There were six stone jars of water at the wedding in Cana. Huge jars. Jars that could hold 20–30 gallons each; or, 100,000 jelly beans, each, give or take. Jars that were big enough to be good hiding places for kids playing hide-n-seek, or sardines, if the jars were empty and not full of water. (You probably don’t want to hide in the jars if they are full of water.)
The scripture says that these jars of water were for the Jewish rites of purification. So the water wasn’t for drinking. And it wasn’t for hygiene. It was there for purely ceremonial purposes.
In fact, that’s why the scripture tells us that these jars were made of stone, and not pottery. Jars of pottery could become unclean, ceremonially speaking, if something unclean touches it or is put inside it; but stone jars would remain clean.
(This is all explained in the book of Leviticus, everyone’s favorite book to read, so I’m sure this is stuff you already know.)
So if, say, one of those kids playing sardines was unclean, ceremonially speaking, and hid inside one of those stone jars, the stone jar itself, because it was made of stone, would remain in a state of cleanliness, and it would still be ok to use that stone jar the next day to hold the water for the Jewish rites of purification.
See?
Jewish teaching instructed ritual purification by water for a number of reasons. It was part of the process by which a ritually unclean person could become ritually clean. If a person wasn’t ritually clean, they couldn’t be a part of the celebration.
So they had to go through the washing ritual, in order to be clean, and be a part of the party.
In fact, I think everyone did some sort of washing as they arrived at the party, or before they ate. Again, this wasn’t for hygiene; it was a ceremonial ritual.
Depending on the situation, purification might require a washing of hands; or, it might require complete bodily immersion: a washing of the whole body.
Hence, the need for six large stone jars of water.
These purification rituals were distinguishing marks of Jewish identity. Among other things, they helped show who is a part of the group, and who is not. Who is in, and who is out. Who is welcome, and who is unwelcome.
You don’t want just anyone coming to your wedding. Only certain people are invited to the party. At the very least, they had to be ritually clean, ceremonially clean, to attend.
It reminds me of Alexander Campbell and his communion token. I don’t know if you remember, but I shared the story with you last fall of a young Alexander Campbell, going to his Scottish Presbyterian worship service on one of the few Sundays of the year when communion was served.
In that faith community, in order to receive communion, one had to meet with the pastor prior to the service. The pastor would examine you, evaluate your worthiness, and give you a token which you then had to present in worship in order to receive communion.
Obviously, those who were not in good standing with that Scottish Presbyterian church would not receive a token.
Meeting with the pastor in order to receive a token was like the ritual of washing before joining the wedding party; both were ways of determining one’s worthiness. They were ways of dividing people into those who were worthy, and those who were not; those who we want to let in, and those we want to keep out. Those approved, and those not approved.
Figuring out who is approved and who is not, who is allowed in and who is barred from entering, is something we still do today, in various ways.
The debate over immigration—and immigration reform—is a debate over who is allowed in, and who is not; who gets to benefit, and who gets denied benefits.
We divide people by immigration status, and also by race, by religion, by class, by education, by sexual orientation and gender identity. We deny rights to certain people based on one or more of these categories. Those we deem less worthy get fewer rights.
We’re still separating people into categories of clean and unclean.
Tomorrow, we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. King knew about our tendency to separate and divide people. He knew about and experienced how we judge people by the color of their skin, and use skin color to determine who is worthy and who is not. He knew that too many were kept from entering the party, while only a few were let in.
For me, the doors to the party are often open; but for others, because of their race, or their gender, or their sexual orientation, or their nationality, or their religion, those doors are kept shut.
I work hard; but I know people who work even harder, yet receive only half as much. Half as many opportunities, half as much pay, half as much respect.
People look at me, and often think to themselves, “Oh, yeah; he’s clean.” Or they say, “a little water on your hands is enough.” But then they look at others, and say: “No, you need to wash up. You need to immerse yourself in the water. You can’t just come in here like that! You need to jump through a few more hoops first, and then, maybe, we’ll let you into the party.”
But they set the bar so high (for them, not for me), that not even six large stone jars filled with water would be enough.
Well, what if there was no water for the washing ritual? No jars, no buckets… not even a thimble full of water? Not even a drop?
Without the ritual, how could people determine who is allowed in, and who isn’t? How could people determine who is clean, and who is unclean?
What if we just did away with that, and just allowed everyone into the party?
It’s a radical idea. It’s revolutionary! It completely shifts how society is ordered.
And it’s what Jesus did, when he turned the water into wine.
