My wife, Lori has a large family. She has 6 brothers and sisters, plus, kids, grandkids, great-grandkids, in-laws, nephews, nieces, great nephews, great nieces…you get the idea. There’s a lot of ‘em! So, when her family gathers for Christmas, or other holidays… well, it can be a little nutty. What they consider a medium sized family gathering is probably 25-30 people. And if everybody comes…well, the last time that happened, I stopped counting at 50. There is always laughter, and love, and craziness all over the place. It’s really fun.
And the food. Well, it is an impressive thing. For Lori’s family, gatherings become like a feast. It is kind of never-ending.
Lori’s family is also very proud of their Norwegian heritage. So, one year, they decided that for their Christmas Day meal, we would have Norwegian open-faced sandwiches. (Apparently, these are a thing…I had no idea.) Everybody would bring different kinds of these sandwiches, and it would be a big smorgasbord.
But as good as Lori’s family is at planning menus…when it comes to doing math? Maybe not so much. Everyone did bring sandwiches. Everyone brought enough of these specialized, delicate, tasty sandwiches, to feed everyone. In other words, every family group brought somewhere around 40 sandwiches. Which meant that when they were all placed on our kitchen counter, we had inexcess of 250 Norwegian open-faced sandwiches. I did the math. It works out to 6.25 sandwiches…per person.
When we figured out where we all went wrong, all we could do was laugh. But it did fit the Norwegian hospitality ethic: It’s always ok to have leftovers. It’s never ok to run out. Right?
This is the ethic that sits at the center of our Gospel story today. The story begins at a wedding reception. A huge festive celebration with lots and lots of people.
Jesus and his disciples were there. In the middle of the meal Jesus’ mother, Mary, came running up to him. “Jesus, they have run out of wine,” she told him. Now, this was a huge deal. Jewish culture put a lot of emphasis on hospitality…so to run out of wine was a major faux pau; a giant problem. Mary gave Jesus the look. The look. You know the look. The Mom look? The one that says, “You’re going to need to do something about this.”
Jesus asked his mother what she expects him to do about it. “This isn’t really our problem.” he said. “And this isn’t the right time for me to go public with who I am, and what I can do.” Mary again gave him ‘the look,’ and without saying a word, she turned to the servants and told them just to do whatever Jesus said, and then she swept off to comfort the embarrassed mother of the groom.
I imagine that Jesus would have sighed and maybe shook his head a bit. He looked around and spotted six large stone jars in sitting in the corner. Each would hold thirty gallons of water. He told the servants to fill them all to the brim, 180 gallons of water in all.
Then Jesus told the servants to draw some of the water out and take it to the head waiter. From the jar, they drew not water, but wine.
When the head waiter tasted the wine that the servants had brought him, he was overcome with relief. And, it was the best wine he’d ever tasted.
The Rev. Dr. Kristin Adkins Whitesides has written that “for the writer of John’s gospel, signs are important. While in other gospels we hear about miracles, in John, we hear about Jesus’ signs. Because, according to John, the point of Jesus’s healings or his feeding of the five thousand, the purpose of walking on the water or raising Lazarus from the dead, isn’t to reverse something that’s already happened. And it’s not to inspire awe and wonder.
No, for John each of these moments in Jesus’ ministry, these signs, point beyond themselves. They point to Jesus, revealing who he was and what he had come to do. When Jesus turned the water into wine, Jesus revealed who he was…the Messiah…the Son of God. And when his disciples saw this, John writes, they believed in him.
If we look back earlier in John’s gospel, to the story of Jesus calling the first disciples we notice something. Jesus doesn’t say to these fishermen, “follow me,” he says, “come and see.”
- Come and see who I am.
- Come and see what I am about.
- Come and see, what I do.
- Come and see the signs.
Jesus knew that once the people saw, they would believe he was the Messiah. And they would have faith that through him, there would always be an abundance. Which may not mean much when you have enough, but it feels like miraculous good news when you know how it feels to run out.
Let’s think about our own community for a moment. Here, in Owatonna, and in our congregation, there is so many things to come and see…there are so many ways that people can see what God is doing, right here. Just look…come and see what Jesus is up to in our community.
- Come and see the new Lighthouse of Southern Minnesota. It was in the newspaper last week. It’s the new merger of Hospitality House and Rachel’s Light. It will provide shelter and care to those who experience homelessness here. Men, women and children. And now soon…soon there will be a place for families to go who don’t have other options. This is God’s doing, and it is a game-changer!
- Come and see Oak Hill Community Connection provide a space; a space that will allow organizations that care for those who live on the margins to do their work, to steward their resources and to find new ways to collaborate. This is God’s doing.
- Come and see the new relationship Trinity is developing with Kimpangua Lutheran Church, in Singida, Tanzania…and all the new possibilities that will develop to do ministry together. This is God’s doing.
- Come and see this congregation growing in breadth and in depth.
- Come and see over 300 kids participating in our summer ministries.
- Come and see the energy, when this building is full of people of all ages, every Wednesday night.
This is all God’s doing. Come and see what Jesus is up to…right here in Owatonna. Right here at Trinity.
There is so much…so much to come and see!
It seems to me that this story of Jesus turning water into wine is not about Jesus just making people happy at a party or doing what his Mom wants. It’s much more than that.
It is about who Jesus is. In this simple act, he is revealed as the Messiah. And he demonstrates the abundance and the joy that he brings.
After all, Jesus makes way too much wine. In these six stone jars, he makes the equivalent of over 1,000 bottles of wine. The jars are filled to the brim with wine of the very best quality. A vintage that even catches the head waiter by surprise and makes him wonder: “Where did this come from?”
It is as if Jesus is reminding us that in God’s kingdom there is more than enough to go around. And that no one should receive the remains…the leftovers.
While God’s love and grace had once been set aside only for those who followed the law to the highest standard…to those who passed the test, now that same love and grace is about to overflow out of those old stone jars for everyone. So that any who wants to drink of God’s goodness can have their fill.
In the same way, this miraculous sign from Jesus allows the party to continue. He turns people’s embarrassment into joy, and their worry into wonder.
In this simple story, Jesus is reminding you that in God’s kingdom the plain water of your lives can be transformed into something better when he shows up. Something rich and joyful. Something more powerful than our anxiety or our concern.
At the end of that infamous family Christmas meal, 15 years ago, after we had put a pretty good dent in that giant pile of Norwegian sandwiches, came the very best part. After the plates had been stacked and the dishwasher filled, and some time passed for dinner to settle, came dessert. Dessert is different every year…but it almost always involves chocolate…and it is always amazing.
The sweetest moment came at the end of the meal.
And maybe, in the end, that is the most important lesson we learn in this story of Jesus turning water into wine. Maybe this is the greatest sign of all. For in this simple act, Jesus shows us that the best is yet to come.
In the very first sign of who he is and what he is about, Jesus is showing us how the story will end. Not with suffering or shame. But with joy, abundance, and miraculous surprise. Like dessert at the end of a meal when you have already eaten your fill, Jesus is telling us: “Don’t worry. I am saving the best for last.” Come and see!
Thanks be to God!
Amen.
Test Driving Theology 