Second Sunday of Lent: Desire to be Known

Here we are, nearly two weeks into the Season of Lent: a season that calls us to get serious, to unclutter our hearts and ready them for Easter. So why are we hearing about this rather fantastic story of Jesus’ Transfiguration? Shouldn’t we be hearing some Gospel message that tells us to carry our cross?

The purpose of this mountaintop revelation of Jesus’ divine nature, was to give his inner circle of disciples a glimpse of his true identity, to offset the gruesome display that they would soon see. When all the powers of evil would converge upon him, Peter, James and John, would have the memory of what they witnessed, as well as the memory of what Jesus had told them—that he would go to Jerusalem, would suffer greatly, be killed, but then be raised on the third day.

And so, as we, in these days of Lent, move toward the fateful journey encounter the cross, we are reminded of this truth about his identity.

But aside from the purpose and timing of what’s described on the mountaintop, one thing it says objectively is that Jesus wanted his disciples to know something about him. In fact, one of the things essential to understanding God from a Judeo-Christian standpoint, is that He’s a God who reveals Himself, who acts in human history, who desires to be known, so that He can be in relationship with those to whom He reveals Himself.

It’s the reason there is a Bible. God, working through the authors of the individual books within the Bible, desired to be understood, to be known; God, who walked with Adam and Eve in the coolness of the garden; God, who can still be encountered in the beauty of nature and the wondrous marvels of the universe, all of which reveal an order and arrangement, that only could come from a Creator; God, who took on our flesh, who spoke in intelligible language; God, who reveals Himself to us in what was a piece of bread—He did (and does) all this so that He can be known. The God of the Jewish people, the God of Christianity is a personal God who desires relationship.

We’re like that too. In our hearts, we all desire to be known and to be in relationship—further evidence that we are made in God’s image. Even those of the psychological sciences would say that’s true about us. So, who in your life really knows you? Who demonstrates that they desire to know you? How do they demonstrate it?

Among the concerns in our society, is the disconnect between people. Part of it is that most of us grow up in homes where everyone does their own thing in his or her own space. Perhaps it’s all too common that each person in the family has so much going on—work, sports, etc.—that we have very little time together as families.

And there’s no question that smartphones and the platforms of social media accessed through them are a tremendous factor in our disconnect. Again, the psychological sciences would concur with this. By the way—just throwing this question out there—Do elementary school age children really need smartphones? When all their friends have them, they’ll want to convince parents that it’s as essential as oxygen.

But all this disconnect and isolation also has us living in the shadows: My private life, experienced through my phone. I can access so much stuff that I would never want anyone to know about, and thankfully they don’t. The devil loves it when we live in the shadows.

Part of the problem is that the disconnect we experience tends to make us believe that no one desires to know us, and that begins to shape our self-perception. We seek affirmation through the shallow engagement that comes through electronic communication. It’s there that we seek affirmation and to feel that we’re loved.

By the way, I’m not suggesting that we immediately start peppering each other with 21 questions. Parents, I’m aware that your teenagers many only know how to answer your questions with Frankenstein-like grunts and one-syllable answers. They will be uneasy with that kind of attention.

But maybe during Lent, instead of continuing to be disconnected from each other, we try to disconnect from the things that cause the disconnect. Maybe we can put the video game controller away for a while. Maybe there are no cell phones or other screens allowed at certain parts of the day, except for essential communication.

Much of getting to know someone is spent just being together, even in our non-verbal experience. I know it’s not easy, because of how we’ve become conditioned. But the disconnect that has become our norm is undermining family, as the cell of society and as the domestic church. And ultimately it’s destructive to our self-perception.

We all want to be known, just as God wants to be known by us. The God who invites us to walk with him to the cross, wants us to know that he’s willing to accept suffering, because he loves us more than we can begin to know. In this Lent, let’s work more at getting to know Him, as individuals and as families.