Ceremony or Celebration?

A Sermon about Accepting God’s Party Invitation

Sermon Audio

Text:           John 2:1-11

Introduction

Many years ago, my wife Rachelle and I traveled to Chicago to attend the wedding of a high school friend of Rachelle’s; a wedding for which there was no shortage of fine cuisine, Champaign, and yes, wine. A different wedding than the one we find ourselves “attending” today. At least, at first.

John can be called the jumbled Gospel. He is not as interested as the other Gospel writers with providing a day-by-day, historically accurate account of Jesus’ ministry. The cleansing of the Temple for example which follows our text is generally found near the end of the other Gospels when Jesus is in Jerusalem for what will be his final Passover. The Evangelist has one goal in mind, to make it loud and clear that Jesus is the Messiah. John calls the miracles of Jesus “signs;” preferring to emphasize the significance of the action rather than the phenomenon. They are important because they reveal Christ’s glory. There are only 8 of these signs or miracles in John, much less than the other Gospels. Which makes the wedding at Cana today significant because John included it in his gospel and because it is found only in John and not in any of the other Gospels.

Let us pray,

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen

Homily

Jesus’ mother, Jesus, and his disciples have been invited to a wedding in Cana, a town near the Sea of Galilee. Things are going fine it seems until the wine runs out. Now we don’t know why. Maybe there were too many guests, maybe they drank too much. Either way somebody messed up. Now this is a big deal. In Jewish culture, the family hosting a wedding had an obligation to provide a feast in accordance with the social standard of the time complete with the usual drinks of wine and water. Running out of wine at such a feast would have caused the hosts major social embarrassment.

Now we come to an interesting dialogue between Jesus and his mother. Jesus’ mother informs him that the wine has run out. Verse 4. “Dear woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My time has not yet come.”

Now let’s be clear. Jesus is not putting his mother down. “Dear woman” is a term of the utmost respect and affection. Jesus addresses his mother this way when he is on the cross at the end of the gospel. When he says, “My time has not yet come,” it seems that Jesus is resisting a role, an occurrence which happens throughout John’s gospel. I suspect there is more to the conversation than the text leads us to believe.

Perhaps Mary is overstepping her bounds, but I think she is simply doing what mothers do. She calls it like she sees it. Have you ever noticed that no matter how old you are your mother can get away with calling attention to problems that no one else would dare to and getting you to help fix them? At least, that’s how my mama is. Mothers tend to notice things no one else does. And know just who the person is to tell, who to volunteer for the job, and just what their children are capable of.

“Uh, Jesus? Son? We have a problem.” Now Jesus is more sophisticated than we are. (clear throat) “My time has not yet come.” For me early on, it was just, “Aw Mom, do I have to?” Later, I realized it did me no good to argue. And now that I am older, I have come to understand that there is no wisdom quite like the Wisdom of Mother.

Well, whatever the reason, Mary recognizes a problem and has all the faith in the world that her son, Jesus, can rectify the situation.

Now at this wedding in Chicago, there was no shortage of anything, including wine. I had the privilege of sitting beside a gentleman who let me in on a subplot that was happening at the reception that I would have been unaware of had he not told me. He had been a former cook and kitchen director at a catering service and so he knew the way things worked. He pointed out to me the woman who was the catering director and the hand motions she used to direct the servers to and from the tables. When she did this (throat motion) they stopped serving and returned to the four corners of the room where they waited for the toast or the cutting of the cake or something that was happening at the center of the room. If a server attempted to serve at this time, they got this (cut) or a very dirty look. Once the ceremony was complete, she did this (motion out) and the servers immediately began serving again. It seems to me that Mary had a similar kind of authority. “Do whatever he tells you,” she tells the servants, and then she disappears from our story. Unlike our Catering Director, I like to think that she turned on her heel and went back to the party, confident that now everything was going to be alright.

(Verse 6) 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, He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside 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.”

This, the first of his miraculous signs Jesus performed in Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed his glory and his disciples put their faith in him.

It is no accident that Jesus chose the jars he did. The Jewish people would become ritually unclean through their daily activity and were cleansed by washing their hands. Jars made of stone were superior to earthen jars which could become contaminated and have to be broken. Stone jars could not be made unclean. At a feast with many guests, it was especially important to have plenty of water on hand so that the guests could be purified. John is using the wedding to describe the new way of Jesus, a way that does not involve ritual cleansing, (motion) washing one’s hands of the world. Such a way is barren; the wine is gone, the jars are empty. But Jesus is about a new way, a feast of freedom and celebration, a way that engages the world, the creation of a new people, new wine. And new wine (as described in Mark 2:19) cannot be poured into old wineskins.

