SERMON FOR EVENSONG
HAMPSTEAD PARISH CHURCH
8 January 2023
Epiphany, Year A
OT Lesson : Isaiah 60.1-9
NT Lesson : John 2.1-11
Text: Jesus … revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him (John 2.11)
A key feature of St John’s gospel – one might indeed call it John’s leitmotif – is the revelation of the glory of God in the life and death of Jesus. The concept has already featured in the climatic final verse of the Prologue (John 1.14) which introduces the central themes of the gospel, the silver cord which links together the episodes from Jesus’ life which John has chosen to include in his gospel for this very purpose – to reveal Jesus’ glory. There we read that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory.”
In John’s gospel the good news about Jesus is told through a succession of seven signs, of which the wedding at Cana is the first, and John concludes: “Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.” Glory and belief. Jesus’ disciples may not have grasped at once the full import of the miracle which they had witnessed, any more than did the steward of the feast, who had tasted the wine and pronounced it very good, but looking back over the whole stretch of time which the disciples had spent in Jesus’ company, perhaps two or three years, John recalled this occasion as the moment when he at least got it. Jesus had revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in him.
It had been a long time coming, and even now the revelation was not apparent to everyone. The servants knew that water had been turned into wine, the steward knew that the wine was a surprising improvement on what had been served earlier on, and the wedding guests had their glasses – or perhaps more likely their homely beakers – refilled. Mary’s quiet confidence in her son’s ability to find some way to resolve a difficult situation was amply justified, but it was not everyone who perceived that the first step had been taken towards lifting the veil of mundane humanity which concealed Jesus’ divine origin from those observers whose eyes had not been opened. Not for nothing is one of the later signs in John’s gospel (chap 9) the healing of the man born blind, and the refusal of the Jewish authorities to believe his evidence, even when it was literally staring them in the face. Our eyes have to be opened to see the true glory, even in a miracle.
It had been a long time coming, but it should not have been such a surprise. Tonight’s Old Testament reading from the prophet Isaiah is just one example of the prophets’ confident expectation that one day the light of truth would dawn, God’s presence would be revealed, the whole world would see it, and all would stream towards Jerusalem bearing gifts to celebrate the joyful occasion. One could find similar examples in almost any of the prophets, including Malachi (Malachy Frame was leaving the choir) who says that ‘for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall.’ (not an instruction for your procession!)
What a tragedy it is then that when the glory of God was revealed in the life of Jesus, sadly, so many of the people who should have been the first to see that glory, for which they had been prepared by the prophets, were in fact the first to reject in Jesus the light which had been promised to them, indeed to attempt to snuff it out by procuring his death at the hands of the Roman authorities. But God’s purposes are not so easily overturned. In St John’s words, the light shone in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. Indeed, the glory of God which is most truly and utterly expressed in and through his love, was more fully demonstrated by Jesus’ giving of his life for us than it could ever have been by any act of power, however dramatic and overwhelming such an act might have been. “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man should lay down his life for his friends” (John 15.13). It is simply not possible to imagine anything which God could have done which would have shown more clearly just how much He loves us, the lengths to which He is prepared to go for us.
Moreover, what God did in Jesus was not like some super-powerful, awe-inspiring New Year fireworks display – stand back and admire from a safe distance. By the prophet Jeremiah God had promised to write his law on our hearts, his law of love. But Jesus goes even further than that. Through the bread and the wine of our holy communion He gives us His body, He gives us His blood, so that we may dwell in Him and He in us, in a communion so intimate that it is not just his law that is written on our hearts, as Jeremiah perceived, but his love that inspires and animates our love.
The Christmas Haiku with which Bill and Christine Risebero concluded their Christmas greetings this year expresses the same point so very succinctly:
God saw that it was good;
It needed augmentation;
God’s son brought the love.
Jesus revealed his glory, and his disciples believed in Him. As we are inspired to be His body in today’s world, as individuals, as the church in this place, and as a small part of the church throughout the world, we pray that our sharing of the gift of his love may begin to reveal the true glory of God in our time and place, just as the miracle at Cana began to reveal the true glory of God in the life and death of our Saviour Jesus Christ.
Praise and thanks be to God.