Jesus and Geography

Robert Pattinson

The Pentagon

Obama

Alaska

Japan

Oval office

Battle Creek Central

Capitol Hill

What do all these have in common?

They give is a concrete picture, an image we can see in our mind.

Names like praetorium Golgotha and Antipas were loaded with meaning in Jesus time.

Who was the king who committed to try to kill baby Jesus?

Herod the Great

Herod Antipas was his son. He came to power when Herod died.

That's when the Angel told Joseph that it was safe to return to Jerusalem with Jesus.

They settled in the town of Nazareth in Galilee.

That is about the time Herod Antipas began his rebuilding and expansion project for the city of Sepphoris...

Sepphoris has been revealed as a cosmopolitan city of great wealth and beauty, the largest and most important city in all Galilee (according to roman historians). Even after Herod built Tiberias and moved his capital and residence there, Sepphoris continued to be a prominent and influential city.

Sepphoris was "perched like a bird" on a four hundred-foot hill. The city commanded a panoramic view of Lower Galilee, including the towns of Cana, and Nazareth, four miles to the south. The Jewish historian Josephus called it "the ornament of Galilee."

Sepphoris boasted a 4,000-seat amphitheater, built into the eastern side of the hill. Its stage was 156 feet wide and 27 feet from front to back. Herod’s rebuilt city included his palace, an upper city and a lower city, a new city walls, an extra large market place, a colonnaded street, and a residential area. Several large cisterns (like water towers of today), one holding a thousand gallons, supplied running water for the city. It was a fancy sophisticated and rich place.

During Jesus’ early years, Herod Antipas was restoring, developing and fortifying Sepphoris. It served as his principle residence and the administrative center of Galilee, until he built Tiberias in A.D. 18-20.

Why are we talking about Sepphoris?

Well it was less than 4 miles from a tiny village named Nazareth.

Jesus father, Joseph, was identified by the word tekton.

This word was used to identify, a carpenter, a builder, or any craftsman.

This would mean that they were construction craftsmen, skilled in wood and or stone work. Since it was the practice of a father to teach his son his trade or skill, and since we don't see Jesus studying under a rabbi (remember he got his authority at his baptism) Joseph probably trained Jesus for this vocation.

Nazareth was a very small village, presumably lacking in the kind of construction projects that would provide sufficient work for skilled builders. With extensive building in progress less than an hour’s walk away, it is likely that Joseph and Jesus would have been employed in Sepphoris.

There is evidence to lend credibility to this theory because Jesus was well acquainted with much of the predominantly Greek and Roman culture.

When He used the word "hypocrite" for instance:

The word Hypocrite means actor or pretender, literally "one acting under a mask," . It is a Greek word, not Jesus native Aramaic, and would be primarily used to speak about the actors in a Greek style theatre. Such as the one built at Sepphoris around when Jesus would have been a teenager.

So Herod the king who's father had committed genocide, and who maintained his power with the roman military muscle ran the kingdom from his fancy city on a hill.

Imagine what it would feel like to look up at the spectacle from the poor little village of Nazareth below it. Only a few hundred people lived in Nazareth, it had no civic structures... People still went to a well for water...

Herod then built another huge town called Tiberius (named after Ceaser and built on a grave yard).

So what does all this mean...

Jesus is recorded as going to Nazerath,Cana, Capernum (a small village next to Tiberius) and all kinds of other places around this great wealth and power. But he never goes to these places during his ministry. He never goes to the capital to lobby or seek an audience with the powerful folks there who were running the day to day political operations of that whole region.

In fact the text is very careful about where he goes and what roads or paths he takes to get there. He always avoids the places of imperial power. Although he does go to the places of religious power (as we have seen at the temple and we will see with pagan temple at cessarea philipi)

By the lake in the area of Zebulun and Nephtali these were land allocations given by God to the former Egyptian slaves (not the fancy Greek names provided by the empire). By using these names the text is underlining the fact that the land is Gods not the empires.

Jesus reminded people why they had come to the desert in the first place. They could gone to Sepphoris the theater... and watched a great play about a girl who meets a boy who happens to be a vampire and who's vampire family takes her in and defends her against other vampires, culminating in a fiery battle inside a dance studio... until she wakes up in the hospital with a broken leg...

Sorry that was totally uncalled for ;-)

Or

They could have gone to tiberous to lobby the rich rulers and advisers to the king to "take their countyr back to its religous roots...

