I imagine that we’ve all looked at pictures, similar to the one on the screen and seen one image or the other. Perhaps you’ve even struggled to ‘see’ the other one and you can only see the image one way. What do you see? Profiles of two people? A table. A vase. Or a wine goblet?
The reflection title is a quote from Wayne Dyer, the author of many self-help and self-actualization books. Whether or not you’re a fan of his or not, and I can’t say that I have read any of his books, the quote resonated with me.
As you know, this week starts a six-week series on what I’m calling The Abundance of Jesus. The person who designed the liturgy called the series the Economy of Jesus, which is relevant and meaningful if you know the etymology of the word. Which mostly only Bible geeks know… 😉
The word economy in English is derived from the Middle French’s yconomie, which itself derived from the Medieval Latin’s oeconomia. The Latin word has its origin at the Ancient Greek’s oikonomia or oikonomos. The word’s first part oikos means “house”, and the second part nemein means “to manage”.
So, originally economy meant to manage the household resources. Some of us can remember taking ‘Home Economics’ in high school… yes, I’m that many years old. It still means the management of resources, but often on a macro, or large scale… and usually everything is sacrificed to the ‘economy.’
So, knowing that a series called Filled With Abundance would resonate more than The Economy of Jesus, I took the liberty of changing the series title. One of the things we are going to be looking at over the time of this series is how Jesus’ idea of economy, which is really how resources should and could be distributed. And that abundance is possible, not only possible, but already present!
In the gospel reading this morning, John tells of Jesus’ first miracles, changing the water at a wedding feast into wine. As you listen to the reading, ask yourself, what is this passage really about? Is it the miracle, the wine, Jesus’ interaction with his mother? Or something else?
Let’s listen, as the story unfolds in John 2: 1-11:
2:1 On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. 2:2 Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 2:3 When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”
2:4 And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.”
2:5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”
2:6 Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. 2:7 Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. 2:8 He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it.
2:9 When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom 2:10 and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” 2:11 Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.
What I was struck with in this passage is the idea of scarcity and abundance. Mary’s words, ‘They have no wine,’ could just as easily been us, seeing what we don’t have. Churches are really good at looking at what they don’t have and we are no exception. What are some of the things we say around here that we don’t have enough of? I was invited to contribute two reflections to a Lenten Devotional Book a few years ago; I entitled it: Do You See What I See? And this is what I wrote:
Appreciative Inquiry and Asset Mapping are two practices that are being used more and more often in church circles. Simply put, they are ways of viewing our lives and our communities through a lens of plenty, which focuses on what we have rather than what we lack. In other words, looking around and seeing the abundance rather than the scarcity. You might remember this kind of question from the Listening Circles that were held at the beginning of my time here, when I asked, “What are the signs that St. James is a healthy church?” I have often found it easier to identify what is lacking in my life rather than what I have in abundance. When I fixate on what I don’t have I become anxious, fearful and despairing; these things crowd out gratitude, trust and a sense that whatever I need, God has already provided for me.
My experience with faith communities has been the same, when we become focused on survival, we fail to see the abundance that is present. My gifts seem so meagre at times. But with prayer and blessing, Jesus enables me to share what I have, and trust that they will be multiplied with God’s help. (There’s No ATM in the Desert – UCPH, 2010)
We so often look at things through the lens of scarcity and fear instead of abundance and freedom.
As Debie Thomas writes, on her website, Journey With Jesus, “The wedding in Cana story is not — finally — a story about scarcity. It’s a story about abundance. Lavish, excessive, extravagant abundance.”
I asked my Facebook friends to tell me about their images of scarcity and abundance.
Some of them were typical of what you might think:
- An empty cupboard / pantry shelves in the basement groaning under the weight of canned goods and toilet paper.
- Line ups at restaurants, line ups at food banks.
- The hundreds of people who moved into tents in the park around Allan Gardens in Toronto during the three years I lived across the street. Abundance: the Indigenous folks who set up a Sacred Fire Circle in the midst of the encampment, living there themselves in shifts, offering food, shelter, and spiritual practice.
- Large houses and tent cities
- Scarcity: The government of a wealthy country cutting foreign aid spending because “times are tough and we need to make sure that we can look after our own people.”
- Abundance: Someone who is barely getting by, yet dropping off food in a community food pantry because “I have enough to eat, at least, and there are people out there who don’t.”
- One of them, Rev. Katie Flynn, said something that really resonated with me: Scarcity: so many churches are closing, is this the end of the church? It’s going to get worse. Abundance says: it will be fine! God is with us and doing new things! Both are true. The glass of water can be half full and half empty. Scarcity to the extreme, has no hope. Abundance to the extreme is unable to see the full truth of a situation and the issues that arise.
What are our places of perceived scarcity? What are our places of plenty that we simply need a change in perspective to think about them differently. And this place has so much abundance! Can you see it? Feel it? Celebrate it?
The gospel reading is a wedding celebration! In those times, weddings went on for days, sometimes even weeks. It was a time not only of celebrating a wedding, but of cementing ties of kinship… This account of Jesus’ first miracle operates on two levels…
On the level of a story… we could have questions about whose wedding it was… we could sympathize with the host… there could be some amusement thinking about Jesus obeying his mother when she brings to his attention that the wine has run out… and none of these aspects is unimportant. But on another level we might have some insight into the nature of Jesus and thereby into the nature of God.
Wine poured out in abundance… just as Jesus life was poured out for us… in his living and in his dying… Water transformed from ordinary to something more than it was…
Just as we are transformed into more than what we were by being touched by Jesus…
We in turn can be instruments of transformation for others. By what we do, who we are, how we interact with one another. God’s love is extravagant… poured out like overflowing wine for us.
What are some of the resources that you and we have at our disposal to heal part of God’s world. God does not call us to share what we don’t have… God calls us to share what we do have. These stories from scripture can remain just stories written thousands of years ago… Or they can be as alive as you and me… The wine of transformation…
So let us go forth from this place… Sharing God’s extravagant gifts with each other, our church and our world. Jesus’ mother, out of concern for her host, came to Jesus with a problem, and Jesus offered a solution.
Maybe we can be like Mary. Maybe we can notice, name, persist, and trust. No matter how profound the scarcity, no matter how impossible the situation, we can elbow our way in, pull Jesus aside, ask earnestly for help, and ready ourselves for action. (Journey With Jesus)
Thanks be to God for the challenge and the opportunity in seeing abundance! Amen.
© Catherine MacDonald
John 2: 2-11
January 19, 2025 – SJUC
Six Stone Jars
St. James United Church Dartmouth 