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Saving the Best for Last (John 2) · Prodigal Hope

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: One thing you have to keep in mind when you approach the Gospel of John is
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  SPEAKER_00: that it has a very distinct shape to it, you could say.
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  SPEAKER_00: From chapter 2,
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  SPEAKER_00: from roughly about where we are,
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  SPEAKER_00: from chapter 2 roughly to the end of chapter 20,
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  SPEAKER_00: this youngest of Jesus' disciples,
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  SPEAKER_00: he tells the story of Jesus roughly, we could say, through seven distinct verses.
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  SPEAKER_00: Miracles.
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  SPEAKER_00: You can find them in John's Gospels.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is one of the things that John's Gospel is known for.
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  SPEAKER_00: Some of these miracles that you'll find if you read the Gospel of John are unique to him.
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  SPEAKER_00: No other of the Gospels sort of tell the stories and tell the accounts
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  SPEAKER_00: of these miracles that John does, such as the case this morning with ours.
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  SPEAKER_00: But all of them, all of the ones that John records, he refers to as signs.
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  SPEAKER_00: You notice that word, verse number 11, that Pastor Eric just read.
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  SPEAKER_00: This, the first of his signs.
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  SPEAKER_00: In fact,
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  SPEAKER_00: you're going to find that same word carried throughout the Gospel
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: of John some 17 times.
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  SPEAKER_00: And each time it's meant to show us that there's something deeper going on than just a miracle.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's something more important happening, in this case, than water being turned into wine.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's something more important happening than a blind man receiving his sight.
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  SPEAKER_00: You see,
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  SPEAKER_00: when John invokes this word signs,
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  SPEAKER_00: what he's trying to communicate is that,
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  SPEAKER_00: yes, there's something miraculous, but there's something deeper.
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  SPEAKER_00: Each of these moments, each of these miraculous events, they were more like tokens.
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  SPEAKER_00: They were more like signposts that were meant to point everyone who was in
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  SPEAKER_00: the audience,
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  SPEAKER_00: every onlooker,
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  SPEAKER_00: every person at that event,
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  SPEAKER_00: they were meant to point to the fact that the one doing the miracle...
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  SPEAKER_00: Was the long-awaited-for Messiah.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's what they were all meant to do.
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  SPEAKER_00: Each of these signs, we could say that they were like spokes on a wheel.
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  SPEAKER_00: And they're all drawn towards the central hub.
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  SPEAKER_00: And what is that central hub?
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  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's the confession that John is trying to lead everyone who reads his gospel.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's trying to lead them to a certain juncture, which is the end of his book.
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  SPEAKER_00: Go with me to John chapter 20 really quick.
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  SPEAKER_00: You'll find the same word, but you'll find John's thesis.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's not very often...
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  SPEAKER_00: In academic writing or if you write anything,
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  SPEAKER_00: any type of paper for an English class,
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  SPEAKER_00: they're going to tell you to put your thesis at the very beginning.
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  SPEAKER_00: So John would get bad marks because he puts his thesis at the very end of his book.
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  SPEAKER_00: But this is what he's trying to do.
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  SPEAKER_00: What he's trying to prove and what he's trying to show is this right here,
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  SPEAKER_00: verse number 30 of John chapter 20.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now Jesus did, notice, many other signs.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's many other things I could tell you about, John says.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's many more of them in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book.
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  SPEAKER_00: But he says, but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's no other one.
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  SPEAKER_00: The Christ, the Son of God.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that by believing, you may have life in his name.
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  SPEAKER_00: All of those miracles weren't just to make people feel better.
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  SPEAKER_00: Weren't just to make people get their sight back or get their walking back.
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  SPEAKER_00: It was meant to show that the Messiah was there.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's what they were meant to do.
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  SPEAKER_00: Each one was meant to give us a glimpse of precisely who Jesus is.
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  SPEAKER_00: So, okay, with that in mind, what does this first one tell us?
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  SPEAKER_00: This one is unique.
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  SPEAKER_00: This very first miracle that Jesus does in his public ministry,
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  SPEAKER_00: this first of his signs, it occurs here in John chapter 2 and nowhere else.
