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Second Sunday After the Ephiphany
Light of Christ Anglican Church
The Rev. Michael Moffitt, January 17, 2016


Do Whatever He Tells You


Text: John 2:1-11

As most of you are already aware I spent most of my adult life driving a tractor trailer over the road. Many of my friends and family assumed that I did so because of the freedom to travel that it affords. At one time or another I have been to all of the lower 48 states and most of Canada in the cab of a truck. Now even though I did enjoy the travel, living in a truck and driving all day in all conditions isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. What attracted me to the job wasn’t the traveling as much as the simplicity. I would call my dispatcher, or as an owner operator, my broker and they would tell me to go to a certain place and pick up a load and take it another place and they would pay me for it, which was helpful.

Everything was clearly defined—go over there and take this load over here, what could be simpler? I did what they asked and they paid me, which is what I was asking—everybody won. The thing is simplicity doesn’t necessarily mean easy, it just means that the task is clearly defined and I love clarity.

As I was considering our gospel passage this morning I realized that often we make many of the commands of God so much more difficult than we need to when in fact the task before us is really simple to understand. Let’s consider our passage from John 2:1-11 and consider what John and the Holy Spirit want to teach us this morning. This is the story of the first recorded miracle performed by Jesus and it is rich with instruction for us.

I believe that it is important to begin by understanding that John’s emphasis on the miracles performed by Jesus is different than the writers of the Synoptic Gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke. For the Synoptic writers the point is to show that the coming of Jesus—God in the flesh was a revelation that Heaven had come to earth and the Kingdom of God had begun its reign through the Messiah. What is referred to by theologians as the “Now but not yet”. For John the miracles performed by Jesus though certainly historical acts of supernatural power are more symbolic, they point beyond the miracles themselves to Jesus and His significance as God in the flesh. John is writing at a time in the life of the church where the divinity of Jesus had already been called into question and the enemy had sown serious seeds of discord within the Christian community. John’s goal in his Gospel was to reveal that Jesus Christ was God in the flesh and the miracles and teaching of Christ testified to that divinity.

With that in mind let’s consider the story in John 2:1-11 where Jesus changes water into wine. The story begins:

“On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, 2 and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.3 When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”

Jesus and his disciples have been invited and have arrived at a wedding where possibly Jesus’ mother Mary had some catering role. The fact that the wine had run out would have been a social disaster. Jewish wedding celebrations sometimes would last up to a week and it would have been a real faux pas and reflected badly on the bridegroom to run out of something as vital to the celebration as wine. Some have suggested that Mary had come to Jesus because it was customary that guests bring wine as a wedding gift but perhaps he and his disciples had shown up empty handed. Either way Mary obviously comes to Jesus believing that he could do something about it. The interaction between them is very important for us to grasp this morning.

Mary merely informs Jesus that the wine is gone and leaves it up to him to do something.

“Woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”
5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”

Some have suggested that Jesus’ response was disrespectful and rude. He addresses his mother as “Woman” but I think the message is that Jesus wasn’t denying his relation to Mary but was revealing that their relationship had changed. Now he would be following whatever His heavenly Father said and that would direct his works, not any human relative. He isn’t claiming that his ministry hasn’t started John has already revealed at Jesus’ baptism that he is “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29) and Jesus has already called his disciples and they are with him at the wedding but Jesus is telling Mary that the time for him to reveal his glory had not yet come but Mary knows who the angel said that he was and she has also waited 30 years knowing that someday he would be revealed as the Son of God and so her response has so much to reveal to us here.

Mary’s response was the perfect example of intercessory prayer. She states the problem to Jesus and lets Him decide how he wants to deal with it and she merely instructs the servants, “Do whatever he tells you” and she walks away. I love that! Mary knows that there is nothing more that she can do but she goes to the one whom she knows can fix the problem and leaves it up to him to decide how. There is nothing harder for me to do than to walk away from an unsolved problem even when I have no control over it.

When Mary tells the servants to do whatever Jesus asks them to do, she is taking the risk that Jesus will do nothing and the wine supply will continue to be depleted. I think she knows Jesus’ heart though and believes that he will not let the bridegroom be shamed but instead Jesus will use this occasion to reveal his love and power. John is also provided us with a foretaste of the messianic banquet to come.

6 “Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons.

7 Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.8 Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.” They did so, 9 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 aside10 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.”

11 What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.”

The Apostle John is writing this story probably somewhere between AD 85-90, towards the end of his life, but I can imagine that as he is writing this story under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that he is laughing and crying in remembrance. He was there and saw the looks on the faces of the servants when Jesus instructed them to fill the ceremonial stone water jars with water. They had to be wondering why he wanted the jars full of water since they were for ceremonial washing of hands but for whatever reason they did as he asked.

Imagine what they were thinking when after filling the jars with water Jesus instructs them to draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet. Maybe they would be afraid that the master would think they were mocking him or demand an explanation as to why he was being given water.

I guarantee you that no one was prepared for what happened next. The water had not only miraculously turned into wine but it had turned into a wine that was far better than the best they had served so far.

John finishes out the story by revealing that it was this, the first of Jesus’ miracles that revealed Jesus’ glory and his disciples believed in him.

Remember that John had just written in chapter John 1: 1-4; 10-11:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.”

He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.”

John is telling this story of Jesus’ first miracle after revealing that Jesus was the creator God and that the Father had used the Son to create the heavens and the earth. It was Jesus that spoke to the darkness, and void and chaos in Genesis chapter 1 and had cried out to all that nothingness, “Let there be light and there was light and it was good.”

