John 2 - Part A

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That's connectwithskip.com. Now let's get started with today's message from Pastor Skip Heitzig. My name is Skip Heitzig. I'm the author of Narnia, and the first book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. So when the kids get to Narnia, they discover there's snow on the ground. It's always winter, but never Christmas. That's what the Lion says.

It's always winter, but never Christmas. Because this character called the White Witch has put a curse on the land of Narnia. And that curse remains on the land.

It is a joyless land until Aslan comes. That great lion, that Christ-like figure comes. And when he comes back, when he comes on the scene, the melting begins.

The joy begins to spring forth. In John chapter 2, we come to the first miracle that Jesus performed. The first miracle that Jesus performed. The wedding at the Feast of Cana.

The turning water into wine. And it's interesting that that's the first miracle of Jesus at a wedding. Seemingly for no other reason except it's going to cause his disciples to believe in him in a greater fashion. That really is the heart of it. But as far as a miracle that would have a big lasting impact, this wasn't the one. But he brought joy to a group of people at a wedding, giving them a lavish gift.

We're going to explore that. You know, you might think that the first miracle that Jesus would perform would be some dazzling, miraculous, cosmological feature that everybody in Jerusalem say at the Passover or at the Feast of Tabernacles where you'd have hundreds of thousands of people gathered. And maybe he would just write something in the sky. I'm the Messiah.

I'm here. But the first miracle that Jesus performs is a private miracle. Not even a public miracle.

It's at a private wedding feast at Cana. Now in the Gospels, we have a total of 37 miracles. If you count all of them in the Gospels, we have a total of 37 miracles that Jesus performed. John gives us only eight of them. And eight significant ones. And each one is in its own category. It's different from the others.

They're all different signs. He gives us eight. Now he did many more than that, of course.

There were times he did more than eight in a day. But what John says toward the end of his book is truly many other signs Jesus did in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written. That you may believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that by believing, you might have life in his name. So John is selective and John is the one that gives us this very unique picture at the first miracle of Jesus in Cana of Galilee. It says in verse one, on the third day.

Now I always think that words are there for a reason and you ought to find out what they mean. On what third day? The third day of what? Third day of the week?

No. It probably refers to the story right before it when Jesus in the first day of his ministry selected his disciples. And so right now there aren't twelve disciples with him. There are five disciples with him.

There's Andrew and Peter and Philip and Nathaniel and John the author. Those five disciples are present with Jesus on the third day after that first interview down by the Jordan River. Or you might say the third day of Jesus' public ministry. So on the third day he has made it back up to the Galilee from that southern area down by the Jordan River. He's up close to his hometown. His hometown is, he was raised in Nazareth. Cana of Galilee is about nine miles to the north, northeast of where he grew up in the city of Nazareth. People I'm sure knew of Jesus in Cana. We know that Nathaniel, one of Jesus' disciples, was from Cana of Galilee. If you were with us on the tour to Israel, we went right through Cana on that bus ride from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee as you go over that first hill and go down into that valley.

Do you remember that? You're going, no, I mean that's all I did is go up hills and down valleys on so many different days. But it's in my mind's eye still we drove right through it on the way to the Sea of Galilee. Now it's funny, whenever you deal with miracles, you always run into people who have a very difficult time with them. And not just people that you come in contact with, I'm talking about Bible commentators. People who write Bible commentaries, commentators, and there are some taters that are more common than others.

But some commentators have a real problem with the miraculous works of Jesus. And one of them is one of my favorite commentators for a specific reason, that is William Barclay. If you're going out buying commentaries for your library and you come across a commentary by William Barclay, it's worth the money, but I'll give you a warning. William Barclay will give you all great history and language and context and geography. He'll plumb those depths, but when it comes to the miraculous stuff, you might as well just don't even read it.

Or just rip out that page, because it's absolutely worthless. Because as much as I loved William Barclay's research, Barclay had a tough time with the miracles of Christ, had a tough time with the deity of Christ, had a tough time with Christ. And honestly, anybody who has a hard time with Jesus, I have a hard time with him.

