Church.

I go with ridiculous expectations of one hour transformation and come away jaded and disappointed. I go in with a critical heart and am rewarded with much fodder because you get what you are looking for. So this morning I went trying to be a blank slate and praying simply that God would offer a nugget or two from the Word that I had not heard before…this is what I got.

A reading was done from John 2:1-10

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.”

“Woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour 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.”

The scene:

We have a wedding, or more correctly, we are late into the wedding after-party. You know the time – that part of the evening where all of the alcohol has been drank. Generally it is the craziest part of the evening when most inhibitions have been lost and the best stories are being prepared.

It’s at this point that Jesus’ mother Mary comes to him and very simply states – “The wine is all gone” which, for anybody with a mother, means “Do something about the lack of wine”. Jesus is curt and verges on disrespectful “woman, why do you involve me, my time has not yet come”. Still when momma wants something momma gets it but Jesus has fun with it too.

Jesus’ time comes when Jesus decides it will come and now is as good a time as any…in fact it is the best time because this scene is loaded with symbolism and opportunity. Jesus did not need water in order to make wine…being God enfleshed he could simply have apparated it into being. No…Jesus decides he will use the six enormous containers used for ceremonial washing.

I wonder if Mary was panicking by this point? I wonder if she was nagging him about it. “You can’t use those!” Do something else but these are sacred vessels and for the purpose of cleansing not to be used to hold wine!!!”

At this point I imagine Jesus smirking and saying quietly “You asked me to help and this is what it looks like when I help.”

It is at a wedding feast that Christ takes jars designed to hold water used for purification, has them filled with water and transforms it to wine. In this moment it is as if he says “there is coming a time very soon when you will no longer need this water to be clean. Something new has come among you…the kingdom of God has come among you and everything is changing…starting with this.” It is as if he is saying – these jars will soon be useless…and I am the reason.

Christ’s first miracle foresees his last – as the water is transformed into wine in sacred vessels of cleansing for the benefit of the wedding guests so his blood will also become an agent of cleansing and transform those who partake of it – only once they have drank the wine of Christ they will never thirst again and there will no longer be a need for ceremonial jars to contain water for cleansing…let them be transformed into containers for wine that the wedding guests might partake and continue to celebrate.

Of course another interesting point here is that aside from some servants and Christ’s mother no one else really knows of the miracle that has occurred. Like the master of ceremonies they likely assume the groom is just an amazing guy who saved the best for last.

Maybe that is not really the point though. Maybe whether one sees the miracle or not is beside the point. The miracle happens and is effective whether one sees it or not. Christ’s final miracle at the cross was done  relatively alone as well…his mother was there, and two of his best friends, some Roman soldiers…that was it…and yet that miracle transformed everything.

That first miracle at the wedding…it foresees everything and it contains all the brilliant, unexpected, promise of Christ in one moment.

Yeah…that’s what I got this morning. Not too bad.