Sam Bush, “Lifetime Supply”
One of the most ingenious marketing gimmicks of all time is the lifetime supply of something. If you’re caller number 7 or sink a half-time half-court shot you fulfill the fantasy of never having to buy something like bacon or baked beans again. And yet, hearing the personal testimonies of these winners will give you pause. It turns out that a lifetime supply of Cinnabons, for example, is about four weeks long because, after eating unlimited Cinnabons for four weeks, you never want to see another Cinnabon. It’s just too much Cinnabon for any one person to handle.
Still, this fantasy of the lifetime supply remains. Why? Because our lives are haunted by finitude. We are always running out of things. You want to bake a cake but you’re out of sugar. You want to buy a ticket to Puerto Rico, but you’re out of PTO. You want to be outgoing but you’re out of social bandwidth. This is our reality. Our family was on a road trip last summer and, with a minivan full of boys, I pulled up to the station with the Miles to Go barometer at 2 (the search for that gas station was thrilling). What are you running out of? Are you running out of time? Are you running out of options? Have you run out of patience with someone? Are you low on hope?
Today’s Gospel reading addresses the limits of life straight on. It’s not an emergency situation. It’s not life and death. There’s a wedding in Cana at which Jesus is a guest. Now, if you think weddings today are extravagant, weddings back then would go on for five to seven days. People would give the bride’s family money to throw these lavish parties. Oftentimes, contracts would be drawn up so, if the family didn’t really throw down, they could face legal action.
And what happens? The wine runs out. This may not feel like a big deal if you’re Baptist, but as Episcopaleans, you and I can appreciate the urgency. A wedding without wine is like a feast without food or a pool party without water. And there are consequences. Mary understands that the host or the master of ceremonies, known as the Chief Steward, would be in serious hot water for such a faux pas. He’s obviously not a very good planner. He didn’t review the guestlist well or crunch the numbers with the caterer. At this point, he’s probably panicking. The wine is not simply running low, it’s gone. “They have no wine,” Mary says.
How does Jesus respond? He basically says, “It’s not my problem. It’s not really yours either, Mom. My hour has not yet come.” It’s a polite refusal. I wish my children would speak to me this way when I tell them it’s bedtime (“Our hour has not yet come!”).
We assume this is ultimately how God responds to us in our need. It’s not His problem. Which is why many of us do all we can to avoid getting into this kind of problem. We have checklists and calendars and do your due diligence to make sure our proverbial wine never runs out. Our world is fixated on the idea that you, as a finite person facing infinite tasks, need only apply yourself more fully in order to accomplish your goals and have a meaningful existence. Get rid of the distractions, work hard now so you don’t have to later, be more disciplined, get on top of things, power through. Do this long enough and one day your real life, a life that you can enjoy, will begin.
But do you really think that’s true? The writer Oliver Burkeman pokes a hole in this approach to life in his new book Meditations for Mortals. He says to be a person is “never achieving the sort of control or security on which many of us feel our sanity depends.” The quest for control is a hamster wheel. Staying on top of work, figuring out your relationships, doing enough to address all the national and global crises. Good luck! Let me know how it goes! In other words, making sure the wine doesn’t run out isn’t just difficult. It’s impossible. Even mastering the situation is likely the worst case scenario because you will likely lose your taste for wine altogether. You might never run out but it won’t taste like it used to.
This is why, we as Christians, turn to Jesus. What’s difficult for us comes very easily to him. It takes five to seven years for wine to age, but Jesus says, “I’ve got 180 gallons of some instant wine right here. It’s better than anything you’ve ever tased.”
There’s a story about the conquering king Alexander the Great who had a general who had served Alexander for a while and whose daughter was getting married. He approaches Alexander’s throne and asks him in front of a crowd of people for money to pay for the endowment. Alexander says absolutely, how much do you need? And the man, in front of everyone, mentions an exorbitant amount of money - much more than anyone had expected. And Alexander's face just beamed. He said "Absolutely! Go to my treasurer and it will be given to you." People then asked Alexander why he wasn't furious or didn't feel tricked and he said this: "This man has given me a profound honor because he has believed that I am a man of fabulous wealth and am extremely generous." We often assume the opposite about God. We assume he has limited funds and is not very generous. But this is the king that we worship, far more wealthy and generous than you’ll ever know.
We see in this passage that the Christian life is not a serious business. People think it looks more like bookkeeping and scorekeeping, but the Kingdom of God is most often described as a wedding feast! Isaiah prophesies, “The Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines.” Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet.” The Book of Revelation says, “Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.”
Make no mistake, the party isn’t just in heaven. At the wedding in Cana, Jesus doesn’t say, “Well, the wine has run out here but just wait until heaven.” God meets you in your life now. Your life is not going to start 10 years from now when all your ducks are in a row or when you graduate or get that dream job or get married or when your kids grow up or when you retire or have grandchildren. This is it!
God meets you in your finitude here. And wherever you are empty - of peace, comfort, confidence, joy - Jesus promises you life to the full.
The eternal life that Jesus promises does not start when you die. It started when Jesus died. That is when you were set free from sin and death. Just as the Chief Steward was saved from ruin, so have you been saved from ruin. Later in John’s Gospel, when Jesus finally says his hour has come, he’s one day away from being crucified. The wine that he serves from that day on, flows from his hands and his feet. Two-thousand years later and it has not run out. It is not merely a lifetime supply, but an eternal supply of love, mercy and forgiveness. And what are we to do with this wine? “Drink this, all of you. This is my blood of the new Covenant.” Receive it again and again and again. You will never tire of its taste and it will never run out. Amen.
Amen.
