Transformation
Readings: John 2. 1-11
Way back in January of 2024 I first preached on the Wedding at Cana. And in that sermon I mentioned that we didn’t have enough time to cover everything and so we’d finish next year. But if you cast your mind back to January 2025 you’ll remember that I said I wanted to focus on Mary’s words in the passage and that we’d have to wait another year. Well, here we are February 2026, the conclusion of what is quite possible the shortest sermon series delivered over the longest time, hopefully it will be worth the wait.
First, a refresher, because it’s been a while. John in this passage refers to this first recorded miracle of Jesus’, the turning of water into wine, not as a miracle, but as a sign. And signs point to things, they don’t exist for their own sake. If you look at a sign it’ll point you to something else. And 2 years ago we considered how this sign points us to Jesus as the greater bridegroom who covers over our shame, and how the abundance of wine produced points to the reality of the God who gives grace in abundance.
And so what else does this sign point us to? Well for that we need to look at the very substance of this miracle, the transformation itself. There are some who attempt to explain away this miracle, who attempt to reduce it to Jesus cheekily trying it on and the master of ceremonies running with it, ‘this wine is great’ wink wink, nudge nudge. But John doesn’t give us that option, he very clearly tells us that the water has become wine. Jesus has transformed it, and why should that surprise us, if Jesus is the God of the Universe in the flesh, then the one who created the vine, and the soil it grows in, and the mechanism by which fermentation can happen to create wine, can much more easily transform water into wine.
Jesus’ ministry is at its heart one of transformation, we see that in the lives of those who meet him, whose lives are utterly transformed by his call and his presence. But it’s about transformation at a deeper level too, right down to the very atoms of our cosmos. Jesus has come to transform our whole universe.
And to see how this passage richly communicates that we need to rewind. All the way back to the beginning of John’s Gospel which we heard at Christmas. How does John begin his Gospel? In the beginning. He’s echoing the start of Genesis and the beginning of creation itself. In the beginning was the Word. And actually we get a bit more of an echo of creation as he declares ‘the light shines in the darkness’. Echoes of day 1, ‘let there be light’.
Skipping down through the prologue to verse 19 where John the Baptist is asked whether he is the Messiah, he declares that the Messiah is not him, but is coming after him. And then at verse 29 we read ‘the next day’, John the Baptist testifies about Jesus. Then verse 35 ‘the next day’ where John points two of his disciples to Jesus and they follow him, we thought about that a few weeks ago. Then verse 43 ‘the next day’ when Jesus calls Philip who goes to get Nathanael, we thought about that encounter a few years ago.
But do you notice, John is counting days. We start with Day 1; in the beginning, let there be light, light that shines in the darkness. And then we go to the next day, and the next, and the next. It’s mirroring creation; the first day, the second day, the third day. It’s not a perfect one to one, but as John begins his Gospel, it’s not just the prologue which we hear every Christmas that mirrors Genesis 1, the very structure he’s giving us throughout this opening chapter is mirroring it. What John is pointing us to in this opening chapter is that Jesus has come to transform creation, that in him the new creation has begun. In Christ, God is making all things new. And here in John’s Gospel we see the beginnings of the coming of this new creation in the witness of John the Baptist and the gathering of the first disciples. Jesus has come to make all things new.
So where are we up to? Day 4. And then we come to today’s passage which begins ‘On the third day’. Three days after the previous events, so we’re on day 7. The culmination of creation. Now it’s assumed that this week doesn’t start on a Monday, or a Sunday (as the first day of the week was then), so we’re not at the Sabbath itself for this wedding. Nevertheless in the symbolism we’re at Sabbath rest in this new creation account. So what sits at the conclusion of the new creation? What happens as Christ restores and transforms the universe?
Well where do we find him? Where is the location of the miracle that crowns this beginning of the new creation. A wedding. As the new creation is completed as it were, we find not just rest, as we did in the original creation, but with it festal joy, the joy of a wedding feast, a banquet. This new creation is building up to joy, the joy of a great celebration.
