"Be ye transformed." The first step is consecration. We must give our selves unreservedly to Him. In preceding verse St. Paul says, "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable 4o God, which is your reasonable service." If we are not willing to give Him full control, to make Him King of our lives, He can not transform us. He could transform Peter, and Paul, and Stephen, but He could not transform Judas or Ananias. If we are honestly willing, He can come in and His presence will transform our lives. Nothing temperamental or physical can hinder Him—it is the light that shines and not the lamp. I shall never forget n illustration in this connection that I heard Dr. Jowett use in Westminster Chapel. "It is the light that shines he bade us remember, "and not the lamp." It matters not how beautiful the exterior of the lamp. unless there is a light within, it will not give light to the house, And sometimes the spirit of the light, which is the same for all, seems to shine with the greater glory in the less pretentious lamp.
One other word. May I suggest for your private study and meditation that you will find a wealth of symbolic meaning in a devotional interpretation of the details of the Gospel narratives of the Transfiguration. For instance, "His face did shine," says St. Matthew. Those who e much in the presence of God bear this mark of Christ within. Like Moses coming down from the Mount ter forty days of communion ith God, there is a glory on the face evident to all. There is an element of truth in the reputed request the vage made the missionary, that he would give him some of the stuff that he gave his converts to make their faces shine. Then we read that "His raiment became shining, exceeding white as.snow, so es no fuller on earth can white them." Transfigured garments. Garments mre always symbolical of habits. The transforming power will affect every department of our life, and even manifest itself in our humblest daily habits. You cannot have Christ in you and t show it by word and deed.
Then notice the cloud. According Matthew's version "a bright shadowed them," and cloud God speaks. The cloud is not taken away, but, if we will allow it, clouds of calamity will ight to one of the branches?
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.