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  SPEAKER_00: Why?
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  SPEAKER_00: Why does John record this for us?
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  SPEAKER_00: We all know, maybe perhaps, we're familiar with the beats of this story.
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  SPEAKER_00: Like a couple weeks ago, I preached on Zacchaeus.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's a very familiar story.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is another very familiar of Jesus' stories.
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus gets invited to a wedding, and the wedding quickly runs out of wine.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so he turns the water into new wine.
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  SPEAKER_00: Everybody wins, wedding saved, yay.
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  SPEAKER_00: Is that all that there is?
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  SPEAKER_00: No, of course not.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because as simple as this moment sounds...
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  SPEAKER_00: This event is actually an object lesson, I would say, for Jesus' entire ministry.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's actually a window,
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  SPEAKER_00: we could say, into understanding the gospel itself by turning water into wine.
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus gives us, yes,
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  SPEAKER_00: an abbreviated but nonetheless striking glimpse at what the good news is all about.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it happens and it occurs in nowhere else but this wedding at Cana.
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  SPEAKER_00: Verse one, on the third day, there was a wedding.
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  SPEAKER_00: At Cana in Galilee.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the mother of Jesus was there.
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  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.
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  SPEAKER_00: John refers to Cana in this manner because it was a small town.
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  SPEAKER_00: It was a small Jewish village.
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  SPEAKER_00: If the archaeologists are correct, it was in the northern region of Galilee.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sort of close to Nazareth, but it was in the northern quadrant, so to speak.
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  SPEAKER_00: And this city,
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  SPEAKER_00: this town,
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  SPEAKER_00: it wasn't really a city, this town, this village, it was a small rural village.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it would have been largely overlooked except for the fact
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  SPEAKER_00: that Jesus does his first miracle there.
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  SPEAKER_00: And what's happening?
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  SPEAKER_00: Well, we don't know who they are but an unknown bride and groom.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're celebrating a new life together.
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  SPEAKER_00: It is a happy time.
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  SPEAKER_00: There is joy, there is elation, there is laughter, tears of joy perhaps.
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  SPEAKER_00: And biblical weddings,
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  SPEAKER_00: if you have done any sort of research,
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  SPEAKER_00: biblical weddings, especially in the first century, they weren't like our weddings.
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  SPEAKER_00: I've done some weddings, we've gotten in and out in roughly 30 minutes.
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  SPEAKER_00: I'm not trying to give Elizabeth any ideas,
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  SPEAKER_00: but biblical weddings, they lasted sometimes for three or seven days.
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  SPEAKER_00: They were long affairs.
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  SPEAKER_00: They were lots and lots of partying, lots and lots of feasting.
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  SPEAKER_00: There was all kinds of traditions and rituals and things that they did
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  SPEAKER_00: to signify these two lives coming together as one.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it was a beautiful thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: It was a beautiful occasion.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the whole community would surround this young couple in this awesome, joyous occasion.
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  SPEAKER_00: They would celebrate along with you.
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  SPEAKER_00: Everyone was invited.
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  SPEAKER_00: And a significant part...
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  SPEAKER_00: Of that tradition,
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  SPEAKER_00: at least in those days,
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  SPEAKER_00: was the groom and his family and the way in which they would provide all the food
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  SPEAKER_00: and the drink for all of the invited guests.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was sort of an expected thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was an expectation in that culture.
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  SPEAKER_00: A culture, by the way, that had very strong values when it came to hospitality and generosity.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right?
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  SPEAKER_00: Hospitality was one of the chief virtues of first century Jewish life.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so, in other words, when John tells us in verse number three, those simple words.
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  SPEAKER_00: Let me find verse three.
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  SPEAKER_00: When the wine ran out.
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  SPEAKER_00: This wasn't just like an oops, my bad sort of situation.
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  SPEAKER_00: That actually what he's trying to get you to realize is that the stakes couldn't be higher.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was a terrible embarrassment.
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  SPEAKER_00: A terrible embarrassment.
