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Jesus Is Lord (Epiphany 2, Year C)

Treasure in Earthern Vessels | Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P./Flickr

Jan. 19 | Epiphany 2, Year C

Isaiah 62:1-5
Psalm 36:5-10
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11

The wedding at Cana, as an episode in Jesus’ ministry, honors marriage, but it also has a greater meaning for God’s people.

The stone jars were those to provide water for ritual cleansing, which turns our thoughts to pre-Christian Jewish practices. We begin with a ritual — an outward and symbolic action. As our attention is brought to God, the reality behind the ritual is revealed. Jesus had these jars filled, and then he changed the water into fine wine. This is a miracle of transformation. The time of fulfillment had come, and a new age was beginning. There are overtones of the great heavenly banquet, but the direct message is that the external and symbolic was being transformed into the internal and essential; both the symbols and the promises were being fulfilled.

Human beings, like water, are part of the material creation. As a result, we relate to one another and our environment in material ways. We live in a world where “a picture is worth a thousand words.” The truth of gravity in our lives is not founded on the idea that there must be something that causes us to walk on the ground, but that when we let go of an object, it falls to the ground. Throughout history, whenever people sought proof of the truth, they would look for portents in the sky, signs among the people around them, or even arrangements of animal entrails. Even the people of God and the leaders of Israel demanded signs and miracles from Jesus to verify his claim to be a man of God and his words as the truth. The problem, however, was not their need for material signs, but the attitude of unbelief with which they demanded those signs. Throughout Scripture, God provided people with signs of his truth, but they refused to believe. What St. Paul tells us is that we need a transformation.

It is natural, then, that our encounters with the spiritual world would be verified in our minds and proven to the world around us by a material manifestation. Thus, the door is opened wide for any variety of “unnatural” phenomena by those having a spiritual experience. The key to interpreting the validity of such manifestations is not their form or intensity but their message. Do they glorify God in Jesus Christ, or do they artificially and falsely raise the performer to an elite status? At the primary level of understanding, Jesus is the true message — the material manifestations are just signs. Secondarily, the manifestations of the Spirit will unify the community in his call to make Jesus known in the world and not cause separation or elitism within the community.

In times of relative peace with the prevailing culture, it is harder to see how the Spirit works in the community to influence the world. It is like discerning a cream-colored string against a white background. But in times of persecution, when the backdrop becomes dark, the revealing work of the Holy Spirit becomes more obvious. To say “Jesus is Lord” when standing before the throne of a converted Constantine does not appear to be as strong a sign as making the same statement before Nero. That takes an essential and inner transformation, one that is beyond our power. The unified life of the Church, empowered by the Holy Spirit to live a life that contrasts radically with the rest of the culture, is the sign or manifestation of the God-inspired transformation that St. Paul wrote about. The gifts manifested in the Church are those needed to edify the Church as a community dependent on God, and to empower the Church to live in a Christlike manner. That life is “unnatural” and, as a result, a sign to the world of the reality of God’s truth — Jesus is Lord.

Look It Up: Isaiah 62:2

Think About It: How would Jesus being Lord of my life manifest itself?

The Rev. Dr. Chuck Alley, former rector of St. Matthew’s Church in Richmond, Virginia, teaches anatomy at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical School.

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