He had a hard time believing Jesus was God, he had a hard time believing that the laws of nature could be superseded or suspended, even by God himself. So when it comes to the miracles, it's humorous to see how Barclay treats them. For example, the feeding of the 5,000, Barclay says, it really wasn't a miracle, everybody actually brought their own lunch.

But they were selfish, they hid it. But then when Jesus got that little kid, you know, to cough up his lunch, everybody started going, well, you know, I feel convicted now. So they started bringing out their food and sharing it with those who didn't bring it and everybody was fed.

That's how he treats it. Or another explanation, Barclay says, is perhaps disciples stored mass amounts of food in advance, like in some cave in Galilee. And then Jesus was on the mountain and he was there knowing where that food was and he just sort of backed up as he was speaking toward the mouth of the cave and just, you know, brought those loaves under his arm and the fish. And it appeared to me miraculous, but the disciples knew better. One of my favorites is Jesus walking on the water. Says Barclay, he didn't really walk on the water, that's impossible. What happened is our Lord was walking by the shore of the Sea of Galilee in ankle deep water. But you know, when there's a storm out and you're on a boat and the moon is reflecting off the water, you don't really know what you're seeing. You're just freaked out.

So they thought it looked like somebody was walking on the water when they were really just walking on the beach. And I'm telling you, I read some of Barclay's stuff and I think it takes more faith to believe Barclay's writings than just the simple narrative of the gospel. Talk about somebody who stretches it. So I've looked at it this way. Once you can get past the first verse of the Bible, the rest is all downhill from there. The rest is easy. If you can believe Genesis 1-1, everything else is a snap.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Deal with that miracle. And if you can buy into that miracle, then it's duck soup after that.

Walking on the water, turning water into wine, not a big deal. When it comes to the miracles, it's also to me interesting how we have a tendency to talk about them. We, I'm talking about just people in general, Christians in general. It seems either we over-naturalize them or we minimize them.

On one hand, we naturalize them, we over-naturalize them. We say things like, oh, when a baby's born, that's a miracle. Well, no it's not. It happens every day. It's been happening for a long time. There's nothing out of the ordinary about that. It's not like, oh, I can't believe it happened.

Okay, you've got bigger problems. It's not a miracle. It's not the intervention into natural law.

That's natural law. Or a sunrise and a sunset, oh, those are miracles. Well, sure, you can't do that, but that happens every day once again.

Rotation of the earth and the planets around the sun. Or, you know, it's a miracle I found a parking space at Uptown. Well, that may be a miracle, actually.

So some people just naturalize them. Other people try to minimize them, and that's William Berkeley. Just try to say that these things didn't happen and there are alternate explanations for it, and he explains it away. You're listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig. Before we get back to Skip's teaching, God desires to work in and through your life as a believer, and he does this through the Holy Spirit who lives in everyone who places their trust in Jesus. We want to help you better understand the Holy Spirit by sending you The Holy Spirit Then and Now, a resource featuring two books by Chuck Smith. The book of Acts' commentary, Empower, a Biblical Balance on the Person and Work of the Holy Spirit, with an introduction by Skip Heitzig. This resource is our thanks for your gift of at least $50 today to help share biblical teaching with more people around the world through Connect with Skip Heitzig.

Go to connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888 and request your copy when you give at least $50 today to reach people around the world through Connect with Skip Heitzig. Let's continue with today's teaching with Pastor Skip. Is it really hard for God to turn water into wine? I mean, in 1950s, we built a nuclear submarine.

In 1969, we went to the moon. If man has the capability to put a person on the moon back in the 60s and bring that person back alive, is it really hard for you to give admission that God who created the heavens and the earth can turn water into wine? He can do that in his sleep.

And of course, he doesn't sleep, so you've got nothing to worry about. This is a private miracle. On the third day, there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee and the mother of Jesus was there. Now both Jesus and his disciples were invited to the wedding.

