DESERT PALMS PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Sun City West, Arizona

Saving the Best ‘Til Last

A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Dr. David S. Hodgson

January 17, 2010

Psalm 24

1 The earth is the LORD’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it; 2 for he has founded it on the seas, and established it on the rivers. 3 Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD? And who shall stand in his holy place? 4 Those who have clean hands and pure hearts, who do not lift up their souls to what is false, and do not swear deceitfully. 5 They will receive blessing from the LORD,

and vindication from the God of their salvation. 6 Such is the company of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob. Selah 7 Lift up your heads, O gates! and be lifted up, O ancient doors! that the King of glory may come in. 8 Who is the King of glory? The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle. 9 Lift up your heads, O gates! and be lifted up, O ancient doors that the King of glory may come in. 10 Who is this King of glory? The LORD of hosts, he is the King of glory.            Selah

John 2:1-11

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. 2 Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3 When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” 4 And Jesus said to her,

“Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” 5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” 6 Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. 7 Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. 8 He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. 9 When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom 10 and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” 11 Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

“Everyone serves the good wine first, but you have kept the good wine until now,” John, Chapter 2, Verse 10. Let us pray for insight. Open our minds, O Lord, to see you searching for us, speaking to us, caring for us, even in this remarkable passage from your holy word. Amen.

Mary was, after all, a Jewish mother. Nowhere is that fact more evident than in this delightful portrayal of a wedding in Cana. If you read this passage like a seasoned theologian or parse it like a Biblical scholar, you are likely to miss the point completely, but catch a glimpse of a Jewish mother with her son and it all begins to make perfect sense. 

So why does a Jewish mother invite her son to a Jewish wedding? To meet lots of nice Jewish girls, right? This story is a whole lot more fun, you’ll find, if you read between the lines rather than trying to stay within the lines. We have permission to go there because of all the details that John puts there in the spaces between the lines for creative imaginations to find. For example, though he never says so we know that Jesus was not the one being married, that Mary was therefore not the mother of the groom nor was she the mother of the bride, and we know that Jesus was not performing the ceremony. So why was he there? Could it be because words were spoken such as these: “Son, it’s your cousin. He’s being married. He’s three years younger than you. Of course, you don’t have to go. I know you’re busy. I could probably manage by myself.”

              Jewish motherhood, as you clearly already know, is the art of planting, cultivating and harvesting guilt, because every Jewish mother knows, if you control the guilt, you control the child. Maybe that’s why Jesus spent so much time talking about forgiveness. We see that drama unfold with pure delight in John’s description of the wedding.

The wine ran out, a potential source of embarrassment for the host. It was somebody else’s wedding, somebody else’s problem, but it was Mary who was fussing about, trying to make it Jesus’ problem. In his reply to her we see him teasing his mother for being a typical Jewish mother. His words, loosely paraphrased, sound like this: “So woman, how did this get to be your problem?”

Her retort to him is so typical of Jewish motherhood that Jewish mothers actually have a name for it. It is called ‘third person invisible’. You turn to another, as she did to the servants, and talk about the third, as though he were not there. “Just do whatever he tells you.” To understand the passage you have to see the precise cock of the head, the rolling of the eyes and hear the sigh. You have to hear the sigh, because in that moment, she determined the outcome of a situation that she just declared was totally up to him. That’s Jewish motherhood at its finest.

            I grew up in a Jewish neighborhood. Most of my friends had Jewish mothers. I didn’t have one. Mine was Baptist. She didn’t do the guilt thing—she just prayed out loud so I could hear. The sheer beauty of this passage, however, is that beneath that wonderful layer of delightful ethnic humor, Jesus uses the occasion to remind his mother of the sacred trust that had been once given to her in a manger. It also reveals the purpose for which God would use that trust.

            Six jugs of water, filled to the brim. A symbol of his own spirit, waiting, fermenting, if you will, in a human body; a gift from God entrusted to a family system for its nurturing. His fullness of time had not yet come; nevertheless, God was preparing his spirit as gift for the entire world. Then he poured it out to the surprise of guests. A symbol that one day he would take his life’s spirit and pour it into a chalice and let it spill out to all the ages. God’s gift, once entrusted to Mary and to his mortality, shared in all of its maturity with the world, so much so that those who received it would be wont to say what the startled steward remarked, “God, you have saved the best until now.” 

As that spirit of God poured out upon the ages, I believe it has inspired human intellect in its search for truth. It has awakened the heart of civilization in its adventure with compassion. It has marshaled temporal resources for the advancement of civilization, and it has reassured the human soul in every generation that its longing for things eternal it just a trace of homesickness. As the spirit of Christ poured out upon the ages, to my estimation it went across Europe and motivated the great renaissance of learning, a reformation of faith, a struggle for liberty, a liberation of society and the manifestation of justice. With that life spirit it is my firm belief that God was investing divine spirit in the evolution of human life and the elevation of human society. It is God’s gift to us, and even as we receive it is fermenting, expanding with inflexible wineskins, until the fullness comes and it is shared with all of its life-giving celebration.

Have we not found it so? If we were to trace God’s influence through the life of Christ upon us, do we not remember how it shaped the seasons of our youth? Taught us not to be afraid of this God, but to relate to the personality of God as we found in that life? To be guided by the wisdom and the mysteries that he taught, later to be inspired by his companionship as we walked the pathway of life, ever growing, ever maturing, that spirit fermenting within us, helping our spirit to grow in the fullness of time. It has been that spirit that has strengthened our faith in times of crisis, expanded our love into all aspects of life, empowered our hope, increased our patience, improved our resilience, guided us with its wisdom. The personality and spirit of God, poured out upon the ages, gifted to each and every one of us.

That same spirit has been poured out upon the life of this church, and you know it, because I have felt you celebrating with it in worship. You have brought to this beautiful place of celebration the stories of your lives and the shared experiences of your faith. In this place you celebrate, so much so that some of you have actually said of your spiritual experience, “Lord, you have saved the best ‘til now.” 

In this congregation we have many opportunities to share that spirit with one another. Through the programs and interpersonal relationships of our common life together, one of the most amazing and respected programs of this church in which the spirit and love of Christ is shared is our Stephen Ministries program. It is through those confidential relationships that life in its finest hour is shared, one with another. On behalf of those who give care and those who receive care I want to say thank you, because I know that the spirit of Christ, from what I have heard from caregivers and care receivers alike, in those relationships has been poured out in all of its fullness and maturity. I have heard both caregivers and care receivers say of that care, “Surely, Lord, you have saved the best until now.”

            So why did that Jewish mother take the son of God to a Jewish wedding in Cana? Perhaps because she knew that one day we would be there, too. Amen.

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Service of Recognition of the eight new Stephen Ministers.