Dr. William A. Ritter
First United Methodist Church
Birmingham, Michigan
Scripture: John 2:1-11
June 22, 2003
Let’s start with a question. When a Roman Catholic priest is ordained, what is the first thing he does? He celebrates mass, that’s what he does. And it is a really big deal….his first mass, I mean. He announces the date, names the place and sends out invitations. Friends come. Family comes. Colleagues from the seminary (and from the hierarchy) come. It’s the culmination of one long journey and the beginning of another. So people want to be there.
As for me, I don’t remember the first thing I did after I was ordained. Well, yes I do. I skipped church, that’s what I did. There’s a story there. I was ordained on a Saturday afternoon in Adrian (two years after beginning my ministry). The big ordination question being: “Was Kris going to attend?” Which was not so much a question of “would she,” but “could she.” For she was a little over nine months pregnant at the time.
All that week she kept checking the signs. I kept checking the signs. The doctor kept checking the signs. Finally, it was the lack of signs that led the doctor to say, “All right, go for it,” even though we had checked out the location of Bixby Hospital in Adrian, just in case.
Well, nothing happened (which, I suppose, is a strange thing to say about your ordination day). So after the laying on of a few hands and the snapping of a few pictures, we drove home on Saturday night to a swelteringly hot house in Dearborn. Taking a short walk in search of a cool breeze, we stopped at a small park….sat on a big swing….and at 6:00 the next morning, Kris woke me and said: “It’s time.” To which I said: “It can’t be time. It’s Sunday morning. I’ve just been ordained. I have to go to work.” But I didn’t. Instead, we went to the hospital and Kris went to work. Meaning that all I did on my first day of “official” ministry was pace.
So what was the first thing Jesus did in his ministry? Preach a sermon, says Matthew. Preach a sermon, says Mark. Preach a sermon, says Luke. Luke even tells us what the sermon was about. He says that Jesus talked about the lame walking, the blind seeing, prisoners going free, and all debts being forgiven. Then, as his final “kicker,” he said: “Everything you just heard has come true today.” Leading the members of his congregation to scratch their collective heads and say: “What?”
So what does John say Jesus did as the first thing in his ministry? Go to a wedding reception, that’s what John said he did. And what did John say he did there? Change water into wine, that’s what John said he did there. So I ask you, which event would you rather attend? Sermon…. reception? Sermon….reception? Sermon….reception? Let’s go to the reception with Jesus.
My new friend, Dr. David Jones (who first found me on the internet), preaches in Georgia, where too much talk about wine can get a preacher in trouble….even when it is part of the lesson. He tells of the couple who were having an open house and one of the guests brought a bottle of wine as a hostess gift. The husband, being an abstainer, was appalled. Later on, when they were getting ready for bed, his wife tried to console him. “Remember dear,” she said, “Jesus himself turned water into wine.” To which her husband scowled and said: “Makes no difference. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”
But on with the story. Which many of you know, even if you have never been to Cana. On today’s map, Cana is an almost non-existent town in Israel’s West Bank, just a stone’s throw from Nazareth. But even in Jesus’ day, it was a small town. Which means that a wedding in Cana most likely involved the whole town. Including Jesus. And his friends. And his mother. John makes no mention of his father, here. Just his mother.
The other thing you need to know is that a Jewish wedding….then….there….was as long as it was big. We’re talking “multi-day event” here. Some cultures still throw those kinds of weddings. Just the other day, one of you said: “We went to the most amazing wedding last month. It never seemed to end. We just went to bed for a while before starting over again the next morning.”
They were talking about an ethnic wedding. But it doesn’t need to be. The newest thing I am seeing involves what are called “destination weddings,” meaning that everybody flies to the wedding site from somewhere else. And there are several days of dinners and lunches, pre-wedding golf tournaments and post-wedding brunches. What’s more, the bride and groom don’t leave the reception to rush off on a honeymoon. Instead, they stick around until the last dog is hung and the last guest leaves town. Why? Because they want to see and enjoy everybody.
That’s the kind of wedding this one is. Big time. Long time. Good time. Until a glitch develops. Mary, the mother of Jesus, overhears a waiter tell the caterer: “We’re running out of wine.” And while local custom called for the guests to bring some of the wine for the festivities (the original BYOB, as it were), it was the groom’s responsibility to see that there was wine enough to last. Which, in this case, there wasn’t. We’re talking “social disaster” here. I have told you before that no wedding is glitch-free. Last night’s “glitch” involved wedding rings. We got up to the altar and there was only one ring instead of two. What’s worse, it was the bride’s ring that was missing. “Not to worry,” I said, even as I began removing my own wedding band. Which was how it came to pass that for fifteen minutes last evening, I was married to a lovely young girl named Nicole.
