Based on John 2: 1-11 and 1 Corinthians 12: 1-11

Drysdale Uniting Church – 20 January 2014

Prepared by Wayne Myers ©

Our talents reflecting God’s love

The theme set for the Linked Congregations today is about “our talents reflecting God’s love.”

As we talked about the readings during our planning we considered it important to recognise the talents of Jesus.

The wedding at Cana resulted in Jesus performing his first miracle; or perhaps that should be God performing his first miracle through Jesus. In the Gospel of John we read of the seven miracles that Jesus performed finishing with the eighth miracle performed by God in the resurrection. Perhaps you might go home and read the Gospel and look for these miracles.

John uses the word “sign” rather “miracle” as a way of reinforcing that they demonstrate faith and therefore glorify God. Whatever it is, it is mystery but it is also an opportunity to express faith.

Jesus did not set out to turn the water into wine. Up until now he had not performed any miracles; that we are aware of. He didn’t know that he had such a talent to do so. He didn’t feel confident initially when his mother asked him to do something but then he obviously felt God at work in him.

Can you turn water into wine? Of course you can but not as fast as Jesus did. You can plant grape vines, keep watering them and with help from the sun produce some grapes that can be turned into wine – water into wine!

Why did Mary ask him to help? We don’t know why Mary and Jesus went to the wedding. Cana was a town reasonably close to Nazareth so perhaps they were relatives. Weddings went for a number of days and were a very important occasion that needed to follow particular traditions. Do we still have traditions associated with weddings today? I guess I’ll find out about some in the coming months. For the wine to run out it would be a terrible embarrassment for the host. I would be embarrassed if there was insufficient food or drink for Ashley’s wedding – and I am only the groom’s father when it is traditional the bride’s parents who are the hosts.

Mary must have been close to the host to become concerned for him. She knew that Jesus was special, and all mothers know that their children are special, but Mary knew that Jesus had a special purpose in life. But how did she know that this day was the time. Perhaps she was being the typical mother pushing her son along – as a 30 year old he was getting a bit past it so it was certainly about time he performed at whatever he had to do.

Don’t you really wish that you knew more about what happened to Jesus between the temple story and this one?

Jesus’ involvement in turning the water to wine is very much at arm’s length – he doesn’t touch the water, he doesn’t pray over the water, he doesn’t call on God for help – he just tells the servants what to do, because Mary told him to, and they take notice, because Mary told them to do so. I read an interesting article in preparing for today that looked at this from the servant’s perspective. They had emptied the stone water jars for the ritual washing before the guests started to eat. The jars were very large – 20-30 gallons or about 100 litres in our measurements today – and now they have to go and fill them all again. 600 litres of water to be drawn from the well by a bucket and carried to the jar would have taken a long time – no hoses to help. They would certainly have not been happy, and Jesus was not their master, he was just one of the guests who didn’t have a big reputation at this stage.

But when the miracle has happened it is the servants who know and perhaps not the rest of the guests. The servants are not in a position to make a big deal of it there but they certainly would have started the spread of the miracle.

Would they have said that Jesus performed a miracle or that Jesus had special talents that enabled him to do this?

If I had produced wine this morning in the children’s talk what would you have said? You wouldn’t have believed it – I wouldn’t have believed it! I might have some talents but producing wine is not one of them.

What talents or gifts do you have? I’ll ask you that question again later. What gifts did Jesus have?

In the Psalm God’s attributes are listed as including steadfast love, faithfulness, righteousness, judgement, refuge, abundance, delight and salvation.

What do you think applies to Jesus? (Get ideas)

In the Corinthians reading Paul is talking to the people of Corinth who have been giving him a bit of trouble. There appears to be split camps within Corinth and Paul is trying to draw them together – to take notice of him for the benefit of being people of Jesus. He says the gifts that we have are spirit –given that each person have a specific set of gifts.

Can we change our gifts or add to them? If you do not have leadership skills at 20 can you learn them? If you can’t cook as a young person can you pick it up later and use it for the benefit of God? The answer is of course –we have all been given the ability to learn. In putting the power point together I found a saying that fits here – Graeme please bring it up – “your talent is God’s gift to you; what you do with it is your gift back to God.” In other words we have to decide how to use our talents.

Frequently we hear people talk about someone’s hidden talents; a talent that others see the person has but they are not yet using it.

At Christmas or birthdays we give gifts to others. We might take special care in selecting the gift and then in wrapping it, finding the right box or paper, and feeling really pleased with ourselves. Children will immediately open it without much care for the wrapping, but an older person may get as much pleasure out of the care placed in the wrapping as the gift itself. If they didn’t open the wrapping then the gift is not seen and doesn’t have any value although the action of giving has been appreciated.

If we have gifts we should use them to show our love that God has provided them. Within the church you can use a gift with flowers to be on the flower roster and create wonderful flower arrangements; you can use a gift with children to lead KFC, or be involved with mainly music, or Friday School; you can use a gift of physical skills to look after the church property be it painting or carpentry or weeding or cleaning; and if you have a gift with prayer you can be part of the prayer chains. If you don’t think you have special gifts perhaps you can use your gift of talking to provide a word of encouragement to someone for their part in a service or their concern for another person and so forth.

We say that God has the gift of love and that he portrayed that love by giving his son, his only son, to die on our behalf. That is certainly an ultimate act to prove your gift. Many people over time and thought they were showing their love by giving up their children for sacrifice but was that love or blind faith not real faith?

Jesus created a ministry to change the ways of people from the Jewish practices of that time. He created a way that showed greater love through a commandment that we love one another, that we love our neighbour, that we go out of our way to do things to help others, and that we witness to others about Jesus.

Disasters always bring us stories about people who make that special effort to assist. Last week we heard about the Guides from Portarlington who were rescued from Port Arthur by boat during the bushfires and who then jumped in and cooked sausages to feed people. The Guides knew they had the ability, the gifts, the talent, to cook sausages and they saw a need and were prepared to do it because it would help. Were they Christians or led by God? It would be nice to think that God was in the background encouraging them. And their act of support was recognised by the community in Tasmania, by the Guiding movement generally, and by their local community back home.

This week’s readings invite us to trust in God, revealed through Jesus, knowing that he provides abundantly for our needs. Think about how you might celebrate this abundance in the coming week.

Turning the water into wine as his first public miracle gave Jesus the start of a reputation. We know how the word spread after each miracle and people came from far and wide to see him and to get him to help them or a friend. But it was also as a sign that Jesus was out to glorify God through these actions – to show that he loved his Father. That needs to be our justification for our special actions – to glorify God and to say that we love him.

In today’s Sunday Age “Faith” article the writer mentions that this year marks the 50th anniversary of the Martin Luther King “I have a dream” speech. The writer said that as written in Hebrews, Paul was confident that “faith is the substance of things hoped for” but faith and dreams should not be confused. Trusting in what we can’t see is the essence of faith; we can catch a glimpse of God in our daily life through the generosity of others – we then know we are not dreaming.

We have the talents but it is up to us to use them appropriately.