Water into Wine

Folks, we worship a God who loves to talk.  This God is verbose, garrulous, loquacious, longwinded, chatty, talkative, vociferous; this God just loves to talk.

 

I mean some gods, when they create a world, have to go to war against the dark god chaos, while others have to dazzle us with wild tales of procreation; but the God we worship – the God we know in Jesus Christ – is said to have been existent in the beginning.  When the earth was formless and empty and darkness covered the face of the deep the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters and God said, “Light!” and there was light.

 

The next day God said, “Sky!” and there was sky and the story goes on as God plans for new things to spring forth at his spoken word.

 

It’s then not surprising that Jesus comes of age by heading into Galilee preaching.  The God of Creation whispers existence and vegetation and creatures into being; Jesus Christ preaches joy to the weary soul that has only known darkness.

 

And we have a loquacious God.

 

Because Jesus Christ loves to talk we shouldn’t be that astonished by his first miraculous sign.  People who love to talk are right at home at parties and this is where we first find Jesus.

 

When we find Jesus turning water into wine at a Wedding Feast in the Gospel of John we are reminded of the main criticism of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel.  Jesus’ main criticism wasn’t his Biblical interpretation or theology; his main criticism wasn’t his political leanings and his constant assault on the Pharisees and the Sadducees; his main criticism wasn’t how liberal or conservative he was.  Jesus’ main criticism, especially in Luke is who he ate and drank with.

 

When Jesus was invited to the house of a tax collector, Levi, the Pharisees found out and asked, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”

 

Jesus’ response was, “Well the healthy don’t need a doctor; the sick do.  I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

 

Again, the Pharisees continue, “John the Baptist’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.”

 

Jesus’ response was, “Can you make the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them?...”

 

So now we’ve got this disciple of John the Baptist who just loves to talk, and who also just loves to eat with sinners, and might I add one more thing; this guy just loves to die for people under 30.

 

We have this God who loves to talk finally showing up where normal folks like us hang out.  We’re at a wedding reception – and in the days of ancient Israel these feasts would last about a week long.  One thing most of us don’t realize about the real miracle at the wedding feast at Cana is that if you were the host or hostess of the event and you ran out of food or drink you would basically be a laughing stock for the rest of your life.  I mean there were no cars in those days and most people didn’t own camels so people didn’t travel much.  So the people you invited to your wedding were people from your community who you’d be interacting with for much of your life.  This is something you would never live down if it happened to you.  So, whoever the host or hostess was that day so long ago in Cana was about to come face to face with public humiliation when the wine ran out.  Enter Mary.

 

Now get this, especially all you mothers out there.  The Bible says that when the wine ran out all that Mary did was turn to Jesus and say, “They have no more wine” (v. 3).  Jesus’ response is typical of any young adult who is volunteered to do something by their mother.  He says, “Dear woman, why do you involve me?  My time has not yet come” (v. 4).  Scholars will tell you that the response has to do with Jesus’ destiny – the cross.  To me it sounds like my response anytime my mother has volunteered me to do something I never wanted to do in the first place.  “Dear mother, my time has not yet come!  Stop volunteering me for things I don’t want to do!!!”

 

But, as any wise man would do, Jesus obeys his mother, his name remains in her will, and Jesus gets a bunch of the servants at the wedding to fill up 6 stone jars with water.  Now these jars intrigue me, because they say that they hold 20-30 gallons of liquid – which is more than twice the size of my car’s gas tank – and by now the jars are filled with water.  Jesus instructs the servants to draw out the liquid and give some to the master of the banquet.

 

The master of the banquet, who did not know what had happened, tasted the water that had become wine 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” (v. 10).  And to make matters worse the New King James Version of the Bible ends the story this way:

 

This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and his disciples believed in him.  (v. 11)

 

Well, tell me, what exactly did they believe in?  Perhaps that Jesus should go into catering?  Or perhaps Jesus might do best coming to the Niagara Region and become some sort of wine connoisseur?  I just see this text and think to myself, Jesus just loves to die for people under 30!

 

I mean, if I could turn Pepsi or Coke into Jack Daniels or milk into Smirnoff Ice surely I could convince a young adult or two to become my disciples.  Jesus takes a crowd at a wedding and turns the water into wine and his disciples believed in him.  Wow!  That’s all it takes to win a crowd over.

 

But I’ve also got some concerns about Jesus’ ministry.  The text is very clear that Jesus’ wine was better than the stuff they had just run out of, and that the people at the party had already had too much to drink when he offers the more expensive tasting wine.  My question is, “Who is this Messiah that encourages people to drink too much?”  Does Jesus not care about alcoholics?  He is revealing his glory by encouraging the drunkards to drink EVEN MORE!!!  As the hooligans often exclaimed in the first Batman movie starring Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as the Joker I exclaim too, “Who is this guy?”

 

Well, I’ll tell you who this guy is.  This guy is what scholars will call a Jewish Apocalyptic Prophet.  The most important word here is apocalyptic - the word apocalypse just means unveiling or revealing, or literally “lifting of the veil”.  The last book of the Bible has traditionally been called the Apocalypse or the Revelation.  That is what the term means – the hidden will be found and revealed.  Jesus’ signs, like the Wedding at Cana, are signs of what God is unveiling.  As Bart Ehrman, an agnostic scholar of the New Testament, argues:

 

Throughout the earliest accounts of Jesus’ words are found predictions of a kingdom of God that is to appear, in which God will rule.  This will be an actual kingdom here on earth.  When it comes, the forces of evil will be overthrown, along with everyone who has sided with them... (Ehrman p. 251).

