Epiphany 2 John 2:1-11 (2022)

Wedding, Wine, and Word

John 2:1-11

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.

St. John 2:1-2 On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. ² Now both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding.

Dear fellow redeemed in Christ our Lord…  Everything God has created reflects something about the Creator. Psalm 19 begins: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim His handiwork.” And as Psalm 8 begins, “O Yahweh, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”  God’s act of creation foreshadows His great act of redemption in which the Son became flesh, died for our sins, and created in His own body a new creation restored to the image of the Father.

The fact that people can’t recognize God’s goodness and mercy in creation isn’t the fault of the Creator; it is because of our sin.  Sin, which we have inherited from our first parents, has corrupted all of creation, and it has corrupted our perception of God.  Of course, God’s works are still evident in His creation, and no one is excused from recognizing God and glorifying Him.  Even our consciences bear witness to some kind of divine law, for we recognize that it is wrong to murder, steal, and cheat.  But our hearts are by nature blinded by sin and unable to behold God’s gracious hand throughout creation.

This is true especially of God’s creation of marriage.  Marriage, along with the estate of the home, is the highest institution among all of God’s acts of creation.  He created man, both male and female, in His own image.  He formed the man out of the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils.  God said that it was not good for man to be alone, so, He made Adam fall into a deep sleep as He took a section of the man’s side and out of it formed the woman.  The man woke up and he rejoiced to behold his wife.  He called her bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh.  

This is why God has commanded that a man should leave his father and mother and cling to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.  Here is reflected the great unity of God himself, as the Father, His only begotten Son, and the eternal Spirit reign forever as one God.  God gave the man and his wife dominion over all creatures as they lived together as one flesh.  He gave them the blessing of children as He blessed the womb like a fruitful vine.

But since the fall into sin, this beautiful image of God’s creation has been besmirched, railed against, mocked, and despised.  Especially today we see that the splendor of marriage is not what God has intended it to be.  Sex has been divorced from both procreation as well as marriage.  As far as this evil and godless world is concerned, you can have sex with whomever you choose, whether or not you’re married, and no one seems to bat an any anymore.  Adultery?  Well, that is a thing of the past.

And bearing and raising godly children?  That is given a backseat, while the pleasures of the flesh are given priority over all things.  Adults who are lousy parents allow their children to be disrespectful to authority.  Adults also set bad examples when they despise church and encourage their children to find their own truth.

God created marriage so that the home would serve as a sanctuary of His Word of grace.  This means that the first thing you should look for in a potential spouse is whether that person fears God and wants to confess the purity of his Word.  Yet, the desires of the flesh lead many young Christians to seek after things like good looks, intelligence, and other qualities long before they consider a faithful confession of the one true Faith, that is, if they ever consider it at all.

We need to understand that God established marriage as a remedy against sexual immorality.  As Hebrews 13:4 says, “Marriage is to be held in honor by all, and the marriage bed is to be kept undefiled, for God will judge sexually immoral people and adulterers.”  Yet, the expectation of our society is that couples should live together as if they are married without actually being married, you know, to see if it will work out, and to see if they’re a good fit…like trying on a pair of shoes.

And even when people do get married, the sinful nature remains selfish and self-serving.  God established marriage as a picture of the relationship between Christ and His bride, the church.  But the sinful flesh is always corrupting this.  A wife imagines that she can hold her husband’s faults against him, waiting for him to conform to her own standards before she will respect him as her head.  A husband imagines that he can put down or even abandon his wife just because he thinks she is being irrational or disrespectful.

Meanwhile, the devil has deceived even many Christians into denying themselves the gift of children, as if they are not gifts given from God’s fatherly and divine goodness and mercy without any merit or worthiness in us.  Love of money, earthly comforts, and selfish desire for luxury overtake the selfless and self-giving love, which reflects our Lord’s steadfast love all the way to His bitter suffering and death.

Dear friends, God created marriage because He loves us.  He cared about Adam and didn’t want him to be alone.  God gave Adam his wife in order to keep him from sinning.  She was supposed to be a great blessing for him.  And yet, it seemed as though she proved to be a curse on Adam by giving him of the forbidden fruit, leading him to sin with her and bring all of creation into sin.

There’s nothing new under the sun.  If your frustrations toward your spouse seem to overwhelm the blessings God intends for you, remember Adam and his wife.  They had a dispute, which was more earth-shaking than any adultery, abuse, or defiance couples today may experience.  You might not think this isn’t true.  After all, they just ate a piece of forbidden fruit.  Some wives are disrespectful and even demeaning.  Some husbands are abusive and untrustworthy.  Perhaps we imagine these vices and faults to be much worse than eating from some tree in the middle of the garden.  And yet, the worst and most damaging sin in marriage is despising God’s Word.  It was by despising God’s commandment and disregarding His instruction that Adam and his wife brought destruction not only on their marriage but on the entire creation.