Mathew 22:1-14 describes a parable Jesus told about another wedding.

1Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: 2″The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. 3He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come.

 4″Then he sent some more servants and said, ‘Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’

 5″But they paid no attention and went off—one to his field, another to his business. 6The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. 7The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.

 8″Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. 9Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’ 10So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, both good and bad, and the wedding hall was filled with guests.

 11″But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. 12’Friend,’ he asked, ‘how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ The man was speechless.

 13″Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 

14“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”

Now this part about the guest with no garment sounds pretty harsh doesn’t it? Does God have a dress code? Well, not exactly. It was the custom at this time for the host to provide the guests with a wedding garment especially if they were coming in off the street. It was the fault of the guest not to put on a garment and an insult to the host who was providing it.

There was a dress code at the wedding Rachelle and I attended. I am not a suit and tie man and so I had to borrow a suit coat from my dad to wear at the wedding banquet. Even so, I felt underdressed and not the most comfortable. 

Not at God’s party. Everyone is invited and God provides everything. Including a wedding garment, a new way of living, a new wineskin, if we are willing to accept it and put it on.

God invites us to the table filled with food and wine and clothes us in garments of celebration and joy.

The guests in Jesus’ parable found any reason they could to refuse the invitation – fields, work, business, obligations, responsibilities. And they got so mad at God for being persistent and disrupting their lives, that they killed his messengers.

Have we accepted God’s invitation? Or are we making excuses? Refusing the garment? (motion) Washing our hands of this whole Jesus thing?

Tell me, what business is more important than attending God’s party?

Tomorrow, we commemorate the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. King could have stayed in the safe confines of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, a relatively well-educated and wealthy African American church in Montgomery, Alabama. He could have stayed inside those hallowed walls with all of the ceremony, going through the motions, (motion) washing his hands of the whole Civil Rights thing. Participation was not easy for him. Dr. King actually turned down the initial invitation to be president of the Montgomery Improvement Association which organized the Montgomery bus boycott. He reluctantly accepted only after being persuaded by his friend, Ralph Abernathy. The rest is history.

No, it was not an easy thing for Dr. King. It wasn’t easy for Jesus. And it definitely won’t be easy for us.

Was Dr. King interested in getting the world into his church? I don’t know, probably, perhaps initially. But it seems to me that something shifted in him and he became more interested in getting the church out into the world.

That’s how miracles happen. When the power of God slams full force into the principalities and powers of the world. Do whatever he tells you. You will see more than water turned into wine. Lives are changed. Walls are broken down. Nations are redeemed. Justice rolls down like a healing stream.

So what’s up? Are we worried the wine’s gonna run out? Do you feel like the wine has run out for you? For your family? For your community? For our nation? For our world? Here is some Good News from our text. Jesus stepped in and the wedding at Cana went from scarcity to abundance, from embarrassment to joy, from no wine to “Let’s party!” Jesus gives us the best and then he keeps giving us the best, which is better than the best he just gave us.

Do we believe in a God of scarcity or a God of abundance?

Do we believe in a God of limits or a God who has unlimited potential to change our lives, the world, and the lives of the people around us? When we go through the motions, we wash our hands of the wondrous possibilities that God has in store for us. We block ourselves from hearing and following the voice that says, “Do whatever he tells you to do.”

The people around us are not interested in more ceremony, in more ritual cleansing, in more hoops to jump through. They are looking for a celebration and for a people who have something worth celebrating. And guess what, they have been invited. Who is going give them the sign? Who is going to give them the invitation?

In 2024, what is Jesus telling his people to do?

What is Jesus telling me to do?

What is Jesus telling you to do?

What dream has been tickling your heart lately?

I don’t think the question is whether we know what we’re supposed to do. Personally, I think we know. Rather, I think the question is more, are we willing to do whatever Jesus tells us to do? To step out of our comfort zone, to stop washing our hands of the gunk around us, to stop going through the motions, to get up and join God’s party.

Listen. Do whatever he tells you. Celebrate.

That’s how impossible dreams come true.

Let us pray….

Gracious and Loving God, May each one us accept your invitation to your banquet table and invite those around us to join us at your love feast as well. Amen.