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  SPEAKER_00: A very, very serious situation.
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  SPEAKER_00: One, in fact,
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  SPEAKER_00: that could have just really,
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  SPEAKER_00: we could say, had the potential to follow this young couple for years down the road.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, if some historians are correct, it could even result in lawsuits.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was not just a, oh man, I guess you should have planned better.
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  SPEAKER_00: No, this was the groom and his family on the brink of seeing their name just implode.
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  SPEAKER_00: Their reputation just go down the tubes.
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  SPEAKER_00: This, of course, put yourself in that situation.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is the kind of news that you don't tell the bride and groom.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is the kind of news that you would try to keep to yourself as long as possible
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  SPEAKER_00: as you're trying to figure out a solution.
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  SPEAKER_00: Their minds are elsewhere.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're hobnobbing.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're talking with everyone.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're having a good old time.
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  SPEAKER_00: Meanwhile, all the caterers, they're looking at each other.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what we're going to do.
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  SPEAKER_00: I was trying to think about how to picture this.
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  SPEAKER_00: Imagine being one of the caterers at this event,
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  SPEAKER_00: and you see person after person come up,
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  SPEAKER_00: dip their cup in the wine,
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  SPEAKER_00: and you see it dropping, and there's none that they can refill it with.
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  SPEAKER_00: Getting a little bit nervous.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was bad.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was an event planner's worst nightmare.
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  SPEAKER_00: No one would have wanted to be the event planner at this wedding.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yet one of them, someone...
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  SPEAKER_00: Someone has the bright idea to tell Mary, the mother of Jesus.
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  SPEAKER_00: And there's lots of perhaps reasons we can speculate.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe Mary was helping.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe she was there.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe she was part of the catering crew.
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  SPEAKER_00: She was helping them out so she knew.
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  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe just she knew the bride and groom so she was involved.
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  SPEAKER_00: Either way,
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  SPEAKER_00: what I love about this scene is it shows us that Mary's maternal instincts just kick
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  SPEAKER_00: into high gear.
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  SPEAKER_00: She sees this problem and she cannot sit idly by
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  SPEAKER_00: while this new young couple starts their marriage off like this.
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  SPEAKER_00: This would be like starting off with lots of bad luck.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is not a good way to get this marriage going.
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  SPEAKER_00: And she can't sit by and take it.
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  SPEAKER_00: So what does Mary do?
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  SPEAKER_00: Well, she sneaks away.
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  SPEAKER_00: She tells her son Jesus what's going on.
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  SPEAKER_00: Verse 3 again.
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  SPEAKER_00: When the wine ran out.
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  SPEAKER_00: The mother of Jesus said to him, They have no one.
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  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said to her, Woman, what does this have to do with me?
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  SPEAKER_00: My hour has not yet come.
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  SPEAKER_00: His mother said to the servants, Do whatever he tells you.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now, I don't have to,
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  SPEAKER_00: perhaps,
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't have to hyperbole,
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't have to make this sound more serious than it is,
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  SPEAKER_00: but this little exchange,
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  SPEAKER_00: this little conversation between Mary and Jesus has been scrutinized countless times
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  SPEAKER_00: by countless theologians over the centuries.
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  SPEAKER_00: And mainly it involves two questions.
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  SPEAKER_00: What did Mary expect?
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  SPEAKER_00: What was she expecting Jesus to do?
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  SPEAKER_00: And why did Jesus respond the way that he responds
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  SPEAKER_00: Taking the last question first,
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  SPEAKER_00: at first glance,
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus' reply to his mom sounds a little rude, at least to us, right?
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: It may be a lot rude.
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  SPEAKER_00: If you learn anything from this sermon today, don't go home and call your mom woman.
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  SPEAKER_00: Probably not the best advice, but Jesus does.
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  SPEAKER_00: Woman, what does this have to do with me?
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  SPEAKER_00: Sounds a little dismissive.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe a little bit.
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  SPEAKER_00: But actually it wasn't so.
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  SPEAKER_00: This was not out of the ordinary, at least in those days.
