Water into wine

Homilist on 2nd Sunday after the Epiphany (01/19/2025), Seminarian Shawan Gillians

Come Thou all Victorious Lord. Thy power to us make known. Strike with the hammer of Thy word, and break these hearts of stone. 

I come to you in the name of our God who is our creator our comforter and our kinsman redeemer. Please be seated. I missed y'all last week. It somewhat surprises me that only five months ago I needed GPS to make my way here, and now Sunday doesn't feel the same when I'm not here. But it is the custom of my three dearest friends, and particularly that of me and my best friend Katie, to travel for our birthdays. So last week's Sunday, those friends and I were wrapping up some time in Miami to celebrate my 43rd birthday.

As is also my custom, I Googled the church to attend while I was there. I do this for two reasons. One, I like attending church. Two, I never know when my mom and dad are going to ask me if I went to church. Now, my mother is subtle—she'll ask me how service went, wherever I happened to be. My dad is a little bit less subtle—he just asks, “Did you make it to church today?" And because what my parents think of me matters a great deal to me, I try not to be in a position to have to give them an answer I don't think they want to hear. It has been a habit that started in my youth, and I've not outgrown it.

As a result, if someone really wants me to do something, they frequently will not ask me directly. They will ask my mother to ask me or they'll wait for her to ask me of her own volition. I think that puts me in good company since one could conclude that people have the same impression of Jesus. In our gospel reading this morning, we find ourselves at the time and place of Jesus' first miracle according to John, the turning of water into wine at the wedding in Canaan. Now there are many things that can be said about the turning of water to wine and what it means for us as the bride of Christ. After all the miracle does occur at a wedding.

But I'm going to resist the urge mostly to focus on the one and instead talk to you this morning for just a little while about time. One of the benefits of getting older is a greater appreciation of time, its passage, and how events unfold in relation to one another, and the role time plays in all of that. Not only time but timing plays an important role in the human experience. We would be hard pressed not to think about the fact that the Gregorian calendar, a 1983 US law, and the 20th Amendment to the US Constitution has resulted in President-elect Donald Trump being sworn into office on the day set aside to celebrate the life and legacy of the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Timing is indeed an interesting thing but let's set the scene for today's Gospel. It's a wedding feast, and Jesus, of course, is there along with his entourage, his newly recruited disciples. Also in attendance is his mother Mary. Bear in mind that just a few days earlier in the week, John the Baptist had proclaimed Jesus to be the Lamb of God, testifying that he saw the Holy Spirit descend and remain on Jesus, identifying him to also be the Son of God. Now I suspect that in those times the world did not have the potential to travel as quickly as it does today. Though of course Mary always knew of Jesus's divine origin. Into this world we're dropped when, horror of horrors, they’ve run out of wine at the feast. The text doesn't tell us the timing of the wine running out but we can assume it wasn't as the last guests were leaving. So this isn't just a question of an abrupt end to the party, although nobody likes an abrupt end to the party. It would have been a source of deep embarrassment to the host family. But Mary is there and she has the bright idea that this looks like a job for Jesus.

When I was a little girl, if your parent knew you were good at something, say if you were good at dancing, and they had friends over, they'd pull you out of your room and say, "Go ahead and do that dance for everybody." You didn't always enjoy it but you did it ‘cause your mom or your dad asked you to do it. But think about the temerity, the unmitigated gall, and the unmitigated faith that kind of move by Mary took. Remember Jesus hasn't even started his ministry. Yet Mary asks him to solve this problem, not only assuming Jesus can do it but also assuming that Jesus will do it. The servants who likely had no reason to know what Jesus could do took it on faith because Mary directed them to do whatever Jesus told them to do. I can't help but wonder how many of us have that kind of faith to do something that doesn't make any kind of sense just because Jesus said to do it.

We would be remiss if we didn't acknowledge Jesus' initial response to his mother. The most common translation indicates that Jesus rebuffs Mary. He tells her, “Your timing is bad. Why would I do this when it's not yet my time, when my ministry hasn't even begun?” This seems a rational response yet Mary has the kind of faith that won't take "no" for an answer. But, Saints, what strikes me most about what happens in today's Gospel is not the faith Mary and the servants exhibited, though of course that's a sermon in and of itself. It's that Mary and the servants acted without delay. Mary acted without delay. The text says, when the wine gave out, Mary called on Jesus—not after a while, not after giving it some thought, not when all hope was lost—Mary acted without delay. The same thing can be said with the servants. Nothing in the text indicates they went to the master of the feast or the household and asked if it would be okay if they did what Jesus commanded. They didn't ask Jesus why he was asking for water when they told him they were out of wine. They just did what he said. Nobody said, “Well, we're already out of wine. It's too late now.” Nobody said, "Jesus hasn't even started his ministry so I don't want to bother him." Nobody said, “Well, he's already won the election.” [I'm sorry!!! I was supposed to take that out of out of my notes. A winter storm isn't the only thing bringing headwinds we'll start facing tomorrow.]

Friends, whether or not the president-elect intended it, and whether or not we like it, there are those in our nation who now feel emboldened to get to engage in the most violent acts of bigotry and hatred. We the church must always have unshakable faith. But in these times, we the church, like Mary and the servants, must act without delay to wrap our arms around God's children.

There was one thing about the text that disturbed me. Nowhere does it tell us when Jesus turned the water to wine. Did y'all notice? We know it was water when the servants filled the jars. And Jesus doesn't call it wine. He tells them to draw some out and take it to the chief steward. He calls it water. We never see Jesus perform any action concerning the water. (This is not like blind Bartimeus, where he takes some spittle and mud and puts it on his eyes.) And yet when it gets to the steward, it's wine! I simply could not make the timing of it work in my mind and that's when it occurred to me that the water became wine while they were walking. We'll see the wonder-working power of Jesus while we're walking, while we're working, while we're ensuring immigrants have a fair shake at the so-called American Dream, while we fight to retain the right to equality earned by those in the LGBTQ+ community. Whether it be the basic right of medical care for those in transition or the right to marry whomever you choose. While we make sure the government is more interested in educating people of color than incarcerating them, while we make sure young black men are given books more often than they are met with bullets—while we're working!

So as we celebrate Dr King tomorrow, we must remember that he was not only a civil rights activist—yes he was a civil rights activist and we're grateful for it; the world is a better place because he was an activist. But he also stood flat-footed in the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist on Sunday mornings and declared the liberating, lifegiving word of God available to every person. He understood the work of the church is inextricably intertwined with the body politic. Away with this foolishness that Jesus wasn't political. He fully understood that our burnt offerings and trappings of church and holiness meant nothing if we were prepared to walk by and walk over those who are marginalized in our world.

Proverbs 21 tells us a leader's heart is in the hands of the Lord. Just like rivers of water, God will turn it howsoever he will. We should all continue to pray and trust God to work on the hearts and minds of humanity. We ought always to pray. That's a good thing. But when we're done praying, Saints, we need to be about working. Then and only then will we see our water turned to Wine. Amen, amen.

© 2025 Shawan Gillians

image credit:"Wedding at Cana" (1696) by Nicolas de Correa