Sermon for the Second Sunday of Epiphany
January 14, 2007
Isaiah 62:1-5
Psalm 36:5-10
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11
Year C
I.N.I. (In the name of Jesus)
Glory to God in the highest, and peace to God's people on earth.
If you were to create a liturgical game called "Where's Jesus?" and this was the Time of Epiphany, you would expect to find God's beloved Son so recently announced as such at his baptism calling his first disciples, healing the sick, or exorcizing demons. We may find him doing so just yet.
But today the Epiphany or revelation of God is located in the Galilean town of Cana, where the grown son of Mary and Son of God goes with his mother to a wedding. Oh, joy!
I don't know if you would think to include Jesus on your guest list at your wedding, but we know he was at this one. At my wedding, I was married at around 4 pm, there was the reception at the Strongbow Inn, famous for its turkey, and there were the usual toasts, dancing, and gifts. It was all done before midnight, and Kari and I were long gone by that time. In Jesus' time, wedding celebrations would last for about a week, and the bride and groom stayed around. It was one big party.
In the middle of this blowout, the bar closes up early. You can just hear the chatter and music grind to a halt. You can just imagine the change in expression when the wedding guest saunters up for a refill and is told "we're all out." What?
Mary evidently thinks Jesus can do something to restore joy to this suddenly lackluster reception. The banter between mother and son sounds a lot like conversation I have heard or been a part of as mother and son. The Son gives lip to his mother. The mother takes everything her son says with a grain of salt, knowing that in time he'll listen to her anyway.
Mary:
Jesus, they're out of wine.
Jesus:
That's not our problem. Besides, it's not my time to take the limelight.
Mary (to the servants):
My son will soon offer his gift to the bride and groom. Just do whatever he tells you to do.
At this time, I'm going to take a "time-out" to let you know that in this Gospel, as in many in the gospel of John, there is a story within a story. There is symbolism flying all over the place, this is not just a wedding, it's like our lives when everything is chugging along, life is great, and the wind gets sucked out of our sails. The manure hits the fan. The bottom drops out. Just when you think things should get better, then get worse.
For believers in Jesus' time, they lived with stories of the abundance of wine as symbolic of their messianic hopes fulfilled.
Second Baruch records:
The earth shall yield its fruit ten thousandfold; each vine shall have 1,000 branches, each branch 1,000 cluster,
each cluster 1,000 grapes, and each grape about 120 gallons of wine
(2 Baruch 26:5).
That's a lot of wine! And there's one of my favorites from Isaiah
On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines,
of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear (Isaiah 25:6).
This vision includes the wiping away of all tears.
The wine is more than affirming drunkenness. The abundance of wine signals something new that God is doing, to satisfy deep gut-wrenching longing for things to be different, for life to be more fulfilling, for an end to destruction and violence, clearing a path for the ways of God.
Back to the Gospel…. There were how many, six, earthen jars used for ritual purification. Everybody knows that with
seven days in a week, seven days in creation, seven gifts of the Spirit, and the seventh year the sabbatical year that
seven is the perfect number, a sign of perfection, a symbol of eternity. At this wedding there were
not quite seven, an incomplete, a lacking in fulfillment. Like many marriages. Like many lives. Jesus, the wedding guest with a nagging mother, comes through in a big way for the bride and groom and perplexed wine steward and the partygoers and the disciples and we who live through too many parties and too many days in January without joy. Tasteless water, thirty gallon jars times six, now becomes beaucoup de wine, and not just the cheap stuff with the screw top. Chardonnay, flush with its exotic combination of pineapple, oranges, and coconut. Or the spicier and up and coming Shiraz lined with lots of purple fruit and peppery charm. Or the reliable cabernet sauvignon with black-currant-soaked red with a tendency to be at the center of the parties and open houses.
A little wine loosens up awkward conversation. A little wine makes the day and the gathering that much more festive. A little wine, fruit of the crushed grape transformed through the fermentation process, changes and improves with age!
Into a young couple's first days together, the wedding guest Jesus saves the day. For us who look for the story within the story, we find that Jesus comes into our marriages, our parties, our relationships, somewhere after first blush of romance and broken to smithereens. We find that Jesus comes to our homes where messes are likely to crop up or hidden just behind the closet. We find that Jesus comes into our relationships that are yearning for a modicum of give and take, a level of compassion and understanding. And if we extend an invitation and listen and welcome Christ in, we may just find gladness and salvation beyond knowing.
Into this community somewhere between incompleteness and perfection, an open house is offered each week. A wine tasting is held each Sunday morning, which is known by names such as Eucharist (thanksgiving) or communion (together). Over time if not at first sip, we may just discover the riches and the bouquet to transform us into people altogether new and full with the qualities we would expect to find in God's beloved: compassion and kindness, eager to serve one another and the poor, ready to discover God's grace in children and strangers, and transforming us when we run out of the proverbial wine.
Can you imagine Jesus himself coming here to Christ the King and adding to our joy through our Chapel School, our budgeting process, in our Sunday School and Confirmation, and following us into the other days and experiences of the week? You might be drunk, or you might be filled with the Spirit.
It's time to break out the good stuff. Cheers. Prost. Opa!
And glory to God in the highest, and peace to God's people on earth.
I.N.I.
The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
| CtK Home
| Back to Pastor's Page
|
Christ the King Lutheran Church, 3 Lutheran Drive, Nashua, NH 03063 (603) 882-6142
If you have problems with this web page contact:
webmaster@ctknashua.org