All About the Right Business

I remember going to the dollar theater with my family when I was a kid to see Disney's original cartoon Aladdin. Of course, it was full of drama and laughs, and I enjoyed myself hugely, but I remember listening to my mom talking to a friend later about the movie. The friend asked how she had liked it, and my mom said: "We enjoyed it. You know how there are usually two levels of humor, one for children and one for adults? The movie had both."

As I grew older, I understood what she'd meant as my husband and I took our own children to see cartoons. We'd laugh ourselves silly over the "inside jokes" tossed in for the parents, and our kids would glance our way, like: "Stop embarrassing us, Mom and Dad."

Their turn is coming. ;)

This morning, John 2:1-11 covers the story of a wedding in a town called Cana in the region of Galilee where Jesus and His disciples -- as well as His mother -- have been invited. No mention is made of Jesus' legal father, Joseph, either here or in further reading, and we can assume that Joseph has likely died at some point before Jesus begins His ministry. 

Jesus is now thirty years old, which seems young-ish, but there's been a long silence with no record of events after the time He is a boy of twelve (Luke 2:41-52). Luke 2:52 leaves us with a stretched out: "And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man," but we don't actually read about Him again for eighteen years of His life.

When He does re-enter the pages, He is ready to begin His ministry. He approaches His cousin John the Baptist to be baptized, then He prepares Himself to begin ministry with a forty-day fast in the wilderness. After that, He calls at least some of His disciples to follow Him.

Now He's at the wedding in Cana, and the guests have drunk up all or almost all the wine. In this culture and time period, this is an egregious social faux pas. They don't have coffee and tea and punch and soft drinks to offer should the wine run out. They've got essentially the two staples: wine and water, and now it's about to become just water. The bridegroom's family is socially bound to provide the beverages and stands to be embarrassed by their lack of preparation (or the inordinate thirst of their guests; perhaps a mixture of both).

Mary, Jesus' mother, somehow gets wind of the predicament. She pulls Jesus aside, possibly also his disciples (John 2:11 contextualizes this), and says (to paraphrase): "Jesus, they're almost out of wine." In other words: "Do something! I know you can!"

"Dear woman, why do you involve me? My time has not yet come," He replies.

Jesus responds, as Jesus so often does, on two levels. 

First level: "What do I have to do with this wedding? You've got the idea that I'm going to intervene and fix it, show off my miraculous power, but it's not time for me to reveal the Father's full plan for Me yet."

The second level goes much deeper and, in my analysis, rewinds time. Mary looks deep into her Son's eyes and is transported back eighteen years to the moment when she enters the temple courts after three days of panicked searching for twelve-year-old Jesus... only to find Him sitting with the Teachers of the Law and explaining Scripture to them. "Son!" She rushes toward Him. "Don't You know Your father and I have been looking everywhere for you?"

The boy Jesus looks up at her and says: "Why were you searching for me? Didn't you know that I had to be in my Father's house?" In that scene, in that time, twelve-year-old Jesus gently reminds His mother of the contrast between His father (Joseph) and His Father (God). He reminds her in that single question that He has come for a higher purpose, a different order than the plans for Jesus to which she and Joseph so want to cling. As a mother, I understand her heart; I understand that she desperately longs for certain things for Him: success, safety, happiness, security.

Jesus understands her heart, too, but calls her beyond those things. "I have a purpose, but it's not the one you want to hold onto. Let me go; I need to be about my Father's business."

Now this conversation at the Cana wedding rings those memory bells for Mary. "Dear woman," Jesus says -- an endearment, not a term of disrespect. He addresses her the same way when He hangs on the cross three years later. "Dear woman, why do you involve me? My time has not yet come."

This second level of conversation goes far beyond the wedding festivities. It has not much to do with the fact that there is wine or lack thereof. It's a gentle reminder to Mary of their conversation in the temple eighteen years ago, and here, on the cusp of His ministry, it's a reminder to her: Don't you know that I have to be in my Father's house? That I have to be about my Father's business?

