Sermon on John 2:1-11

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

The Gospel of John doesn’t call miracles “miracles.” It calls them “signs.” This might seem like an insignificant detail, but it’s important:

A miracle is miraculous because of what it is. It’s a show of power that defies the laws of nature.

A sign points to something beyond itself. Each of the seven signs in the Gospel of John tells us something about God.

The sign of Jesus turning water into wine might seem like a weird one for the Gospel of John to begin with. It’s not life-altering like healing someone or dramatic like walking on water. Jesus doesn’t even get credit like he does when feeding the 5,000!

Even Jesus seems reluctant to get involved. It’s only at his mother’s urging that he does anything at all!

Mary notices that the wine is running out at the wedding she, Jesus, and the disciples are attending. Hospitality is an incredibly important value in their culture, so running out of wine is horribly embarrassing.

In this story, there is lack. There is scarcity.

But Mary notices what is lacking and has the insight that Jesus could do something about it. She isn’t initially successful in convincing Jesus to act, but she pursues her insight anyway. She points the servants to Jesus and directs them to do what Jesus says.

And Jesus quietly, discreetly turns water into wine.

And remember, as remarkable as this is, this isn’t just a miracle (though it is impressive). This is a sign. This tells us something about God.

When Mary first alerts Jesus to the lack of wine, Jesus tells her that his “hour has not yet come.” “His hour” is the cross and resurrection. It’s not yet time to do what he has come to do.

But, this is the first sign that points to it.

Jesus is the fulfillment of the Reign of God. Throughout the Bible, God, and specifically Jesus,is referred to as someone getting married. We see an example of that in our Isaiah reading today:

“as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, / so shall your God rejoice over you.” And in other parts of the Bible, the fulfillment of the Reign of God is described as a wedding feast.

This first sign points us to the “wedding feast of the Lamb,” the fulfillment of the Reign of God, and God’s glorious, lavish abundance.

It’s all too easy, though, for us to fall into a mindset of scarcity. It seems more realistic:

It seems like there are only so many resources to go around, so we’ve got to make sure we, or other people who are deserving, receive them.

And that leads us to creating—consciously or not—hierarchies of people.

We, the institutions we support, and society in general can start treating people differently based on any number of factors: race, gender identity, economic status, education level, body size, physical ability—it goes on and on.

If a CEO and someone who is unhoused walked into pretty much any building anywhere around here, they would be treated differently.

A mindset of scarcity can lead us to judging whether people are deserving or not and deciding whose lives are more important than others.

We can start asking ourselves: what concern are other people’s problems to me?

The truth is: they have everything to do with us. We are all made in the image of our God, who loves each of us and wants us to be in relationship with one another.

When we start asking ourselves what concern are others to me, God sometimes puts someone like Mary in our lives to encourage us to get involved.

When we fall into a mindset of scarcity, God calls us to something different: a mindset of abundance, where there is enough for everyone, where everyone is important and cherished.

For example, God called Martin Luther King Jr., whose life and work we will celebrate as a nation tomorrow, and God called so many others during the Civil Rights Movement to a mindset of abundance.

God gave Dr. King a dream.

Dr. King drew on biblical imagery of what the Reign of God would look like, saying: “we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

He had tangible ideas of what that would look like, such as:

·        there would be no signs saying “for whites only”

·        Black people would have equal access to housing, lodging, and hotels

·        Black people would have the full voting rights they had been promised

And he had broader, more philosophical ideas of what justice and righteousness would look like:

·        That “the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood”

·        “that[his] four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character”

·        That “all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning: My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrims' pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

We, as a nation, as a world, and as a church, fall so far short of this dream still. Yes, there have been improvements, but there is still so much disparity in housing, education, employment, rates of incarceration, and healthcare between people of different races.

There have been improvements, but racism has gotten subtler—it hasn’t died.

Disparity based on race has continued to work its way into our institutions.

It’s harder to point to than different sections of a bus or different bathrooms.

It’s less likely that you will hear an overt racial slur (though that, of course, still happens), but it’s harder to point out why backhanded compliments like “you’re so articulate” or “you’re a credit to your race” are so hurtful.

Death by a thousand paper cuts. Or not getting a job because one’s resume has a name on it that doesn’t sound white. Or getting pulled over because one lives in a “bad neighborhood.” It’s much harder to identify racism when it’s not explicitly codified in law but happens anyway.

Some people are deemed more important than others or less of a threat than others or more likely to succeed than others. That’s the scarcity mindset talking.

That is not what God calls us to.

God created us each in God’s image—every person of every skin color and hair texture. People of every profession and education level and economic status. People who our society celebrates and those who are forgotten and marginalized.

In our Gospel story today, those who are “in” on the secret of where the wine came from are the servants—they are the ones at the margins of the wedding. They are the ones who are working when others are celebrating. They are waiting on others. They are the people in the background. They are the ones deemed not as important as the guests.

And they are the ones who see Jesus more clearly than anyone else there (other than Mary, of course). They are the ones who see the sign and what it points to.

God calls us to a sense of abundance that is something far beyond simply physical wealth—beyond Teslas and yachts and designer clothes. God calls us to abundant celebration together. And it is often the most marginalized that see most clearly the vision of what abundance means.

God calls us to a dream of radical community,

where the least are the greatest,

where the forgotten see God,

and where God’s abundance means that the celebration goes on forever.

Let that spirit of abundance cast out any fear of scarcity, and let freedom ring!