But they came to the desert to seek a new way to live, to seek a truth that was/is deeper than the plastic and fake ways of the world. They came out because they has a sense that a new world was possible and they needed to see/hear that a new world that was emerging.

Luk 7:24
After John's messengers left, Jesus began to speak to the crowd about John: "What did you go out into the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind?
Luk 7:25
If not, what did you go out to see? A man dressed in fine clothes? No, those who wear expensive clothes and indulge in luxury are in palaces.
Luk 7:26
But what did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.

This takes place at Capernum just a stones throw away from Tiberius (Herod's new shinier imperial city) where John sets on death row waiting to be beheaded...

Why didn't Jesus rush to save John?

More on that next time...

water to wine - DRAFT-

Long long ago when Johnny Carson was the host of The Tonight Show he interviewed an eight year old boy. The young boy was asked to appear because he had rescued two friends in a coalmine outside his hometown in West Virginia. As Johnny questioned the boy, it became apparent to him and the audience that the young man was a Christian. So Johnny asked him if
he attended Sunday school. When the boy said he did Johnny inquired, "What are you learning in Sunday school?" Well, came his reply, "Last week our lesson was about when Jesus went to a wedding and turned water into wine." And while the audience roared, Johnny tried to keep a straight face as he said, "And what did you learn from that story?" The boy squirmed in his chair. It was apparent he hadn't really thought about this. But then he lifted up his face and said, "If you're going to have a party, make sure you invite Jesus!" And he was certainly on to something in a simple yet profound way.


Jewish wedding feasts lasted for 7 days, and to run out of wine so early would have been embarrassing to say the least. That’s probably why Mary asked Jesus to get involved in something that was really not their concern.

And lastly the stone jars held water normally used only for ceremonial washing, a symbolic act of cleansing from sin, not for cleaning off the dust of the road or other dirt. They were placed at the door so a person would not enter a friend’s house in a ceremonially “unclean” state and contaminate the house. By dipping their fingers into the water and wiping them dry, a person would symbolically “wash away their sins” and be ceremonially clean. When we say, “I’m washing my hands of this matter,” we really mean we’re trying to absolve ourselves of any responsibility for it. The phrase comes from this practice, which was soon to be immortalized by Pontius Pilate in the matter of Jesus’ trial and conviction.




1On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, 2and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, "They have no more wine." 4"Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come." 5His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you." 6Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. 7Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water"; so they filled them to the brim. 8Then he told them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet." They did so, 9and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside 10and said, "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now." 11This, the first of his miraculous signs, Jesus performed in Cana of Galilee. He thus revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him.
The occasion was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, the home of Nathanael, a town around 10 miles from Mary and Jesus’ home city of Nazareth. We can assume that because Mary, Jesus, and His disciple’s were invited, the wedding was of a close friend or a relative. We have no way of telling when it happened, but Joseph must have died at some time after Jesus’ twelfth birthday, the last recorded time he was with Mary and Jesus (Luke 2:41-51). It is very likely that at whatever time Joseph had died, financial responsibility rested on Jesus, as the eldest, to be the breadwinner for the family until His brothers had grown up. We are told that Mary had four sons after Jesus’ birth and at least two daughters, and that Jesus was known as the carpenter’s son (Matthew 13:54-57). We don’t know who was responsible for the catering of the wedding at Cana, but it is logical to assume that Mary felt some level of care and responsibility for she was the one who was told that the wine had run out instead of the master of the banquet. The master of the banquet certainly knew nothing of the problem, as evidenced by his lack of knowledge when the water was changed into wine (Verse 9). The way the stewards looked to Mary for direction is perhaps an indication that the wedding was the occasion of a relative or close friend. Certainly she was giving instruction to the servants when the wine had run out as to what to do about the problem.
Hospitality was, and still is a big thing in the Middle East. In that culture it was the groom that was responsible for the wedding expenses. The family could be sued by the bride’s parents if people left the festivities unsatisfied, or thought that the catering was under par. People would drink wine because it was safer to drink than water due to the purifying process it went through; water was more suspect. One never knew what had happened to the water upstream. Wine was essential to a marriage celebration in the Middle East. The Bible says that, “Wine gladdens the heart of man (Psalm 104:15). In the Jewish culture, wine symbolized joy. Rabbi’s had a saying: “Without wine, there is no joy.” Being drunk was frowned upon however, and often the wine, if strong, was watered down, but wine with dinner and festivities was and is the norm for adults in the Mediterranean region and Middle East. I
At the wedding that Jesus attended in Cana, there was great joy, but a problem developed. There was a shortage of wine. Not only was that a social embarrassment, it was also a symbol or sign of things to come in Jewish culture. For a wedding to run out of wine was an omen that there was little chance of this particular marriage reaching its full potential, and that maybe joy was not meant for this couple.

