The Sign of Wine: Glory, Blessing, Blood

John 2:1-12

Our sermon text this morning is John 2:1-12.

In the lead up to these verses, Jesus has been introduced as the Son of God, the promised Messiah, the light of the world, the creator of all things, and various other titles and descriptions. John the Baptist and several of Jesus newly gathered disciples testified to those things.

The apostle John now turns his attention to not just tell us who Jesus is, but to show us.

In our passage this morning, we'll hear about the first miracle of Jesus. It happened at a wedding in Cana which is in the region of Galilee.

Reading of John 2:1-12

Every single culture throughout human history has had weddings … you know, ceremonies and banquets. And there are some interesting customs.

I've never been, but I understand that if you go to a Jewish wedding, you’ll see the groom and sometimes the bride smash a piece of glass under their feet. At Greek weddings, the attendees will dance in big circles around the happy couple - apparently it's a sign of blessing. I’ve never witness that but I've seen the movie.

A few years ago when I was in India with Pastor Chuck, we drove by a big wedding reception. There was an elephant and there were lots of colors. It was beautiful and very celebratory.

And it’s no wonder why weddings are so significant. God established marriage from the very beginning. Right there in Genesis 2, God instituted the union between man and woman. A man shall leave his father and mother and shall be united to his wife and they shall become one flesh.

When I am meeting with engaged couples, one thing I emphasize is that Genesis 2 happened before Genesis 3. I know that sounds obvious and it is, but it is very significant. Genesis 3 is the fall – it’s when sin entered the world. Genesis 2 is when God established marriage. In other words, marriage between a man and a woman is part of God’s created order before the fall. Marriage is not part of God’s redemptive plan - No, it precedes it and transcends the fall. In other words, marriage is not just for Christians, rather, it is an institution that applies to all humanity.

To be sure, not everyone is called to be married – the apostle Paul makes that clear. But marriage and family are at the very center of God’s established order for humanity.

So, it’s no wonder that weddings have always been a big deal everywhere – because they are!

I bring all that up because the fact that Jesus' very first miracle happened at a wedding is very significant. Jesus didn’t turned water into wine at some arbitrary banquet. No, he did so at a wedding feast. He did so at a celebration of the most important union here on earth… and more importantly, a union modelled after his relationship with us - the marriage between Christ and his church.

My hope is that as we work through what happened at this wedding in Cana, that you will see not only the glory of Jesus on display, but you will also see how it reveals the greater wedding banquet that is to come.

Ok. Before we get into the specifics, I want to point out one other significant thing. Look at verse 11. It says, “This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee.” Notice that John does not use the word “miracle.” No, instead he uses the word “sign.”

Sign is the word that John uses throughout the book. In fact, chapters 2 through chapter 12 are sometimes called the “book of signs.” The content of these chapters revolve around 7 signs that Jesus performed. The word sign comes from the Greek word “sēmeia.” The word indicates that these events are more than just miracles. They point to something significant. Think about all the English words derived from the Greek word for sign. Significant, signify, signal, assign… all of those capture the idea that there’s a deeper meaning here. And that is what these signs are. They direct our attention not to the miracles themselves, but rather to what the miracles reveal.

I think the clearest example of this I think is in chapter 6. Jesus multiplied the fish and the loaves and then he said to the crowd, “I am the bread of heaven.” Through that miracle, Jesus gave us a sign that he is the one who spiritually feed us and gives us life.

So here at the wedding in Cana, it’s not only that Jesus displayed his glory and power by turning water into wine. But Jesus also revealed greater things.

The question is, then, to what is this sign signifying? … you know, beyond just Jesus' glory? Well, as we work through the narrative, there are two additional things that the sign of wine is signifying. It foreshadows the cleansing blood of Christ, and it demonstrates the abundant spiritual blessings that we have and will received in him.

We'll consider those in three points: #1 the sign of Jesus' glory. #2, the foreshadowing of Jesus' blood. and #3 the foretaste of eternal blessing.

