Jesus

At one level, we see Jesus at the start of his ministry joining in a happy human occasion and showing by his presence that he blesses love between a man and a woman joined in marriage. (12) The amount of wine was huge and amounted to a delayed wedding present to the couple (13) which could have been sold to provide some useful funds for them at the start of their married life.

At a deeper level, the abundance of wine is a sign of God’s overflowing generosity which led him to bring about the salvation of humankind.  So although the hour of Jesus’ death of the Cross was some way in the future, the “superabundance of Cana is…a sign that God’s…self-giving for men, has begun”. (14) It a sign that Jesus is the Messiah and the generous amount of wine is in keeping with the idea of the Messianic banquet.  The prophets had looked forward to the coming of the Messiah which would be characterised by plentiful amounts of wine: “The time is surely coming, says the Lord, when…the mountains shall drip sweet wine and all the hills shall flow with it” (NRSV, Amos 9:13). 

So too, at a deeper level, the initial words “on the third day” take on a more profound meaning.  They point us back to the Old Testament in which the third day is a time for theophany, the appearance of God: “On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning…Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God.  They took their stand at the foot of the mountain.  Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the Lord had descended upon it in fire…” (NRSV, Exodus 19:16,17,18).  And Cana also prefigures “history’s final and decisive theophany: the Resurrection of Christ on the third day…”. (15)  The transformation of water into wine at the wedding feast of Cana is therefore an example of one of those times when “heaven and earth intersect”. (16)

Transformation is an important concept in thinking about this sign.  The use of water for purification according to the Jewish Law was a ritual which could never make people really “pure” for God. (17) By changing the water into wine Jesus signified the transformation of the Jewish religion into the Christian religion so that “to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God…” (NRSV, John 1:12).  And still today, to those who come to him, Jesus can and does give power to become the sort of people God intends them to be, changing them into his likeness.