Going back to our wedding ceremony in Cana, the lack of wine at the wedding was a problem that could have disappointed those at the celebration. It was a dilemma that needed a solution. Mary did something about the problem. She went to Jesus and said, “They have no more wine.”
What do you think Mary was expecting Jesus to do about the problem?
Did Mary know what Jesus would do about this problem? Remember, this was His first miracle, as we are told in verse 11, so we do not know if she expected anything miraculous, only that she was relying on Him in a tight situation, hoping that He would have an answer.
Perhaps she was expecting Him to make up a decent excuse to those attending. It’s possible that she was expecting Jesus to give a speech of some sort to get people’s minds off of drinking while the bridegroom went to buy some more wine.
Perhaps at this wedding she wondered if it was finally time for his fate to become apparent to others. Mary was confident that Jesus was more than capable of fixing the problem. In responding to Mary, however, Jesus’ answer at first seems to be negative; "Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come"(Verse 4).
Mary’s only response is to instruct the servants “Do whatever He tells you” (Verse 5).
Jesus saw six stone water jars that were used for ceremonial foot and hand washing. Each one of these jars held 20 to 30 gallons of water. Jesus told the stewards to fill each jar to the brim and then take some of this water to the master of ceremonies. They must have wondered what He was thinking! Why would they serve the guests water which they were meant to wash with? Imagine the surprise of each steward who had bucketed water from the stream to each water pot. When a ladle was dipped in, out came wine, and not just good wine, but exceptional wine! The master of ceremonies was quite surprised at the quality of this wine and was so impressed, that he said to the bridegroom: "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now."

Jesus was to reveal the everlasting God, some established customs and rules needed to broken. At Cana, Jesus used six large stone jars as carafes for new wine…jars that were normally filled with water for
purification ceremonies, for the ritual cleansing of dirty Jewish hands. Jesus claimed the
authority to break the rules, and put those jars to another use. And for those who knew what
he was doing, it was disturbing, to say the least.

Imagine if someone threw a party and we all went. And while the crystal punch bowl is being carried to the center of the room, it accidentally slips and smashes to the floor. Daren says, “Don’t panic. I know something we can use.” He goes out of the room and hoists the washing dish and carries it to the kitchen where the caterers fill it with water and the washing bowl becomes our serving bowl! Get the picture? It goes against the grain, it’s disruptive...like what Jesus did behind the scenes at the wedding in Cana.

It goes to show there’s no telling what rules Jesus Christ will break in order to disclose the presence and power of God. All we can be sure of is that God’s glory will not be reduced to traditions and rituals. According to John’s gospel, Jesus Christ is not interested in maintaining stale religious customs and established patterns.

week 1

The Sun has a radius 100 times that of the Earth which means that about 1,000,000 (1 million) Earths would fit into the Sun!

This is the size of the Earth compared to our Sun.http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp...son_labeled.jpgInteresting? This is our Sun compared to a red giant


star:http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/5664/redsupergianthl3.jpgHmm...that is one giant star.

Well, here we have a Hypergiant Star compared to our Sun.http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/8601/hypergiantgx2.jpg

By this point, you are probably peeing your pants. But wait, theres more! This is the largest star that astronomers have YET to discover. This star is called the VY Canis Majoris. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3...nis_Majoris.png

I wonder how many Earths it would take to fill up VY Canis Majoris.


There are an estimated 200 billion stars Milky Way.

http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/milkyway.jpg




Several hundred never before seen galaxies are visible in this "deepest-ever" view of the universe,
called the Hubble Deep Field (HDF)made with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Representing a narrow view a the HDF image covers a speck of sky 1/30th the diameter of the full Moon.
Though the field is a very small sample of sky area it is considered representative of the typical distribution of galaxies in space because the universe, statistically, looks the same in all directions.

http://hepwww.rl.ac.uk/ukdmc/pix/galaxies/hdf-mosaic.gif



How big is an atom?


