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Knowing Jesus:
Ben Witherington's
What Have They Done With Jesus? |
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Praying: David Crump's Knocking on Heaven's Door |
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Passages, Preaching, Poems, Prayers:
Epiphany - The Glory of God Revealed in Jesus
AND the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there: And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage. And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come. His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it. And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And he saith unto them, Draw out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was: (but the servants which drew the water knew;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples believed on him.
John 2:1-11
Our Lord at Cana
It was the glory of Christ again to sanctify, that is, declare the sacredness of,
all things natural—all natural relationships—all natural enjoyment.
What He sanctified by His presence was a marriage. Now remember what had gone before this. The life of John the Baptist was the highest form of religious life known in Israel. It was the life ascetic. It was a life of solitariness and penitential austerity. He drank no wine: he ate no pleasant food: he married no wife: he entered into no human relationship. It was the law of that stern and in its way sublime life, to cut out every human feeling as a weakness, and to mortify every natural instinct, in order to cultivate an intenser spirituality. A life in its own order grand, but indisputably unnatural.
Now the first public act of our Redeemer's life is to go with His disciples to a marriage. He consecrates marriage, and the sympathies which lead to marriage. He declares the sacredness of feelings which had been reckoned carnal, and low and human. He stamped His image on human joys, human connexions, human relationships. He pronounces that they are more than human—as it were, sacramental: the means whereby God's presence comes to us; the types and shadows whereby higher and deeper relationships become possible to us. For it is through our human affections that the soul first learns to feel that its destiny is Divine: it is through a mortal yearning, unsatisfied, that the spirit ascends, seeking a higher object: it is through the gush of our human tenderness that the Immortal and the Infinite in us reveals itself. Never does a man know the force that is in him till some mighty affection or grief has humanised the soul. It is by an earthly relationship that God has typified to us and helped us to conceive the only true Espousal—the marriage of the soul to her Eternal Lord.
It was not a marriage only, but a marriage-feast to which Christ conducted His disciples. Now we cannot get over this plain fact by saying that it was a religious ceremony: that would be mere sophistry. . .Neither can we explain away the lesson by saying that it is no example to us, for Christ was there to do good, and that what was safe for Him might be unsafe for us. For if His life is no pattern for us here in this case of accepting an invitation, in what can we be sure it is a pattern? Besides, He took His disciples there, and His mother was there: they were not shielded as He was, by immaculate purity. . .
Here again, then, Christ manifested His peculiar glory. The Temptation of the Wilderness was past: the baptism of John, and the life of abstinence to which it introduced, were over: and now the Bridegroom comes before the world in the true glory of the Messiah—not in the life of asceticism, but in the life of Godliness—not separating from life, but consecrating it: carrying a Divine spirit into every simplest act—accepting an invitation to a feast—giving to water the virtue of a nobler beverage.
F. W. Robertson, from a sermon
entitled "The First Miracle II.
The Glory of the Divine Son", preached January 30, 1853
"Royal Presents"
The off'rings of the Eastern kings of old
Unto our Lord were incense, myrrh, and gold;
Incense because a God; gold as a king;
And myrrh as to a dying man they bring.
Instead of incense (Blessed Lord) if we
Can send a sigh or fervent prayer to thee,
Instead of myrrh if we can but provide
Tears that from penitential eyes do slide,
And though we have no gold, if for our part
We can present thee with a broken heart,
Thou wilt accept: and say those Eastern Kings
Did not present thee with more precious things.
Nathaniel Wanley, 1634-1680
Epigram on the Miracle at Cana:
"The conscious water saw its God, and blushed."
Richard Crashaw, 1613-1649
From "The Crystal"
But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of Time,
But Thee, O poet's Poet, Wisdom's Tongue,
But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love,
O
perfect life in perfect labor writ,
O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest—
What if and yet, what mole, what flaw, what lapse,
What least defect or shadow of defect,
What rumor, tattled by an enemy,
Of inference loose, what lack of grace
Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's—
Oh, what amiss may I forgive in Thee,
Jesus, good Paragon, thou Crystal Christ?
Sidney Lanier, 1842-1881
O GOD, whose blessed Son was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil, and make us the sons of God, and heirs of eternal life; Grant us, we beseech thee, that, having this hope, we may purify ourselves, even as he is pure; that, when he shall appear again with power and great glory, we may be made like unto him in his eternal and glorious kingdom; where with thee, O Father, and thee, O Holy Ghost, he liveth and reigneth, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
The Collect for the Sixth Sunday after the Epiphany
The Book of Common Prayer
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