Six Stone Jars: The Economy of Jesus, Week 1: The Things We Hope For

John 2:1-11

When I was a child, my elementary school held a pumpkin decorating competition every Halloween, and I wanted to win so much. Competition was stiff, though. Every year you would see parents carrying in elaborate creations that took your breath away – and you knew who made that creation. It wasn’t the kid. Still, I kept trying.

One year I decided I would decorate my pumpkin like a spider. So I began working on it, black spray paint, wire hangers for legs. My mother watched and offered some suggestions, but I did all the hands-on work. And I won.

Well, I was elated. I could not stop talking about it for the rest of the day, about how I did this, all by myself, and I won. It was all “I, I, I.” And then my father took me aside. He reminded me that my mother had been a part of it too. She had offered me suggestions that led to the best features of my spider pumpkin. Without those ideas, I would not have won. And I knew this was true.

When I look back on this I realize my mother gave me a particular gift. She helped me do it better, but she let me do it myself. And she never asked for credit, she only celebrated my triumph. And the gift my father gave me was to open my eyes and see this.

I am thinking about the ways we give and receive things. And even whether we are aware of what we have given or received.

When we give something to someone, we have a choice as to how we look at it. We can view it as a transaction – an exchange of some kind. When I come to your birthday party, I bring a gift as the price of admission. It pays for the cake I eat and the decorations I enjoy. So I will make sure I eat my fair share of cake.

But another way to see such an action is as a gift, plain and simple. A gift asks for nothing in exchange; it is given freely. I assume that most of you, when you go to a birthday party, or a wedding reception, do not view it as a transactional event. It’s about gift. The host provides the celebration – food, drink, music – and the guests come bearing gifts. It may or may not equal out in the end. It doesn’t matter. 

When Jesus attended the wedding in Cana with his disciples and his mother, I have no idea if he brought a gift with him. But as it happened, he gave the bride and groom a gift worth much more than everything they spent on the entire wedding celebration. 

Weddings in Galilee were different in many ways from the weddings we might attend. We often say that American weddings are quite extravagant, but they’ve got nothing on the weddings of ancient Israel. 

Back then, it would begin with a betrothal which lasted at least a year. Then the wedding would begin. The groom, wearing dazzling clothes, perhaps with a crown on his head, would set out with his friends in a procession to fetch his bride from her father’s house. She, also, would be fabulously dressed, and lifted up into a sedan chair to be carried back to the groom’s house. The procession of bridesmaids and groomsmen would sing songs all along the way. They would be met by the groom’s parents, who would say a blessing for the couple, and then the festivities would begin – party all night long. That’s day one.

The next day would be the wedding feast. A day of more celebrations – singing, dancing, gift giving for the bride. Then in the evening, the bride and groom would come together. Traditional words would be exchanged, followed by more blessings, more rituals, more celebrations. That’s day two.

The celebrations would continue for several more days. Eating, drinking, dancing, blessing.

Wine was, of course, a very important part of it. Wine was essential to the ritual of blessing. To the feasting, to the general celebration. So, imagine how much wine you could go through in a week of celebration.

I have no idea how many days they were into it when the wine ran out, but it seems apparent that the celebration expected to go on for some time still. And so they would need more wine – wine for celebrating, wine for feasting, wine for blessing.

Mary, the mother of Jesus, was the kind of person who could look at a problem and see a solution. She didn’t fret, she didn’t wring her hands, she didn’t panic. She turned to her son, Jesus, and simply said, “They have no wine.” That’s all she needed to say. He understood what she was asking, just as she understood what he could give.

He responded to her, “My hour has not yet come,” the meaning of which is a little confusing. But most likely he meant the hour of his death. And therefore, it is celebration time. And so he provided the wine. Something like 900 bottles of wine. Only here is an interesting thing: No one, except the servants, knew that the wine was from Jesus. 

He made the host look really good, as everyone exclaimed over the high quality of this wine. He made the celebration go on and on for a good while longer, offering opportunities for many more blessings, much more thanksgiving. But he was not given, nor did he ask for, credit. It was a gift.

There is something called a gift economy, which is simply a system where gifts are given with no expectation of receiving payment or any kind of reciprocity. The gift is given for the sake of giving. We see it most often among family members, because – of course you do. I saw a movie trailer recently where a father confronts his adult daughter with an itemized list of everything she has cost him from infancy on, including diapers and baby bottles. Most people understand this is not done.

We see the gift economy among friends sometimes, too. When you buy your friend a latte or pay for a golf round, just because you want to. Maybe you like it if the friend reciprocates. But that’s not the reason you did it.

Giving to charity is almost always an example of the gift economy. You will get from it a feeling of having contributed to the welfare of the community or the world. But that’s all. 

And participating in the gift economy is what we are doing when we give to the church. It is something we want to do. It is something important to us. It is something that makes us feel more complete, for I know I would not be fully who I am if I did not give to the church.

