You’ve all heard that phrase, “You can’t squeeze blood from a turnip”. Well this morning, as you heard from our Scripture readings, you can get water from a rock, and even get the finest wine from ordinary water in a stone jar. At least with God, nothing is impossible.
Our OT lesson, told in 8 verses, would almost seem like a minor event, but it was very significant. The Israelites had been in Egypt for 400 years, the last couple hundred years as slaves. They had become dependent on their Egyptian masters for food and water, and had been strongly influenced by the many Egyptian gods. In Egypt, they had grown from a small, Hebrew family of Jacob to well over 2 million people, but had lost their allegiance to Yahweh, the God of their ancestors. God had sent Moses to be His visible leader to bring the large population of Hebrews out of Egypt to the Promised Land, the Land God had promised Abraham centuries before. But these former slaves weren’t ready to conquer the land that had become occupied by pagan people. God would lead them… but they had to learn to trust and obey Him, or they’d be killed in the process.
Couldn’t God just have killed off the Canaanites living in what would be known as Israel? Like the pursuing Egyptians were drowned in the Red Sea? But God’s ultimate purpose was more than for His people to live and prosper in the land. He wanted them to know Him, to be their trusted, faithful God. It would have only taken a few months, instead of years, to travel from Egypt to the land that would be known as Israel. Even for the well over 2 million men, women, children, and their livestock. But that generation had only known slavery and Egyptian false gods, and no longer knew their God. God wanted their hearts to belong to Him, loving and trusting the faithfulness of the God who loved them and would protect them.
The travel to the Promised Land would be such a time of bonding, like a courtship of a man and his bride to be. In those days, brides were purchased from their fathers to begin a betrothal, an engagement period for them to learn about each other before the actual wedding. God had purchased His bride, His people, from Egypt’s ownership, and was now reacquainting with them, wanting to prove Himself to His bride-to-be on their way to their new home. Jesus would later refer to His Church as His bride. But before taking His bride-to-be to their new home, He needed to gain their trust as the loving God who would care for His bride, so she would trust Him with her life. So God carefully planned their “betrothal trip” to be that bonding time.
We join them on their betrothal trip, where God had been leading them by a fiery cloud as they come to Rephidim, almost two months after leaving Egypt. God had already showed them His care, providing them daily manna, even quail for meat on occasion. Once they left Rephidim, it would be about a day to Mt Sinai where they would camp for about a year, and receive the Ten Commandments, God’s way of detailing what He would expect of His bride. How to honor her God-husband: have no other before Him, honor His name, use His gift of a Sabbath day well. How to honor each other as family: Honor parents, don’t murder, don’t steal, lie, covet.
But arriving at Rephidim, they discover there was no water to drink because the brook that had been watering this area had dried up. Had the God of Creation mistakenly led the well over 2 million people to this place to die without water? The people quickly confronted Moses,” Did you lead us out of slavery just for us to die in this place?”
But God does everything for a purpose, even if we don’t know it. Instead of complaining, God must have hoped by now His people might have said, “God, we need water and we don’t see any. What’s Your plan?” And then waited for God to provide for them, as He inevitably would. But they grumble against Moses and God, and God tells Moses to take the leaders to a giant Rock near the mountain feeding the dried-up brook, and strike the rock with his staff. The same staff God had Moses use to bring each of the plagues on Egypt to show His power. The same staff God had Moses use to strike the Red Sea to provide a way across. Moses strikes the Rock, and water pours from the rock. Scripture doesn’t give any more detail, but it was a miracle, that should have shown the people God’s power to care for them.
How much water would be needed to satisfy their thirst, including their livestock and the cooking and cleaning needs of over 2 million people? It would have taken railroad tank cars of water stretched out over many miles, millions of gallons, for just one day. The water from the rock must have filled that dry brook bed to become a flowing river to satisfy those needs. If God had prepared that water supply before their arrival, they might not have recognized His Presence. revealing His power.
Instead, it was God showing His bride-to-be how much He cared, and how much He would provide for them. But that generation would prove themselves unwilling to trust God. Despite His continuing show of good faith and care by just bringing them to the brink of the Promised Land, they still feared the inhabitants were too strong for them, even with God leading them forward. God would allow that generation to die off while wandering in the desert for forty years, before the next generation was willing to trust God’s leading them to His promised home to them.
