THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
WATER TO WINE
DR. JIM DIXON
MAY 17, 1987
JOHN 2:1-11
His name was Alfred I Beatty, but people just called him Al. They also called him other names. Some people called Al a drunk, and some people called him a bum because he was an alcoholic. For 20 years, he lived in San Francisco’s skid row area. He would sometimes take odd jobs, but most of the time he depended on contributions from others and he would kind of rummage around in trash cans looking for something to eat. Mostly what he looked for was something alcoholic to drink. People kind of liked Al and from time to time they gave him the price of a drink. But in 1959, they found Al beside an old, beat-up building in a San Francisco slum. Al was dead, with an empty wine bottle at his side. The autopsy showed that he had cirrhosis of the liver, and for most people it was just one more hopeless derelict gone from the Earth.
But you see, Al’s life had not always been hopeless. There were a few people who looked back and researched Al’s past, and they were amazed to find that Al at one time was in the old Army Air Corps in Kelly Field in Texas. He’d been an officer and a pilot, and he had graduated first in his high school class, nominated the most likely to succeed. There were many other people in Al’s class who went on to become United States congressmen and senators. Some went on to become heads of great financial corporate conglomerates. But what happened to Al? He became the victim of alcoholism. Of course, tragically, Al is not alone. In the world today and in the world of the past there are and have been millions of people afflicted with alcoholism. Tragically, from Alexander the Great to John Wilkes Booth, from President Andrew Johnson to King Edward II of England, alcohol has ruined many lives.
We’re told that 20 million Americans are afflicted with alcoholism today, and over 50% of the traffic fatalities on America’s highways are in some way related to alcohol abuse. With this tragic situation we might well ask, “Why it was that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, created abundant and even excessive wine at a marriage in Cana of Galilee 2,000 years ago?” Why did He create wine at all? The biblical message concerning wine is actually quite simple. Some people try to make it complex. Biblically, wine is not evil in and of itself. It is not a sin to drink in moderation. There are even some passages in the Bible where wine is spoken of as a gift from God, passages such as the hundred and eighth Psalm. But all through the Bible, we are cautioned again and again about the abuse of alcohol. And in the Bible, drunkenness is called sin.
If anyone has a tendency to drink to excess, they would be better off not to drink at all. 10% to 20% of the people in this world, we are told by scientists, have chemical predispositions towards alcoholism. They should not drink at all, and even those Christians who do choose to drink in moderation are cautioned in the Bible that they should not drink in those circumstances where they might cause someone else to stumble. But what our Lord Jesus Christ created in Cana of Galilee almost 2,000 years ago was not wine in moderation. He created 120 to 180 gallons of wine—six stone jars, each jar containing 20 to 30 gallons. Why did he do that? Most theologians are agreed that He wasn’t simply trying to keep the party going. In fact, most biblical scholars are agreed that this miracle at Cana of Galilee had very little to do with wine and it had very little to do with a party. This miracle had a deeper meaning, and our Lord Jesus Christ had a deeper purpose. Those who have eyes to see and ears to hear are meant to understand this meaning and purpose. You see, in the passage of scripture, in the Gospel of John, this miracle is called a sign—from the Greek word simádi—and refers to that which points to a deeper truth, a deeper reality.
Jesus Christ had a deeper truth He was pointing to when He performed this miracle, and it’s all bound up with the symbolism of wine in the Bible and in biblical times. You see, in biblical times in the Greek, Roman, and Hebrew cultures, wine was a symbol of life. It was a symbol of joy, and it was a symbol of life. At the beginning of His ministry, in His first miracle, as Christ transformed 180 gallons of water to wine, He was showing that He is indeed the source of abundant life. We cannot understand the meaning of this miracle unless we understand that. With this concept of wine as symbolizing life, I have three simple teachings this morning.
The first teaching is this: apart from Jesus Christ, the wine will run out. If you do not belong to Jesus Christ, if you do not have Him as your Lord and Savior of life, then eventually in your life the wine will run out. Life will cease and joy will cease. There’s a cartoon that I kind of like. I saw it in the newspaper a few weeks ago. It’s kind of embarrassing to admit that I like this, but it shows a man who’s on an airplane. He’s about to jump out and he’s never jumped before. His friend is with him giving him instructions. His friend says, “Now when you jump, it’s really simple, you pull the right cord, and the parachute will open. However, if it doesn’t open, you pull the left cord and then the parachute will open, and you’ll just go gently to the ground and my wife will be there to pick you up. Well, in the second picture in the cartoon, the man has jumped and he’s flying through the air, and he’s pulled the right cord and the parachute hasn’t opened. But strangely, he has a relatively calm expression on his face. In the third picture in this cartoon, he’s pulled the left cord. He’s flying through the air, and he’s pulled the left cord, and again the chute didn’t open. But again, strangely, he has kind of a calm expression on his face. Then in the fourth picture, the fourth and final picture in this cartoon, the man is flying through the air at what looks like about warp 10. Amazingly, he has kind of a calm but perplexed expression on his face. You can tell he is contemplating something and he’s thinking to himself, “He lied about the right chord. He lied about the left chord. I wonder if his wife’s really going to be there to pick me up.”