If the nucleus were the size of a basketball the nearest electron shell would be about 8 miles

Ok so if you stumbled upon this blog looking for a resource on narrative theology, I'm sorry. This blog is not finished. My notes are under a state of constant revision, as I make them more readable, and as the sprit sees fit to reveal new insites to me.

It is my end desire to provide the kind of place where you will be free to explore all the resources I have been collecting.

But at this point most of my notes do not make much sense yet.

So if you have a question, or need help on a specific issue, please e-mail me (my address is on my about me page).

Otherwise feel free to read through, comment, and check back in a couple of months.

Grace and Peace

Tom

notes

In the beginning
Trinity = egg
Adam was the first human Made in Gods image
Adam needs a companion
Eden was huge
God made Adam name all of the animals
God gave Adam Eve
The betrayal
Flood - Warning signs?
Devinne chemo
Noah had it made a fresh start
The great building project
Tower = oppression and slavery
Its not that they were a threat to God, They were a threat to themselves.
Abram and Sari
Go walk
“I will make out of you a great people”... Blessed to be a blessing
Exodus
The people cried out, and God heard their cry.
God calls this guy moses who is a murder and a fugitive...
God tells him to stand up to Pharaoh and be like “A God” to Pharaoh.
After an extended struggle in which God humbles the worlds supper power (Egypt) Pharaoh lets Moses lead the slaves and refugees out of Egypt.
In the desert God says I have something for you to do, or more like someone for you to be.
A kingdom of priests...
A priest mediates the Devinne to people.
So God is calling these people to all be a message to the world.
Then God places them in what will be one of the most traveled trade routs in the world.
King David has a son named Solomon.
Solomon was a wise king.
But he forgot his peoples story
He forgot the dream/mission God had given them.
Solomon used slave labor to build his empire (palaces, gardens, fortresses, temple)
He imported AND exported weapons (God had forbidden this back in the desert)
He built military bases in places like Megetto ( in English Armageddon)
He collected great wealth (666 tons)
God HAS to stop this insanity... His Message is not getting through to the world.
What does it say about God when these people did these things in his name?
Exile
But God is patient
God warned them again and again and again
Then when “there was no remedy
People carried away into slavery
The “great” buildings were destroyed
The “great” wealth taken away
By the rivers of Babylon
The prophets tell of a liberating King who will come to rescue the people, and set them free.
Ezra experience
The people return their land with a decree from the emperor to rebuild their city and temple.
But as always they grew to be judgemental and arrogant once again...
scriptures have a very direct massage
God always hears the cry of the oppressed
God cares about human suffering and the conditions that cause it
God is searching for a body, a Kingdom of priests, a community of people to care for the things God cares about.
God gives power and blessing so that justice will be upheld for those who are on the underside of power.
That is what God is like
That is what God cares about
This is who God is
To forget this to fail to hear the cry, to preserve prosperity at the expense of the powerless, is to miss what God had in mind.
Humans have always misconstrued God's blessing as favoritism and Entitlement.
They become indifferent to God and their priestly mission, to bring liberty and freedom., restoration and healing, to others.
So God has to come down here and rescue us from ourselves
Jesus
….........................

Luk 2:8
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night.

Luk 2:9
An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.

Luk 2:10
But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.

Luk 2:11
Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ [fn] the Lord.

Luk 2:12
This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."

Luk 2:13
Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying,

Luk 2:14
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."

Doxa

What is Glory?
Is it one of those things that you sing about, read about, maybe talk about, especially if you have been around a church for any length of time. But what does it mean “Glory to God in the highest?”

To help us unpack this a little we are going to study the word Glory a little, as it appears in the scriptures.

The word glory is a very complex nuanced sort of word...
Lets start in


Psa 19:1
For the director of music. A psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

The word Glory is the word kabowd (kä·bode')
and it means :
honor, glorious, abundance, riches, splendor, glory

And it comes from the root word kä·bad'
Which means to be heavy, or weighty


The heavens declare the Kabowd of God

Remember lessons one and two?
Have you ever looked at the stars , maybe through a telescope, or ever watched a mediator storm?
When I was a kid my dad took me out in the country away from all the man made lights to watch a mediator storm first hand...
I was struck by the idea that these rocks, which use to be part of something else much larger, and had been flying through space for who knows how long, were crashing into our earth our home. They had traveled perhaps millions of light years, much farther than even our strongest telescopes can see. And now they were burning up in our atmosphere.
Which is another good point, we live on a planet that is designed to protect us from all of this floating space junk...