And if you’re not convinced by the counting of days from the beginning of John, simply look at the beginning of this passage for the sign there; on the third day. The third day, it echoes back from the other Gospel accounts. Jesus is crucified and on the third day rises again, the third day echoes the day of Jesus’ resurrection. This wedding points us to the resurrection to eternal life.
We often talk when people have died of them now being at rest. And Scripture itself at times speaks of eternal life in that language of Sabbath rest. But it also speaks of joy and feasting and rejoicing. As we read in Revelation, the new creation is crowned with the marriage supper of the Lamb. As we are raised with Christ, as the new creation begins in its fullness, it begins with a marriage, and a wedding feast.
The location of this miracle, this sign, as at a wedding, as the crown upon this new creation, points us back to the language of the Old Testament, and ahead to the language Jesus will use, and the Apostles writing after him will use, of the relationship between God and his people, between Christ and his people. And it’s a rich picture. One you can plumb the depths of and still find more to discover. And it’s one I reference at every wedding I take. That in marriage we’re to take as our vision Christ and the Church, that’s what husband and wife are to be aiming for. When we look at the very best of marriages, what we are looking at is a living parable, a living breathing image of the relationship between Jesus and his people. A picture of the marriage to which all things move, when heaven and earth are united and Christ is united to his people.
Christ has come to transform all things, to make all things new, to bring us to the wedding feast. And this new creation, which is coming from the old, is even more glorious, even more wonderful than the former.
As Christ moves to sustain the feasting, and to cover over the shame of this groom who has not provided enough wine for the festivities, he takes the stuff of this creation and transforms it. He takes the water, the stuff of life, the most basic of needs, and transforms it into wine, the stuff of joy and celebration, the stuff that isn’t needed, but is instead graciously given. In the transformation of our universe, this new creation is coming out of the old, the new heavens and earth that we look forward to, they are coming through this earth on which we live, the heavens to which we look. At the last day, as we come to the wedding banquet of the Lamb, God will take this world, and transform it and infuse it with joy. And not just that, but as the steward observes, that this new wine is far superior to anything served until this point in the feast, God will transform this universe beyond our wildest hopes and dreams.
And the New Covenant comes from the Old, the new promise to God’s people through Jesus comes from the former which God made with Abraham. For Jesus takes the water that is used for the rites of purification, the system under the Law, and this is what he chooses to transform into wine. What was once used to make clean and pure is now used for celebration, what was once a cause for effort and straining, is now a cause for joy. Because in the same way Christ takes the Law of God, and transforms it, not doing away with it, but fulfilling it. Turning the weight of the law which we must fulfil, into the freedom and joy that his fulfilling of it for us brings. As once we were cleansed temporarily by water, so now, through his death and resurrection, we are cleansed eternally by his blood. And perhaps it’s not pushing the imagery too far to see that cleansing blood signified in the wine.
As Jesus comes to celebrate at a wedding we see a Saviour who is not dour and miserable, but who rejoices with us, who brings joy and celebration. And so as we look deeper to the signs in this miracle, and we see that this same Saviour has come to bring transformation. Transformation in the lives of those he meets, transformation in our lives in our day. But much more so the transformation of the whole universe. For his coming is to bring about a new creation, and we can be assured that this new creation will be infused with that same deep joy, the joy of a marriage feast, of love given and shared.
For us, and for all creation, the beginning of eternity is not simply rest, but the joy of the wedding feast of the Lamb, who by the shedding of his blood has cleansed us as his bride, made us his people. And as we enter into this new life, this new universe, we will see that God has transformed all things, beyond all we could have hoped for.
As we read in Revelation;
‘Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting:
“Hallelujah!
For our Lord God Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and be glad
and give him glory!
For the wedding of the Lamb has come,
and his bride has made herself ready.
Fine linen, bright and clean,
was given her to wear.”
(Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of God’s holy people.)
Then the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!”
– Revelation 19. 6-9
Amen.