Now what? That man is going to need picked up with a spatula. It is an amazing thought, mildly humorous at best, to envision someone just flying to their death and seeming to be unaware of it. And yet, you see, tragically, there are millions of people in the world, billions of people, just like that. They’re just racing towards death, and they don’t even seem to be aware of it. It doesn’t even seem to bother them that one day life will cease. Whatever measure of joy they have in this world will cease apart from Jesus Christ.
Now of course, there are some people in this world who, though they yet live, still have little joy, some people who so tragically despair of life that they take their life. Two such people were Charles and Carolina Hovenden. I read their story recently. Charles had MS, and he suffered for 20 years. His body becoming increasingly paralyzed, and his wife Carolina had cancer and she was restricted to a wheelchair. As the years went by, their grief grew and finally they just despaired of life itself. The wine ran out and they took their lives. Authorities found them with their hands holding each other in death. There are, of course other people like that in this world who have taken their own life when it seemed to them as though the wine had run out.
Some people who didn’t really have any physical problems or physical sufferings but who had emotional sufferings or relational problems have also taken their own lives. One such person is named Joe Barnes, who took his life just recently in New York State. He jumped into a river, but Joe didn’t know how to swim. He did it on purpose. He wanted to die. He left a suicide note in the New York Times. He published that note in the newspaper and said, “My name is Joe Barnes. I have no accomplishments, no friends, and no relatives. I have no hope.” There are people like that in the world. You see, the wine just ran out.
There are some people who seemingly have everything going for them, and yet there is no joy and no life. One such person was named Robert Young. Now you’ve all heard of Robert Young the actor, but this was Robert Young the railroad tycoon. He was chairman of the board of the New York Central Railroad. According to Time Magazine, he was one of the most powerful men in the whole railroad industry. According to Time Magazine, this man Robert Young had everything this world has to offer. He had wealth, power, and glittering friends, including the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. He had palatial homes in Newport and in the Palm Desert and in many other parts of the world. And yet, something was wrong, because when Robert Young turned 60 years of age, he took his own life. No one knows why. Perhaps he just didn’t want to grow older or maybe his power was waning, but the wine ran out.
We are told by the World Health Organization that in the decade of the 1970s 50 million people in this world attempted suicide. In the last 20 years, more than 1,500 books have been written on the subject of suicide because, for millions of people, the wine just runs out. The tragic truth is that for millions and perhaps billions of additional people who would never attempt suicide there is still an absence of joy and of life itself. But there’s a message of hope in the Bible, a message of sure hope.
Our second teaching this morning is this: Jesus Christ is the winemaker. He is the source of life abundant, and He is the source of joy. And He has said, “I have come that you might have life and that you might have it abundantly.” There were six stone jars, each jar containing 20 to 30 gallons. The Bible tells us that these stone jars had been set aside. They were used for Jewish ceremonial washings. They had been set aside for the Jewish rights of purification. These six stone jars represented the Old Covenant—the Old Testament law—and the number six in Hebrew symbolism was the number of imperfections. So perhaps they represented the imperfections of the Old Covenant and the Old Testament law. But you see, Jesus Christ took what was imperfect and He made it wonderful. He transformed that water into wine—abundant wine—symbolic of the New Covenant. He had come to offer a New Covenant that is the very source of life and the source of joy. He offers that to each and every one of us who are here today. He alone offers victory over death, meaning, purpose, and joy in the midst of life.
There’s a man who is known to all of you. He is one quarter Cherokee Indian. He is perhaps the most famous folk and country singer in the world. He hit the big time in 1956 when he released a song called “I Walked the Line.” He has set attendance records from Nashville, Tennessee, to London’s Palladium. However, in his rise to prominence he discovered more than fame and fortune. He also discovered suffering, emptiness, and tragedy. As the years passed, he had more and more gold records, but he also had more and more emptiness, more and more despair. Somehow the world just didn’t seem to have the answer. He was first arrested in 1965, and incredibly, they found more than 1,000 pills in his pockets. You see, he had to take pills in order to get up for concerts anymore, and he had become addicted to amphetamines—tragically addicted—and his body was beginning to waste away. He had dwindled from 200 pounds to 140 pounds. His soul and spirit were dying, and he was thinking of taking his life. The wine had run out.
