Rafferty came across one of his old sermons the other day, & wondered if it might help someone looking for a lead-in idea for preaching on the Wedding at Cana. Here it is:

Mary has a good eye! Here she is, & Jesus, & the rest of the gang, too, at this rellie's wedding. & just when things're warming up & everyone's having fun, Mary happens to glance across at the bar & sees the barman opening up the last wine cask, ripping the inside out of it, & squeezing the last drops into someone's cup. The Kaiser Stuhl's run out!

Next time Jesus comes near her as he dances around - why do we persist in thinking of Jesus out on the sidelines somewhere as a spectator just watching what's going on? - next time Jesus dances near, Mary says in a stage whisper, `They're out of wine!' Now Jesus isn't all that keen to be interrupted. He responds to Mary rather brusquely in words that mean roughly "what's that got to do with you & me. It's not my time yet." But as I say, Mary has a good eye & Jesus gets an eyeful & next thing we know the waiters are filling these 6 huge terra cotta pots with water; water, mind you! Now each of them holds 25 or 30 x 4 litre casks so we're talking about a lot of water! When they've filled the pots, Jesus tells them to dip in & give some to the head-steward to taste; &, would you believe it, the water's become Grange - or at least Mt.Edelstone! It's a very good year! & the party's a wow from this point on.

Why do I tell the story like this? Because we aren't too good at celebrating life to the full with Jesus. We persist in making him into a stern face & a straight lace, often into someone more likely to turn water into vinegar than into wine, or Grange into cask wine. No wonder a lot of people don't find Jesus so relevant & attractive they just have to get out there & follow him! I bet you that if we were to put a new stained glass window of Jesus at the Wedding at Cana into the church, Jesus'd be up there watching from the sidelines with a serious look on his face. We've got into the habit of showing him like that. Have you ever seen Jesus smiling in a stained glass window? Couldn't we just once dare show him clapping his hands & stamping his feet, kicking his heels up in the boisterous Jewish dancing really enjoying himself, & encouraging everyone else to enjoy themselves too? Could we just once risk showing him with a glass of whatever red is on offer in his hand? One in each hand might be going just too far! You know, years later they're still saying, `Do you remember that wedding at Cana?'! Yet Church has become better at making Jesus more unreal than real. So it follows that this miracle of water into wine & all his other miracles of feeding & helping & healing people become unreal too.

In the Cana story, here's Jesus the compassionate One busily saving that host family from shame & putting the joy back into someone's wedding. & here we are, the church, all too often portraying Him as someone who takes the joy out of everything he touches. No wonder not too many people want Jesus to touch them & their life in case He spoils it! You know, today during a Jewish wedding the Groom is often given a wine glass, representing the beauty of all that God provides for us.But then he has to stand on the glass & smash it as a reminder of how fragile love is if it's not cared for. One Rabbi tells the story of how a Groom is given the customary glass, but stand on it as as he might, he can't smash it. The groom is getting more & more frustrated, the bride's in tears, when the Rabbi twigs to the fact that someone's replaced the glass with an unbreakable plastic one!

Maybe the wedding at Cana can remind us of the dangers of creating a plastic unbreakable Jesus instead of the compassionate, vulnerable one we come to know & love in our midst as we live out the Gospel together today. // There's a great irony in the Cana story, because underneath the out in front story of the water & the wine, S. John means us to see that here enjoying himself incognito in the midst of this typical family wedding party is the True Bridegroom of Israel! The One who out of his great love for us wants all of us to marry Him. In Jesus, Messiah comes into our midst, revealing himself in all his love & compassion, rescuing these newlyweds & their family of the Gospel story who stand for us all. JES wants to rescue us all from our various shames by filling us to the brim & overflowing with the best joy on offer represented by the best wine in this story.

I began by saying, `Mary has a good eye'. Let me end by asking what kind of an eye we have for the things that really matter, people in all their needs, & how we can help them? What kind of an eye do we have for the True Bridgroom among us in daily life today & tomorrow? As persons, as communities, certainly as a nation we need to turn to the One who can stop us shaming ourselves in our relations with one another, &, it follows, with Godself, & turn to the One who can stop any of us settling for less of a life than God's got on offer for us.

A lot of us may have to settle for cardboard cask wine in day to day reality, but none of us has to settle for a plastic unsmiling unbreakable Jesus when the real One can make even the cardboard casks of everyday life taste pretty good!