“Imperfect Timing”

John 2:1-11

May the words of my mouth and meditations of or hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. Amen.

We gather this morning in search of miracle, a miracle that will uphold an island devastated by an earthquake the magnitude of which confounds us. The recurring aftershocks make not just the ground beneath Haiti, but all of us, tremble. We fear for the dead and the wounded that cry out from prisons of concrete and debris. Our hearts go out to the survivors who mourn for their countrymen as they struggle to find water, food, shelter and above all hope.

Our confidence in a world mobilized into international cooperation to share money, supplies, workers and military personnel is threatened by the stark reality of limited accessibility to the airport and fuel and no clear path to reach thousands of Haitians in need of food clothing and shelter. Here at home we read about Haitian neighbors and friends unable to contact family and forced to live in suspended animation hoping for signs of life at the end of a silent cell telephone.

Now we fear that despair and anger will trump grace despite this outpouring of love and support. This morning John tells us about a miracle and we come to the text with heavy hearts wondering how a wedding feast in an obscure village 9 miles north of Nazareth in Galilee almost 2000 years ago can speak to us of Good News equal to the task at hand in Haiti.

Is there Good News powerful enough to make sense of the apt, but painful, Tampa Tribune headline Wednesday morning, “Agony of the Living.” I believe that the author of the Gospel of John would say, yes, there is Good News equal to the task.

Today we meet Jesus at the beginning of his public ministry. He and five disciples accompany his mother to a wedding banquet. John tells us what happens, before and after Jesus turns water into wine, but absolutely nothing about what Jesus said or did to make the water into wine. In fact John never uses the word miracle. He calls this a sign: a sign that points to God a sign that reveals the doxa glory of Jesus to the disciples and “they believed in Him.”

Picture the staging of this scene. Jesus’ mother, nameless in John’s Gospel, says to her son “They have no wine.” His response gives us pause but many scholars, analyzing the Greek words, find it less offensive in the context of that culture. For example, “Woman” was actually a term of endearment and Jesus will use that same word from the cross to commissions John to care for his mother.

There is no denying, however, that Jesus is abrupt with his mother and it troubles us. John drives home one point: even with his mother there is a boundary that cannot be crossed - a boundary where Jesus’ humanity ends - where his likeness to us ends - and where His divinity and another eternal life with His Father begins; home to him but alien to us.

His mother steps down from him and turns towards the servants saying, “Do whatever he tells you.” Without replying to Jesus, she recedes into the background. Jesus instructs the servants to fill the stone jars and to take the wine to the chief steward. Then Jesus recedes into the background and a spotlight falls on the chief steward. He samples the wine, is astonished and approaches the bridegroom.

The steward interprets this sign as a clever act of hospitality- not a miracle or a sign but clever hospitality on the part of the bridegroom. The story ends without a word from the main character in the wedding party: the bridegroom.

That is because the main character is not the bridegroom but Jesus. The story is about God revealing his son to us. Slowly now the five disciples make their way to center stage and they look towards Jesus standing in the shadows and gradually their gaze meets his and strobe lights surround Jesus: they have seen and believed.

Their faith will waiver in the years ahead but it will not disappear for it is anchored by hope. Hope is a miraculous force. Hope can stand side by side with despair and be heard, not for our voice or our deeds or our prayers, but for the presence of Jesus Christ.

I believe this man we know as John would understand our feelings today because he wrote for a Jewish Christian audience suffering from scattered but intense persecution. At the time he wrote, 80 to 90, the Jewish Christian sect known as “Jesus Followers” had been expelled from the synagogue by Pharisees unable to believe that Jesus was the Messiah.

John writes to encourage them to believe, to persist, to stand alone, but together, in their conviction that Jesus is the Messiah. A miracle is not a supernatural event it is a natural event that is infused with the unlimited grace and hope of God’s eternal love and that gives us a glimpse of heaven – a fleeting momentary “Ah ha” experience of something mysterious that upholds us in love, an extravagant abundance of love called grace for the moment.

The Rev. Geoff Kohler of Palma Ceia shared an email that he received from friends in Haiti with The Presbytery of Tampa Bay.

This eye witness report from the Orlando mission group reads in part, “Spent night about 5 miles inland away from water. Surrounded the vehicles and stayed on the grounds of one of the high schools - buildings too damaged to sleep inside. Slept on ground and in trucks.  We've gotten dozens of aftershocks. Seems like every 15 minutes mild to shakes the car hard.

Haven't had one for about hour now.  Dale and I are going to scout out the road to Port-au-Prince at dawn but from what I've seen it looks really bad - 1000's of people sleeping in streets and sides of road... They won't go to homes cause too damaged or afraid tremors will cause more.

But all we hear is singing - praise songs all over the place - these large groups huddling together singing. You can hear it all around from the darkness. It’s unbelievable - these people are in the dark - singing to the Lord. So awesome!  We prayed a lot. God is in control. He's got our back! "

In Saturday’s paper Jake Feaster of the Community Life Church in Tampa recounts a similar experience last week at an orphanage 20 miles outside the capital: devastation and hope and hymns. “We prayed a lot. God is in control. He's got our back!” God not only has our back, he propels us forward. Fear, uncertainty, danger and a sense of dread are palatable in the stories we have read and seen and heard this past week yet we also heard of heretofore unimaginable bravery, perseverance and daring. The missionaries surrounded by darkness anticipate dawn and plan to walk towards the capital to search for signs of hope. The hymn singing is to me the Cana Grace John described - grace for the moment and that is sometimes enough to hang on in untenable pain and suffering.

This weekend we celebrate the legacy of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and as we consider his life and his achievements we also need to remember that, like the disciples and like us, he was at times overcome with fear and doubt.

In the early sixties, Dr. King composed a sermon, Our God is Able. It is based on Jude 1:24 “God who is able to keep us from falling” a hymn of praise. In the sermon Rev. King admits that the night after the Montgomery Alabama civil rights bus protest he almost walked away from everything. He was exhausted. In the middle of the night the telephone rang and instinctively he picked it up and awoke immediately to the sound of still more threats not only against him but also his family.

Overcome with fear and dread he said, “I was ready to give up. I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing to be a coward. In this state of exhaustion, when my courage had almost gone, I determined to take my problem to God. My head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud. The words I spoke to God that mid-night are still vivid in my memory. ‘I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I’ve come to the point where I can’t face it alone.’”

In that moment, nothing of the reality Dr. King faced had changed, but he felt a peace he not known in a long, long time. Three nights later his home was bombed. He could not account for the strength he had on that occasion except to say, “My God is able.”

Today John tells us that our God is able to change water into wine and 5 disciples believed in Him. Their faith waivered as events unfolded but in the gospel of John the same group that gathered at Cana at a wedding feast ultimately gather at the cross.

As The Rev. Peter Gomes observes, from that cross Jesus offers words of hope and love: caring for his mother and beloved disciple and even a thief.

The events of this past week take us to the cross as well to cast our burdens on our Lord and pray for grace for the moment to pray, to do what we can relying upon our God, who is able, to carry us that we might be a part of the miracle of love and hope in the midst of this tragic, overwhelming, catastrophe. Amen.

The Rev. Elizabeth Kuehl

Temple Terrace Presbyterian Church