But then, one day, on the 8th of May in the year 1971, he went into a little church in his hometown. a minister was speaking. At the conclusion of the sermon, the Minister gave an invitation for anyone to come forward who would like to receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. And so it was that at that time, in that place, Johnny Cash got out of the pew and went down to the wooden altar rail and said, “Lord Jesus Christ come into my heart.” He gave his life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. He met the winemaker. That was 16 years ago. Johnny Cash has continued to have problems from time to time, but he testifies that his life has never been the same since that time, because, whenever the wine seems to be running low, he knows where to go. Whenever there’s an absence of life or joy (or perhaps some sense of failure, some despair), he knows where to go. He goes to the feet of the Son of God, the foot of the cross, and he presents his life anew to Jesus Christ, the winemaker.
Very few of you have ever heard of Jacob Deser. Jacob Deser was an American military man in World War II. He flew among Jimmy Doolittle’s Raiders over Japan in World War II, and his plane was shot down. As his plane was shot down, Jacob Deser bailed out of the plane and parachuted to the earth, where he was picked up by the Japanese and thrown into a prison camp. Life was miserable in that prison camp. Jacob Deser was an atheist. He didn’t believe God even existed. He didn’t want to have anything to do with God. But in that prison camp, he began for the first time in his life to truly despair. The weeks passed, the months passed, the years passed, and he began to fall into a deeper and deeper depression and sense of hopelessness. Life had no meaning, and the wine was running out.
Jacob Deser didn’t even know where to look for hope. But of course, he’d heard of the Bible. He’d never read the Bible. There was no Bible in the prison camp. But he decided to ask one of the Japanese guards one day if he could get him a Bible. And the guard just laughed. But a few weeks later, the guard came back (and Jacob Deser does not understand how or why) and gave him a Bible. He said, “I’ll let you have this Bible for three weeks and then I want it back.” So Jacob Deser began to read the Bible, and during that three-week period a miracle happened. He was transformed from water to wine, from bitter water to sweet wine. He met the winemaker, and he gave his heart and life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. At the conclusion of World War II, he was released from that prison camp. In 1948, he returned to Japan with his new wife and a little infant child. He returned to Japan as a missionary, his life transformed by the power of Christ.
Perhaps you don’t know Christ today. Perhaps your life’s nothing but water. You’ve never had that sense of passing from death to life, you don’t have the confidence of eternal life, and you don’t know you’re going to heaven. If that’s true, then God has a message for you. There’s one source of eternal life, one source of purpose in this life, and that source is in His Son Jesus Christ. Perhaps you’re already a Christian, but you still have times when you feel like the wine’s running out. Maybe you’re in the midst of some sense of doom, some measure of despondency, and you want help. Jesus Christ wants you to know that He’s the winemaker. You might be in a marriage where you don’t love your wife like once you did, or maybe you don’t love your husband like once you did, and you feel like the wine’s run out and it’s all over.
But Jesus Christ wants you to know that He’s able to turn the water of your marriage into wine. I’ve seen Him do it countless times in the lives of men and women who are willing to trust their marriage to Him and say, “Lord Jesus, we need a miracle here. We commit ourselves anew to each other and to You.” Because, you see, He’s the winemaker and He can rekindle that love. You might be in the midst of some other kind of suffering. It might be financial, or it could be health related. But in any case, you see, Jesus wants you to know He’s the winemaker. I’m sure the children of Israel felt like the wine had run out when they came to the Red Sea. I have to believe that the woman who was hemorrhaging horribly—who reached out her hand in a crowded street in Israel and touched the hem of the garment of the Son of God—surely was thinking the wine was running out. For the little man who climbed a sycamore tree in Jericho, the wine must have been running out. He just wanted a glimpse of the Son of God. Mary and Martha, at the tomb of their brother, Lazarus, must have thought the wine was running out. But you see, because they turned to Jesus Christ, they found their water turned to wine. He’s the winemaker.
Well, thirdly and finally, we have this message from this miracle: you have a part to play. Jesus Christ is the winemaker, but you have a part to play. You see, the miracle at Cana of Galilee was not wrought apart from the faith of Mary, who brought the problem to the Son of God, her own Son in the flesh. This miracle was not wrought apart from her faith, as she said to the servants, “Whatever He tells you to do, do it.” It was not wrought apart from the obedience of the servants. You have a part to play in every miracle God would do in your life.