DO you get a feel for how big the universe is?

Kabwod is heavy, signifying that other things are light, temporary, Its as if the wind could blow at any minute and they would be gone...

Dust*****************************
Everything turns to dust or rust
Rust****************************

Advisers spend a lot of energy convincing us that we will be happy if we just buy that new shiny car... But after a few years, especially if you live in a cold climate where they spread copious amounts of salt on the roads, it starts to turn into rust.

This is true of everything we lust or long for. (even other people)

**********************************************************

Kabowd is like the kick drum of the universe, its what happens when you come face to face with the bigness of the universe and you are reminded of the proper proportions of the universe and that you are not the most important thing in it!

This is the Hebrew Idea of Kabowd

Exodus 33:17




Exd 33:16
How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?"


Exd 33:17
And the Lord said to Moses, "I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name."


Exd 33:18
Then Moses said, "Now show me your glory."


Exd 33:19
And the Lord said, "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.


Exd 33:20
But," he said, "you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live."


Exd 33:21
Then the Lord said, "There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock.


Exd 33:22
When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.


Exd 33:23
Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen."


Moses asks to see Gods Kabowd...
But God says “I will cause all of my goodness”

Rhe Rabbis say that the “You will see my backside” is a way of saying you will see the spot where I have just been.

So Moses says I want to see ALL of your Golor..
And God says You can't handle my Kabowd...

Can't you hear God laughing in this... Its like he says
You have to catch your breath when you see the stars, and now you want to see my Kabowd?

Central to understanding the Kabowd of God is the Awe the reverence the humility that comes from knowing who God is and who you are.

Sometimes we loose track of the proportions...

It is good for us to be reminded of this...

But the scriptures have a little more to say about Us (humans) and Glory...


Psa 8:3
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,


Psa 8:4
what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?


Psa 8:5
You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings [fn] and crowned him with glory and honor.


We are crowned with Kabowd?
What does it mean?

This is why when you hear a story, like of slaves beening set free
or
like of homeless people being fed and clothed
or
like of a community garden where people work together shoulder to shoulder and then give the extra food to people who are hungry

This is why you feel that leap in your heart, why you are like
YES NOT THAT IS WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT.

We are hard wired for Kabowd...
And yet we continually seek that feeling in so many other ways...
And we live in a culture that promises to fulfill that yearning that need for Glory in a million ways.
Marketers invent a new way to fall into debt every day. That is they try to convince us that they have tapped into a new way to find fulfillment and happiness...

But it is all Dust and Rust!

It should not be lost on you that the neon lights and the bright security lights drown out the stars. It you want to see the stars, to be reminded of the Kabowd of God, you have to escape all ot that.

So one of the central if not the central them of Christmas is this.

Gods Glory has come to earth... the fulfillment of the very things we long for the very things that our culture trys to sell us, but always falls short, is present is at hand. It has arrived and is available for anyone who is willing to accept it.

But only if you are willing to let go of all the lies, of all the dust and rust that our culture sells us!

Water to wine

Long long ago when Johnny Carson was the host of The Tonight Show he interviewed an eight year old boy. The young boy was asked to appear because he had rescued two friends in a coalmine outside his hometown in West Virginia. As Johnny questioned the boy, it became apparent to him and the audience that the young man was a Christian. So Johnny asked him if he attended Sunday school. When the boy said he did Johnny inquired, "What are you learning in Sunday school?" Well, came his reply, "Last week our lesson was about when Jesus went to a wedding and turned water into wine." And while the audience roared, Johnny tried to keep a straight face as he said, "And what did you learn from that story?" The boy squirmed in his chair. It was apparent he hadn't really thought about this. But then he lifted up his face and said, "If you're going to have a party, make sure you invite Jesus!" And he was certainly on to something in a simple yet profound way.


Jhn 2:1
On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there,

Alright so get your radar up. In this first verse we have a clue about what is going on here.

When does it say this wedding took place?
And Did Jesus do anything else on the third day?




Jhn 2:2
and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.


We have no way of telling when it happened, but Joseph must have died at some time after Jesus’ twelfth birthday, which is the last recorded time he was with Mary and Jesus (Luke 2:41-51)

The occasion was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, the home of Nathanael, a town around 10 miles from Mary and Jesus’ home city of Nazareth.

10 Miles is a long way to walk, so this is probably an important wedding for them.


Jhn 2:3
When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, "They have no more wine."