 

Ehrman’s study of the New Testament has deepened my faith in ways that are difficult to articulate.  But let me unveil what is really going on in the water to wine episode.

 

I had told you that Jesus turned the water into wine because of a wine shortage that would make the hosts of the wedding feast laughing stocks in their village for the rest of their lives.  Jesus goes toe-to-toe with shame and says, “I don’t think so!  These are God’s children!”  Our God’s will is very simple, folks.  God is relentlessly attempting to get back everything that belongs to God.  Jesus is assaulting the forces of darkness that erode and disassemble human solidarity – which, itself is a sign that God is getting back everything that belongs to God.

 

That’s why so many of our Jesus stories are about wining and dining.  God is gonna get back everything that belongs to God.  God sees nothing more profound than people doing things together.  Let me get at the significance of what I mean.

 

When I was living in downtown Toronto, one of my brothers lived on the streets of the city.  He would stop into our apartment usually once-a-month to collect his paycheque, but rarely otherwise.  At that time I was working in Whitby, Ontario, and my sister, who I shared an apartment with, was heading to Ottawa by train sometime that morning.  All I remember is that I woke up listening to my sister walk around the apartment at like 9 in the morning.  About 10 minutes later I heard the front door slam and assumed that she was gone.  I went back to sleep, and soon heard the front door open.  I looked at my clock and it was after 9:30 – it couldn’t be my sister because her train left Union Station at 9:30.  I went back to sleep, and just after 10 got up.  I open my door and notice that the front door’s still open, which made me a bit nervous.  I look around our living room – nothing.  I head to the bathroom and peek in – nothing.  I peek into my sister’s room – nothing.  I head into the kitchen – nothing.  I glance into our sunroom – it’s my brother.  For some reason I recall being shocked, but I really shouldn’t have been.  I guess I was just still creeped out by finding the front door wide open when I woke up.

 

Anyway, my brother and I hung out for awhile that morning.  We had a Starbucks across the street and were too lazy to make our own coffee so I ran and got us some from there.  After we were done our coffee I say to my brother, “If you leave, please make sure to lock up.”

 

I didn’t come home until about 9:30 or 10pm and I walked up the stairs to the back door of our apartment and all the lights were off and the door was wide open.  I grew slightly annoyed as I assumed that my brother had left without having locked the doors.  I walk into the sunroom and make my way to the kitchen and flick on the lights as I enter.  I move further into the apartment and peak into my sister’s room – there’s my brother asleep on the bed.  I withdrew my irritation and thought I’d like to get a nice slice of cheese bread.  I go into the kitchen and the bread I had just bought that morning was 2/3rds gone.  It was obvious who had eaten the bread, but that’s not what disturbed me.  I decided that I wouldn’t eat the bread because my brother had cut it up and probably not washed his hands, and was homeless...as soon as I thought that to myself I grew worried.  I heard Martin Luther King, Jr. cry out:

 

Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.  (Letter from Birmingham Jail).

 

We were imprisoned by the dark depths of prejudice.  I regarded my brother, a homeless man, with prejudicial treatment.  I began to surmise, NO WONDER OUR WORLD IS SO MESSED UP!!!  If I think about my brother this way, how is it that others think about their neighbours?  Jesus ends up at a Wedding Feast to decry those who would inflict the deadly insults aimed at a host who had miscalculated the volume of alcoholic beverages required to keep the crowd comfortable at the celebration.

 

At the same time, there are some who just don’t care whether we throw insults at them or not.  There are those who just don’t care whether we approve of their lifestyle or not.

 

Down in the southern United States a church congregation had received funds to operate a program to make the homeless more employable.  They thought to themselves, wouldn’t it be nice if the Bishop could come and bless our grand opening?  And so they called up the Bishop and invited him to come to give a blessing to the program.

 

The Bishop begins speaking, “Well it’s just wonderful that you folks have started this program and it is even greater to see so many potential clients here whose lives could be changed and yada, yada, yada...”

 

In the middle of the speech some bum at the back calls out, “Well did Jesus ever have a job?”

 

The Bishop was surprised by the question, but responded carefully, “Um...normally I don’t get to talk with people who’ve actually read the Bible...but we just don’t have enough evidence – the Scriptures say that his father was carpenter, but other than that we just don’t know.”

 

“Well, fine,” the homeless man says, “Did he ever have an apartment?”

 

“Well that, my friend, I can tell you with certainty.  Jesus once said, ‘Foxes have holes, but I have no place to lay my head.’  So no, Jesus did not have a home.”

 

The man huffs, gets up, and looks at the hundreds of people gathered at that church and says, “To hell with you folks, I’m sticking with Jesus!”  And he squares his shoulders, turns and walks out.”

 

Somehow I think that turning water into wine isn’t so much about us putting an end to poverty, or an end to homelessness.  It seems to me that ridding the world of shame and humiliation, and in turn, loving our neighbours as ourselves is more about teaching ourselves to become neighbourly – to not assume that the homeless man has something wrong with him and that that’s why he’s homeless.  God is gonna get back everything that belongs to God.  Amen.