Justice Lessons from the Transfiguration
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Justice Lessons from the Transfiguration
Herb Montgomery | February 13, 2026
If you’d like to listen to this week’s article in podcast version click on the image below:
Our reading this week is from the gospel of Matthew:
Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.” (Matthew 17:1-9)
In our reading this week, we encounter the gospel of Matthew’s version of Jesus’ Transfiguration. This story is often read as a moment of divine revelation and confirmation of Jesus’ identity. Yet when read through the lens of our justice work today, the scene becomes not only a mystical vision but also a political and ethical declaration about power, authority, and faithful resistance to injustice.
Jesus is transfigured on a mountain, his face shining and his clothes dazzling white. He is joined by Moses and Elijah—figures who embodied God’s liberating justice in Israel’s history. The Torah is not abstract morality; it is shaped by the experience of an oppressed people freed from imperial domination. Moses represents the law born out of liberation from slavery in Egypt, while Elijah represents prophetic resistance to corrupt power, especially in his confrontation with King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, who used state violence and religious manipulation to exploit the poor. Together, Moses and Elijah symbolize God’s enduring commitment to liberation and prophetic justice. Their appearance affirms that Jesus stands firmly in continuity with these traditions, not apart from them.
The context of the Transfiguration is crucial. Just before this scene, Jesus predicts his suffering and execution and calls his followers to take up their cross. In the Roman world, the cross was a tool of state terror, one used to crush resistance and enforce social order. The Transfiguration does not negate this path but confirms it. God’s affirmation, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him,” comes not in spite of Jesus’ commitment to confronting injustice, but because of it. Divine glory is revealed not through domination, but through solidarity with the oppressed and faithful resistance to the violence and injustice of unjust systems.
Peter’s impulse to build three dwellings for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah reflects a familiar temptation: to preserve the spiritual moment and remain on the mountain. When read in the context of our present momeant and the current demand for voices on the side of justice, Peter models the desire to turn faith into private spirituality rather than public responsibility. But God’s vision for justice cannot be contained. The disciples are commanded to listen to Jesus, not enshrine their experience. As Black poet and teacher Carl Wendell Hines, Jr., wrotein his 1965 poem “A Dead Man’s Dream,” “It is easier to build monuments than to build a better world.”
Peter’s impulse to build shelters for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah at the Transfiguration can be read not simply as awe, but as a revealing moment of resistance to the costly demands of justice. On the mountain, Peter encounters a dazzling, validating religious experience: Israel’s law and prophets stand affirmed, Jesus is glorified, and divine approval is unmistakable. In response, Peter wants to institutionalize the moment. He proposes structures or sacred spaces that would preserve the revelation, contain it, and perhaps also control it.
Peter’s desire reflects the human temptation to remain on the “mountaintop” rather than descend into the valley where suffering, oppression, and conflict persist. Mountains are places of clarity, safety, and privilege. Valleys are where demonized migrants are being detained, where unjust systems grind people down, and where standing up and speaking truth carries risk. Building shelters on the mountain would allow Peter and the others to preserve this moment, to protect it from the messy realities of getting one’s hands dirty with the reality of social inequality below. But the Hebrew prophets, whose tradition both John and Jesus stood within), had dirt under their fingernails.
This instinct to control revelation on the mountaintop parallels how religious institutions sometimes prioritize preservation over justice in our time. Faced with injustice, communities of faith often choose to protect tradition, status, and comfort rather than confront systems that harm the vulnerable. For us, then, the Transfiguration is not a call to withdraw but a call to prepare to engage. God interrupts Peter’s plan with a command: “Listen.” Listen to Jesus. And what Jesus has just been saying before and after this scene, is about standing up for life and confronting the powers of death.
Jesus does not stay transfigured on the mountain. He comes down and immediately encounters the Roman oppression and Temple complicity again. In this way, the story challenges faith communities today. Authentic spirituality is not about building monuments to holy moments or defending institutional privilege. It is about allowing those moments to propel us back into the world, where justice, healing, and solidarity are urgently needed. The glory of the mountain exists to empower the courage required in the valley.
The Divine call to listen to Jesus in our reading this week holds deeper meaning for us, too. It means following Jesus back down the mountain, into the valleys where the guilty are justified and violence is committed against the innocent and those who resist. The cloud that overshadows the scene, telling Peter, James and John to listen to Jesus, reminds us of the cloud of divine presence in the Exodus folklore, when God traveled with a displaced people through the wilderness. In Matthew’s transfiguration, the Divine voice once again aligns itself with those on the margins of power, not with empire or the elites, and the command to “listen to him” elevates Jesus’ teachings. Jesus insisted on mercy, welcoming the stranger, economic justice for the poor, enemy love, inclusion of the excluded, and the humanity of those the system had valued as the least. In this way, the Transfiguration in Matthew’s Gospel challenged those complicit with Rome. It challenges Christian complicity with nationalism and injustice today too. Following the Jesus of the Transfiguration means aligning oneself with the liberation and courageous truth-telling found in the stories of both Moses and Elijah.
