Sunday, January 17, 2010

Sermon for Year C, Epiphany 2: It's NOT All In The Timing

Preached on Sunday, January 17, 2010 at Christ & Saint Stephen’s Church. Lectionary readings this sermon is based on can be found by clicking here.


It is very often the case with Shakespeare’s comedies that the final curtain rings down on, or just after, the scene of a wedding. Midsummer Night’s Dream, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, and others. The wedding represents the happiest outcome, the joyful union or reunion of lovers and families and kingdoms – and is the occasion of great rejoicing. There’s a propulsive or progressive aspect to the weddings. It’s often the case that the wedding comes about as the young lovers thwart the objections of their elders and are true to their true love. The lovers are vindicated, a new era begins, life, as it must, goes on with a new generation at the helm.


So, in dramatic terms, weddings represent the culmination, the ultimate goal of the regenerative forces at work in classic comedy. But the wedding we have today from the Gospel of John comes not at the end of the gospel but near the beginning. Our passage is taken from John’s second of 21 chapters. And the lectionary places this story of the Wedding at Cana near the beginning of the church year and the calendar year – Advent and Christmas are barely over. It is the second Sunday of Epiphany. The wedding at Cana is not found at the end of play, but at the beginning of the story.


The several Sundays after Epiphany introduce the drama that will unfold in a few weeks during Lent and Holy Week. The Greek word Epiphany means appearance or manifestation. Something is revealed, something is made known, something is recognized in an epiphany. The Feast of Epiphany just past celebrates the revelation to the Gentiles of the birth of Jesus in the familiar story of the visit of the Magi. Epiphanytide continues with several weeks of readings that are meant to help us recognize the unique nature of Jesus as God’s anointed Son. Last week we heard about the baptism of Jesus by John in the River Jordan and at the culmination of that scene, a dove appeared and a voice from heaven declared, “This is my Son.” This week, a miracle occurs when water is turned into wine. In a few weeks, there will be a miraculous draught of fish and the season will end just before Ash Wednesday with the Transfiguration.


So, we can think of the Sundays after Epiphany as Act I. Advent and Christmas have been the prologue, giving us the back story. In Act I, we’re being introduced to the main character in our drama, we’re finding out who he is are and what he is capable of, before the story takes a turn toward the tragic with the trial and execution of Jesus.


And in our reading today, Jesus proves capable of a great deal. In fact, the miracle at the wedding at Cana is at its core all about abundance. In the ancient world as today, wedding feasts were just that, feasts. You do your best to put on as large a spread as you can. But Jesus will make this feast an especially bountiful one.


The scene is set for the miracle with an enigmatic dialogue between Jesus and his mother. She tells him the wine has run out. He responds somewhat curiously, telling her that it’s nothing to do with him or her, and then, in a bit of dramatic foreshadowing, Jesus says, “My hour has not yet come.” Then Jesus’ mother says something quite enigmatic. She tells the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”


We sense that there’s a lot more going on in this terse exchange than might at first appear. Jesus seems a bit reluctant, not quite ready to step out into the public eye. He knows something’s coming -- his ‘hour to come’ -- but he’s not quite ready for it, not right now in the middle of a wedding.


His mother’s comment to the servants echoes the words of none other than Pharaoh. In Genesis, when Joseph interpreted the Pharaoh’s dream predicting 7 years of plenty followed by 7 years of famine, Pharaoh told his servants “do whatever he says,” follow Joseph’s instructions for storage of grain against the coming years of hunger. Pharaoh grants to Joseph full authority and, in a sense the words of Jesus’ mother do the same thing. Take up the mantle, undertake the task at hand.A nation facing famine, a wedding feast without wine. God is calling Joseph and Jesus to counter these scarcities with abundance and great plenty.


The miracle itself is all about abundance, it’s about bigness. The stone jars are huge, they hold many gallons and are much larger than needed for the ritual washing of the hands of the wedding guests. They are stone jars in particular, because stone jars were the most ritually pure. Stone is impermeable, unlike skins or clay or wooden vessels. Anything put in stone jars is not contaminated by whatever may have been in the jar before. The jars represent the old forms, and Jesus uses them to make something new, something never before seen. The jars are filled with water and that water is turned into wine – in fact, the finest of wines. Jesus uses the jars for the ancient ritual to produce something new, something unheralded, a miraculous abundance of the finest wine.


Upon tasting the wine, the steward is confused. Why has the groom, in possession of such fine wine, served the inferior wine first? Just as Jesus did, the steward thinks the timing is off with this wedding. Jesus seems to think that it’s too soon to be performing a miracle when first approached by his mother -- and the steward thinks the miraculous wine has come too late in the celebration.


What should have come first has come last -- and the miracle itself has come a bit early or so it seems. What should be first is last, what we might have expected sometime in the future is coming to pass even now.


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It’s the beginning of a new year and a new decade. January is always cold, and cloudy, with short days and dark nights. Not at all the time for a wedding feast -- and statistics agree. January ranks 12th among the months of the year in terms of number of marriages. People choose June over January for their weddings. Or they usually do. But not so this year in New Hampshire, because on January 1, 2010, same sex marriage became legal in the state of New Hampshire. It’s an ancient ritual, the rite of Holy Matrimony, but in New Hampshire this year, something many people would have thought impossible, something almost miraculous did in fact come to pass. Many same sex couples scheduled weddings for just after midnight on New Year’s Eve and throughout New Year’s Day this year in New Hampshire. Not the best time for a wedding perhaps, not the most popular, or maybe exactly the moment that you’ve been waiting for. Sometimes when the timing seems all wrong, it is in fact just right…


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What’s next for you? What’s ahead in this new year and this new decade? Are you like Jesus in our gospel today? Do you feel your hour has not yet come? Do you feel like it’s too soon to step into the spotlight? Too soon to expect a miracle?


Or maybe you feel you’ve come to the end of the performance, and you’re all played out. The final act is almost over and the curtain will soon come down. But maybe you’ve got a bit left to give. Maybe like the wine steward, you find that unwittingly you’ve saved the best for last and what comes near the end of this phase in your life will be the best yet.


And is there someone in your life who sees in you all that you are capable of? Is there someone in your life who is urging you to step up, to be part of something miraculous? Someone urging you to assume your own authority and do what God is calling you to do?


John’s message in the gospel today is that with Jesus there is a superabundance, there is a bounty of grace and mercy and joy. The great celebration will never end. Don’t worry too much about the timing. Don’t worry that it might be too late or too early. Sure, you may have always dreamed of a June wedding, but you might find that a chilly New Year’s Eve New Hampshire wedding is even better than your wildest dreams. Listen for the call of the Spirit urging you forward, urging you to exercise your authority and answer God’s call. Follow Paul’s advice to the Corinthians; let the Spirit activate your gifts, for your gifts are for the common good -- the manifestation of your gifts will be a gift to all of us. Be part of the miracle. Drink your fill from the old stone jars and you may well find them full of the sweet wine of renewal and redemption. +Amen.


(c) The Rev. Mark R. Collins

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