On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.” “Dear woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My time has not yet come.” His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim. Then He told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.” They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside and said, “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.” This, the first of His miraculous signs, Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed His glory, and His disciples put their faith in Him. (John 2:1-11)
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Preaching last week on “Life Of Pi” was a great experience, and a worthy one at that - since I believe that since everything that is comes from God basically anything and everything is a sermon waiting to happen; you just have to look hard enough to find the message of the gospel in it. Having done, that, though (at least I think I did!) I don’t want us to get off balance in terms of what’s really important, and so it seemed to me that one sermon based on Life Of Pi, should be balanced with some reflections on “Life Of Jesus,” and so I’m going to spend the next seven Sundays looking at significant events in the life of Jesus, after the temptation narratives but before the entry into Jerusalem. What do we learn from Jesus’ life? Not from His teachings (which are also important of course) but from his life; not from what he said but from what he did?
If time travel were possible, I would love to travel back to the late 19th century to have a conversation with Letitia Youmans about today’s Gospel passage. The name might not be familiar to you. Letitia Youmans was basically the leader of an organization which eventually came to be known as the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. The WCTU was absolutely and totally opposed to Christians drinking alcohol of any kind. Their influence was important in causing many churches to use grape juice instead of wine at Communion services. The WCTU explained that wine contained "the narcotic poison, alcohol, which cannot truly represent the blood of Christ." I’d be fascinated to see what the WCTU would have to say about this passage in which Jesus acts - for lack of a better word - as a vintner; a maker of wine. Perhaps that’s why this passage often gets overlooked when we consider the great events in Jesus’ life. Yes, we know it’s His first miracle; that we’re told. But then we don’t think about it too much. A hint of how beloved a Scripture passage is can be found in how many times a hymn writer chooses imagery from a passage as the basis of a hymn. Voices United has almost 900 hymns in it. Do you want to know how many of the 900 refer to this event? Exactly 1! And I’m not using that hymn today because it’s not really about this passage; it just makes a reference to the passage. And in all my research, I’ve only come across one other hymn that refers to Jesus turning water into wine; a more modern hymn written in 1973. You see, this passage often gets ignored, because even in the modern world the image of Jesus as a party-goer grates on a lot of people. A lot of people still have trouble with the image of the laughing Jesus. But Jesus at a party? But that’s exactly what today’s Gospel describes. Jesus, His mother and some of His disciples were at a party; they had been invited to what we would call today a wedding reception. And we, the church, aren’t quite sure what to make of a party-going Jesus who makes sure that there’s enough wine for the guests.
I admit myself that this seems like a strange way for Jesus to reveal his miracle-making ability. I mean, why not calm a storm as the first miracle? Or feed some hungry people? Or heal a sick person? Or raise a dead person? Why not do something really dramatic that future generations of Christians wouldn’t feel at all squeamish about commemorating with songs? Somehow, we expect more of Jesus, don’t we?
This is the Son of God! This is God in the flesh! And He goes to a party and turns water into wine. Well, I suppose if His goal was to reveal His power, He accomplished it. I mean, people don’t turn water into wine. Water is water; wine is wine. You can turn water into something that looks like wine. To do that you need sodium carbonate and a chemical called phenolphthalein. I don’t believe that Jesus would have had access to either in the Palestine of 2000 years ago, and in any event, you can’t really drink the stuff made with sodium carbonate and phenolphthalein, but the master of the banquet tasted what Jesus had created and declared it to the “the best.” So, it was wine - alcohol and all. It’s a dramatic revelation of Jesus’ power, I suppose, but it also has the tinge of a parlour trick, don’t you think? At best, it seems like something a magician might pull off. At worst, it seems mundane; pedestrian; unimportant and insignificant. So what? Jesus turned water into wine. So what? It’s dramatic, but what did it accomplish? What good did it do?
By the time Jesus’ life ends, of course, He has accomplished a lot and He had done a lot of good. By the time Jesus’ life ended He had calmed a storm, He had fed the hungry, He had healed the sick and He had even raised the dead. But it all started with a curious little miracle of little importance that seems to have accomplished little purpose except to make sure that the party was a success. Jesus’ first miracle was to rescue a party that seemed to be going downhill because the wine had run out. And you know what? The more I thought about this, the more I realized - maybe this isn’t only the first miracle of Jesus; maybe it’s actually the most important miracle of Jesus. Not the most dramatic; not the most helpful; not the one that touched the most people - but maybe the most important.
By saving a party that was going nowhere fast because there was no wine, doesn’t Jesus essentially associate Himself with the mundane and unimportant things of everyday life? And if Jesus was God in the flesh, doesn’t that tell us something about God? Maybe the first miracle had to be something quite unimportant and even trivial, because if Jesus had started with something big, the implication would have been that God only cares about the big things in life - and in everything else we’re on our own. We see that expressed often. When a football player prays before a game, we say “God doesn’t care about a football game.” But think again. If God cared about a party, God probably cares about the football game. Do you know why God cared about the party - because God’s people who were at the party cared about the party. Do you know why God cares about the football game? Because God’s people who are at the football game care about the football game. We want to limit God to only the biggest and most earth-shattering things. Healing the sick and raising the dead by all means. Feeding the hungry and caring for the poor? Absolutely. The particular troubles and trials and tribulations that I’m going through right at the moment. Well, sure - because they’re my troubles and trials and tribulations, and that makes them important. But saving a party? Or blessing a football player? Say it ain’t so. It can’t be. But I want to ask - why can’t it be?
Did Jesus not say “I am with you always …” He didn’t say, “I’m only with you when you’re facing the biggest challenges.” He didn’t say “I’m with you for only the most important things.” He said, “I am with you always.” The miracle of turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana is a sign to us of God’s presence in the everyday things of life that so many people want to declare off limits to God because God should only deal with the big things, as if God’s attention span was as short as ours, and as if God were incapable of multi-tasking.
I will confess to you that in one sense I really couldn’t care less that Jesus turned water into wine. I don’t much care for wine. I really don’t. It’s not a temperance issue. I just don’t much care for wine. I couldn’t tell the difference between a $5 bottle of plonk and a $200 bottle imported directly from France. Nor do I care. I hear people talk about the aroma and the flavour of wine. To my taste buds, wine is wine. I’ll never be a wine connoisseur, so, in a way, this miracle fizzles a bit. But then I think about it. If Jesus cared this much about saving a party, how much does he care about the admittedly trivial things that sometimes get to me? Is there anything so inconsequential that I can’t “take it to Jesus,” so to speak. The wedding at Cana tells me that, no, there isn’t. From the big things to the small things, Jesus cares. From the earth changing and life changing events to the things that don’t much matter and are barely remembered an hour later, Jesus cares. To me, that’s the message of this passage, and that’s the point of this being Jesus’ first miracle. It’s to make sure we understand that Jesus cares about it all!
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