In Matthew, when the Transfiguration vision ends, only Jesus remains. Moses and Elijah fade, not because the law and prophets are discarded, but because they find a renewed expression in the model of Jesus’ teachings and actions. For Christian communities committed to social justice today, the Transfiguration proclaims that the struggle for liberation even against the impossible odds faced by slaves in Egypt, the courage of prophetic truth telling and speaking out against Ahab and Jezebel, and Jesus’ costly path of standing up to complicity with imperial harm in the face of being threatened with a cross, are all the very places where God is present.
For Matthew’s audience, following Jesus meant stepping into a living tradition of liberation and prophetic courage that stretches back through Moses and Elijah and continues in our social justice work today. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Moses represented God’s decisive intervention on behalf of the oppressed. The exodus is not merely a spiritual metaphor; it is a concrete act of liberation from economic exploitation, state violence, and dehumanization. To follow Jesus today, then, is to inherit his commitment to justice and freedom. It is to stand with those trapped in modern Pharaohs, systems of injustice and harm, and to declare that such systems are neither natural nor ordained.
Elijah embodies another essential dimension of this tradition: speaking truth to power. Elijah confronts kings, exposes the violence hidden behind religious and political respectability, and refuses to bless unjust arrangements. His prophetic voice in the stories insisted that faithfulness to God cannot be separated from justice for the vulnerable. Jesus stands squarely in this lineage. Like Elijah, Jesus names the lies that sustain oppression; like Moses, he announces a way out. When Jesus proclaims good news to the poor and release to the captives, he is not starting something new. He’s bringing this ancient struggle to its fullest clarity and urgency.
To follow Jesus today is therefore not primarily about private piety or institutional preservation. It is about joining a movement of liberation and truth-telling in our own context. I can’t help but think of the courage being demonstrated in Minneapolis at this moment. Following Jesus means challenging laws, economies, and cultural narratives that crush the vulnerable, even when doing so is costly. It means organizing, resisting, and reimagining community in ways that reflect God’s desire for abundant life for all. In this sense, Christian social justice work is not a political add-on to faith; it is the faithful continuation of the work begun with Moses, sharpened by Elijah, and embodied in Jesus. Ours is a path that still leads from bondage toward freedom, from silence toward courageous truth, from death-dealing crosses of state violence to triumphant and overturning resurrections.
Discussion Group Questions
1. Share something that spoke to you from this week’s podcast episode with your discussion group.
2. How does Matthew’s Transfiguration inspire you to leave the mountain and engate justice work in the valey? Share and discuss with your group.
3. What can you do this week, big or small, to continue setting in motion the work of shaping our world into a safe, compassionate, just home for everyone?
Thanks for checking in with us, today.
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My latest book Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political and Economic Teachings of the Gospels is available now on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and also on Audible in audio book format.
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Right where you are, keep living in love, choosing compassion, taking action, and working toward justice.
I love each of you dearly,
I’ll see you next week.
New Episode of The Social Jesus Podcast
A podcast where we talk about the intersection of faith and social justice and what a first century, prophet of the poor from Galilee might have to offer us today in our work of love, compassion and justice.
This week:
Season 3 Episode 8: Justice Lessons from the Transfiguration
Matthew 17:1-9
For Matthew’s audience, following Jesus meant stepping into a living tradition of liberation and prophetic courage that stretches back through Moses and Elijah and continues in our social justice work today. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Moses represented God’s decisive intervention on behalf of the oppressed. The exodus is not merely a spiritual metaphor; it is a concrete act of liberation from economic exploitation, state violence, and dehumanization. To follow Jesus today, then, is to inherit his commitment to justice and freedom. It is to stand with those trapped in modern Pharaohs, systems of injustice and harm, and to declare that such systems are neither natural nor ordained. Elijah embodies another essential dimension of this tradition: speaking truth to power. Elijah confronts kings, exposes the violence hidden behind religious and political respectability, and refuses to bless unjust arrangements. His prophetic voice in the stories insisted that faithfulness to God cannot be separated from justice for the vulnerable. Jesus stands squarely in this lineage. He’s bringing this ancient struggle to its fullest clarity and urgency. In this sense, Christian social justice work is not a political add-on to faith; it is the faithful continuation of the work begun with Moses, sharpened by Elijah, and embodied in Jesus. Ours is a path that still leads from bondage toward freedom, from silence toward courageous truth, from death-dealing crosses of state violence to triumphant and overturning resurrections.
Available on all major podcast carriers and at:
Finding Jesus: A Fundamentalist Preacher Discovers the Socio-Political & Economic Teachings of the Gospels.
by Herb Montgomery
Available now on Amazon!
In Finding Jesus, author Herb Montgomery delves into the profound and often overlooked political dimensions of the gospels. Through meticulous analysis of biblical texts, historical context, and social discourse, this thought-provoking book unveils the gospels’ socio-political, economic teachings as rooted in a profound concern for justice, compassion, and the well-being of the marginalized. The book navigates the intersections between faith and societal justice, presenting a compelling argument for a more socially engaged and transformative Christianity.
Finding Jesus is not just a scholarly exploration; it is a call to action. It challenges readers to reevaluate their understanding of Christianity’s role in public life and to consider how the radical teachings of the gospels can inspire a renewed commitment to justice, equality, and compassion. This book is a must-read for those seeking a deeper understanding of the social implications of Christian faith and a blueprint for building a more just and inclusive society.
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