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  SPEAKER_00: It sounds a little gruffer in our English translations,
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  SPEAKER_00: but essentially calling Mary woman would be the same as calling her ma'am.
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  SPEAKER_00: Ma'am, why are you bringing me this?
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  SPEAKER_00: Still strange, not disrespectful, still a little odd.
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  SPEAKER_00: But what this is hinting at,
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  SPEAKER_00: what this is alluding to is that there's a significant shift happening.
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  SPEAKER_00: This is marking a new era in the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth.
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  SPEAKER_00: Think about what has happened here.
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  SPEAKER_00: Chronologically up to this point he's been baptized by John
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  SPEAKER_00: the Baptist publicly sort of inaugurating him for public ministry.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's also been publicly identified by John the Baptist no less than twice as
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  SPEAKER_00: the Lamb of God and the Son of God.
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  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus,
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  SPEAKER_00: you can find that in chapter 1,
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  SPEAKER_00: just a page over,
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus calling his mom, ma'am,
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  SPEAKER_00: suggests that what he had come to earth to do,
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  SPEAKER_00: why he became incarnate in the first place, that plan is now in motion.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's busy with his father's business, his heavenly father.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's a new era now.
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  SPEAKER_00: And this is why, of course, he follows that up with, my hour has not yet come.
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  SPEAKER_00: He tells her that.
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  SPEAKER_00: An hour, of course, if you study this out, hour doesn't mean just a block of 60 minutes.
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  SPEAKER_00: No, hour, when he says that, verse number 4, my hour has not yet come.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's referring to...
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  SPEAKER_00: A very particular moment or period of time that was foreordained,
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  SPEAKER_00: it was prefigured to happen before even time began.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in fact,
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  SPEAKER_00: if you want to do another study of the Gospel of John,
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  SPEAKER_00: you can do a study on that word as well.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because along with the seven signs,
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  SPEAKER_00: you could also do this study of Jesus' hour as it appears throughout the Gospel.
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  SPEAKER_00: Flip over to chapter number 7, verse number 30.
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  SPEAKER_00: Chapter 7, verse number 30, what does Jesus say?
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  SPEAKER_00: So they were seeking to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him.
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  SPEAKER_00: Why?
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  SPEAKER_00: Because his hour had not yet come.
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  SPEAKER_00: Next chapter, chapter number 8, verse number 20.
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  SPEAKER_00: You'll find the same phrase.
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  SPEAKER_00: These words he spoke referring to Jesus in the treasury.
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  SPEAKER_00: And as he taught in the temple, but no one arrested him.
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  SPEAKER_00: Why?
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  SPEAKER_00: Because his hour had not yet come.
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  SPEAKER_00: Flip over.
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  SPEAKER_00: You'll see,
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  SPEAKER_00: if you go to chapter number 13,
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  SPEAKER_00: you'll find sort of this urgency that sort
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  SPEAKER_00: of undergirds every single time this word comes up.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because now look at verse number 13.
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  SPEAKER_00: Or chapter 13, verse number 1.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now before the feast of Passover, notice,
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  SPEAKER_00: when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father,
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  SPEAKER_00: having loved his own, Who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
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  SPEAKER_00: You see,
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  SPEAKER_00: each time,
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  SPEAKER_00: it wasn't yet,
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  SPEAKER_00: it wasn't yet now,
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  SPEAKER_00: in the middle of what we would call a holy week,
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  SPEAKER_00: Jesus is very aware that his hour had come.
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  SPEAKER_00: When Jesus says to Mary,
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  SPEAKER_00: back in John chapter 2, that his hour is not yet time, it's not yet time, mom.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's letting her know that it wasn't yet the occasion for his passion and his resurrection.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's what the hour is referring to.
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  SPEAKER_00: The hour when he would be pegged to a Roman cross as the Lamb of God slain for
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  SPEAKER_00: the sins of the world.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's why he came.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's what he'd come to do.
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  SPEAKER_00: He'd come to be.
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  SPEAKER_00: The true and better scapegoat,
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  SPEAKER_00: the lamb that takes away the sins of the world by taking them on himself
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  SPEAKER_00: and sacrificing himself for the remission of sins.
