“Guest or Master?” (John 2:1-11)
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The First Sign
As followers of Christ, every time we return to the Gospel,
we see wonderful things in the Word, and we discover that Christ becomes a
little bigger and greater to us. It’s something like Lucy’s experience with the
lion Aslan (the Christ figure) in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia.
As Lucy looked again into his large, wise face, she said:
“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”
“That is because you are older,
little one,” answered he.
“Not because you are?”
“I am not. But every year you grow,
you will find me bigger.”[1]
In this gospel John uses the word “sign” (σημεῖον). There are
seven signs recorded in John’s gospel. Today’s story – the wedding at Cana – is
the first sign (v. 11). As we know, a sign “point us to something beyond itself.”
For instance, perhaps some of you saw the “Beach Service” sign this morning. The
sign itself is not the service, but it points us to the service. That is the
purpose of the sign. That is the purpose of today’s passage. And that is the
purpose of John’s entire gospel:
Now Jesus did many other signs in
the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these
are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah,
the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his
name (20:30-31).
My prayer is that as we work our way through the signs of John’s
Gospel one by one, we may find Christ bigger and bigger and bigger.
Wedding without Wine
Today’s story goes like this: one day, Jesus and his
disciples were invited to a wedding. In Jesus’ time, a wedding celebration was
considered the pinnacle of life. Instead of a honeymoon, the bride and groom
opened their home for a week. They were treated like a king and queen.
Oftentimes, the whole town was invited. It was a community celebration. At a
wedding banquet, wine was essential. In the Jewish mind of that time, wine was
a symbol of joy. So in a sense, “without wine, there is no joy.” But in today’s
passage, something happened. The wine ran out. “They have no more wine!”
the mother of Jesus said. Running out of wine during a wedding celebration would
bring shame to the family. But even more than that, it meant that the joy
had run out.
Spiritually, a life without Christ is a life without
wine. If we think about our own lives and the lives of people around us, sometimes
the wine runs out when life seems to be at its best. We are healthy. Our
finances are doing well. We have plenty of food. We have a warm place to sleep.
We have family and friends. And yet, somehow, the wine runs out. The sparkle
disappears. The joy is gone. It can happen to teenagers. It can happen to young
adults.
It can happen in middle age. It can happen in our later
years. Ultimately, it catches all of us. If you feel like your life has lost
its sparkle, if you are still wandering and searching for joy and purpose,
today’s story is for you.
Water into Wine
Many of us in this room already invited Jesus into our
hearts, but oftentimes, we treat Jesus as our guest, perhaps even
a very special guest, but not as the Master. There is a clear limit and
boundary for guests. Guests are welcome, but they are not allowed to take over
the house. They do not get involved in every personal matter – our family
matters, our finances, our plans, our private lives.
And sometimes, that is how we treat Jesus. We invite him in.
We welcome him. But we still remain in control. In today’s story Jesus was
invited as a guest. But as the story unfolds, we see people who recognized his
authority and treated him as their Master. First, Mary. When Mary told Jesus
that the wine had run out, Jesus responded, “My hour has not yet come.” But
Mary turned to the servants and said, “Do whatever he tells you.” (v. 5) Mary
trusted Jesus. Second, the servants. There were six stone water jars,
altogether holding up to 180 gallons of water. And Jesus said to the servants,
“Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up, not to half, but to
the brim (v. 7). They showed complete obedience. Then
Jesus said, “Draw some out now, and take it to the chief steward.” And they
did. They showed immediate obedience. You see there was no
logical connection between filling jars with water and producing wine. But the
key is “obedience.” When we trust Jesus as our Master and obey him, he
turns water into wine. He turns a tasteless, insipid, sparkless life into a rich,
satisfying, joyous life.