We don’t know who was responsible for the catering of the wedding at Cana, but i Mary felt some level of care and responsibility. She was told that the wine had run out before the master of the banquet. The master of the banquet didn't even know of the problem, he was suprised when the exceptional wine was brought out (Verse 9).



Hospitality was, and still is a big thing in the Middle East. In that culture it was the groom that was responsible for the wedding expenses. The family could be sued by the bride’s parents if people left the festivities unsatisfied, or thought that the catering was under par.

Why?

It was a social stain on the couple if their wedding had gone badly. It woiuld make them and their families outcasts.

People would be like... “see that kid walking down the street there. He's the son of that couple who through a banquit and couldn't afford enough food and wine for all the guests.”



The wedding is in trouble...

It was a dilemma that needed a solution. Mary did something about the problem. She went to Jesus and said, “They have no more wine.”

What do you think Mary was expecting Jesus to do about the problem?

How could Mary know what Jesus would do about this problem? Remember, this was His first miracle.

So we do not know if she expected anything miraculous, only that she was relying on Him in a tight situation, hoping that He would have an answer.

Perhaps she was expecting Him to make up a decent excuse to those attending. It’s possible that she was expecting Jesus to give a speech of some sort to get people’s minds off of drinking while the his disciples went looking for the nearest party store to buy some more wine.




The way the stewards looked to Mary for direction also tells us that the wedding was the occasion of a relative or close friend. She gave the instructions to the servants when the wine had run out as to what to do about the problem.



Jhn 2:4
"Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come."



Mary was confident that Jesus was more than capable of fixing the problem.

Jesus’ answer at first seems kinda harsh; "Dear woman, why do you involve me?"





Jhn 2:5
His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."


And you have to love Mary's response to the servants “Do whatever He tells you” (Verse 5).



Jhn 2:6
Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. [fn]



The stone jars held water normally used only for ceremonial washing, a symbolic act of cleansing from sin, not for cleaning off the dust of the road or other dirt. They were placed at the door so a person would not enter the celebration in a ceremonially “unclean” state.
By dipping their fingers into the water and wiping them dry, a person would symbolically “wash away their sins” and be ceremonially clean. When we say, “I’m washing my hands of this matter,” we really mean we’re trying to absolve ourselves of any responsibility for it. The phrase comes from this practice, which was soon to be immortalized by Pontius Pilate in the matter of Jesus’ trial and conviction.
 
Canna was a small village 120 gallons means probably people from several surronding villages.




Jhn 2:7
Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water"; so they filled them to the brim.



Jhn 2:8
Then he told them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet." They did so,



Jhn 2:9
and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside



Jhn 2:10
and said, "Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now."


Jesus told the stewards to fill each jar to the brim and then take some of this water to the master of ceremonies. They must have wondered what He was thinking! Why would they serve the guests water which they were meant to wash with? Imagine the surprise of each steward who had put water from the stream into each water pot. When they dipped in ladle and out came wine, and not just good wine, but exceptional wine!

The master of ceremonies was quite surprised at the quality of this wine and was so impressed, that he praised the bridegroom.
 
 Jesus was to reveal the everlasting God, some established customs and rules needed to broken. At Cana, Jesus used six large stone jars as carafes for new wine…jars that were normally filled with water for purification ceremonies, for the ritual cleansing.

Jesus claimed the authority to break the rules, and put those jars to another use.
 
Imagine if someone threw a party and we all went. And while the crystal punch bowl is being carried to the center of the room, it accidentally slips and smashes to the floor. Daren says, “Don’t panic. I know something we can use.” He sends two of you out of the room to get the washing dish and carry it to the kitchen where the you are told to fill it with water and the washing bowl becomes our serving bowl! Get the picture? It goes against the grain, it’s disruptive...like what Jesus did behind the scenes at the wedding in Cana.
 
It goes to show there’s no telling what rules Jesus will break in order to disclose the presence and power of God. All we can be sure of is that God’s glory will not be reduced to traditions and rituals. Jesus is not interested in maintaining religious customs and established patterns.

One last thought...
Jesus never turned the water into wine...
He simply told the servaqnts what to do, and when they did it the water became wine.
The servants do what Jesus said and the hope of the family of the couple for a future is restored
The servants do what Jesus said to do and Joy is present at the feast.

Have you ever not done what Jesus said to do?
How can we do what Jesus said to do?