Hebrews 9: 1, & 9 - 14
Now the first covenant had regulations for worship and also an earthly sanctuary. This is an illustration for the present time, indicating that the gifts and sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the conscience of the worshipper. 10 They are only a matter of food and drink and various ceremonial washings—external regulations applying until the time of the new order.
11 But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. 12 He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. 13 The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. 14 How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!
John 2: 1- 11
On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, 2 and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3 When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”
4 “Woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”
5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”6 Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons.7 Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.8 Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.” They did so, 9 and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside 10 and said, “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.”
11 What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.
Think about it, where things better in the past?
Or, will things be better in the future?
I find some people think change is the answer, and some people think change is the problem, which are you?
It has been said a conservative is someone who locates the ideal world in the past and wants to call a halt to change, or better still, to return to better times. Whilst a radical is someone who locates the ideal world in the future, and wants to change things in order to make it happen.
The conservative’s natural state of mind is yearning nostalgia, whilst the radical’s natural state of mind is yearning idealism. Of course, both are permanently disappointed as we can no more live in the past than the future,
we must make do with the present.
I can understand the desire to keep things the same, constant change can erode that which we hold dear. Karl Marx, that arch radical, is not often quoted in sermons, but there is a passage from the ‘Communist Manifesto’ that I think captures the sense that change can destroy the things we cherish; he writes of the modern world, ‘all that is solid melts in to air, all that is holy is profaned.’ Marx thought this 'melting in to air' a good thing, but surely we can see the melting away of all that once seemed solid, and the profaning of all that once was taken for holy, can be profoundly disturbing.
However, I can equally understand the desire to embrace change. Modernity has brought benefits undreamed of to our ancestors; would anyone really want to dispense with penicillin, with equal rights, with the inside lavatory, just because these are products of modernity?
One of the most frustrating things I hear as a Minister is, ‘this can’t change because we have always done it this way.’ I remember giving a detailed and reasoned account of why the service times of a parish needed to be changed, only to be met with, 'well, it's always been at this time.' No effort of mine could get them to engage with the difficulty this caused, I may as well have been speaking Chinese. I think rejecting change because things have always been done a certain way is an excuse for not thinking.
Tradition can be a good measure of value, if things have come down to us from the past there is a good chance it is because they are serviceable, but it does not mean everything in the past was good.
For instance, when I ran my second hand furniture shop I soon noticed a substantial difference in quality between old furniture and modern. Laminated chip board has all the structural resilience of wheetabix covered in cardboard. In the shop the only thing keeping some modern wardrobes upright was the old wardrobes either side. Never-the-less, the punters liked the new. They were far less keen on old wooden wardrobes, some of which were so well constructed they could have survived a nuclear blast, but they looked old fashioned, and so were hard to sell. For a while I thought furniture manufacturing must have been superior in the past, until it dawned on me that the passage of time was filtering out the poor quality furniture. Just occasionally I would get a rickety survivor from the past, one that demonstrated cheap and cheerful was a much a part of the past as the present.
So there is value in tradition, filtering out the dross, but that value is nullified if we unthinkingly pass on junk to the next generation because ‘that's what we have always done.’ Tradition doesn’t bypass the need for critical thought.
So are you for change, or against it?
And why do I ask?
Our 2nd reading this morning was the story of Jesus turning water into wine, a story, amongst other things, about change, a change that I would think only a recovering alcoholic, or a prohibitionist would object to. This miracle is, however, about a greater change than just water into wine.
In John's account of the life of Jesus this is the first recorded miracle, and this miracle occurs at the start of a couple’s married life together, but this miracle is about a greater new beginning than any of these things.
John concludes his telling of the story by saying that this was ‘the first sign’ through which Jesus revealed his glory; John goes on to write of seven such signs. A sign points to a destination, in our literalist age we are rather used to reading texts as destinations in themselves, but John is from an age when allusion and symbol expanded the meaning of stories from the literal to the transcendent. The water into wine, the new beginnings signified in a wedding, and the start of Christ's ministry, are all signs of a greater change, a profound new beginning for humanity. Don’t get stuck on the signs in the bible but look where they point.
We read, that ‘the water was used for ceremonial washing.’ This is a part of the Old Testament law, a part of the religious ritual that governed everything in daily day life. Washing in a religious rite usually symbolises our sinfulness, and our need of God’s cleansing forgiveness, so this is about religion not hygiene. John pointedly says that the jars are the kind used by Jews, and in first century Israel religious and national identity were one.
Jesus transforms this ceremonial water into wine. As Christians we should hear the Eucharistic associations of wine, ‘... after supper he took the cup of wine, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me." John is saying that the old covenant, the old agreement, between humanity and God, is being transformed into a new covenant, a New Testament symbolised by wine instead of water.
Notice the wine provided by the wedding host fell short, perhaps reminding us of humanity’s fallibility. Jesus steps in and completes the work by the generous ever flowing grace of God. The work of redemption is completed by God's grace, not by our provision.
Perhaps also symbolic of this are the six jars, one short of the biblical number that symbolises perfection, that is - seven. Perfection is brought about by Jesus. The old order was good, the new revelation is perfect. The New Testament writer of Hebrews describes in chapter 9 of that book how the New Covenant in Jesus supersedes the Old Law, he writes of that Law,
‘...they are only a matter of food and drink and various ceremonial washings—external regulations applying until the time of the new order. But when Christ came as high priest...he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.’
That which the writer of Hebrews explains in words, John explains in a picture made of words. The water in to wine, the new beginning of the wedding, and Christ’s first miracle, all signpost the new revelation of God seen in Christ, the transformation of the water into wine also signposts the transformation of the old understanding of reconciliation into the new. In Jesus Christ there begins the recreation, or redemption, of the world, as Paul writes in 2 Corinthians, ‘...if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!’
Now back to our original question about the old debate between conservatives and radicals, those who are for change and those who are against it.
At Cana we see how God changes our world. He neither abolishes nor preserves the old, but rather transforms the old into the new. The God of the writer of the book of Hebrews, and of the Apostle Paul, is the same God as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Moses, the same God that King David sang of in the Psalms, the same God who spoke through the prophet Elijah, the God of the Old Testament and the New, whose perfect image can be seen in Jesus Christ.
As a Christian I believe the ideal world is neither located in the past nor in the future, but in the Kingdom of Heaven. The Kingdom of Heaven is eternal and so transcends time; the Kingdom can redeem our past, and transform our future.
This is the Kingdom we are to long for, the Kingdom that Jesus Christ commissioned Christians to work and pray for here on earth.
May God’s transforming Kingdom be established here on earth as in heaven; and by our repentance, and the gift of God's grace, may His Kingdom be established in our hearts.
Amen.
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