Jesus, as He so often does throughout His ministry, uses this two-leveled conversation to first, address the needs of the heart, and second, to take care of the situation at hand. Matthew 9:1-7 gives us a clear picture of this order of Jesus' priorities when He heals a paralytic. Before He ever cures the man, allows him to stand up off his mat, He says: "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven." And then He heals the man. 

Jesus knows His purpose isn't shock and awe. He knows it's not the wow-factor, though there is plenty of that throughout His ministry. His purpose is always to be in His Father's house, being about His Father's business.

So Jesus sets the standard that He follows throughout His ministry here. He first reminds Mary of what He's about, and then He takes care of the situation at hand. 

Mary understands at least that Jesus will take care of the wine situation. She seems fairly wise, having "stored up all these things and pondered them in her heart" for years. At this moment in time, it's likely she gets that Jesus is speaking to her on a secondary level, because while His statement on the surface seems like a refusal, she understands that it is not.

So she turns to the servants. "Do whatever He tells you."

And the servants, the disciples, and Mary, become eye-witnesses of Jesus' first recorded miracle. 

Jesus tells the servants to put water in six jugs nearby that are used for ceremonial washing. Each one of these jugs, at capacity, holds twenty to thirty gallons. The servants fill the jugs right up to their brims, and then Jesus tells them to draw some of the water out and take it to the master of the banquet.

You and I have preparation bias, you know? We've read last page, we know what's going to happen. We are quite familiar with Jesus' ministry; we know that this is just the first of many miracles He's going to do.

These servants have none of that. As far as they know, they're going to lose their jobs for bringing water to the master of the banquet. They might get a cup thrown at their heads. They might become a laughing stock of the guests, and they might lose the possibility of catering any other weddings down the road. 

What Jesus asks of them isn't easy. But they must have seen some semblance of authority, either in Mary or in Jesus or in both, that causes them to put aside their misgivings and carry the sample to the master of the banquet.

When the master tastes the liquid sample, he quickly waves over the bridegroom. The servants are probably watching with tense nerves. Will they get fired on the spot? Or will the bridegroom at least allow them to gather their belongings from the kitchen area before kicking them out?

The master of the banquet pulls aside the bridegroom, and the servants hold their breath. The master says: "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now."

I can't help but think some of the crowd who follows Jesus in the upcoming pages are these servants. Shock and awe. Look what just happened! Jesus doesn't just change a small sampling of water to wine; He shoots the moon with His first miracle, turning (at most) 180 gallons of water into the best wine. He's the Owner of the floodgates of heaven; He can certainly do what He likes with them (Malachi 3:10: "See if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it," and Luke 6:38: "A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over will be poured into your lap...")

Here, Jesus chooses to begin His ministry with a bang. And these servants, Mary, and His disciples are eye-witnesses. In John 2:11, John-the-Writer says: "This, the first of His miraculous signs, Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed His glory, and His disciples put their faith in Him."

A chapter before in John 1:14, John notes: "We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, Who came from the Father, full of grace and truth."

The disciples are eye-witnesses of His signs; and they are eye-witnesses of His glory. Both levels of the conversation have begun, and this night, the night of the wedding, is the night Jesus chooses to speak to them on the second level.

"And His disciples put their faith in Him."

How important it is to see beyond the surface of things! My Facebook feed has become absolutely bombarded with surface events, headlines, opinions, theories, statements. The world has lived into its crazy just a little more each day, and I think it's not just important, but it's crucial to seek out that second-level conversation with Jesus.

What is Your Father's business, Jesus? He is all about that business. We need to be all about it, too. So rather than being so homed in on the lack of wine at the wedding, Jesus gently reminds us of His higher calling: "Dear woman..." Dear church. Dear bride of Christ.

"My time has not yet come." 

Why are we pointing our fingers at this event or that event or the other event and saying: "Jesus, work here. Here is where I've assigned You. This is what I want You to do."

Jesus, forgive our arrogance and our assumption that we understand Your perfect plan. I hope we can understand Your perfect plan. But I also am absolutely grounded in the fact that my sight is "through a mirror dimly" (1 Corinthians 13:12).

Speak to us on the second-level. Remind us, Jesus, of the larger picture, the Father's business. And help us to be all about it, as You have always been and always will be.