And when they ran out of wine, the mother of Jesus said to him, they have no wine. There were two miracles at my wedding. The first was that my wife, Lenya, said yes. That was the first miracle.

And the second miracle is that I showed up. I was so scared. I was scared of commitment. Because I knew this was permanent, this was forever, and I remembered even having thoughts, parking the car and walking toward the venue where the wedding was taking place. I was shaking. I was so nervous.

But God got me through that one. Now this wedding in Galilee probably took place on a Wednesday. How do I know that? I know that because that was the typical day the Jews had weddings 2,000 years ago.

It was pretty easy. We know one thing, they didn't have their wedding on Saturday like we do. Because Saturday was Shabbat, it was Sabbath day, it was a holy day.

Nothing happens on the Sabbath day. So weddings, especially weddings for young virgins, happened on Wednesdays. And a wedding was a big deal back then. It was probably the best week of the couple's life. It was lavish. It was that one opportunity to celebrate like no other week.

And it lasted about a week, about a total of seven days. The bride was made ready. A party came to her house, escorted her to the groom's house. The groom back in those days, the groom was the one who footed the bill and the groom's family footed the bill, not the bride's family. That has now been traditional in our culture. So he's responsible for all the fixings, all the meal, all the expense. And then typically after the wedding ceremony, a parade to take the couple to their residence goes on where the wedding party takes the most circuitous route through the little village or city, wherever they are, to get as much exposure, street exposure, to the crowds to give them well wishes and prayers and make a celebration and loud noises and singing, as much of that as possible.

So it was a great, great celebration. Now the fact that it mentions the mother of Jesus and Jesus and his disciples, now five disciples, would indicate that this was a close friend of Jesus and his family or a relative perhaps who lived in nearby Cana. But you'll notice in verse one there's no mention of Joseph, just the mother of Jesus. Mary was there. Joseph is not mentioned, probably, we don't know for sure, but probably Joseph had died by this time. Now we know in three years when Jesus is on the cross, Mary is placed into the care of John the Apostle by Jesus because Joseph isn't around to take care of her. So most scholars assume that probably by this time already, Joseph has passed away.

Jesus is there, she would be dependent upon Jesus, the eldest son, the responsibility to take care of her. But it says in verse three, when they ran out of wine, isn't it funny, no matter how much you plan for a wedding, something goes wrong. Did anything go wrong at your wedding? Can you remember that far back? Do you choose to remember your wedding?

I'm looking at blank faces, some of you. Are all of you unmarried? Now my wedding was terrific, but I do remember there was a problem. I picked up my tuxedo, didn't even think about trying it on. I assumed, that's what you pay the guy for, right? He measures you, you run a tuxedo, you go and it's going to fit perfect.

Not a good plan. When I got to where the wedding was and I'm changing into my clothes, I put on the shoes they gave me, it's two sizes too small. My toes literally were curled up like claws and I had to go through my wedding and it's like I'm at the altar and I'm crying. They're going, oh it's so precious, no, no, I'm in pain.

I could have used a miracle at that time. But something seems to go wrong and I've had the privilege, I love doing weddings. It's a highlight for me because I get the best seat in the house, I get to see the emotions that the bride and the groom, the looks in the eye, the nervousness, the shake, the sweats.

I get to see it all. But there's a couple of weddings that stick out to me. One was when a bridesmaid fainted right here, right on that last step on this platform.

She fell and I'm thankful we have carpeted and padded steps at the time and she hit her head on the steps, she was okay, but it made a thump. I thought we'll never forget this wedding. Another time I did a wedding and the groom fainted twice in the wedding. He fainted, we picked him up, we got him standing up and then he just went out again and we finally had to sit the groom in a chair seated next to his wife standing tall next to him.

