Rev. Debbie Cato
Isaiah 62:1-5 and John 2:1-11
Fairfield Community
Church
January 16, 2022
Let us Pray: Holy God, we need the guidance of your word. Help us be honest with ourselves and with you in this sacred moment of listening for what you have for us today. Amen.
Extravagant
Abundance
Our passage in Isaiah is a call by the prophet for God to set things right. The Babylonians have been defeated. But, the restoration and rebuilding of Jerusalem have met obstacles and delays and the people have lost hope and their morale is deteriorating. The prophet is addressing people experiencing broken dreams and crumbling faith, wondering if God is powerless to fulfill the promises made during the era of exile. Is God indifferent to the plight of His people? 1]
So, Isaiah
addresses God and demands that God do something about the situation. Part of the power of the Bible is the good
news it offers people who
desperately need to hear it. But the other part of the Bible’s power is
its ability to name the reality that people are facing. Someone knows how we feel. This is the power of Isaiah 62:1 for the
discouraged returnees and for anyone dealing with the feeling that God has
turned away in indifference.[2]
The prophet begins these five verses with a bold protest against how God appears to have turned away from God’s people. But the prophet ends with names signifying how God has turned toward God’s people – with the image of a wedding. God has not turned reluctantly to face us; God comes toward us with all of the delight and joy that a bridegroom has for his bride. This is a wonderful image of God’s grace, full of his love for us.[3]
Everyone loves a good wedding. In Jesus day, the bride and groom celebrated the marriage with a seven-day wedding feast at the groom’s home rather than go on a honeymoon. The seven-day feast was all about food and wine and celebration and hospitability.
Running out of anything before the celebration was over was a crisis and embarrassment for the family but running out of wine would have been the worst. We don’t know why or how Mary the mother of Jesus is the one who notices that the wine is giving out. But she does. Mary notices the need and takes action to get the help.
Prompted by his mother, Jesus performs his first miracle, an understated act of turning water into wine. “Fill the jars with water. Now draw some out and take it to the chief steward.” What a happy ending! It turns out the very best wine has been saved for last and only the servants know about the miracle performed by Jesus. The groom’s family has saved face and the joyous wedding celebration can continue.
Jesus’s transformation of water into wine clearly reveals God’s generous nature. For John, the Gospel writer, the miracle represents the first of seven “signs,” or proofs of Jesus’s deity, and signals the onset of the Jesus public ministry. The importance of joy, celebration, pleasure, and hospitality Jesus affirms in conjuring 150 gallons of first-rate wine, just to keep a party going.
God’s endless capacity to transform the ordinary into the sacred, the weaker into the stronger, the incomplete into the whole. The foreshadowing of the Eucharist in the sharing of the wine.
Mary’s pivotal role stands out to me. “They have no wine,” she says. I hear that.
“They
have no money.” “She has no cure.” “He has no
friends.” “I have no strength.” “He’s been sick
so long.” Mary’s line is a line we repeat every week in our prayer
concerns. Every day in our daily
prayers. Blogger Debi Thomas says,
“It’s the line I cling to when I feel helpless, when I have nothing concrete
to offer, when Christianity seems futile, when God feels like he’s a million miles
away. It’s the line that insists against all odds on the mysterious
power of telling God the truth in prayer.”[4]
I think Mary’s role in Jesus’s first miracle is important. It’s odd and provocative because we don’t
know why she’s the one to notice the wine is running dry, because it allows us
a place to find ourselves. While we don’t know how to turn gallons
of water into gallons of wine, we do know how to say what Mary
says. Sometimes, it’s the only thing we know how to say. "There
is need here." "Everything is not okay." "We’re
in trouble." "They have no wine."[5]
Mary persists. Perhaps this is the oddest and yet most encouraging part of the story. I don’t know what to make of Jesus’s reluctance to help when Mary first approaches him. “What concern is that to you and me?” he asks her dismissively when he hears about the dwindling wine supply. “My hour has not yet come.” Of course, Jesus is no fool; he knows that his countdown to crucifixion will begin as soon as he makes his true identity known. Maybe he’s reluctant to start that ominous clock ticking. Maybe he thinks wine-making shouldn’t be his first miracle. Maybe he’s having fun with his friends and doesn’t want to be interrupted. Maybe there’s a mysterious timeline he prefers to follow — a timeline known only to him and to God. Whatever the case, Mary doesn’t cave in to his reluctance; she continues to press the urgency of her need into Jesus’s presence. As if to say, “I don’t care about your ‘hour’ — there’s a desperate problem, right here, right now. Change your plans. Help!”[6]
Mary isn’t discouraged. “Do whatever he tells you,” she advises the household servants. She doesn’t wait to hear the specifics of Jesus’s plan. She doesn’t pretend to know the details; she doesn’t invent a roadmap. She simply communicates her long-standing trust in Jesus’s loving, generous character, and invites the servants to practice the minute-by-minute obedience that alone makes faith possible.[7]
The servants’ task isn’t easy. There’s no running water in the ancient world, and those stone jars are huge. How many trips to the well? How heavy are those jars? Mary turns potential into action and ushers in a miracle. She lays the groundwork for Jesus’s instructions: “Fill the jars.” “Draw some out.” Take it to the chief steward.”[8]
It's hard, holding the promise of God’s abundance up against the agony of scarcity, loss, and need. Don't misunderstand me; I love the miracle, and all that it signifies. But I'm more familiar with water than I am with wine. Many of us are, if we're honest. It doesn’t matter what the “water” look like — chronic illness, physical pain, financial trouble, loss. Regardless of how we rewrite Mary’s line to match our circumstances, it rings true for all of us, in some form or another. They have no wine.[9]
So what do we do? What can our place be in a miracle of
plenty? Debi Thomas suggests that “maybe
we can be like Mary. Maybe we can notice, name, persist, and
trust. No matter how profound the scarcity, no matter how impossible
the situation, we can elbow our way in, pull Jesus aside, ask earnestly for
help, and ready ourselves for action. We can tell God hard truths,
even when we’re supposed to be celebrating. We can keep human need
squarely before our eyes, even and especially when denial, apathy, or
distraction are easier options. And finally, we can invite others to obey
the miraculous wine-maker we have come to know and trust.”[10]
Let’s be a people, be a church that continues to name the need
and be prepared for action to meet that need whenever we can. Perhaps in unexpected ways. "They have no wine." “Do
whatever he tells you.” We live in the tension between
these two lines. Let's live there well, confident of the one whose
help we seek. Because he is good. He is generous. He is Love.[11] Amen.
[1] Feasting on the Word.
Year C, Volume 1. Second Sunday After
Epiphany. Isaiah 62:1-5. Pastoral Perspective. Page. 242.
W. Carter Lester.
[2] Ibid. Page 244.
[3]
[3] Feasting on the Word. Year C,
Volume 1. Page 244. Pastoral Perspective. W. Carter Lester.
[4] https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2053-they-have-no-wine. Debi Thomas.
[5] Ibid.
[6]
https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2053-they-have-no-wine. Debi Thomas.
[7] Ibid
[8] https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2053-they-have-no-wine. Debi Thomas.
[9] Ibid
[10] Ibid
[11]
https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2053-they-have-no-wine. Debi Thomas.
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