An important part of bush craft is learning to recognise the signs. Most of us aren't very good at it. We miss the important clues. These important clues are "significant" - they are sign-making, they give hints, they point to something else, something that has happened, some creature that has passed that way…
Last week we were thinking about John the Baptist and his persistence in pointing, not to himself, but to Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. We noticed the recurring theme that others should "come and see," that they should share in the great discovery too.
In the early years (sometimes called "the hidden years") there were no great signs for anyone to see. At age twelve, we are given a glimpse that Jesus knew himself to be the Son of God and that he had to be about his Father's business. But then he went back with Mary and Joseph, learnt the carpenter's trade and lived a submissive, hidden and uneventful life in Nazareth.
It was when he was about thirty years of age that he left the carpenter's shop to join the crowds that had gone to the Jordan to be baptised by John. Immediately afterwards, he was tempted in the wilderness for forty days. It may have been after this period of temptation that he returned to the Jordan, where John publicly declared Jesus to be the "one greater" for whose coming he had been preparing them. Following this, Jesus began to gather his group of disciples and to preach, "Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand."
It was at this very early beginning of his ministry, when he was still hardly known, that the events in today's reading must have occurred.
We are very conscious in the reading that the Father's business has very definitely become the major force in his life. The mission has begun. No longer is he to be regarded as the Son of Joseph and Mary, no longer as the carpenter of Nazareth…
Nazareth is about a hundred kilometres from where John was baptising in the Jordan River. Cana of Galilee, evidently not a well-known place, is another thirteen kilometres or so further north.
When Mary told Jesus that the wine was finished, was she just passing a comment? Hardly. Jesus certainly didn't take it that way, did he? Was she thinking back to all those things that she had "stored in her heart," believing perhaps that the time had now come? Yet we see her treating him as the obedient son that he had been for the past eighteen years, even though something new was about to happen. Did she think the time had come for a revelation, for him to declare himself? Apocryphal writers have depicted the boy Jesus giving life to clay pidgeons and other miraculous works, but this is not the Biblical account at all. If such things had happened the people of Nazareth wouldn't have been surprised at all at the reports that came back about the healings he had performed. No, they were truly the hidden years, the silent years. So what did Mary expect him to do?
The reply of Jesus is not as cold in Greek as it comes to us in English. In his last moments on the cross, he addresses Mary as "woman" while he commends her to the beloved disciple (19.26). Yet the word does express a new relationship between them as he enters his public ministry, for he is to be seen, not primarily as "the son of Mary", but as "the Son of man" who has come to bring the realities of heaven to men. Literally, the words of Jesus are, "What to me and to you, woman? My hour has not yet come." It's as if he is saying, "What do we have in common? My business and your business are not the same." As if he is saying all over again, "I must be about my Father's business." His relationship with Mary could never be the same now - his one priority is to do his heavenly Father's will.
And Mary seems to recognise this change as she gives instruction to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you." For thirty years now he has submitted to their will, but the time had come - not the hour for his final revelation, that revelation of redemptive love in an aweful death on a cross - but the time has come - the Kingdom of God is at hand - the time has come to repent and believe the good news - the time has come to listen to the Son of God and to do what he says.
I'm not suggesting that Mary grasped all of that. We are given no insights into her mind at this point. She was concerned about the embarrassment of the hosts over a very practical need. Yet the Kingdom-time had come, and her words are important Kingdom-words, "Do whatever he tells you."
Having said that it was not Mary's business to direct him, we find Jesus acting to fulfil this practical need. Six stone water-jars are filled with water. Miraculously the water turns into wine. There are a number of important things to note here.
God in his great love cares about the ordinary practical needs of our lives. Jesus had come into the world with a mission to redeem the world and to call people to repentance and faith. At a number of points in the story we find Jesus moving to some other place because people just wanted him to be their great need-meeter. This was not his mission. And yet this miracle - his first - stands as a reminder that God cares about every aspect of our lives. There is nothing too trivial to bring to him in prayer.
I recall when we lived in Childers a phone call from the hospital about a man who had a heart attack on the way from South Australia to Bundaberg. His wife was there visiting too. We had an interesting conversation about many things, including their close involvement in the church. A wonderful young minister they had - did I know him? A nuisance this heart business… Struck out of the blue… On the way to see the daughter in Bundaberg… Didn't quite make it… After half an hour of warm friendly conversation with these obviously fairly regular church attenders, I proposed, "Let's have some prayer before I go." O no, we don't want prayer! He's not as bad as that!
Really!? How bad do you have to be before it's a good thing to pray? What sort of needs is it appropriate to bring to God in prayer? Let me say to you with emphasis - no need is too trivial!
God's purpose for our life is that we repent and believe, that we submit to him as Lord, committed to doing his will day by day. But we can get a distorted view that God is only interested in what we call "spiritual" things. God cares about us in the totality of our life and experience.
Whenever John describes a miracle, he calls it a "sign". (Matthew, Mark and Luke use a different word which stresses the element of power). So the Good News Bible has v.11 - "Jesus performed this first miracle in Cana in Galilee; there he revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him." But take this in the New International Version - "This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed his glory..."
Leon Morris comments, "It is characteristic of them, not so much that they arouse wonder and are hard to explain, nor even that they are demonstrations of the divine power, but rather that they point us to something beyond ourselves. They show us God at work. They are meaningful."
And so for us there is the clear reminder of the love of God for us in every circumstance - he is here to care for us no matter what. When we put out trust in Jesus, we are trusting the Lord of all who cares about all we do.
There is also the reminder of God's Kingdom. Whenever we pray, "Your Kingdom come," let's remember Jesus who had to be about his Father's business. The reminders of his practical love and care are reminders that for us too there is our Father's will and business to fulfil.
And there is the call to repent and believe. Though I have put this last, it is the beginning point of life within God's Kingdom. At the end of ch.20 John says why he wrote down his account of the life of Jesus - "In his disciples' presence Jesus performed many other miracles (lit. signs) which are not written down in this book. But these have been written in order that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through your faith in you you may have life" (20.30-31).
Can you see anything today, Harry? Look for the tell-tale signs! In spite of some adverse publicity these days, God really is here and it is still the most sensible course of all to go all the way with him!
Back to Sermons