When Jesus sent his disciples out into the world he told them, “freely you have received, now freely give.” He invited them to participate in the economy of gifting, as he invites us to do as well. Just as he lived his life, giving freely as needed, so he asks us to do.

But as simple as that sounds, we find it to be difficult. Giving freely can be frightening.

We are afraid that our gift will be misused or abused. We are afraid that we will be taken advantage of. Mostly, I think, we are afraid that we will run out – that we will not have enough for ourselves.

In the story of the wedding at Cana, we usually focus on the miracle, or sign as John calls it. We rarely wonder why the wedding hosts ran out of wine. Did they plan poorly, or were they stingy? Were they poor of resources and unable to buy as much wine as they would need? Whatever the cause was, it did not stop them from a joyous and abundant celebration. They feasted freely, they blessed freely, they celebrated freely, they did not hold back.

And when the wine ran out, Jesus was there with his gift. Perhaps they trusted just as freely as they did everything else.

Trusting in God’s provision is not a very easy thing for humans to do, yet it is what our faith asks of us. Because we cannot live as authentic loving community without such trust. 

Authentic community is something that seems harder and harder to find in our times. We draw in on ourselves, spending more time alone, pulling back from commitments, trusting one another less. For most of us, it is a loss that we truly grieve. A community where we know others deeply, belong completely, give and receive freely – this is something we treasure in our hearts, even if we don’t believe we can ever really have it.

The good news is this: this kind of community is available. This is what Jesus offers. This is what he asks us to come together and make – for ourselves and for others. 

This is what we hope for. And this is what we may have together, in Jesus.

Photo: Unsplash.com

Come As You Are

Isaiah 43:1-7

Luke 3:15-17, 21-22

This Sunday we remember our baptism, which is something we share with Jesus. He was baptized by John in the Jordan River. John didn’t actually want to baptize Jesus, because he knew Jesus did not need the repentance he offered. John was right; Jesus was a model of humanity in every way. He was our exemplar for how to live into the image of God. But I imagine this was the reason he wanted to be baptized, to show us the way in this as in everything.

He submitted to John in the river, along with all the others, then he came to shore and began to pray. At that moment the heavens opened, and a voice said, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 

“With you I am well pleased.” Not all translations put it the same way. Some versions say, “You bring me great joy,” or, “In you I find delight.” But the one I appreciate the most is in the Common English Bible, which says, “In you I find happiness.”

Which is the kind of thing anyone wants and needs to hear from a parent or a loved one. It is the kind of thing we all need to know – that someone finds us delightful, that someone feels happiness because of us. It is the kind of thing that God offers to each one of us – and one of the ways God does this is by placing us in a community of the baptized.

When we are baptized we are adopted into the family of God, brothers and sisters to Jesus, the firstborn in a very large family. As adopted members, we begin to learn the customs and the values of this new family. We learn that in the family of God we share one another’s burdens and celebrate one another’s joys. We learn that the needs of one become the shared needs of all, and the wealth of one contributes to the wealth of all – this is what it is to be the church. We work together, we grieve together, we celebrate together. 

As we read in the scripture, “just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.” 

In our baptism we make promises: to be Christ’s faithful disciples, obeying his word and showing his love. For many of us these promises were made by others on our behalf. Nonetheless, these are the promises each one of us is meant to grow into. To follow Christ’s word and example, to show his love.

But I am afraid that we sometimes fail to remember these promises.

I listened to some friends talking about what a beautiful community the church is. One after another they described situations in their lives where the church had stepped in to offer support when it was needed. And while I could add my own stories of compassion, I also have memories of a different kind of church experience. Through most of my childhood, when my family was going through some very tough times, we did not experience that kind of love from our church. We did not feel the church being there for us when we needed it. We did not feel the embrace we needed, but rather judgment that only piles hurt upon hurt.

There is something deeply troublesome about the church exacerbating the pain on one of its own, of not being there to support their brothers and sisters in their suffering. It seems to me a tragic failure to live into our baptismal vows.

Kim and I once lived in a small town – a little smaller than Salisbury. It was the kind of place where, if you asked for directions to the bookstore, people would say, “It’s down near the old A&P.” But the A&P had been gone for many years, so anyone who actually needed directions wouldn’t find this helpful. People sometimes said that if you moved to this place from somewhere else, you would never, ever feel like a native; that you have to have generational belonging to really feel like you belong.

And I wonder if the church is like this too.

You wouldn’t notice it, probably, if you feel that sense of belonging. But the challenge is this: every single member of the family should have that same sense of belonging, that same sense that we are all in this together, and we are there for one another.

The baptismal promises we make are all about that. As God said first to Israel: When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; when you walk through the fire, I will be with you. “Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.” So it is that, through Christ Jesus, God says this very thing to all of us too.

