I love a good party. I love gathering folks together who may or may not know one another, feasting together and telling stories, celebrating, entertaining, reflecting. At its best, a good party is a kind of dynamic, life-giving experience that impacts me and sticks in my memory. And so I feel the disappointment when, in the days-long wedding celebration that opens John chapter 2, the wine runs out too soon.
The setting of John 2 multiplies that disappointment. This is a shame/honor culture, with the rumor-mill of a small town, and this being the only wedding celebration that this newly married couple would ever have. Painful. Disappointing. Embarrassing.
But Jesus is there (he loves a good party too). His first miracle extends the party with more wine than needed, and for an extra flourish, it’s a much higher quality. He rescues the honor of those throwing the party, reinforcing this celebration more bountifully than any guest would have expected. Empty cups are filled, physically and metaphysically. Why?
Rather than try to answer the question here, I have an invitation: spend some time with this text, and reflect on the Jesus you see in it. How is this character of Jesus interacting with where you are today? How is the filler of cups consoling or frustrating you? (For further insight into this story, enjoy Dr. Tim Keller’s sermon “Lord of the Wine.”)
This Sunday, we will read the next story in John’s Gospel, which is inseparably linked to The Wedding at Cana. It’s a different kind of story, and seemingly a different kind of Jesus. In John 2:13-22, Jesus’ passion moves him to “cleanse the temple” by flipping tables and driving-out livestock with a whip. Jolly Jesus seems to have become angry Jesus — we have to understand both to know the true consistent Jesus underneath it all, who is driven in both actions by his passionate love for you.
So if you can, come Sunday having spent time with the Jesus who fills empty cups so that we can draw near to the (same) Jesus who flips tables.
Michael+