If you thought getting clean, fresh water from a rock was amazing, how would you feel about getting high quality wine from stone jars filled with water? Let’s fast forward now past the conquest of the Promised Land, the golden years under King David, and Israel’s being exiled for their sins, to the time of being under Roman occupation. The Promised Messiah had been born, and grown up in an obscure town until He was baptized by John the Baptist to begin His ministry. He had been led by the Spirit to the wilderness temptations of Satan, and proven Himself ready to be the Messiah His Father had sent Him to be. He and His newly called disciples had come to the small town of Cana, to attend a wedding, where Jesus would perform His first recorded miracle. We Protestants may somewhat undervalue Mary as just the young girl that gave birth to Jesus, to then be set aside as no longer useful. But she had raised Jesus, apparently through his teen years by herself, since there is no mention of Joseph after Jesus was found in the Temple. Jesus had stepped up as the man of the family, providing for Mary and the family through his learned carpentry skills. In our Gospel lesson, it seems Mary had been invited to a wedding for a friend, an invitation that included Jesus and His newly called disciples. A wedding that would result in Jesus’ first recorded miracle.
We re()d that the wedding was on the third day, presumably because weddings were usually on Tuesday, three days after the Sabbath, and receptions might last several days. But the wine had run out – one of the worst things that could happen at a wedding. In Jewish culture, where wine was a staple, the bride’s parents would bear the stigma of such a faux pas as poor hosts, and the wedding remembered by such a failure. But Mary sees the crisis before the other guests were aware of the dilemma. She knows her son well enough to know His power to overcome that crisis and approaches Him. Jesus is reluctant, that it wasn’t yet time to show His power, but Mary persists and tells the servants to do whatever Jesus tells them to do.
We know that Jesus changes water into wine, but how He does it is also significant. First of all, no one is aware of Jesus’ powers except Mary. Most knew Him as an itinerant, relatively young rabbi traveling with His disciples. “Mary, you must be so proud of your son who is now a rabbi”. His disciples knew He was a very special man of God and were willing to commit their lives to Him, but we don’t know if they were even fully aware of His special abilities.
Jewish Law required people to purify themselves for various occasions, certainly before and after the meals served over the course of the wedding. It was more of a spiritual purification than a sanitary requirement. The wedding hosts had six stone jars filled with of water available to their guests for their purification, each holding 20-30 gallons of water, for a total of 120 to 180 gallons.
Now the stone jars were an important detail. Made of stone, they would be very heavy, and would have taken a while to sculpt. But stone was better than clay pots. They didn’t absorb moisture or impurities, and would have kept the water purer. Now, recall the Israelites at Rephidim needing water. The water flowing from the rock would also have been pure and clear, not muddy like it would have been coming from the ground, to meet their immediate needs. Just as the water stored in stone jars at the wedding would have been seen as more appropriate for cleansing than being stored in pots made of absorbing materials like clay. Jesus has the servants fill the stone jars to capacity with ordinary water from the nearby cisterns.
Then Jesus had a servant take the ritual sample from the new supply from the stone jars to the master of ceremonies for his approval. Some time between the jars being filled with ordinary water to the sample taken to the Master of Ceremonies, the ordinary water had become wine of such high quality wine that the Master of Ceremonies praised it to the guests, openly complimenting the hosts, that normally the best wine was served first, and afterwards, when the guests wouldn’t notice, the cheaper wine would be served. But these hosts were serving their finest wines later. Only the hosts, servants, Jesus’ disciples, and Mary knew what really happened.
Other than preventing Mary’s friends from being humiliated, what was the significance of this miracle? First of all, just the miracle on its own revealed Jesus’ power, especially to His newly called disciples to build their faith.
But it also shows Jesus applying the Old Testament to relate to the meanings of events in the New Testament. Many people believe the Old Testament was replaced by the New Testament. But I’ve studied history too much to believe that history is replaced by current events. The Old Testament provided the intended key to understanding what Jesus would further reveal during His ministry as recorded in the New Testament. The Old Testament often proved pictures of what Jesus would do in the New Testament. As the prophesied Messiah, Jesus would bridges the past with the present.
The immediate understanding of providing clear water from a rock to meet the immediate and satisfying needs of more than 2 million people, allows us to better understand Jesus using ordinary water from the stone to provide the finest of wines to meet the immediate and satisfying needs of those of those in His presence. And from there, we can understand the even greater lesson that Jesus came to us an apparent ordinary baby, lived as an ordinary, humble human being but became the gift of finest wine to meet our thirst for our salvation.
We can derive even further meanings from these two miracles. When Peter confessed that Jesus was the Christ, the son of the Living God, Jesus said that upon that rock, that confession of faith, He would build His church. His Church would be the rock that Jesus would use to pour out his blessings on those who believed. Jesus would be the chief cornerstone of His church, the Solid Rock from which His purest blood would flow to meet the salvation of the believers of His church.
Just as Jesus told His disciples at the Last Supper, when he took the wine and said “this is my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sin”. The blood that flowed from Him he was the purest quality wine that opened eternal life for us.
But the water that flowed from the rock at Rephidim only benefitted those who drank it. And the wedding guests at Cana would have had to drink the wine to know its quality. You and I must believe that His blood was shed for the forgiveness of our sin. For it has no other value, unless, by believing in Him, we are cleansed by His blood. Transforming ordinary people, like you and I, into high quality wines. Amen
