WATER TO WINE John M. Suchanan

John 2:1-12 Broad Street Presbyterian Church
January 16, 1983 Columbus, OH

The purpose of this enterprise is nothing less than the redemption of the
whole creation, /The iible is not at all modest in the way it describes it: the
reconciliation SeEiie world, the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth;
to heal the whole universe, to save the human race. We need an occasional
reminder that the goal of this project is cosmic in dimension, and that, from
the beginning, the strategy has been to do it by seeing to the conversion of
individual people, singly, laboriously, one at a time,

The assumption, from the beginning, has been that individuals, in order to
participate in the reconciliation and redemption of the whole creation, need to
change. The assumption throughout the Bible and throughout the whole fascina-
ting panorama of this enterprise has been consistently that God's Xingdom is
peopled by folk who have changed, repented, stopped doing old things, begun to
do new things; in short, people who have been converted 7“) ee ae

We need a blunt reminder on occasion because there is within those asser-
tions, when they become organized and institutionalized, an almost irresistable
propensity in the direction of dulling the cutting edge, sanding off all the
abrasive surfaces, and forgetting the original purpose of the enterprise.

We need the reminder because when religion gets itself institutionalized,
it seems to be concerned most strenuously with the survival of its own insti-
tutions. In fact, if you ever wish to document the need for people to be con-
verted, and the irrelevance of a lot of organized religion to that need, all
you need to do is list the instances when the church of Jesus Christ took
positions, served its own purposes, but which would have appalled Jesus Christ
- such as refusing to admit Black people, or to ordain women, or baptizing
with respectable piety political systems which are cruel, inhuman and oppressive.

It is not possible to read very far in the New Testament without encounter-
ing a reminder of this purpose and these assumptions. The lesson, this morning,
for instance: the introductory story about the ministry of Jesus as it is
presented in the Fourth Gospel.

Why in the world did Jesus show up at that wedding in Cana? What does it
mean that he changed water into wine at that wedding? It would have been a
seven-day festival. It began with a gala processional in which friends of the
groom escorted the bride to his house for a wedding supper, followed by a
seven-day period of uninterrupted celebrating. There is an ancient tradition
that Mary, motner of Jesus, was the aunt of the groom and that he was none
other than John the son of Zebedee who appears elsewhere in the Gospel narra~-
tive. There is no documentation of those traditions, but it is certain that
Mary and Jesus, if not related, were close friends of the groom and his family.

When they arrived in Cana: Jesus, his mother, and friends, the supply of
wine for the festivities suddenly and unexpectedly ran out. Scholars who comb
through the details of these matters suggest that Jesus and company either came
late in the week, or were unexpected guests, or ~ because of their poverty -
neglected to follow the near Eastern custom which was, and in some Arabic cul-
tures still is, bringing one's own wine to add to the common supply for the party.

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Whatever the reason, the wine was gone, and we may deduce that the groom was .
furious, his mother frantic, his father humiliated, his bride in tears. Mary
apparently knew them well enough to feel part of that pain herself, as only

good friends can.

She called the distressing situation to Jesus' attention and he made a
strange request. Near the entrance to the house stood six large stone jars.
They were part of the foyer furniture of all houses. Their function was to
hold the water for the various rites of purification practiced in a Jewish
household. Several times a day, including meal time, the Orthodox washed
their hands. When guests arrived, they used a bit of the water in the jars
to wash. The jars, by the way, each held twenty-to thirty gallons.

Jesus told them to fill these jars with water which the servants did,
though one can't help but imagine that they were less than enthusiastic about
their curious assignment. The professional host, or steward was summoned.

When he tasted the contents of the jars he discovered very good wine; so good,
in fact, that he chided his employer for not serving the good wine first.

The obvious inference is that after several days of party no one notices the
difference if the quality of wine suddenly changes. And so the party continues
now with Jesus and friends in attendance, and with at least 120 gallons of good
wine to keep it going.

What does it mean? It helps, first, to note that the author calls what
happened a sign. The fact that changing water into wine is improbable, unlikely,
impossible in fact on the basis of anyone's understanding of chemistry, seems
not to concern him at all. "The author”, Roman Catholic scholar Raymond Brown,
points out, "mentions the miracle almost as an aside." The physical makeup of
the contents of the jar is not the astounding thing here, therefore: the power
and grace of Jesus is.

Signs, of course, point elsewhere. It is the essence of a sign not to
call attention to itself but to direct it elsewhere. There is a sense in which
a sign which receives too much attention actually begins to violate its own
purpose, as anyone has discovered, for instance, who is so busy collating, C/K 7
comparing, and computing the information that comes at one on the Signs -at=the- ,
confluence of Routes 315, 670,.and—33-that one ends up at Ohio _stadium rather fr gtr.

than Broad Street—Church. h~ ak 7 be

We would like to know how it is that H70 becomes Chablis, and that Western,
scientific curiosity serves us extremely well except here, because the author
apparently neither knows nor much cares. The text will not yield an answer and
one of the reasons is that it doesn't ask the question. The sign points not to
better life through funny chemistry but to this extraordinary person. It is a
sign pointing to Jesus.

It points, I believe, to the fact that things get changed in contact with
Jesus. I began by suggesting that Christian people - need the reminder that
this is so. It is part of our humanity, I would submit, not to want to change,
to assume, rather, that though others may need to expand their horizons, grow,
change, repent, the status quo in our lives is actually quite good the way it
is. Liberal Protestantism, someone noted, has left the whole idea of conversion
to the fundamentalists. We find the soul-shattering, emotional upheaval commonly

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identified with conversion so distasteful that we keep the idea at arm's length.

