A sermon for the Second Sunday
after Epiphany: John 2.1-11
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What would the life of the
Church look like if we were hosting the wedding feast at Cana of Galilee?
It may sound like an odd
question, but I think it is one that holds a huge amount of potential when we
consider our life and mission at this moment in time.
The pandemic has really shaken
things down. We have to be honest. For many the pandemic made them reassess
what was important.
I rejoice, and I hope you do
too, that we are here today because we have found that our faith, and sense of
belonging to Christ in this place, has sustained us and brought us through.
I rejoice, and I hope that you
do too, that this morning, as has been the case through the pandemic, people
have been drawn to Christ for the first time through what this church offers in
worship, prayer and pastoral care. There is new growth in this church!
I lament, as I imagine you do
to, that some people have fallen away. Perhaps they are out of the habit of
coming to church or sadly, perhaps, they didn’t find that the nourishment, hope
and life of the Gospel sustained them. It is also true that some have found new
places where they connect with God, and we wish them well and bless them in
that.
After that shaking down, the krisis time, what does today’s gospel
give us?
It seems to me that some words
from our Church Vision Day in June 2019 are powerful today as they were then,
before the pandemic, when we said together that we wanted this church to be
known as church that is ‘welcoming and open, where people find life and joy and
feel they belong’.
That sounds a little like the
answer to my opening question, ‘what would the life of the Church look like if
we were hosting the wedding feast at Cana of Galilee?’ If we were a ‘wedding
feast church’ we would be a church that is ‘welcoming
and open, where people find life and joy and feel they belong’.
Let’s explore that thought
through the lens of today’s gospel.
*
Weddings in the days of Jesus
were whole community affairs. They were not just for select friends or close
family like now; the whole locality would turn out and be welcomed and feel
they belong at the feast.
Modern churches have become a
bit like modern weddings: the select few are expected; the select few are
welcomed. Being a wedding feast church means that we throw open our doors, not
just physically but in who we are and how
we are, in our DNA, in our bones, in our culture.
A wedding feast church says
that what happens here is for everyone and it’s about finding life and joy.
It’s where you belong. ‘Fling wide the gates’ as a psalm puts it, to let in Christ,
the King of Glory, and those who come seeking him (Psalm 24). We invite, expect
and welcome the unexpected guest!
*
At the wedding feast in Cana
they famously ran out of wine and it was the Mother of the Lord, Mary, who
noticed this.
To be a wedding feast church
means that we have to acknowledge when the wine of our own effort and
imagination has run out. That’s when we
learn to be the church properly. It’s when we recall that our sure foundation
is Christ.
At Cana the servants panicked
when they realised the wine had run out. We are the servants on whose watch
this pandemic has happened, but it is no time to panic or beat ourselves up
about it. After all, the wine in Cana ran out because people were drinking it;
and that’s good!
This church has served good
wine, to be sure, for more than a thousand years, wine that is replenished in
each new season.
A wedding feast church knows
that new wine needs serving. A wedding feast church asks Blessed Mary to help
us notice the texture and detail of the life of our church. Is the wine
flowing? Is the wine souring? Is the wine running out?
Mary is the Mother of the
Church, and through her prayers, she longs that her children are renewed,
encouraged and drink deeply of the wells of salvation.
So she surely says to us today
- as she said to the servants in Cana – present
all this to Jesus and do whatever he tells you.
*
Now is the time to turn for us
to Christ and to be renewed in the life and mission of the church. The good
wine is to be served as Christ’s hour comes. A wedding feast church is ready to
drink of that wine, for it brings life; it brings joy.
The life is the depth of living that the Gospel beings. ‘I came that
you may have life and have it abundantly’ says Jesus (John 10.10). St Paul
echoes this, ‘take hold of the life that really is life (2 Timothy NN).
The joy is the experience of taking hold of life and finding it in
every day of our lives. Many things weigh us down in life, but joy awakens us
to the fulness of life through our daily existence and the challenges and
threats to happiness.
*
This coming week the priests
and licensed lay workers of this church are going to reflect on the aspiration
to be a church that is ‘welcoming and open, where people find life and joy and
feel they belong’.
What will that look like for
me and for my colleagues? What will that look like for the members of the
church council, the PCC? What will that look like for you?
A wedding feast church is a
church that is welcoming and open, where people find life and joy and feel they
belong.
*
A wedding feast church has a
banquet at its heart: what the Book of Revelation calls the ‘marriage feast of
the Lamb’. The marriage feast of the Lamb of God is the fulfilment of all
things in heaven, of which we have a foretaste in the Eucharist.
In marriage bride and groom
meet to become one flesh; in Christ divinity and humanity meet and become one
in his flesh.
As wine is prepared at the
Eucharist water is added and a prayer spoken by the priest which says, ‘by the
mystery of this water and this wine may we share in the divinity of Christ who
humbled himself to share in our humanity’. That is an intimate union.
At the wedding feast of the
Lamb we become one with Christ, in our bodies, minds and spirits. In this
mystical way we are welcoming into his open love and we find life and joy and the
deepest place of belonging we can find, because we are at home with the Lover
of our Souls.
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