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  SPEAKER_00: And he's telling Mary, it's not yet time for that.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's coming, it's not yet here.
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  SPEAKER_00: So Jesus' reply to his mom is, this is small, it's a slight, but it's also a needed correction.
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  SPEAKER_00: Of Mary herself and her thinking about the Messiah and what his mission was.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's correcting her.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's not yet time.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure what you're thinking, Mom, but there's something going to happen.
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  SPEAKER_00: A baptism that you cannot be baptized with, I'm going to be baptized with.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's the baptism of the cross and sin and death.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's correcting her slightly.
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  SPEAKER_00: But this still leaves another question up in the air.
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  SPEAKER_00: What was Mary expecting Jesus to do?
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  SPEAKER_00: This is just a fascinating thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: Because this is Mary,
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  SPEAKER_00: the mother of Jesus,
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  SPEAKER_00: coming to her son with a problem that there's a wine supply that's diminishing.
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  SPEAKER_00: And there's always, of course, there's a good deal of mystery.
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  SPEAKER_00: Always in chatter surrounding Mary, the mother of Jesus, and what she did or didn't know.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because we have a certain song to thank for that.
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  SPEAKER_00: Mary, did you know?
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, I think she did.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's clear to me, at least, that Mary absolutely knew that her son Jesus was the Messiah.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: The angel was pretty clear.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, Mary, when the angel comes up to her, Luke chapter 1, remember that?
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  SPEAKER_00: And the angel says, in your womb is the Son of the Most High.
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  SPEAKER_00: And twice,
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  SPEAKER_00: twice we are told,
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  SPEAKER_00: if you go back to Luke chapter 2, twice we are told that after Jesus was born...
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: She's holding in her arms this little newborn, this little infant.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yet she knows that that little infant is who?
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  SPEAKER_00: The son of the most high.
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  SPEAKER_00: And it says that she treasured and pondered.
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  SPEAKER_00: That means wrestled.
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  SPEAKER_00: She grappled with these things in her heart.
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  SPEAKER_00: Twice we're told that.
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  SPEAKER_00: Which is just to say this.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't think it's as if Mary was told that her baby...
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus in your belly.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: Her baby was the long-awaited-for Messiah and then just never questioned anything ever again.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, that makes sense.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'm carrying the Messiah.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Never going to question that again.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: No, that's not human.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that's real.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, Jesus' own family questioned him.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter 7, verse number 5.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just read this really quick.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter 7 of John, verse number 5.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: It says this.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: For not even his, Jesus' own brothers, believed in him.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: And they even,
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: if you read Mark chapter 3,
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: his family even at one time tried to go out and seize Jesus.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: Because it says that they thought that he was out of his mind.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: So yes, we have this promise that in your belly,
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: Mary, is Jesus the Messiah, the long-awaited for Christ.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: But Mary wasn't immune to doubts.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Is anyone immune to doubts in this room?
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: No, probably not.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to raise your hands.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's fine.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Mary wasn't either because she was human just like us.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so from the context of this scene, I think Mary is clearly expecting something messianic.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't even think that she knew what she meant by that.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus, there's a problem.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: The wine is running out.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: She's taking this crisis.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: This need to her son, Jesus.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: But notice, she does not dictate Jesus' next move.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Nor does she tell him what to do.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: I was fascinated.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: I was stunned.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Actually,
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: recently,
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Pastor Eric and I were having a conversation that this text is often used as sort
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: of one of the proof texts for all kinds of very,
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: very terrible doctrines regarding the mother of Jesus.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: I can't wrap my head around it.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't even compute.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's like one of those syntax errors with a calculator.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't make sense.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: She's not telling Jesus what to do.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, actually, she receives Jesus' words of correction.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: Mary, it's not my time.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: About it not being her.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: She received that word about it not being her hour.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: And then what does she do?