But in that process we miss the essence and much of the power of our faith we

espouse. There are legitimate reasons for not agreeing with the guilt inducing, is
hellfire and brimstone tirades of the fundamentalist evangelist. But predic- ge 2
tably, our reaction has been to the opposite extreme. If making people feel Aw “a aN
bad is wrong, American Protestantism spends a lot of energy making them feel \ ge ys
good. A book crossed my desk recently under the curious title "Self Esteem - fe Ss
The New Reformation": it is not a bad book actually, but the title must have \% iv
the Reformers, who thought too much self was near the heart of the human problem, 4X
sighing in disbelief. William Willmon, writing recently in the Christian Century, Ww
said, "Unfortunately, we have psychologized the gospel, turned it into a feeling, 4%
transformed the kingdom of God into a mood. We have deluded ourselves into

thinking that the Messiah we await is the great cosmic affirmer of everything we

hold dear." (Christian Century, 12/8/82, page 1247)

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Part of both the joy and the task of being a Christian is change: personal
change. The power has always been in the way discipleship to Jesus gently leads
us to change the way we treat others, the way we spend money, the way we esta~
blish personal priorities, the way we cast our ballots. The power of our re-
ligion is best seen in the changes it has already affected: it was Christianity
that brought orphanages to Rome and the end of gladiatorial murder as public
entertainment. Hospitals were a Christian invention. The early educational
institutions in the New World were begun, without exception, either by clergy,
or to train clergy, or both. We have changed human history, and the same
dynamic which is evident on a grand scale operates personally. The analogy is
a poor one, but the most important people in life, are the ones who have forced
us to change: the ones who saw more in us than we ever recognized: the teacher,
coach, friend, parent who caused us to grow. That is near the essence of the
Gospel of Jesus Christ, and it is the first reality to which the sign of Cana
points.

| The second is that Jesus, and therefore Christian faith, is comfortable / /), ‘S
with the world as home. Madeleine L'Engle, in a wonderful essay on love and 4 t |
marriage, To a Long Loved Love, writes, "Too many people would like to forget WS
that Jesus’ first miracle was turning water into wine at a marriage feast, in a
glorious affirmation of human love, human joy, human pain."

John the Baptist, to whom some. of Jesus' disciples were attracted, would not
have been caught dead at that wedding celebration. Nor would many of the more
vocal Christians I know today. One hundred and twenty gallons of wine would have
them heading for the exits, At the outset of the Fourth Gospel, however, the
author wants his readers to understand that you don't have to be other-worldly,
long-faced, and grimly pious to follow Jesus.

It is a word the church in every age has desparately needed to hear. We
have flirted constantly with that old Greek dualistic philosophy which regards
the created order, the flesh, the world of senses, feelings, appetites, sounds,
colors as evil and the world of the spirit, ideas, soul, clearly the more 1%
appropriate and holy. The Christian church has never been sure that God knew ,
what he was doing when he created human beings with bodies instead of allowing
them to exist as inanimate spirits. From its celibate clergy, to its contem~
porary aversion to honest sex education, much Christianity seems to have con-
cluded that human sexuality is a big cosmic mistake.

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Soren Kierkegaard remarked somewhere that while Jesus turned water into
wine, his church seems determined to turn the wine back into water.

The second reality to which the sign of Cana points, I believe, is the
consistent goodness of the creation and the consistency of the Gospel with the
good gifts of life in all its dimensions.

The third reality to which Cana points is, quite simply, Jesus himself.
As the scholar Raymond Brown taught us earlier, "The purpose of the sign...is
revelation about the person of Jesus...What shines through is his glory, and
the only reaction that is emphasized is the belief of the disciples."
(Anchor bible, p. 103)

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The sign of Cana is Jesus himself, getting involved in a mundane human “"~ 4) -)
situation, helping along a wedding celebration about to end prematurely for :
lack of refreshments. Compared to that - compared to the assertion that pir
Almighty God gets himself involved in that sort of thing, the mere changing of
water to wine, pales in drama. The Incarnation is and always has been the real
miracle. The person of Jesus - the Christ - is the staggering assertion here.

The Holy God come among us in the flesh in the life of one who cares about
things like a wedding celebration, and the birth of a child, and the graduation
of a son, and the death of grandparents; the God who cares so deeply about the
day to day living of the people he has created that he gets into life with them.
Incarnation. Jesus the Christ. The Miracle.

The conversion: the change at the heart of Christianity is not simply
moral improvement, although that is the result. It is not the change to be more
liberal politically, or more conservative: it is not to change life styles,
although that will surely happen. The conversion is to Jesus Christ. The
invitation is to accept his Lordship: to live in relation to him, in obedience
to hts will.

I need the weekly reminder in worship, near the béginning, when we are
told: “In Christ we become new people altogether." /The Good News is that in
Christ we are accepted and forgiven by God, the paét is finished and gone. But,
for my money, the best news of all comes next: In Christ, everything has
become fresh and glorious new."

And so, may we sing it once more:

"Joy to the earth! The Savidr reigns! K)
Let men and women their songs employ. -
While fields and floods, yYocks, hills, and plains

Repeat the sounding joy AMEN.