That was fun. The first wedding I ever performed, don't worry I won't keep going with this, but let me just say the first wedding I ever performed, I call it the sweaty wedding. It was the first wedding I ever did and the reason I call it the sweaty, it was in the winter time and the couple had this great idea of having us all stand in front of a blazing fire in the house. So if you can picture a fireplace and then standing just in front of that are the bride and the groom and then me.

So I'm a few feet away but they're right next to this blazing fire. So as the wedding going on, the poor bride and the groom, and they were an older couple, were just pouring down sweat. It was hilarious, again. A lot of fun. One more.

I promise. It was the silent wedding. It was the wedding that was planned at a beautiful stone church, an old church, classy architecture, it was gorgeous, everything was staged and planned and perfect, except the musicians got the date wrong. And there was no music at all. It was dead air for this wedding. The only thing we managed to do is I think I started leading in a chorus of some kind.

Some lame way to get something going just to break up the curse of dead air. That was very interesting. That was not a fun wedding.

That was tough to get through. Okay, so this is the best wedding because Jesus is at the wedding and let me just tell you, if you're planning a wedding, make sure you invite Jesus. Make sure he's the center of the wedding.

Make sure he's the center of your relationship. It's a good wedding if Jesus is at your wedding. They ran out of wine. The mother of Jesus said to him, they have no wine.

Wine was a symbol of joy. This was a huge faux pas. This was a huge social embarrassment. For a groom, let me just tell you, for a groom to not have wine at the wedding would be a stigma that that family would live with the rest of their lives. That's how serious this was. It's like he can't even provide wine at his own wedding.

How's he going to provide for this girl? That was the stigma he would have to live with. In fact, in some cases, this would have been grounds for a lawsuit in that culture. During that time, the family of the bride could actually bring charges in a court of law for not providing wine at her wedding. Now, wine was a symbol of joy.

Back to the Chronicles of Narnia story. A symbol of joy. Psalm 104 speaks about God's provision to us as humans. It says, he gives the wine that gladdens the heart of men. So it is always a symbol of joy. To not have wine at the wedding is like not having joy present, the symbol of joy present at the wedding. So Mary's there. The mother of Jesus says, they have no wine. Now, I don't know for sure, but probably Mary walked up to him with kind of like, winking.

Like that little grin going, hey, they have no wine. As if perhaps a suggestion to Jesus that he ought to present himself at that time. This is now where you present yourself as the Messiah, the Deliverer. Now, why would Mary be anxious to do that?

Think about it. Mary knows more than she's saying. Mary knows who this is. Think of what's in Mary's memory banks. An angel appeared to her and says, Mary, you're pregnant.

How can that be? I've never even been close to a man. I know, Mary, you're a virgin. But that's even prophesied, you're going to give birth as a virgin to a son.

You're going to bear a son. Because she was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Then, when she went to visit her cousin Elizabeth and the babe in Elizabeth's womb, John the Baptist, jumped when Mary entered the room.

Because of that babe inside of her. She would have remembered the shepherds coming to visit when Jesus was born saying, we saw angels tell us to come visit you. Or when the Magi came and presented gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Or when Jesus was presented at the temple and Simeon said, now I can die in peace, Lord, as he held up Jesus in front of Joseph and Mary.

I can die in peace, Lord, for my eyes have seen your salvation, this baby. Thanks for listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig. We hope you've been strengthened in your walk with Jesus by today's program. Before we let you go, we want to remind you about this month's resource that will help you understand the person and work of the Holy Spirit.

Our two book bundle, The Holy Spirit Then and Now, with two books by Chuck Smith, is our thanks for your support of Connect with Skip Heitzig today. Request your copy when you give $50 or more. Call 800-922-1888.

That's 800-922-1888. Or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. And did you know that you can find full message series and libraries of content from Skip Heitzig on YouTube? Simply visit the Connect with Skip Heitzig channel on YouTube and be sure to subscribe to the channel so you never miss any new content. Come back next time for more verse-by-verse teaching of God's word here on Connect with Skip Heitzig. Make a connection, make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast your burdens on His word. Make a connection, connection. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.