Supernatural Series: Miracles

(I was sooo pumped about this message!)

Tonight we are kicking off a new series, Supernatural. Yep, it’s a little freaky because it’s October. This first night we are going to talk about miracles. So what exactly is a miracle?

1. an effect or extraordinary event in the physical world that surpasses all known human or natural powers and is ascribed to a supernatural cause.

2. such an effect or event manifesting or considered as a work of God.

3. a wonder; marvel.

So tonight we are going to take a closer look at miracles, and just who might receive one.

Let’s dig into John 2:1-11

Jesus Changes Water Into Wine

¹ On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, ² and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. ³ When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”

⁴ “Woman,^[a] why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”

⁵ His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”

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

⁷ Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.

⁸ Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.”

They did so, 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 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.”

¹¹ What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

This is incidentally one of my favorite stories of Jesus in the Bible. And it’s not because there’s drinking in it. I’m sure that is a distraction for you right now, so let me just say a few things about that so that we can move on to the good stuff.

It was a different culture, a different time. Think, life without refrigeration. Your beverage choices were water, or various forms of grape juice. I did a little more research and most wine at this stage in history had an alcoholic content of about 3.5% where today’s alcohol it’s more like 14%. Most biblical time wine was much less potent than today. Our official statement on alcohal is that it’s a gateway to sin (meaning it leads to so much more) so you might as well flee from it. God’s stance on wine is pretty clear, there are more than 600 verses in the old and new testaments that preach against drinking to excess or drunkenness. More than that, all of you are underage and therefore alcoholic consumption is illegal so why should we waste any more time on this subject.

Whew, glad we got that out of the way. Now let’s move on to the meat of this story. We will reap several truths, if we just dig in a little bit.

First off, the servants were obedient. Seems like a simple thing, but what Jesus’s mother was asking them to do was pretty crazy. These ceremonial jars were HUGE and not needed at the moment. This wasn’t a time for ceremonial cleansing, this was a time for celebration, for partying. The servants likely wondered if this Jesus guy was off his rocker. Why on earth should they fill these giant jars with water? What, were they going to fool the drunk guests into thinking it was real wine?

Understand that just filling these jars was an undertaking in itself. They each could hold 20-30 gallons. They were stone as well, so it’s not as though they could pitch them over their shoulder and carry them to the nearest faucet, or even run a hose over to them. Nope, they had to haul water up from a well, or from a nearby stream or lake, and fill these jars a bucketful at a time. This was a serious endeavor that was time and labor intensive. These servants were faithful to the task that Jesus had asked of them.

Have God ever asked you do something that in your natural mind didn’t make sense?

For Pastor Rob and I, one example was leaving our last church. See, things were going well there. We had a solid youth group, about 25 kids. We enjoyed our church, had good relationships with people. We had a cute little house that the bank still owned most of. Our kids were happy. We were happy, comfortable.

And God wound up calling us here. Any time you face change (especially as an adult) it’s nerve wracking. In fact, I’m taking conflict management right now and my book said that change almost always brings about conflict. It’s just tough, for all of us. We were facing the unknown. Trying to sell our house in a down market, living apart for a few months. All of that was hard. In fact, I remember one phone conversation about 5 weeks into our transition where I was whining to Rob about how hard it was and he says to me “Well, do you want me to quit? Is that what you want, me to come back to Baytown and just forget about what God told us to do?” Well, of course I didn’t. The next thing he said was iconic. “Anna, you don’t know how awesome it is here. You aren’t here yet, you don’t see what I see, you aren’t experiencing what I’m experiencing. I promise, it’s worth all the misery you are going through right now.”

I hung on to that promise until we sold our house got here. And you know what? He was right. We’ve experience more satisfaction and success and joy in ministry here at shift then anywhere before. God’s miracle for our life happened because we were faithful to listen to His voice, to be obedient even when it was uncomfortable.

Likewise, these servants were obedient. The scriptures don’t say “they hemmed and hawed and finally decided to what Jesus told them to do.” Nope, their response was to ‘fill them to the brim.” There obedience was both immediate and complete. Which is truly the only kind of obedience that exists. Anything other than immediate and complete is actually disobedience.

In fact, filled to the brim implies best effort, doesn’t it? We are always telling Eli and Sarah, ‘give your best effort’ when it comes to homework and really anything they put their little minds too. Why? Because that’s what God expects of us in everything He’s asked us to do. Best effort is just a great work ethic to develop and maintain. It’s also a sure way to live without regrets.

So what can we learn from their obedience? What was the result of their obedience?

They received a miracle.

That’s the big lesson in this scripture. Obedient servants can expect a miracle. I heard my mother preach that particular phrase, Obedient servants can expect a miracle, on this passage fifteen years ago and it’s been etched in my brain like a scratch on fine china ever since. All I need to be is obedient, and God will supply the rest. I can expect His miraculous provision in my life.

See, miraculous provision is always God’s best, and God’s best is always better than you expected. God’s best is always more than you hoped for, and more than you dreamed possible.

Remember my story of leaving our last church? I was hanging so tightly on to what I had, scared to step out in faith. I want to show you this next slide to give you a physical example of God’s best in our life. Remember the tiny house? This is the house we live in now. And it costs less than the tiny house. God’s best is more than we imagined.

God’s provision is always more than you imagined. He’s God, He doesn’t do anything half way.

So let’s get back to the story in John. Remember the servants? So they’ve gathered the water and filled the jars. And they are probably waiting for the other shoe to drop when the host finds out they are serving nothing more than well water.

Can you imagine their faces when they went to ladle out that first glass of water and it was actually wine? Moments before they had been mucking this water out of a well and suddenly it was the choicest wine of the party. Do you think they suddenly took notice of who Jesus was?

Well, we know they did because the scripture tells us so. “What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which He revealed His glory; and His disciples believed in Him.”

Miracles bring Jesus glory. They are like kind of like fireworks over a baseball game. The fireworks aren’t there to bring glory to themselves, they are there to bring attention to the main attraction, which is the game itself. Fireworks say “hey, something important is taking place here, you should check it out!” Miracles bring attention to Jesus. When Christ’s glory is revealed, it causes others to have faith in Him. This was the first moment his disciples truly believed in Him. Miracles were proof positive that He was the messiah that all of Israel had been holding their breath for.

So we all agree then? Obedient servants can expect a miracle. Provision through God’s miracles is always greater than we can imagine. And miracles reveal Christ’s glory.

Is it possible that there is even a greater purpose in miracles? Do they affect our lifelong story? I would say yes. I know the miracles in my life have had a profound long term affect. If not, I wouldn’t be standing here and you wouldn’t be sitting there, nodding your heads in agreement.

But especially this miracle at Cana. There’s a lot of debate as to why this was Jesus’s first miracle. It may seem kind of trivial. But upon further investigation, we can uncover a greater truth and purpose in this miracle.

The jars were used for ceremonial washing. This meant special cleaning before you went to the temple to perform sacrifices, to repent and be forgiven of sin. The jars represented old ways of purification and old standards of clean before God. Jesus came to change all that. He would instigate a new covenant with us. New wine in the old jars. Opportunities for true relationship with God, no longer bound by our broken ways. This miracle at Cana was representative of all that Jesus was going to do. Blood and water in Bible are always important, so you should pay close attention when you see them occur in scripture.

How can you be obedient? (read the Word daily, ask God to reveal a plan for your life, steps for obedience)

What miracle do you need right now?? (healing, finances, restoration, power to overcome addiction)