“Miracle at Cana”
John 2:1-11

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Second Sunday after the Epiphany—January 17, 2016

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

We started packing away our Christmas decorations last week.  We’re in that season of post-holiday letdown.  It’s not as much fun packing everything away.  Perhaps your celebrations didn’t turn out the way you hoped or expected.  Maybe you didn’t get what you wanted for Christmas.  Some toys and gadgets are already broken.  And the bills for it all are coming due.

Christmas has become for us such a hectic time of holiday festivities that we may lose sight of what it’s really all about.  Maybe that’s why, in the structure of the church year, the ancient church in its wisdom followed the short Christmas season of CELEBRATION with the longer Epiphany season of CONTEMPLATION.

The season of Epiphany is named after the Greek word epiphaneia, which means to reveal or show forth.  During the Christmas season we celebrate the birth of Jesus into the world.  During the Epiphany season which follows we contemplate events which reveal and show forth WHY his coming is so significant.

We began the Epiphany season with the account of the Wise Men: “Where is he who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east and have come to worship him.”  That begins to explain why we are still celebrating the birth of this child over 2,000 years later.  Despite the humble circumstances of his birth, he is a great King, worthy of our homage.  “And when they had come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down and worshiped him.  And when they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”

A great King, worthy of our homage.  But, even that is not the whole story.  For, this morning we see that he is even more, much more, than a great King.  As St. John says at the end of today’s Gospel Reading, “This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him.” 

Some 30 years after his birth, he attends a wedding at Cana, not far from his hometown of Nazareth.  These have been busy days for Jesus.  His public ministry began about six weeks before this wedding, in The Baptism of Our Lord which we commemorated last Sunday, when at the hands of his cousin John the Baptizer he was baptized in the Jordan River:  “The Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.’ . . .  At once the Spirit sent him out into the desert, and he was in the desert forty days, being tempted by Satan. . .  Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside.”

Just a few days before the wedding, he had called the first of his first disciples.  “On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there.”  Mary was probably there as more than just a guest.  Most likely she was a relative or friend of the bridal couple, there to help with, even supervise, the wedding feast.  “And Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.”  Word was starting to spread about Jesus, and he was there as an honored guest, with his disciples.

“When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, ‘They have no more wine.’”  The Christmas story ends, “But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.”  It seems that in the intervening years Jesus had lived a normal human life, and had a normal upbringing in the home of his mother Mary and stepfather Joseph, and had followed in his stepfather’s business and become a carpenter, as St. Mark’s Gospel tells us, “Many who heard him were amazed. ‘Where did this man get these things?’ they asked. ‘What’s this wisdom that has been given him, that he even does miracles! Isn’t this the carpenter?’”

Until his Baptism, the last we heard of Jesus was when he was 12 years old and stayed behind at the Temple on a trip to Jerusalem.  We are told, “Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart.  And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.”

The angel had proclaimed to Mary, “You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus.  He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.”   For 30 years following the miracles of his conception and birth, Mary had been treasuring and pondering all these things in her heart.

Now, the events of the past weeks, his Baptism, beginning to preach, calling his disciples, bring back to her mind those great events.  She knew her son to be the Messiah, the Son of the Most High. So, she turns to him at this critical moment during the wedding feast.

“When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, ‘They have no more wine.’”  What did Mary expect?  Jesus having just come from a long way, in a village not his own, where he appears as an honored guest—how could he supply more wine?  Mary must have expected more than ordinary help from her son, she must have expected extraordinary, wondrous, miraculous help.

“‘Dear woman, why do you involve me?’ Jesus replied. ‘My time has not yet come.’”  Jesus does not only mean that Mary should wait a little longer.  He often spoke about his “hour,” meaning the appointed time for his work as the Messiah, especially his suffering, death, and resurrection.  About six months before his crucifixion we are told that those who rejected him as the Messiah already “tried to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him, because his hour had not yet come.”  Finally, on Palm Sunday, before riding in Jerusalem, Jesus announced, “My appointed time is near,” and we are told that at the Last Supper, “Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world to the Father.” 

This means that Jesus was not simply an unfortunate victim of history, caught up in events beyond his control.  His entire life and ministry, his suffering, death and resurrection, were all part of God’s eternal plan.  As St. Peter says in Acts, “This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge.”  Jesus himself put it this way, “No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.”

In English, when Jesus says to Mary, “Dear woman, why do you involve me?’ it sounds like a harsh rebuff, as though he is saying to her, “This isn’t any of my business.” But, in the Greek text we can see that he’s actually saying the opposite, telling her, in a gentle and loving way, “I will take care of this myself.  This is my business, not yours.”  Years before when he was 12 years old, he had said, when Joseph and Mary finally found him in the Temple at Jerusalem, “Did you not know that I had to be about my Father’s business?”  Now, he is beginning his public ministry, leaving behind his stepfathers business as a carpenter and taking up his heavenly Father’s business once again. 

Mary understands that his reply is not a rebuff, but a statement that this IS his concern, and implies a promise he will help.  That is why, “His mother said to the servants, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’” 

“Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus said to the servants, ‘Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.  Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.” They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine.”

Although this miracle is not a parable, but a real historical event, it also has symbolic significance for us.  Heaven is depicted in Scripture as a great, never-ending feast, as Isaiah says, “The Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine—the best of meats and the finest of wines.”  If our world was still paradise we would never run short or be wanting for anything.  So, the running out of wine symbolizes all the struggles and troubles we face in this life on account of sin.  The consequences of our sinful and fallen world hit each of us in different ways in our lives.  For the bridal couple that day, it was a shortage of wine, which marred what was supposed to be their happy occasion.

On the other hand, the wine which Christ creates symbolizes the cure for sin which he brings.  “This is my blood, which is poured out for you, for the forgiveness of sin.”  Just as he miraculously turned water into wine for the feast at Cana that day, here today by his Word he makes the bread and wine his very body and blood and invites you to eat and drink his holy supper for the forgiveness of your sins.

The high quality of the wine symbolizes that his blood shed on the cross was a perfect, worthy sacrifice for our sin, as St. Peter says, “You were redeemed . . . with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.”  The vast quantity of wine symbolizes that there is no sin left out, no sin too great for his blood to wash away, as St. John says, “The blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from every sin. . .  He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for the sins of the whole world.”  Finally, giving this valuable wine as a free gift symbolizes his gift to you of complete forgiveness and eternal life.  As St. Paul says in Romans, “The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

“This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him.”  In this first miracle Jesus reveals his glory as the divine Son of God, your Savior.

Amen.