But this glitch in Cana is major. In a small town, people will talk about this one for years. Upon hearing the problem, Mary says to Jesus: “Do something.” To which Jesus replies (curtly): “Woman, of what concern is this to you or me?” Followed by: “Besides, my time has not yet come.” We’ll come back to that. But, for now, let’s just follow the action. Mary, making it her concern, points to her son and says to the waiters: “Do whatever he tells you to do.” So what does Jesus do? John says that near Jesus were six stone jars, each one large enough to hold 20-30 gallons. Jesus instructs the waiters to fill each jar to the rim with water. Then he says: “Draw off a flask and take it to the caterer.” The caterer sniffs the wine, rolls it over his tongue, hands the flask back to the waiter, walks over to the groom and whispers: “May I speak to you for a moment?”
When the two of them are out of earshot, the caterer says: “Are you nuts? Everybody knows you serve the best wine first. Then, when things get rolling (if you I know what I mean) and folks won’t be able to tell the difference, that’s when you bring out the jugs with the screw-on caps. But this beats anything I’ve ever seen. For some reason, you’ve saved the best for last.”
And that’s the story. So….what’s it about?
Well, on a very elemental level, it’s about a party saved. That’s what prompted Mary to act in the first place….her fear that (as parties go) this one was going down the tubes. “Do something,” she said to Jesus. “Your timing’s off,” Jesus said to her. But he did something anyway. Which saved the day (or maybe even the week, given what I said earlier about Jewish weddings). And I wouldn’t make a big deal out of a saved party, had I not read so many sermons (preached by so many others) about how today’s church has totally reversed the miracle….watering down the rich wine of the Gospel, diluting the rich joy of the Gospel, until both are bland beyond belief. People who attend more wedding receptions than I do say they can tell when costs are being contained because the drinks are being watered. About which I know next to nothing. But I’ve been in churches that tasted the same way. Or, as a friend of mine once said: “Jesus changed water into wine in one afternoon, and the church has spent two thousand years trying to change it back.”
But moving to a slightly higher level, I suppose this story might serve as an allegory about one wine being supplanted by another. The old wine being Judaism. The new wine, Christianity. And this explanation would fit John’s purpose rather nicely (writing 70 years after the death of Jesus, at a time when Jews and Christians were finally divorcing themselves from each other in the synagogues of Israel). But this would scarcely have been the motive of Jesus who, at the time of this miracle, was very much a Jew….nothing but a Jew….with little thought of becoming anything other than a Jew.
Which leads to a third observation about miracles in general. This one….if it be a miracle….is merely a miracle of acceleration. That’s because it is very much in the natural order of things for water to become wine. Anybody who owns a vineyard will tell you that, over the course of a growing season, water (in the form of rains, reservoirs or rivers) both lengthens the vine and fattens the fruit….without which there would be no wine and Robert Mondavi might still be cultivating cucumbers in California.
But whether you call this conversion of water to wine a “miracle of acceleration” or a “miracle of transformation,” you have to face the fact that John doesn’t call it a “miracle” at all. John calls it a “sign.” And what do signs do? They announce things….introduce things….call attention to things. But this is something of an anticipatory sign…..a “watch this spot” sign…..or a “watch this man” sign. We’re talking “hint” here….“clue” here….“revelation” here. Meaning that this story (at least in John’s eyes) is less about what Jesus did than about who Jesus is (less about mechanics than message).
So what kind of “sign” is it? What are we supposed to notice here? Well, I’ll tell you how you figure that out. You scan the story once more, this time looking for details. And the first thing you notice is that there aren’t many. John doesn’t give you details. You read this story and what you don’t know far outweighs what you do know. John doesn’t tell you who the bride is….who the groom is….who the DJ is….what the main course is….who catches the bridal bouquet….and whether they do that silly thing with the bride’s garter. You learn none of that stuff. But John does tell you one detail. In fact, John is rather specific about it. So you figure it is there for a reason, and you had better figure out what the reason is.
So what detail am I talking about? The six stone jars (each capable of holding 20-30 gallons), that’s the detail I’m talking about. So what, you say. Listen up, I say.
Start with the stone jars. Jews used stone jars to hold what they called “the water of purification.” All of a sudden, water is a big deal in our little corner of the culture. There must be 20 or 30 different kinds of bottled water for sale at Farmer Jack’s. Go to a better restaurant and they ask you if you want your water from a bottle or a tap. And if the restaurant be European (with a higher-than-average price tag), they will ask you whether you want your water with gas or without gas. Which, to me, always sounds funny. Kris tells me not to laugh. But I have yet to see anything carrying the label “Water of Purification.” So what is it? Or what was it?
