Epiphany 2, Year C | John 2:1-11
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
January 19, 2025
the Rev. Jonathan Hanneman
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“Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.” – John 2:11[1]
This week we continue our journey through Epiphany, the Church Season wherein we consider the light of the revelation of Jesus as God’s chosen heir. Two weeks ago we met the Maji, significant foreign figures who recognized God’s active work taking place in Judea while the entire local community completely overlooked it. Last week we watched as God entered into a relationship of Roman adoption, ordaining Jesus as the official family Son. This week we encounter the famous wedding where Jesus turned water into wine.
One of the most common modern questions regarding this text is whether or not we should take this miraculous transformation literally. Did the water physically become wine, or was that simply an image that communicated certain things that we, as a modern audience, simply don’t understand? We could argue this in circles.
John does tend to be the most “spiritualized” author in the New Testament, so a non-literal interpretation can make some sense. However, the text gives no indication that this was a metaphor or a kind of mass vision. I’ve read one source that claims this practice still occurs among less Westernized Middle Eastern communities. If a wedding celebration runs out of wine, a local holy man can declare that the available water has become wine. The person managing the drinks announces that this new “wine” is even better than the real stuff, and the party continues.
However, this too leads us in circles. Is our reading simply one example of a longstanding tradition in which Jesus was one of many ongoing participants, or do any current practices find their roots in this particular event? No matter which way you lean, it doesn’t really matter, because the text is clear that the steward had no idea who might have performed the blessing. Whether it’s literal or not, basic interpretation of the scene falls in line with our seasonal emphasis. Similarly to the visit of the Maji while Jesus was young, someone without first-hand knowledge or information recognizes a holy man or other significant figure is somewhere in their midst.
Honestly, though, this question is more of a distraction than anything truly helpful. If we want to understand what the author is trying to show us, we simply need to look at the very last line of the passage: “Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.”[2] Basically, Jesus did something out of the ordinary, and the people who had gathered to study under him took particular notice.
We talk about this every so often, but this morning it’s important to review what exactly the Bible means when it uses the word “believe.” In our modern context, the term means something along the lines of “to consider to be true or honest,” “to have a firm or wholehearted religious conviction or persuasion,” or “to hold an opinion.”[3]
For us, “belief” is mainly something that takes place inside our heads. That makes it highly subjective and nearly impossible to assess. There’s no standard by which we can recognize belief—or consider its validity. We simply have to trust (or “believe”) that whatever a person claims to believe is consistent with their own interpretation of reality. However, that was not the case when the Bible was first translated into English.
Roughly 750 years ago, the English priest John Wycliffe used two different words to interpret one concept from ancient Greek. For the noun form, he selected the word “faith.” For the verb form of the same word, he decided “believe” was the best equivalent. And in late Middle English, those were the correct choices. Unfortunately, neither of those words means the same thing now as it did in the 1300’s.
In an era of lords and serf and dukes and kings, the word “faith” basically meant “loyalty.” A serf would “have faith in” their lord by serving them well. A knight would “have faith in” their commanding officer by readily obeying orders. A duke or other significant figure would “have faith in” the king by fulfilling their duties to the royal house.
Likewise, “believing” in that era also referred to loyalty. To “be-lief” was to swear fealty, to verbally pledge oneself to remain faithful to another person. So a serf would “be-lief in” their lord and display that “be-liefing” through serving them well. A knight would “be-lief in” their commanding officer and prove the reality of that “be-liefing” by readily obeying orders. A duke or other significant figure would “be-lief in” the king and then attest to that “faith” by fulfilling their duties to the royal house.
So, again, Wycliffe did indeed choose the right terms for his era. Our problem is that we and our forebears decided to retain the same beloved words while completely abandoning their original meanings! The Bible never asks us to “believe God” with the intention that that belief only maintain its structure within our individual inner worlds. Nor do we see people like Martha or Peter or Stephen (or Mary!) having “faith in Jesus” simply by assenting to the correct ideas about him. When the disciples saw what Jesus had done at the wedding in Cana, they didn’t just think, “Ah, this guy must be God!” and tick a checkbox on their religious to-do list. They swore loyalty to him! They pledged themselves to him. In a very literal sense, they committed or entrusted their lives to him.
To look at this wedding incident through the lens of a Roman family that we discussed last week, the disciples declared themselves as practicing Sons to a family Father. They committed themselves to becoming the most perfect reflections of Jesus that they could possibly be so that they might one day find themselves worthy of inheriting his (and his “Father’s”) legacy. They studied to think like him, heal like him, and serve like him. They examined his movements and interactions and words not simply to know about him but to become him.
We as Christians actually commit ourselves to this every week, whether or not any of us recognizes the action. It’s why we recite the Nicene Creed.[4] Simply looking to the Creed as assenting to what we think is correct completely misses the point. We are “be-liefing” ourselves to “one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.” We “be-lief in” “one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God.” We pledge ourselves to—“be-lief in”—the Holy Spirit and the “one holy catholic and apostolic Church.” We aren’t saying “this is simply what I think.” We’re committing ourselves to follow, obey, and embody these things!
The true purpose of Christianity has never been simply to have our sins forgiven or to someday go to heaven or to receive any other type of metaphysical reward. Our purpose, the only thing that truly gives our lives lasting meaning, is to embody, here and now, the Jesus that we read about in the New Testament.
Epiphany is the season of revelation—of God displaying to the world the reality of God’s own character through the example of the capital-S Son, Jesus of Nazareth. We see recollections of that reality at Jesus’ birth, at the coming of the Maji, at his baptism, and today at a village wedding. None of us should be satisfied with simply “believing” some stories from 2,000 years ago. “Faith in Jesus” in its proper sense demands that we step beyond thoughts in our heads and move into the world through our hands and feet and voices. We need to engage life with a loyalty that allows others to look at us and recognize the character and purpose of the one we claim to embody!
Now maybe you hear all this and think it doesn’t really look a lot like your own life. There’s a simple solution to that: change. Pay attention to where you serve yourself and your own interests, imagine ways you might change that focus in support of others, and then go out and actually do those things. Following Jesus is simple, but it isn’t always easy, especially in a world that demands we keep ourselves at the front of the crowd. We can all expect to head the wrong way from time to time as we move forward. We should know that we will make mistakes—sometimes horrific ones with severe and lasting consequences. But that’s the thing with “faith,” especially in God’s eyes.
Faithfulness to God shines most clearly when we recognize our errors and make the choice to turn from our destructive paths. Our “belief”—our commitment to loyalty—only becomes real as we begin walking in the footsteps of Jesus, when we manifest our Savior to the world as living, breathing embodiments of his teachings, commitments, and actions. We discover the transformative power of the New Creation not simply by agreeing with the right doctrines and dogmas but in pledging ourselves to God and then working to reveal the realities of God’s glorious Kingdom, not just in a far off someday or after death but right here and right now.
“Jesus did this, the first of his signs that displayed his renown, at Cana in Galilee. And his disciples pledged themselves to him.”[5]
[1] All Bible quotations are from the NRSV unless otherwise noted.
[2] John 2:11
[3] All definitions from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/believe, as accessed on January 17, 2025
[4] 1979 Book of Common Prayer, pg. 358-9
[5] John 2:11 | My translation