is so fundamentally similar to God’s deliverance of Israel that they can use the same word to describe it.
It tells us that the work Jesus is doing is with a mighty hand and outstretched arm. It tells us there are enemies who will be put down.
It also tells us the wilderness is next. Lent is coming.