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: She leaves the problem with him to figure out.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: Verse number five.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: His mother said to the servants, just do whatever he tells you.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: She leaves it for him to solve as he sees fit.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe this is just me reading between the lines, so I'll admit that a little bit.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I wonder if there isn't something of, I believe, help my unbelief in Mary's response.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because she knows that her son Jesus can do something.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: But she doesn't know what he's going to do just yet.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: And John,
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: the writer of John,
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: of this gospel,
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: who was likely watching all of this unfold, he then tells us exactly what Jesus did.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: Verse number six.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: Now there were six stone jars.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: There, highlight this phrase, for the Jewish rites of purification.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Each holding 20 or 30 gallons.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: And Jesus said to the servants, fill the jars with water.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: And they filled them up to the brim of And he said to them,
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: And so they took it.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: Now again, Jesus' instructions had to sound so ridiculous.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Again, just put yourself in the shoes of one of those caterers.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: You are just now being directed by this rabbi from Nazareth to grab some of these jars.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: Jars reserved and preserved to follow the rites of Judaism.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: Not just any old jars, not just water pots.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: These were big, big jars that were often filled with water.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: Specifically, as it says there, for the rites of purification.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Religious washing.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: Cleanliness in this day and age.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: Cleanliness is important all the time, yes.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: But cleanliness in these days wasn't just a matter of good or bad hygiene.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: This was a matter of ritual purity.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Your spiritual standing depended on how you were able to clean up your acts.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: The rights and regulations for washing in those days have been expanded upon.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: And you were deemed unclean if you didn't wash your hands correctly.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: And this is not just like,
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: I know that during COVID you were supposed to sing happy birthday like once
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: or something like that.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: There was way more involved than that.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: These water pots had been depleted.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: They were empty or on the verge of empty.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus instructs these caterers to fill up the jars, fill them up to the brim with water.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then...
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: The audacity just to take a cup and fill it up out of those jars and hand it to
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: the head waiter.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: That was his instruction, verse 8 again.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: And he said to them, now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast, the head waiter.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: This guy would have been like the maitre d'.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: He was like overseeing the whole thing.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: The one who maybe was hired by the bride and the groom,
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: hired by the groom to sort of oversee the food,
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: oversee the wine supply, all that kind of stuff.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: And remember,
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: when Jesus tells the servants to serve that guy,
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: the head waiter, a drink from the jars, the liquid is still water.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: He hasn't given them any indication that something miraculous has occurred.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: He just says, fill them with water and serve him out of that.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And again...
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: If you're one of the caterers, at least I would be.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'd be raising my eyebrows right about now.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: This rabbi's plan sounds preposterous.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: Serving water to guests expecting wine is probably going to end badly.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like, this is going to be in tomorrow's gossip section in the papers for sure.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, to their credit, they go along with it.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: They do exactly as Jesus told them.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: And something happens that no one could explain.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: They draw out the water,
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: they serve it to the head waiter,
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: and they wait on pins and needles to see if he's going to notice.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: Verse number nine.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: And when the master of feast, taste of the water, now become wine.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_00: And did not know where it came from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: The master of the feast called the bridegroom and said to him,
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone serves the good wine first.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: And when the people have drunk freely, then the poor wine.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: But you have kept the good wine until now.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: The master of the feast, he couldn't believe what his taste buds were telling him.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: Normal party procedure in those days dictated that the bad wine would come out only
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: after everyone's taste buds has been dulled by the good stuff.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: You don't want to waste all the good stuff.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: So you save the worst for last because the partygoers wouldn't be able to tell
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: the difference anyways.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is just normal stuff.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: This is normal procedure.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: And yet this wedding is different.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: The best...
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: Was saved for last.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: And the master calls the groom over.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: This is the most hilarious detail to me.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: At least in my mind.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: The master calls the groom over to thank him for his hospitality.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I bet the groom was just as surprised as everyone else.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: That was my plan all along.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely so.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: He had nothing to do with this generous hospitable gesture.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: And he got the credit for it anyways.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: Crisis averted.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: Newlyweds.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: They're saved from disgrace.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: And the party goes on without a hitch.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: But John, he adds something.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 11.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: The first of Jesus' signs,
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus did at Cana in Galilee and manifested his glory and his disciples believed
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: in him.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: They were beginning to believe.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: He only had roughly about five disciples at this juncture and they were beginning to believe.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: It was an early sign to put their trust in him,
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: in this one from Nazareth, Jesus the Christ Christ.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: So what's going on here?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: What does all this mean?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: How do we make sense of all this?
