But, on the Feast of Pentecost, we remember that the Spirit is not simply, now and always, present and active in the world but was sent specifically to Jesus’ disciples and is sent to us today. And our readings this morning point the way to understanding why.

Imagine if we modeled ourselves on the Ethiopian eunuch – learners rather than teachers; explorers rather than experts; making room to listen to others rather than inviting them in to listen to us. What transformation might the Spirit have in store for us; what invitation into the way of God; what fruits, to borrow Jesus’ metaphor for a moment, might we produce?

The disciples are in the resurrection path of totality and they have the special glasses. They are looking directly at the Son (pun entirely intended) and having an astonishingly dramatic experience. They will go and bear witness to this experience, just as Jesus tells them to do

Easter answers one question – God’s love is absolutely stronger even than death – and then immediately asks another: so now what?

Thanks be to God that we are a Good Friday people – called to see the world as it really is – broken and despised, fearful and violent, and also, always, loved and redeemed. So come – come to the foot of the cross; come in penitence; come in need… and come in hope-filled thanksgiving for the love that is stronger than sin, stronger than despair, stronger than death.

The story of Holy Week is not just another story. It is the story that makes us who we are – the formational memory of the community of the church, the Body of Christ. We don’t just tell this story – we live it, in the rituals of this week but more also – and more importantly – in our lives.

And so the question for us, as followers of Jesus, is how do we need to die – what do we need to lay down or renounce or accept – so that we can enter into eternal life – not in some otherworldly afterlife but this very day and every day to come?

This is what Lent is about – preparing ourselves for this work of self-giving AND of resurrection – it is a journey to the cross and the tomb and through to the promised Easter garden.

And through is the only way to get there. There can be no resurrection if there is no death.

Jesus may have been the one who was outwardly transfigured but it was Peter and James and John who were changed by what was revealed on that mountaintop, called to go beyond what they knew and embrace Jesus in a more complete way; to listen to him and obey his instruction to take up their own cross and journey with him down the mountain.

Readiness for a new beginning is, perhaps, the most remarkable thing about Simeon – even more remarkable than his faithfulness in waiting or his ability to recognize the Messiah in the unlikely form of the baby Jesus. He was able to release what was finished and embrace the new beginning that God had prepared; to lay down his previous role with grace and humility and hope.