When the Wine Gave Out

Scripture Lessons: Song of Solomon 8: 6-7 and John 2: 1-11 Sermon Title: When the wine gave out Preached on January 27, 2019 Weddings. You plan, and you plan, but something always seems to go wrong. At the wedding in Cana of Galilee it was the wine that gave out, but it’s always something. It’s no wonder marriage is hard, just the wedding is hard. There’s a great story I heard about a wedding back in Tennessee that took place in a Baptist church. The groom and his father walk out from the front, but during their processional they somehow trip and fall into the baptismal font. “I guess they got a two for one deal – married and baptized in the same ceremony,” someone said. As a preacher I’m proud to be a part of weddings. I’m proud to have had the honor of being a part of some of your weddings, but our own – when planning our wedding I only had one job: to secure a soloist. And when a friend offered to sing at our wedding, I thought to myself, “That was easy.” I just took him up on his offer, which took care of that, but I never thought to ask whether or not he could sing. So, the first time I heard him sing was when Sara and I were up there, just having made our vows. He was so bad we could hardly keep a straight face. My cousin asked if I had asked him to sing that way because I thought it would be funny, but I hadn’t. Weddings. Something has to go wrong. When I officiate, I get to stand right up front next to the groom as the bride walks down the aisle. I get to watch as he sees her walking toward him, which is a special thing to get to see, but there are other things that the preacher sees. Sometimes I’m the person who knows the most about what’s lurking below the surface. Sometimes I know where the bride’s father is and why he’s not there walking his daughter down the aisle. Sometimes I know why the groom’s grandmother can’t stop crying, or what it was that caused the wedding to start 5 minutes late. Sometimes I have an idea of the disfunction that’s been covered up. The pain that everyone has agreed to momentarily push aside. Sometimes I know that this day is meant to be perfect, so I keep my mouth shut, because if it can’t be perfect, at least we can pretend it is. Right? But Jesus’ mother – she said something about it. Did you notice that? Mary, the mother of Jesus goes to her son and makes a big request that masquerades as a simple observation, “They have no wine.” So, at this wedding – no groom fell in the baptismal font, the soloist sang on key, the ceremony started on time, daddy was there to walk the bride down the aisle, and grandma at least pretended to be happy, but the wine gave out – that’s what went wrong with this wedding – something always goes wrong. That’s what went wrong at this one, and if you’ve ever been at a wedding reception when the drinks ran out than you know that this would bring an embarrassing and abrupt end to the party. No one wants that to happen – but no one wants anyone to know that something is going wrong either, so I can just imagine the mother of that bride discreetly rushing up to the steward in charge of the wine and loudly whispering: “Do something about this! Do anything! Go to the store – there must be one open. I think there’s some Kool-Aid packets in my purse – just mix them up with some water and add some vodka. Maybe no one will notice.” Do you know that feeling? The wine has run out – but you don’t want anyone to notice. Something is going terribly wrong, but it’s too hard to speak of it. The appearance of perfection keeps you from asking for help. All that is extremely dangerous, because if we can’t have a perfect wedding – if we can’t do perfect even for one day, there’s no chance of a perfect life, so we must learn to be vulnerable – vulnerable enough to ask for help when the wine gives out. Some people are better at that then others. I grew up with a woman named Mandy Swartwood who’s getting good at it. Her parents are Bob and Judy Harper, and on Facebook I noticed that Mandy posted a picture of herself drinking out of a coffee mug that said on the side, “World’s OK-est Mom”. I thought that was funny, and she cited an article from the Today show website: “Moms, sometimes it’s OK to be ‘just OK.’ It was a captivating article. The journalist, Nicki Snyder, is a mother of three boys. Her oldest is 7, and she described one afternoon and evening with her children like this: Husband had to work late, so I had to pick up the boys from the babysitter. After arguing with one of the 7-year olds on the sidewalk for what felt like 27 minutes about why his “pulled hamstring” (barely there bruise on his leg) should not be causing him to walk at the pace of a slug, we made it into the car. Everyone buckled, we survived the 6-minute drive home. Walked in the door, everyone is starrrrrrrving. Made 3 separate simple dinners for each of them because heaven forbid they eat the same thing and I had about 10 minutes before someone over-dramatically “passed out” from hunger. Listened to one complain about why ketchup is too spicy and another yell at me for not signing his homework yet. Opened refrigerator door on 3-year old’s head. Soothed screaming 3-year-old. Unpacked backpacks while they were eating, found nerf bullets and one shoe in one backpack. Decided not to ask why. Packed lunches for tomorrow. Listened to all 3 whine about tablets and Nintendo not being allowed at dinner table. Cleaned up dinner and dishes. Cleaned up the disastrous mess puppy decided to leave upstairs while boys were eating dinner. Stared at myself in the mirror and silently encouraged myself to breathe and just. keep. going. Finally changed out of my heels. I can’t relate to the heels part, but I do know this feeling. Maybe you do too. It’s like how you sanitized every pacifier that fell on the floor for your first child. For your second child you washed it off in the sink. But for your third, you just stuck the thing right back in his mouth. Of course, it’s one thing to do that – it’s another thing to let someone know about it. That’s why my favorite quote to read at weddings comes from one of the great icons of Christianity, Ruth Bell Graham, who was married to Rev. Billy Graham. Someone once asked her if she had ever considered divorce. She said, “No, though I often considered murder.” How nice to know – that even for her, the wine could go out. How nice to know – that even for her, there were hard days. How nice to know – that even for her, not every day was sunshine and roses, but for even the woman married to one of the greatest preachers in history there was struggle. There were days when the best laid plans fell apart. And that’s true for everyone, but we don’t always talk about it. Sometimes we think, “Even if I’m not perfect, maybe I can appear that way.” That’s a true temptation – but I ask you this – do the sick get healed by pretending to be well? Do the broken get mended by pretending that they’re not in pain? Will the marriage get better so long as the couple suffers in silence? Will everything be OK so long as no one knows? You know the answer to these questions – and there it is in the Scripture Lesson. Why does Jesus turn this water into wine? Why does he save the wedding from disaster? Because his mother had the courage to tell him. Because someone decided to stop covering up. Because she was bold to trust that the one with grace enough to cover all our sins and power to heal the brokenness and a voice that can calm the storm who may come to our aid just as soon as we’re ready to stop pretending that we don’t need his help. It might be hard to call out to Jesus. It takes real courage to ask for help. It might take everything to put up the white flag of surrender – but if we never tell him that the wine has given out – then the one who can turn water to wine never has a chance to make a miracle happen. Too often we suffer in silence as the wine gives out. We worry about making that appointment with the counselor. We keep walking in pain – afraid of the diagnosis. We fail to lean on the everlasting arms of Christ our Savior – trying to stand up on our own two feet in the storms of this life. But we can’t do it ourselves. We can’t even pull off the perfect wedding, so how could we possibly make it through life without some help? When the wine gives out – call on him. And watch what he can do. Amen.