Sermon on John 2:1-11
Pastor Jennifer Garcia
Focus:Just as Jesus provided what they needed at the wedding at Cana to keep celebrating together, God forms us into Beloved Community where we can lament and celebrate and love our neighbors together.
Function:This sermon will provide permission to hearers to lament in a difficult time and remind them that they can lean on each other and God as Beloved Community.
Weddings are supposed to be joyful celebrations. And yet,they’re events where emotions of all kinds run high, and one small mishap can turn into a great deal of crying and yelling. Imagine getting a stain on the wedding dress or one of the groomsmen gets the flu and upsets the balance of the attendants. Or the wine runs out.
Hospitality was a huge part of the culture in the first centuryin the Middle East. Running out of wine would have been a Big Deal.
But fortunately, Jesus was able to fix the problem before any crying or yelling.
Not only did he turn a massive amount of water into wine, but he produced wine that was better than what had already been served. Crisis averted!
But of course, it wasn’t just about getting the hosts out of a tricky situation. The Gospel of John marks this as the first of seven signs that point to who Jesus is and what work God is up to in the world.
This might seem like a strange sign to start with. It’s certainly very different from healing people or raising Lazarus from the dead.
But this sign does say several things about Jesus and God’s work in the world. Here are five:
First, when Jesus defied the laws of physics, it tells us that Jesus is powerful. Creation obeyed Jesus’ commands. In Jesus, God was at work in the world in a tangible, powerful way.
Second, we have a God of abundance. Jesus didn’t just make enough wine for one more toast—Jesus filled 6 jugs for a total of between 120 and 180 gallons of wine. I don’t know how many people were at the wedding, but we can safely assume that there was enough for the party to go on for a lot longer.
Third, Jesus helps foster community. He helped the families of the wedding couple save face from the embarrassment of running out of wine—of not having sufficient resources to offer the expected hospitality to their guests. Jesus made it possible for this community-enriching event to continue.
Fourth, there’s a ton of symbolism in this story that tells us who Jesus is. We see Jesus described in Revelation and elsewhere in the Bible as a bridegroom and the fulfillment of the Reign of God as the wedding feast of the Lamb. The Gospel of John uses this story to say from the very first sign that Jesus is the host and guest of honor at the banquet that will never end.
Finally, God likes a celebration. It can be easy to stereotype religious folks as stern and joyless. But that’s not what we see in this story. In addition to all the rich symbolism, we can’t forget that here we see Jesus and his disciples at a party.Critics of Jesus would later complain that he partied too much. Jesus was not the ascetic John the Baptist living off the land in the wilderness. Jesus likes a party. God likes it when we celebrate.
But right now, there’s a whole lot in our world that doesn’t feel celebratory.
There are the wildfires that are causing so much damage in LA. Many of us know someone who has had to evacuate or has lost their home, workplace, or faith community. Bishop Brenda Bos from Southwest California Synod lost her home.Some people have lost their lives. The destruction is immense. It will take years not only to rebuild the structures, but to heal from the trauma of what’s going on.
And in our own faith community, we’re grieving with the Wood family after John’s memorial service yesterday. Of course, this is only the beginning of the grief journey, and sometimes it’s hard to know what to say or do. But keep praying for John’s friends and family, check on each other, and don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know what to say, but I’m thinking of you.”
Many of you are also navigating illnesses, surgeries, other challenging life events, and anxieties about difficult things going on around the world.
It can seem like there’s not much to celebrate. And that’s okay.
There is room for lament also.
The dominant US culture isn’t great at lament. There’s not much time for lament when you’re trying to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. We’re encouraged to get over things fast and not bother other people with our troubles.
But the Bible is full of lament. Just look at the Psalms or the book of Job! Look at Naomi in the book of Ruth changing her name to Mara, or bitterness, in her grief. Look at Jesus himself praying in the garden of Gethsemane until his sweat fell to the ground like drops of blood or crying out on the cross, asking why God abandoned him.
Lament is holy.
And one thing that lament and celebration have in common is that they’re good things to do in community.
Two of the most significant events we gather for are weddings and funerals. We need our communities for big life changes like that, whether they’re joyful or grief-filled.
Throughout his ministry, Jesus was forming community. Right before this story, he collected disciples. There are many stories of him healing people and restoring them to their communities. He ate with “tax collectors and sinners,” not caring if he was making the “right” impression, but choosing to spend time with people in the margins. He called us to love our neighbors.
He spent his life on Earth gathering people into the Beloved Community, and at the end of time, the doors to the wedding feast of the Lamb will be thrown open, and there will be a place card with your name on it, with everyone’s name on it.
And while there will be great rejoicing at that eternal banquet, we’re not there yet. The world is not as it should be. And it’s okay to grieve that.It’s okay to lament, to shout, to cry, to lie in bed until you can face the world again.
That’s also what community’s for. We’re not mean to do life alone. We’re meant to share the joys and the sorrows with our friends, family, neighbors, and siblings in Christ. We’re meant to care for each other, and that also requires allowing ourselves to be cared for.
We also have different gifts to contribute to community, which is what our reading from 1 Corinthians talks about. None of us can do everything, so we have to depend on each other and the Holy Spirit to fulfill our mission in the world. For us, it’s to “feed people body and soul,” and thank God for each of your gifts!
The outgoing Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, wrote an essay called “My Parting Prescription for America,”[1] and, while you might expect it would be about the benefits of exercise or nutrition, it’sactually all about community.
Here’s what he says about why this is his prescription for our country:
“With every conversation, I saw the stakes more clearly: the fracturing of community in America is driving a deeper spiritual crisis that threatens our fundamental well-being. It is fueling not only illness and despair on an individual level, but also pessimism and distrust across society which have all made it painfully difficult to rise together in response to common challenges.
“Through my work over two terms as Surgeon General, I saw that the answer to “What’s missing?” is simple, yet profound: community. The loss of community has become one of the defining challenges of our time. In response, we need a fundamental shift in how we build and prioritize community.”
And this is what he says about how to make that shift:
“So, what makes community possible? Three core elements: relationships, service, and purpose. And one core virtue: love. Together, they create the ecosystem of meaning and belonging that are essential for fulfillment.”
If that’s not a good description of what church should be, I don’t know what is. Relationships, service, and purpose, held together by love.
God has formed this faith community, building relationships, helping us serve our neighbors and show God’s love to our neighborhood. This is a place where we should be able to bring our whole selves: our grief and lament, not just our celebrations and service.
Jesus came to usher in the Reign of God. I often use the term Beloved Community interchangeably with the Reign of God. Beloved Community was a term popularized by Dr. King, who we will be remembering tomorrow. Beloved Community can be summarized as “a community to which we all belong, in which all live in freedom. King described it as a space of social equity and belonging, peace, and freedom from prejudice.”[2]
Jesus spent his life forming Beloved Community, restoring human dignity, and expressing God’s love to the world.
We are the Body of Christ, striving to live in his example.
He was fully human, so we’re allowed to be fully human also.
Let’s bring our whole selves—our gifts and our griefs—to this community as we celebrate each other’s joys and lament with each other in difficult times.
You are not alone. God is with you, and we are with each other.
In the name of Christ, Amen.
[1]https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/my-parting-prescription-for-america.pdf?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
[2]https://www.aclu-wa.org/story/fighting-justice-inclusion-reach-mlk%E2%80%99s-beloved-community%C2%A0
