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Exodus 24:12-end; 2 Peter 1:16-end; Matthew 17: 1-9Lent and mystical encounterIt’s hard for me to believe that Lent begins again in only three days from now. Time seems to move so quickly. Once again, the Church gives us the story of a mountaintop experience to reflect upon - that of the Transfiguration of Christ. This is paired with the story of Moses’ encounter with God on Mount Sinai.Now, if you’re anything like me, you might think about Lent with a certain amount of dread. When I mention to my children that Lent is coming up they can see no good in it. For them, it is simply a time when they can’t eat as much sweet stuff as normal.And we can so easily think about things in that way: Lent is just about giving things up and having less fun and so on. Thought about in this way, Lent is very depressing. It can even be life-denying and a kind of rejection of God’s good creation.But what if we reframe this slightly? Let’s say that Lent is not so much about giving stuff up or even doing more but about seeking an encounter with God, seeking a mystical union with the divine presence.I believe that making changes in our regular patterns of behaviour can be very beneficial. The effects can be physical, psychological or spiritual. So, if I said to you, that Lent gives you an opportunity to be united with the divine presence and so to know greater peace, love and joy, might that be a slightly more attractive picture?But the key to all of this is making the decision to prefer God to everything else. It is to recognise the futility of life without God and of pursuing ends which are less than God.To quote the mystical poet Rumi:‘God said,“The world is a play, a children’s game,and you are the children.”God speaks the truth.If you haven’t left the child’s play,how can you be an adult?Without purity of spirit,if you’re still in the middle of lust and greedand other wantings, you’re like children…The same with the fightings of mankind.It’s a squabble with play-swords.No purpose, totally futile…Don’t wait till you die to see this.’Rumi, A Children’s GameWe see something of this reality in the mystical experience of Moses and the disciples in the story of the Transfiguration.Both of these mystical encounters take place on a mountaintop, far away from the civilised world and the concerns of ordinary life. Moses is told to wait upon the mountaintop. He takes Joshua with him and delegates his great responsibilities to Aaron and Hur. The cloud of God’s glory covers the mountain, and Moses waits for six days in that silence until, on the seventh day, the voice of God calls to him out of the midst of the cloud.How does six days of nothing but silence strike you?Again, in Matthew’s account of the Transfiguration, we are told that Jesus took Peter, James and John with him up the mountain “after six days”. Six days before, Peter had confessed that Jesus was the Christ, and Jesus had told his disciples to take up their crosses and follow him.This six day wait links the story of the Transfiguration with the story of Moses on Mount Sinai. The point being that the same glory that was revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai was revealed to the disciples through Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Both were manifestations of the divine presence.A point I would like to emphasise is that both encounters involved solitude, quietness, and waiting. In Scripture, these things almost seem a prerequisite for an encounter with the divine presence. Perhaps we can learn from this.Lent is not about doing moreOne of the mantras of the modern world might be “more is more”. We are constantly being told that we do not have enough: money, pleasure, success, leisure. Whatever it might be.And this constant hectoring creates a sense of unrest and anxiety. We imagine that, in some state in the future, we will obtain that which we have been seeking and be at rest. But, of course, we can never get there because there is always more.It is important to see that something like this can a