You see, if you’re not a Christian, if you’ve never had your water turn to wine and you’ve never received eternal life, then the part that is yours is that part called faith. You must invite Jesus Christ to become the Lord and Savior of your life and commit your life to Him. Even if you are a Christian but you’re in the midst of some circumstances that seem so depressing—some circumstances that seem so overwhelming—God wants you to know that by His Son He would change your water to wine. Perhaps you need a change of attitude for the power of Christ to be released in your life.
There’s a story (it’s a true story) that we’ll close with. It’s the story of a woman named Mary Menifee during World War II. She accompanied her husband, a military officer, to a small military base on the edge of a California desert. Mary Menifee didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to go because she knew it wouldn’t be much fun. Her husband had told her that. But she went out of duty and accompanied her husband. She thought that it wasn’t going to be a very good time. She was wrong. It was an absolutely horrible time. She lived in a little shack there on the edge of the desert. The accommodations at the base were meager, to say the least, and it was so hot (115 degrees in the shade) day after day after day, with no change in the wind. The wind was everywhere, just blowing over the desert sand. The sand was constantly in her hair and in their food and over everything. The days were long and boring, and she had no neighbors except for some Indians on a nearby Indian reservation, and they didn’t know English.
As the time went by, somehow, she grew to begrudge her husband who had taken her there. She knew he couldn’t help it because he was in the military, but she still somehow was angry at him. As the days went by, it seemed as though the wine just went out of her marriage. She wrote her mother and she said, “Mom, I’ve had enough. I’m leaving my husband.” Her mother wrote her back, told her that she loved her, and said, “If you’d just be open to hear me for a little bit, I’d like to remind you of a couple of things. I’d like to remind you of the vow you made to your husband when first you were married. Even more importantly, I’d like to remind you of the vow you made to Jesus Christ when you were in junior high school at a camp when you asked Him to come into your life and be your Lord and Savior.” Mary Menifee thought about that. She prayed about that, and she committed her life to her marriage and to her Lord. Again, she resolved that she would stay, and she prayed about it. She said, “Lord, but I hate it here.” She said, “Change my water into wine. I’m so miserable. The joy of my life has run out.” And it was as though the Lord spoke to her and one verse of the Bible came alive for her. And that verse of the Bible is that verse that says, “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” And it was as though Jesus Christ was saying to her, “If you’ll obey that verse, if you’ll seek to the best of your ability to give thanks in all circumstances, I will change your water into wine.” So, she began to do that. She began to make friends of some of the Indians. She took classes from the Indians in weaving and pottery. She began to study their culture and their history, and she grew to love them. And she began to share Jesus Christ with them.
Then she began to study the desert, and a whole transformation took place. She had viewed the desert as a barren, desolate, and miserable place, but suddenly it became a vast expanse of beauty, beauty unique in this world. She began to study the Yucca Joshua trees. She found shells in the desert from a long, long time ago when the desert had been an ocean floor. Mary Menifee actually wrote a book about the wonders of the desert. You see, her life had been transformed from water to wine. And how did that happen? What changed? The desert didn’t change. Her husband didn’t change. The military didn’t change. Mary Menifee changed by the power of Christ who changes water to wine. But you see, she had a part to play. She had to resolve that she would indeed seek to give thanks in all circumstances. If you’re not a Christian, there’s only one source of life—abundant and eternal life—and that source is Jesus Christ. He invites you to receive Him today as Lord and Savior of your life. If you are a Christian, He would challenge you anew to an attitude that reflects His will: giving thanks in all circumstances. And if you do, He says, “I’ll change your water into wine.” Let’s close with a word of prayer.
Lord Jesus, You are indeed the source of life. You came into this world that we might have life and we might have it abundantly. You lived a sinless life and You died an atoning death that we might have life, and You rose from the dead in power and great glory that we might have life. Lord, sometimes in this world life seems hard. Our weeks have many joys, but also many challenges and sometimes much pain. Sometimes, Lord, we begin to despair, and it seems as though the wine is running out. We know, Lord Jesus, that You are the source of joy in life. Lord, if there’s anyone here in this place who has never had their water changed to wine, never passed from death to life… in the stillness of this moment, as we sit in the pews, Lord, I would ask that they would pray this prayer with me: “Lord Jesus, come into my heart. Be my Lord and Savior. Change my water to wine, my darkness to light. I want to live for You. Give me eternal life.” Lord, for the rest of us, we commit our lives to you anew this day. Lord, we pray that You would transform our minds, that truly we would seek to look for whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is good, whatever is lovely, and whatever is gracious. If there be anything excellent or anything worthy of praise, Lord, help us to think on these things in the midst of every circumstance of life. Lord, help us to give thanks and transform our water into wine. We love you, Lord. We would serve You faithfully. We pray these things in Your great name. Amen.