This sermon was preached at Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 3pm.
Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father,
and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Everyone serves the
good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you
have kept the good wine until now.
Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations
of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Today we have come together
to witness the marriage of Darryl and Carol. And Darryl and Carol are a man and
a woman who have been joined together in marriage like many men and women throughout
the centuries. In the reading about Jesus turning water into wine we read about
Jesus going to a wedding, just like we are attending this wedding today. Right
from the beginning of the world, God created marriage. We read right at the
beginning of the bible, that God made them male and female, and it says:
And God blessed them.
This is what we read right at
the beginning of the bible which is talking about the very beginning of time,
and the first human beings. But also, many years later, we read in the bible
about the life of Jesus and how he lived a life, just like us. But then he died
for the sin of the world, and he rose again from the dead. And from that time
onwards, Jesus has always been gathering to himself followers, disciples, and
making them into his church. And in the bible, the church is pictured as the
bride of Christ, so that our earthly marriages are a kind of picture of that
wonderful marriage that exists between Jesus and his church. Right at the end
of the bible, in Revelation, it says that we are invited to the marriage
banquet of the Lamb. Heaven will be like a wonderful wedding celebration.
In our reading today, when
Jesus goes to a wedding in the small town of Cana, we also see how a wedding is
a public thing, and how it involves the community. Weddings can happen quietly,
but it’s always a great thing when our friends and family and loved ones can
all come together a join in the celebration.
A marriage is a wonderful
thing. But it is also the coming together of two sinners. And the longer we are
together as a married couple the more we see each other’s problems, and the
more we are called to live with each other despite our foibles. And also,
because the devil brought sin into the world, marriage has some suffering that
comes with it too. We have struggles, we have disagreements, sometimes we have
to slog out together some hard times. In our reading today, it says that the
couple ran out of wine at the wedding too, and weren’t able to enable everyone
to join in with the celebration. When we’re older, we know that one of us will
die first, and one of us will have to watch the other one taken away.
But in all of this, the most
important thing is that Jesus is the one who has laid down his life for his own
bride. He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, including the
sins of our marriages. He had died for us, and he has risen again from the dead
for us. And he is the one who has called us to share in his heavenly wedding
banquet. We read in Ephesians: Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved
the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having
cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present
the church to himself in splendour… Just as Carol stands here in splendour
today, even more so, because Jesus has died for all our sins and has won the
forgiveness of every single one, and promises us his righteousness, we also as
his people stand before him in splendour.
But the other thing that
happens in the reading about Jesus attending the wedding at Cana is simply the
fact that Jesus was there. He was happy to come, and he was happy to be there.
And he was happy to give this couple a wonderful gift, and to turn their shame
around, and give them what they needed for their celebrations. And also, at
this wedding today of Darryl and Carol, we know that Jesus is here, and that he
is happy to attend, and he is happy to bless you, just as he was happy to
attend that wedding so many years ago.
But what happens also in our
reading about the wedding at Cana is that we see just how wonderful Jesus is.
We believe that Jesus is truly God, and that he was there right before the
world even began together with his Father. Later on, he took on human flesh and
was born in Bethlehem, and became a man. But he is both God and man at the same
time. Everything he does is a human work and God’s work at the same time. At
the beginning of the world, we see that one of the first things God did was
create the first people and bring them together so that they could live together
as husband and wife. And this event at this wedding is Jesus’ first miracle. We
read: This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and he
manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him.
There were other people like
Peter and Paul, after Jesus rose from the dead, who also performed wonderful
miracles. After the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came and Peter gave
the first Christian sermon, and 3000 people were converted and baptised, Peter
later healed a man who couldn’t walk. But Peter was simply a man who was given
the power by Jesus to do this. But in our reading today it says: Jesus
manifested his [own] glory. Jesus didn’t have someone else’s power, but
because he was also God, he was using his own power.
And so, it says in our
reading that Jesus manifested his glory. Jesus didn’t just attend a
wedding, he didn’t just sit in the back row and say nothing, but he actually
did something. He performed a miracle, and we are told: he manifested his
glory. And we also read that Jesus said: What God has joined together, let
no one separate. This wedding isn’t just about Darryl and Carol, but it is
about how God has brought you together, and it is about how your wedding is
blessed by the presence of Jesus here today, and about Jesus himself blessing
you and manifesting his glory in a wonderful way among us today.
Now the amazing about Jesus
turning this water into wine is that it doesn’t happen upfront at the wedding.
It happens out the back somewhere, quietly. Eventually people begin to realise
what happened, and start to talk: Jesus was here! He did it! And the same goes
with us—Jesus often works wonderful miracles when our wine runs out, when our
chips are down, and we didn’t even know what was going on. And then afterwards
we realise he was there all along, and that it was him, it was he who did it!
So let these words be a great
encouragement to you both, Darryl and Carol, and to all of us who are married
or planning to get married. The union of a man and a woman in married life is a
precious thing in the sight of God. He is the one who created it like this, and
when Jesus walked on this earth, he also blessed a wedding with his first
miracle. And as we grow closer in our married life together, and grow closer to
him, nothing is impossible, because Jesus is with you, and he will protect you
and lead you with all his power over heaven and earth. We read: Everyone
serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the
poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now.
Let’s pray: Dear Jesus, we
thank you for bringing Darryl and Carol here together today to be joined in
marriage in your presence. Bless them today and every day, and bless all of us who
have come here to celebrate with them with the joy that comes from your words
and your presence. Amen.
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