Preaching text: John 2
Oh, goodie. It’s that time again. Time for Pastor Allen to preach on the Wedding at Cana. Time for me to remind y’all what this little miracle story is really about. Time to talk about something a lot Christians, for some strange reason, think is taboo and anathema. Time to talk about how Jesus wants our lives to be FUN.
“I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” Jesus says elsewhere in the Gospels. But what does Jesus mean when he says “life abundantly?” Well, in this miracle, he shows us what he means.
We all know the story. We all just heard it. Jesus goes to a wedding for a family friend in the village of Cana, right next door to Nazareth. Next village over. While he’s there, the host commits the worst of all party fouls; They run out of booze. There’s no more wine. Mary goes to Jesus and gives him the news. At first, Jesus tries to blow Mom off, but we all know how well that works, so he gives in, tells the servants to fill up the jars of purification, and then take some of it to the steward. The water turns to wine, the steward is impressed enough to compliment the bridegroom on his choices, and the party resumes full force.
There are a few things people tend to miss in his story, and I believe those misses are deliberate. First off, this is a wedding feast and that is a party. This is when the villagers pull out all the stops. Feasting and drinking and laughing and all that. It’s a time of fun and joy and happiness. This is a good time to be had by all. Now, I don’t know about y’all here in York County, but I grew up in West Virginia and we were surrounded by Southern Baptists and other Christians of the fundamentalist sort. The thought of Jesus going to a raucous party and smiling and laughing and having a good time would have, to borrow a phrase, given a lot of my fellow Christians “the vapors.”
And if they think that’s bad, it gets worse. I served my first church in Davis, WV and there is still an active chapter of the Women’s Christian Temperance Movement in that town. You know, the group that lobbied for Prohibition about 100 years ago? Yeah, they’re still around. I wonder what they think of Jesus creating 180 gallons of wine for this party. Yeah, John tells us the amount in his text. Do a little math and you discover that Jesus created 180 GALLONS of wine for this party. Now I’ve been to some wild shindigs in my day but none of them had that much to drink.
I’m poking fun here in part because that’s the point of this story. For many of the Christians I’ve encountered in life, it seems they believe the life of a faithful disciple is to be a life of misery and boredom. But here we see Jesus is having fun and that he wants the people around him to have fun. This is a fun story, a funny story even. You supposed to chuckle at the extravagance of it all. It’s so over-the-top.
Some might critique me by saying I’m not being pious or theological enough when approaching this miracle story. But why does piety and theology have to be so blasted dry and dull? We worship a God who delights in us and calls us beloved. When you love something, do you want it to exist in misery or in joy? Do you want it to be sad or happy? Do you want it to frown or to smile and laugh? The answers are obvious. Because God loves us, he wants us to have joy.
Life is a gift. Your life is a gift. Your experiences, your family, your friends, your interests, your passions, all these are given so that you may have joy. Sure, life gets hard at times. Life gets tough. God know, I understand that as well as anyone. Five times in the hospital in the last three years. Many of you can tell similar stories, stories of pain and loss and struggle. But I also know that isn’t what God wants for us. He doesn’t want us to hurt. He doesn’t want us to have pain and sorrow. He wants us to have life. Abundant life.
And that is the whole point behind God’s plan. When things went south because of sin, God knew how it would interfere with his hopes and desires for us, with our ability to have joy and happiness. Thus, he made the Old Covenant with Abraham, promised him the salvation of Christ would eventually come through him, and then made good on that promise in the birth of Jesus. Jesus, of course, demonstrated God’s desire for us to have joyous and abundant life by nearly all that he did. Sickness ruins joy. Jesus healed it. Hunger ruins joy. Jesus fed the multitudes. Loneliness ruins joy. Jesus welcomed the stranger and outcast.
And, of course, sin ruins joy. So Jesus forgave it from the cross.
The end result of this is not that we are to live lives of drudgery and sorrow, but lives of joy. Jesus takes our burdens upon himself so that we can have true life, abundant life, joyous life.
God wants your life filled with joy and fun. I know that doesn’t always seem to happen for ourselves or for others. So here’s the thing, if joy is lacking, find a way to bring it. Give joy to others however you can. Giving a smile or a compliment costs us nothing, but can spread joy far and wide. Give the gift that you’ve been given to those who, for whatever reason, don’t realize they have it too.
God has promised you an abundance of life. He has sealed that promise by giving his very life for you on the cross and he revealed that promise in a goofy little story about turning water into a flood of wine. Life is a gift. Treasure it. Enjoy it. Amen.
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