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_00: To me, there's something so profound about the fact that Jesus' first miracle,
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: his first sign is at a wedding.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about that?
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: He wasn't out healing the sick.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: He wasn't out causing blind people to see.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: He wasn't casting out demons.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: He was at a wedding reception.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: Which by comparison has less, less, less stakes.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: He's not casting out Beelzebub from some guy.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: He's at a wedding party.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: And yet nothing he does is unintentional.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: Instead he's using this invite that he received and this crisis as an opportunity
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: to hint at his mission.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: And it was no accident that the jars that he used were there for ritual washings.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: By the first century, we could say this, that the spiritual state of Israel was dry.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: Sort of like a wedding without any wine.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: And the wine here,
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: we have to make this little side note before anyone just gets
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: a little too uncomfortable or misunderstands me.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: The wine here is not like your Cabernet and your kitchen cabinets, if you have some.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's also, by the way, not like the Welch's grape juice.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's somewhere in the middle probably.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: The fermentation process was different back then, yes.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: And also they diluted wine with water.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: It was still a fermented drink.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: Which is just to say, this is just my own sort of rabbit trail.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: Don't use this passage to affirm your own standards of whatever,
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: however you fall on Christian liberty when it comes to that.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: You're missing the point of what Jesus is trying to tell you.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about that.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: Because wine was widely employed as what?
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: Throughout the Bible you see it as what?
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: A picture of blessing and abundance and joy.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: Isaiah 25 verse 6.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: What does the prophet Isaiah say?
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_00: On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples what?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: A feast of rich food.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: A feast of well-aged wines.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: Amos, the prophet, he echoes the same sentiment.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: He says this,
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: the days are coming,
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: the prophet says,
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: when the plowman shall overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes,
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: him who sows the seed,
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: and the mountains shall drip sweet wine and all the hills shall flow with it.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: You want a picture of blessing and joy and promise?
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: Amos says it's like the mountains having avalanches of wine coming off of them.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's the picture of blessings.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: So conversely, wine running out would be what?
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: A picture of judgment.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, Isaiah,
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: the same prophet,
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Isaiah 16.10, how does he term some picture of judgment coming on the people of God?
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Isaiah 16.10, joy and gladness are taken away from the fruitful field.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: And in the vineyards,
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: no songs are sung, no cheers are raised, no treader treads out wine in the presses.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: The wine is gone.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_00: Joy and gladness gone.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, because in those days,
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: as Isaiah has already prophesied, Israel has turned their backs on God.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: The wine had run out.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Joel echoes the same thing.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Joel 1 verse 10.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: The fields are destroyed.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: The ground mourns because the grain is destroyed.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: The wine dries up.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's an indication of judgment.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's an indication that God is judging his people because they have turned away from him.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: This was Israel in the first century.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: The laws of God.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: The laws that we have just spent weeks going over in the book of Exodus.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: The laws that God wanted his people to live accordingly.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: To have fruitful, abundant, and thriving lives.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_00: They had been interpreted and reinterpreted countless times over to the point
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_00: where they had become a loathsome burden, like an anvil that you're tied to.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's what God's laws had become.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Regulations for cleanliness and Sabbath keeping had ballooned out of control
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: as rabbis and scribes and Pharisees.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: They were patting themselves on the back for good sermons and good efforts
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: and good interpretations about how they could define the law in such detail
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: that they knew how many steps they could take on the Lord's day
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: without ruining themselves.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: Step number whatever, 30.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: They knew how to wash their hands.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: So that they could maintain holiness.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: They knew how to conduct themselves.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: So that they could keep God's favor on them.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: So they thought.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: The religious impulse in Jesus' day,
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: and I would hasten to say in ours sometimes too,
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: but the religious impulse in Jesus' day prioritized what?