John wants the reader to understand who Jesus is and why it shouldn’t be a surprise that he could turn water into wine. After all he was the Lord of Glory and the creator of all things! John is also revealing the compassion of God for us even in the mundane. The bridegroom needed to be rescued and Jesus was willing to comply.

Theologians have debated for years about how Jesus turned the water into wine and some have insisted that he wouldn’t have done that because the people at the wedding had clearly already had too much to drink. The principle that John is teaching us here is not the mechanics of how Jesus did it or whether or not we personally believe that he should or shouldn’t have but that only Jesus could have done it.

Now let’s go back to the idea that I originally offered concerning simplicity. Some have looked at this miracle as minor in comparison to other miracles that Jesus did—restoring sight to the blind, healing the lepers, feeding the 5,000 with a few loaves of bread and a few fish, or, of course, raising the dead—but I believe that this miracle was the perfect way to begin the ministry of Jesus. I believe that it is this miracle that reveals the simplicity of our response to the call of God upon our lives. There are things that we must do but there are things that only God can do.

Jesus never asked or suggested that the servants should turn the water into wine but only that they fill the six stone water jars with water. They could do that and Jesus knew that only he could actually perform the miracle but not until the servants acted in faithful obedience to his command. Once they did that, then they were able to see the result of Jesus’ power and no one would ever be able to dissuade them from what they had seen with their own eyes and I assure you that they were never the same again. Encountering Jesus Christ is like that. John doesn’t reveal their response but he does reveal that because of this miracle Jesus’ disciples believed in Him. John tells the story as a way of revealing who Jesus is. In the Old Testament God revealed his power and glory through a variety of miraculous events and John is wanting his readers to see that Jesus was that same God now in their midst.

What if we were to respond to the commands of God with the same faithful obedience as the servants in this story? What if we didn’t turn aside from the things that Jesus asks of us because we felt inadequate but instead ask ourselves, “What part of this can I do and what part can only Jesus do?” For me going into ministry was overwhelming because I knew my inadequacy and I knew my own heart but I also knew that Jesus was my equipper and my strength, so here I am. Still I know my helplessness before him but also know his faithfulness. “Go fill up the water jars”—well I can do that. “Now watch this!!!”

Let’s consider a few of the things that Jesus has asked (or commanded) us to do.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:43-45)

Again we have a command that begins with something that we simply cannot do in our own strength but gives us a way to respond in faithful obedience. It’s important that the word that Jesus uses for love (Agape) is in the verb form (Agapeo). In other words it’s not a noun demanding that we feel good about or even like our enemies but that we serve them because Jesus asked us to. He even tells us how to begin the process of obedience by praying for our enemies or those who persecute us. When we pray for our enemies it changes us. I have found that I can’t hate someone that I am praying because the Holy Spirit changes my view of them. This act of obedience allows us to be in the position of seeing God change our hearts and reveal the power of God to our enemies. Like Mary we are asking that God provide the change that we want but then by prayer acting upon what Jesus has said and depend on him moving in the way that he sees fit.

Either way we win, hatred is removed from our lives and we are free to not let that define us any longer.

How about another example, equally difficult? Ephesians 5: 22-23:

“Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.”

I have had wives say to me, “He doesn’t deserve my respect because he isn’t respectable.” And my response has always been, “God’s word doesn’t make conditions on when we obey or not but only asks us to obey. What if you asked God to enable you to move in obedience? Could this be the catalyst that changes your husband? I don’t know but I do know that it will change you.

How about Ephesians 5:25:

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”

In other words husbands treat your wife as more important than yourself and lay your life down for her as Christ did for the church. You might say “but Pastor, she isn’t lovable” and my response would be “did Christ wait until the church was lovable before he laid down his life for her?” By the way the word that Paul uses for love here is the same word for love your enemies, the verb form of Agape- Agapeo. In other words become her servant as Christ became the servant for us.

The miracle at the wedding feast at Cana reveals the power of obedience even when it doesn’t make any sense and that is vital as we ask God to enable us to move forward as a church. As we ask God for clarity in the simple request of the Great Commission we begin by acknowledging that the request makes sense but that we can’t do it without the power and wisdom of the Holy Spirit. The charge of Christ reads very simply in Matthew 28:18-20;

“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

It’s like the exhortation to feed the poor, it’s too big and can’t conceive of how I can feed the poor but if you show someone who is hungry I can conceive of that. The command to spread the gospel to the world sounds overwhelming but I think it begins by inviting God to help us to be faithful in the small everyday tasks like loving our neighbor as ourselves and having the passion to step out in faith believing that He is able to accomplish whatever he has purposed to do. That’s why we are meeting regularly to pray. We want God to give us his eyes to see, his ears to hear and his heart to understand our place within the community as we focus on what it means to reveal that the kingdom has come and Jesus is Lord- NOW.

I love Psalm 36: 7-9,

“How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!

People take refuge in the shadow of your wings.

8 They feast on the abundance of your house;

you give them drink from your river of delights.

9 For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light.

This is the promise revealed at the wedding feast at Cana. Jesus was pointing us to the reward of obedience, it comes with a cost but the payoff is huge because it’s Jesus himself and all that comes with that, a river of delight, the fountain of life as it was meant to be and the ability to see clearly through his light. His commands are wonderful because they reveal his best for us and they lead us to see and reveal the absolute glory of God.

I want to close with a prayer from a book of Puritan prayers that I use daily. It’s called The Valley of Vision.

©2016 The Rev. Mike Moffitt

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