Tuesday after the Festival of the Transfiguration of our Lord
Posted on February 8, 2022 by under
Scripture: St. Matthew 13:36-43 (NKJV)
13:36 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house. And His disciples came to Him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field.”
37 He answered and said to them: “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. 38 The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. 39 The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels. 40 Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. 41 The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, 42 and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!
Devotion
Want to know what you are going to look like when Jesus raises you from the dead? You need not fret about it. Jesus tells you. “Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.”
And you may say, “But I am not righteous. I have no righteousness.” And you are correct. Indeed, you have no righteousness of your own, on your own. But God has created faith in Christ’s righteousness in you by the work of the Holy Spirit through Word and Sacrament. By faith in Christ’s righteousness you assume His righteousness. By His power you believe in Christ, and your faith in Him is credited to you as righteousness.
During the week after Transfiguration we see Jesus shining like the sun. By this we get a vivid image of the way we will look when He comes again. Christ will put his righteousness on you who believe in Him. We will thus be like Him. Only those who are clothed like Him can enter the doorway to heaven, to God’s eternal feast. We will shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of our Father!
Prayer: O God, Who in the glorious Transfiguration of Thy Only-begotten Son, hast confirmed the mysteries of the faith by the testimony of the fathers, and Who, in the voice that came from the bright cloud, didst in a wonderful manner foreshow the adoption of sons: Mercifully vouchsafe to make us coheirs with the King of His glory, and bring us to the enjoyment of the same; through the same Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