And yet, God still cared about their marriage, and He cares about yours as well.  In Genesis 3:15 He promised to send a Savior to be born of a woman in order to destroy the power of the devil who tried to ruin that first marriage made in paradise.  This gave hope to Adam and his wife.  It changed everything.  That’s what the Gospel does; it changes everything, and it converts hearts to God.

So, Adam, who moments before blamed God for giving him his wife, now gave her a name.  He called her Eve, which means life.  Their marriage was restored as together they hoped for the coming Savior to be born of a woman.

This Savior is, of course, the Lord Jesus Himself.  He was born of the Virgin Mary thousands of years later, born for you and me.  The Lord Jesus, who created our flesh and blood, has joined Himself to our flesh and blood as our brother.  He became one of us in order to take our sins to His cross and die for them all.  He blessed the marriage of Mary and Joseph by His holy birth.  But He didn’t stop there.   He wasn’t interested only in their marriage, and our text today from St. John’s Gospel demonstrates this.

Jesus and his disciples were invited to a wedding.  His mother was there.  They were celebrating.  They were rejoicing over what God had created in paradise.  Two people, a man and a woman, had become one flesh in marriage.  What had been ruined by the eating of forbidden fruit was now being celebrated in the presence of the Lord Himself.  

But then they come across some problems with another kind fruit.  The fruit of the vine had run dry; they were all out of wine.  Again, this doesn’t seem so earth-shattering.  Many weddings don’t have any wine or booze at all.  And yet, the Lord cares.  Wine gladdens the heart.  The Lord wanted them to celebrate His institution of marriage.

Notice what our Lord does.  His mother came to Him to tell Him that there was no more wine.  Jesus responded rather briefly: “Woman, what does this have to do with me?  My hour has not yet come.”  Jesus didn’t call her mother; He called her woman.  Now, to some, this may seem disrespectful, but our Lord is being very intentional here.  He is distancing Himself from His mother, signifying what He was about to do.  God said, “A man shall leave his father and mother and cling to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”  Jesus was on a mission to claim His bride, the church, to wash her clean from all her sin by His own blood, baptizing her into His own death and life.  So, to signify this eternal marriage feast between Himself and the church, Jesus blessed an ordinary marriage here on earth.

The waterpots were for purification rituals.  But these rituals were only the works of men, and all the religious ceremonies in the world can’t take away the stain of sin that infects us.  So Jesus overtook the works of men and brought them into submission to Him.  He commanded that the waterpots be filled up with water; and so the servants filled them to the brim.  He told them to draw the water and bring it to the master of the feast.  They did as He told them.  Mary told them to listen to Jesus.  She understood that He must leave her to fulfill His true work.  She trusted His Word, so she admonished the servants to trust in His Word as well.

Jesus turned the water into wine, and the master of the feast declared that it was the best wine.  While Adam and his wife fell from grace by eating of a fruit, now our Lord had restored joy to a wedding by blessing it with the fruit of the vine.

This was more than a supernatural act of our Lord.  It was a sign.  Jesus was signifying something by blessing that wedding feast with wine.  He was signifying the redemption He would win by His own blood for the sins of the whole world, and He chose a wedding for His first sign, because He cares about His creation.  He cares about marriage.  He cares about your marriage.  He cares about you, your spouse, your children, and all who are far off.  He cares about all your needs in this life.  This is why He died for you.  This is why He has risen bodily from the dead.  This is why He baptized you by His Holy Spirit in the water with the Word.

God loves marriage.  This is why He created it.  He blesses marriage with blessings much greater than all the riches of this world.  Such blessings include companionship, children, and chastity.   There is nothing better on this earth.  And yet, the greatest blessing God bestows on marriage is His gospel and all the ways He delivers Himself to His people.  It is the good news of His loving grace by which He forgives you of all your sins for His own sake.  

And in marriage, God gives us a picture of the marriage of Christ to His bride, the church.  As a father gives his daughter’s hand in marriage, so God the Father presents you, His bride, to the Bridegroom who is Christ. 

And Christ has perfectly fulfilled the role of the faithful bridegroom by giving Himself in death upon the cross to cover and pay for all of your sins.  And to sustain you, He gives Himself continually to you in His Gospel preached, in the forgiveness and promises of Holy Baptism, in the proclaimed and delivered forgiveness of Holy Absolution, and especially here in His body and blood, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of all your sins.  Here at this altar you partake of the most intimate spiritual blessings of this marriage between Christ and His bride, the church.

God loves you.  He has given His Son to die for you.  He sustains you with His Word and Sacraments.  And all of this will most certainly carry you into His arms where you will be with Him forever in the sinless bliss of eternity.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.