1. The Sign of Wine - Glory

So, first, glory. I think you would agree, this miracle displays God’s glory in and through Jesus. Verse 11 tells us that. It says, "…it manifested his glory."

The very act of the miracle itself manifested (or displayed) Jesus' glory.

And by the way, just to be sure, this really was wine. As some of our Baptist friends think, Jesus did not turn water into grape juice, but, in fact, wine, good wine.

Ok, let's spend a little bit of time just walking through the narrative.

Notice first that it mentions this happened on the third day. The way we count days today, it's actually two days later. Back then, the current day was considered day one as you count days. Tomorrow would be day two. And the day after is the third day. As you know, we usually count tomorrow as day 1.

So, basically two days later, Jesus and his new disciples were at a wedding. They'd been invited. And we find that in some way, Jesus' mother, Mary, was helping. Perhaps this was a relative. Furthermore, Jewish weddings at the time were multiple day affairs - some of them would go on for 7 days. I know that's hard for us to even imagine. It involved multiple meals and celebratory things. Furthermore, the wine used throughout was more than just for enjoyment, it indicated a mutual blessing upon the families being united together as they celebrated the marriage. Also, the groom's family would have hosted it, and they would have spent a lot of time and money. So, it was a big deal.

But we find out pretty quickly, that there's a crisis. They've run out of wine! They couldn’t just send someone to Kroger or Publix. It was a major problem… and running out of wine would have come with a social stigma. The groom's family would have been very embarrassed.

Why did they run out? We're not told. it could have been poor planning. Maybe they had more people than they expected. Maybe people drank more than they thought they would. We just don’t know.

When Mary said to Jesus that there was no more wine, we get the sense that she knew Jesus could resolve the problem. But Jesus responds to her, "woman, what has this to do with me? My hour has not yet come." Now, to our ears, it sounds a little roughly worded. It sounds like Jesus was scolding his mother. But actually, the word 'woman' was used in a different way at that time. I think the NIV translation does a better job here. It says "dear woman." You see, the word "women" was sometimes used as a term of affection. Jesus was lovingly saying to his mother that it was not his problem. His "hour," as he said, had not yet come. We'll come back to the word "hour" in a few minutes. The bottom line is that Jesus indicated that this was not his matter to resolve.

Notice, though, that he did not say he wouldn't help. Mary understood that and she knew that Jesus in some way could fix the problem. And so, what does she do? She tells servants, "Do whatever he says." Truly, it was a display of deep faith on her part. She believed in what he could do.

Now, the venue had a set of stone purification jars - there were six of them. We'll come back to their ceremonial purpose in a minute.

Jesus asked the servants to fill them. So, the servants followed through with Jesus request as Mary had told them to. They filled them "to the brim," it says. That would have taken some time. And then immediately when they finished, Jesus had them draw some of it out and they were to bring it to the master of the feast.

At this point, the miracle had already been done - the servants knew it, which is pointed out for us. The servants also knew, as did Mary and the disciples, that the wine had run out… but now there was plenty.

But the master of ceremonies didn’t know any of that. And when he tasted the wine, it was not diluted nor was it lower quality wine that was sometimes served after the good wine. No, hardly at all. The master went straight to the groom and said, "you have kept the good wine until now." It was an encouraging word. Not only had disaster been averted, but quite the opposite happened. The celebration ramped up! The festivities continued with good wine served to the guests. What a tremendous blessing for the whole wedding party!

Part of the miracle was that Jesus never touched the stone jars. He wasn't the one who filled them with water. He was also not the one to bring the new wine to the master of the ceremonies. In fact, we're not told that the master, nor the groom, nor the guests ever knew about the miracle. But the servants knew, and Mary knew, and Jesus' disciples knew - they had observed from a distance. And look at the brief note at the end of 11… right after it says that Jesus manifested his glory… it says, "And his disciples believed in him."

You may remember, at the end of chapter 1, we're told that Nathaniel believed. But now we're given a fu...