And through our baptism, our adoption into God’s family, we make the same promises to one another: We will be there for you. You are precious in my sight, you are honored, and I love you.

Wow. Right?

Truly, there is nothing I want more than for every child in our congregation to feel our love, our delight, our joy and happiness when they are in our midst. And there is nothing more critical about being the body of Christ than that every member of the body knows this one thing: when you pass through the waters, when you walk through the fire, we will be there for them. You are loved, just as you are.

Remember the promises of your baptism.

How Do We Know

Isaiah 60:1-6

Ephesians 3:1-12

If I start the sentence, “How do you know…” and I invite you to finish it, what comes to mind? 

How do you know if someone loves you? How do you know if this is the one you should marry? How do you know if this is the right job for you? How do you know when it is time to make a change? How do you know?

These are the kinds of questions that fill our imaginations. I don’t often wonder “how do you know if the milk has gone bad?” Because, you know. Things like that are simple and empirical. The “how do you know” questions that hold your attention are different. We know how to solve an arithmetic problem by learning the steps and practicing. We know if we have the right answer because there is a right answer and it’s the same for everyone. Two plus two always equals four, so you know.

But there are many questions in life that cannot be answered that way. And these are by and large the kinds of questions grappled with in the scriptures.

How does the prophet Isaiah know that now is the time to arise, to shine? How does he know that the light has come? 

How did Elizabeth, the wife of Zechariah, know that her young cousin Mary was the mother of her Lord?

How do the shepherds in the fields know that the child who has been born was the Messiah?

How did the magi know that the star they were following would lead them to the newborn king?

How did the apostle Paul know that he was called by Christ to serve the mission to the Gentiles? How did he know, when he was knocked to the ground by a flash of heavenly light, when he heard the voice speaking to him, when he lost the ability to see, how did he know that his life was irrevocably changed?

Some would say that the way you know is that suddenly there is no other choice. Isaiah could see nothing but the light of God’s glory, could do no other than to proclaim this message of hope. 

The shepherds in the fields knew that they simply could not remain where they were. They could do no other than to follow the command of the heavenly host.

The magi knew the power of their dreams to speak truth to them in a way that no human voice could speak. They knew that they could do no other than to follow the star that led them across miles and miles.

Some would say that you know something is right and true when you can do no other than to pursue it. That does not make it easy, though. It certainly was not easy for the magi. It was not easy for Mary or Elizabeth or Joseph to trust the message they had been given from an angel, from a dream, from a vision.

It was not easy for the priest Zechariah, when the angel Gabriel visited him. He asked the question, “How will I know,” not in a wondering way, but in a challenging way, a doubtful way. Which was a foolish thing to do, when the angel took away his power of speech, so he could ponder these things in silence.

Some would say it is a mystery, how you know. Indeed, it is a mystery. You can’t know the steps to follow, you can’t know the source of the revelation, not in any way that we want to know things. All revelation comes from God and, of course, there are real limits on what we can know of God.

There is mystery, Paul uses this word several times in the letter to Ephesians – four times it appears just in this passage. 

There is mystery in the passage from Isaiah, although he doesn’t use the word, but all that he describes conveys a sense of awe, of holy mystery.

How do we know these things? We know by the experience. We know by what our senses know: a star, a dream, a blinding light. A voice that speaks to us and maybe to no one else. A sense of shimmering joy, elation. A sense of peace, the kind that passes understanding. A sense being drawn in. One of the tenets of our Reformed faith is that God’s grace is irresistible – simply irresistible! You know by the flame that ignites within you and smolders, and glows. You know by what you know.

And yet –

The knowing is open to more. The knowing of epiphany must be very wary of putting down a period. Is God finished speaking? Has revelation ended? Is it possible for us, mere humans, to put a limit on God’s divine wisdom, on the extent of God’s love? 

There are very few things I know for sure, but I see that throughout the scriptures, when there is more light given, there is more love. When Isaiah says, “Arise, shine, for your light has come,” we know that the dark days of exile are past, and that God’s grace will shine on Israel.

When the shepherds and the magi see the brilliant light in the sky, we know that God has opened the door and reached out to draw these outsiders inside. When Paul was blinded by the light on the Damascus Road, he knew that this was a turning point in his life, which would from now on be devoted to carrying the good news of God’s grace far and wide.

Paul did not know, at first, where he would be sent. He did not realize that the calling, the commission placed on him, would take him to the outsiders, the whole Gentile world. But soon he did know.

The knowing of epiphany is a strange thing. It can be wild, unexpected. It is ever-expanding divine love.

This light, this love, was there for the people in the time of Isaiah. It was there for the people in the time of Christ’s birth. and the light shines on.

This light, this ever-expanding love is here for us. The light that darkness cannot comprehend or overcome, as we read in the Gospel of John. The light has not left the world. It never will.

It is a mystery that draws us in.

More light is yet to be seen. Keep watching, keep listening, for God is not yet finished.