Robert Munger tells a wonderful story in his classical
book, My Heart Christ’s Home. A young man invited Jesus into his
house. He gave Jesus access to the library, the dining room, the living room,
the work room, and the rec room. He thought that Jesus had finally finished
remodeling and was comfortable living there. But one day, he found that Jesus
was waiting at the door. Jesus said to him, “There is a peculiar odor in the
house. There is something dead in here, in the hall closet.” The man
knew exactly what Jesus was talking about. He knew about the closet. But he had
the key. And he wanted to keep it off limits. He certainly didn’t want Christ
to see what was in there. In fact, he was angry with Jesus and thought, “This
is too much! I’m not going to give him the key!” I wonder if all of us have our
own “hall closet.” But, as long as we hold the key, Jesus is our guest. As long
as Jesus remains as our guest, he cannot clean out the closets. He cannot make
the changes in our lives. Only when we transfer the title of our lives to him,
he turns water into wine.
The Lordship of Jesus Christ
If I say, “I am 75% faithful to my wife Joyce,” then I am not
faithful at all. In the same way, there is no such thing as 50% loyalty to
Christ. It’s all or nothing. Jesus is either the Master or a guest. Tim Keller once
compared the Lordship of Jesus Christ to “a life-quake.”
When a great big truck goes over a
tiny little bridge, sometimes there’s a bridge-quake, and when a
big man goes onto thin ice there’s an ice-quake. Whenever Jesus
Christ comes down into a person’s life, there’s a life-quake.
Everything is reordered… any view, any conviction, any idea, any behavior, any
relationship. He may change it, He may not change it, but at the beginning of
the relationship you have to say, ‘In everything He must have the supremacy.’[2]
For me, indeed, every time Jesus comes into my life, there is
a life-quake. Everything had to be reordered. Each time I struggled. But every
time I surrendered and obeyed, there was joy. Let me share one
example. When I came to the US in 2006, I had my own plan. I wanted to earn a doctoral
degree as quickly as possible and become a pastor of a large church. So getting
good grades was very important to me. I studied very hard, and I did receive
good grades. But one day, the Holy Spirit convicted me of my sin. He reminded
me that I had submitted reading reports for some of the classes without being completely
honest. The instructions said, “Skimming is not counted as reading,” I had
skimmed some of the required readings in a hurry and then checked them off as
100% completed. I had good grades. Not only that, I had borrowed other people’s
ideas and pretended them as my own. But the Holy Spirit exposed what was
underneath all of it: plagiarism, dishonesty, and ambition. I knew what the
right thing to do was. But I struggled for days. I was afraid that I might be
expelled from seminary. Then, I heard the voice saying, “My son, I can use you
without degree, but I cannot use you if you are not clean.” Finally, I
confessed my sins before my professors and my church family. Thankfully, I was
not expelled. But my grades in some classes were significantly reduced. And it
became much more difficult for me to pursue further study. But God gave me
something more precious. He restored to me the joy of my salvation. For me,
Christ still comes. There is still a life-quake. And there is still joy when I
surrender to him.
Guest or Master?
In Revelation 3:20 Jesus says, “Here I am! I stand at the
door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and
eat with them, and they with me.” There is a famous painting by Holman Hunt
called The Light of the World, inspired by this verse. Look closely
at the painting. Jesus is standing at the door. He is
knocking, not forcing. Calling, not shouting. The house is his. He designed it.
He made it. He bought it with his own blood. But he is standing, knocking,
speaking from outside. Notice something else. There is no handle on the
outside. The handle is on the inside. Christ knocks; but we must open.
So before we leave today, let us ask ourselves: Am I truly a
Christian? Do I have the joy of Christ? Do I know the purpose of my life? And
one final question: Is Jesus my guest or is he my Master? In today’s
passage, everyone at the wedding feast experienced the miracle. Everyone tasted
the best wine. But for many of them, it was simply a miracle, not the “sign”
pointing them to Christ. But for Mary, the servants, and the disciples, it was
different. They saw the sign. They saw the glory of Christ and they believed in
him (v. 11).
And this is a journey. It’s a long obedience in the same
direction. As we receive Jesus as our Master, walk with him, obey him day by
day, may we continue to discover Jesus bigger and bigger. May the Lord fill us with
joy, tears of joy! Amen.
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