Wine was something everyone could enjoy. Wine wasn’t used in any ritual that separated people from one another. It was water that was used for those rituals.
But now, there is no water. It has all been turned into wine.
And it’s hard to complain about having more wine! Who’s going to complain about that?
If anyone is upset over the disappearance of the ceremonial water, any objections they might utter will be drowned out by the cheers of people filling up their goblets with the just-appeared wine, laughing, maybe even crying, at the unexpected blessing of wine that has appeared before them.
I am amazed at the way Jesus handles this situation. He does away with the unjust system of division and separation, but he does it in a way that brings joy and laughter. He doesn’t insult the host or anyone else. He doesn’t insult the guests for participating in an unjust system. There is great kindness and compassion in the way he goes about this.
Yet, at the same time, he demonstrates in a very powerful way the need to do away with practices that discriminate and divide.
In doing this, Jesus shows us a better way. Given how divided we are as a country, and the strong opinions people have that so often lead to anger and insult,
Jesus shows us how to move toward justice. He shows us how to shine a light on the benefits of justice, and make plain the injury and harm caused by unjust practices, policies, and attitudes,
All while practicing kindness and compassion and love toward all.
There is a way to stand firm for justice, for equality, while at the same time, showing love and respect for those who have yet to understand how things work in the kingdom of God.
By the way, there are other stories in the gospels, of Jesus and his disciples not washing; and those stories are tied to other stories where the way of Jesus gets opened up to outsiders, foreigners, and people of other religions. So this isn’t the only time in the gospels that we see this happening.
And the apostle Paul, who was a proud Jew until the day he died, also worked to open up the way of Jesus to those who were not Jews—to those who were outsiders—because of his strong belief that there should be no divisions among people, and that all are one in Christ Jesus.
My understanding of this story is indebted somewhat to Elizabeth Edman, an Episcopal priest. She sums things up like this:
“What I saw was Jesus taking these pots of water - water designed for ritual bathing, for spiritual cleansing - and turning that water into wine that everyone was supposed to drink. What I saw was Jesus taking this substance that was all caught up in ideas of cleanness and uncleanness, all caught up in notions about what separates us from each other, and turning it into something designed to be shared, something that eases our anxiety about all the harsh lines in our world, something we take into our bodies in order to overcome barriers like ritual purity laws that separate us from one another.”
Edman identifies as queer, and she sees her queer identity as something that supports and enriches her understanding of this story.
After all, both the gospel and the queer movement work to break down barriers, to rupture binaries (as she puts it), to erase those divisions that separate people into sharply defined categories; and they both work to liberate people so they can simply be who they are: their true, authentic selves.
And that, Edman says, is what Jesus did when he changed the water into wine. He took what was used for rituals that determined who was clean and who was unclean, who was acceptable and who was not - and he transformed it into something that everyone was able to share and enjoy.
The other day I posted something about William T. Major on our church’s social media pages… William T. Major was a Kentucky Baptist for the first half of his life. Most Kentucky Baptists at that time supported slavery. They no doubt made use of the Bible to support their pro-slavery views. They weaponized the Bible, insisting that slavery was condoned and approved by scripture.
But William T. Major was an abolitionist, because like others I’ve mentioned today, he regarded anything that separated and divided humanity to be inconsistent with the gospel—especially an institution as horrible as slavery.
So in 1835, Major moved to Illinois. Two years later, he founded First Christian Church… and instead of making it a Baptist church, he chose to affiliate it with the new Disciples movement led by Alexander Campbell.
To him, it didn’t matter that the Bible, at least in some places, allows slavery. He knew that slavery was contrary to the way of Jesus.
And I think that, were he alive today, William T. Major would support the decision First Christian Church made a few years back, to become Open and Affirming. There’s no way of knowing that for sure, but I can’t imagine Major not welcoming and affirming any person into the life of the church, simply because of who they are. I can’t imagine that any more than I can imagine Jesus saying to a leper, or a Gentile, or any other unclean person: “go away, you have no business being here.”
I can’t imagine that, because Jesus never did it. Jesus always welcomed those who the religious leaders of his day wanted to keep out.
The way of Jesus is about love, compassion, and kindness. The way of Jesus is about breaking down the barriers, and showing welcome and hospitality. Not just to some, but to all.
And it doesn’t matter if you are clean or unclean; Jew or Gentile; black or white; gay or straight; transgender or cisgender; documented or undocumented; rich or poor; male or female…
All are welcome at the party. All are welcome at the feast.
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