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: Personal merit and human tradition.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it went way beyond what God had ever intended.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: And now folks were being crushed under the weight of man-made proclamations
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: which told them how God's favor could be earned by them.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Just keep the Sabbath holy.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what does that mean?
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you can only walk this many steps and do this amount of work and that's work,
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: but this is not work.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: And this is why the wine ran dry.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: Because a religion of merit and a religion of human tradition will always leave you thirsty.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to leave you thirsty.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: Because God's law in and of itself, it cannot save you, let alone help you.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: It can tell you what God's holiness looks like, but it can't make you holy.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: It can tell you how to wash your hands, but it can't cleanse your soul.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: In and of ourselves,
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: see here's the picture,
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: in and of ourselves,
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: we are as powerless to purify ourselves as empty water pots are
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: to provide refreshment.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: And as Jesus says elsewhere,
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: all it does is dress up the outside of the tomb,
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: but inside there's still dead men's bones.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_00: Dressing ourselves up and merit making in human tradition is just like that.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: You're just dressing up the outside and you never get to the soul.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: You never get deep enough to actually change you.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the point is this.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: You don't throw out the law wholesale.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: What's the response?
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's to recognize that our inability to do what the law says and cry out to
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: the Father for a Savior, which is who Jesus is.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: This is what he has come to do for you.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus Christ,
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: we could say,
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: came to pour the grace of his spirit into the empty vessels of the law by doing what
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: the law requires and by giving what the law demands.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's what he has come to do.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: And where the law leaves you dry like a groom whose wine supply has run out, who is Jesus?
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: He's the true and better bridegroom.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: Who is more than enough.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: Whose reservoir of grace never runs out.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's who he is.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: He never fails his bride, the church, you.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: We are the bride of Christ that Jesus never fails.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because he always does what the law requires.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: He does what the law never could.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: He takes your empty jars of failed religion and empty holiness and he fills them up with what?
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: With new wine.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: He fills them up with himself.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_00: See, this is the beautiful picture of this moment that where we fail,
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_00: where we cannot make ourselves full on this,
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_00: that, and the other thing, we are just like stone water pots.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_00: We cannot make ourselves full at all.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: But who is Jesus?
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: He's the bridegroom who comes, who fills us up with himself.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because he came to drink the cup that we deserve so that we could drink the cup
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_00: that he provides us.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: Remember that theme of the hour?
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_00: When Jesus' hour finally came, we could say that he drank every last drop.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: What does he say in Luke chapter 22?
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: That was Jesus acting as the true and better bridegroom Giving us the credit for
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: a feast we didn't provide.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: He is our bridegroom who gives us what we could never earn.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_00: And our failure, we drink his success.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: He gets our sin and we get his righteousness.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's a picture of what Jesus has come to do.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: Filling up these water pots with new wine.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_00: See, before any leper is healed...
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_00: Before any blind person gets their sight back.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus is showing us where joy and blessing and grace are actually found.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: Where?
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: In Him.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's where they're found.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: They're always only found in Him.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: You can't go to any other reservoir.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: You can't go to any other resource and find what only He can give you.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: And this is why He has come.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because He has come to bring salvation and hope and a righteous standing before the Father.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: And He comes to give it by giving you Himself.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: So the invitation is this, come to the bridegroom, but come empty and leave full.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: Come thirsty and drink deeply of the Christ's grace.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: What does he say?
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: Isaiah 55 verse 1 was the invitation of the prophet, which is also God's invitation to us.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: Come, come everyone who thirsts.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_00: Come to the waters.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: He who has no money, come buy and eat.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_00: Come and buy wine and milk without money and without price.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because the bridegroom has given himself love for the bride.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: He has come to lavish a sumptuous feast by giving you himself.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_00: He comes to do just that for you.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: May we never get over the fact that into our empty souls,
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus has poured new wine himself into us.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we now are being changed from one degree into another, into glory and grace.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: May God be praised.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: May God be praised.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: Let us pray.