Well, do you remember how your mother always made you wash your hands before you ate? Sure you do. But the Jews took your mother’s role and raised it to an entirely new level. Washing wasn’t just about physical hygiene. Washing was about spiritual hygiene. They said:
Just as you need to wash the dirt off your hands and your feet, you need to wash the spiritual dirt from your life. Call it sin, transgression, wrongdoing, backsliding. Call it whatever you want. But every time you wash your hands and feet, it will serve as a reminder that you also need to be washing out your life.
So the Jews came up with all these elaborate rituals that required the “water of purification.” Every time you entered a house, you’d wash your feet. Every time you sat down to a meal, you’d wash your hands. In fact, every time a new course was served, you’d wash again. Kris and I spent a delightful evening with Jerry and Liz Patterson last night. It was the occasion of their 50th anniversary. The room was filled with family members and friends. The meal was excellent. But every time they took away one course and prepared to serve another, Jerry told us to go wash our hands. Kris and I didn’t know the Pattersons were Jewish.
But the “water rituals” didn’t stop with food. If you touched something that had been declared unclean, you’d go wash. If you came into contact with the dead, you’d go wash. If you got involved with something messy (like childbirth), you’d go wash. The list of purification rituals went on and on. The Jews said: “God is clean and God is pure. You can’t be close to God and be unclean at the same time.” So, day after day, the rituals of purification continued.
When Jesus turned water into wine, it wasn’t just any water. It was the water from the stone jars (i.e. the waters of purification). We are talking about the water people washed with….the water they counted on to make themselves clean and pure. It was as if Jesus was saying: “Look, that water won’t clean you up. That water won’t make you pure. You can wash with that water seven times a day….seven days a week…..seventy washings a month….even seventy times seven washings….it still won’t help.”
David Jones calls that the “wash water approach to Christianity.” Ask Martin Luther about it and he’d tell you that it almost drove him crazy. There he was, holed up in a monastery, desperately trying to clean up his life so that God would think well of him. But just about the time he came to the lunchroom thinking he was spotless, he would remember another sin. So he would race back to his room and try to clean up some more.
But how do you clean up when there’s no wash water (because Jesus changed it)? Well, you ask yourself what Jesus changed it to. He changed it to wine, that’s what he changed it to. And what is wine? Come on now, you know what wine is. Wine is grace. Wine is mercy. Wine is forgiveness.
Well, that’s good (you say). Everybody needs a little of that in their lives. But here’s where the rest of the story comes into play. We don’t get “a little of that.” We get 180 gallons of that (6 jars times 30 gallons equals 180 gallons). That’s an awful lot of wine. Even Episcopalians at a wedding reception can’t drink that much wine. Although when I tried that out on a layman from Christ Church Cranbrook on Friday afternoon, he said: “180 gallons of wine? One reception? Sounds about right to me.”
Well, John wants it to sound enormous. John loves to exaggerate his numbers. John adds an extra 1,000 to the familiar loaves and fishes story. John has the lame man crying by the pool for 38 years. John gives the woman at the well five husbands plus a live-in lover. All of which John does, just so we can see how amazing it is when Jesus feeds them, heals him and forgives her. Which is precisely the point here. But let David Jones make it.
Just as there was more wine than the guests at that wedding could ever drink, there is more grace in God’s heart than you and I can ever use up. Maybe the point is that you and I don’t have to worry about God ever saying: “Sorry, you’re too late. The jar is empty. I’ve run out.” Maybe the point is that we don’t need to limit the number of times we turn to God out of fear that we will exhaust some heavenly quota. I mean, could that be it? Could those gallons and gallons of wine be a sign that God has gallons and gallons of grace for us?
* * * * *
In one of my favorite wedding homilies, I talk about the difference between finding love and keeping love, asking couples what it might take to keep the love they’ve found. “A lot,” says Paul. “A lot more,” says Jesus. Start with the numbers. It’s all in the numbers.
Going mile number two (with the other).
Offering garment number two (for the other).
Turning cheek number two (toward the other).
Forgiving time number two (the transgression of the other).
No, that’s wrong. Let’s try time number seven.
No, that’s wrong, too. How about time number seventy?
Still wrong, but closer. Let’s try seventy times seven (which, in biblical shorthand, is not 490, but “until you stop counting”).
Then I say to the bride and groom: “If you don’t believe that marriage is a never-ending, graduate-level course in forgiving, there are any number of married people who will be glad to enlighten you at the reception.” And all of the married people chuckle nervously….knowingly.
Which means that they, more than anybody, understand the point of this little story.
