God: "Take your son Isaac, your only son whom you love ... offer him up as a holocaust.
"I swear, that because you acted as you did in not withholding your son, I will bless you abundantly and make your descendants as countless as the stars" (Genesis 22).
In today's Gospel, we hear God taking the initiative again, to make a new covenant. But now it is offering God's very self in the person of Jesus: "This is my beloved son, listen to him" (Mark 9).
These words fall on Jesus at what we call "The Transfiguration" when Jesus takes Peter and James and John to the high mountain. Here is "transfigured" before their eyes, and Elijah and Moses appear, conversing with Jesus. It was immediately after this event that Jesus began his final journey to Jerusalem. There he was condemned and was crucified - and rose from the dead!
At Lent, we are called to a sort of "transfiguration." We are called to turn away from what keeps us separated from God. We are called to our own journey: through all of the grief and pain and sorrow of life - to - the the glory of our own resurrections!