John 2:1-12 How Do You Change Water into Wine?

Debates about a historical Jesus or the veracity of the Bible (or even what "veracity" might mean in this context) are far from over, and ultimately not very helpful in terms of applying the more spiritual truths of the text in our lives. There is one school of thought that holds that the gospel stories are about the uniqueness of Jesus and why he is so very different from ordinary human beings. We are ordinary human beings, though. So, it makes the most sense to read the stories from a perspective that will give us the greatest resources that we can use in our lives.

Take, for example, the first miracle story in the gospel of John, in which the character Jesus changes water into wine. He changes it into very impressive wine, at that (as if the transmogrification was not impressive in and of itself). We don't gain much from trying to dissect how this miracle happened or even trying to determine if this miracle happened. We get a lot more from taking the story as a story and digging into what it might say about us as human beings.

Jesus and his disciples are guests at a wedding -- they are known by the family of the bride or groom well enough to have been invited. Jesus' mother is also a guest, and in a moment of pushy parenting, she presses upon her son to take care of a problem that really isn't his responsibility. In a certain sense, she asks Jesus to "over-function." Jesus sets a boundary with her, but she persists. Ultimately, for whatever reason, Jesus acquiesces and resolves the issue with extraordinary competence. This bolstered the confidence that other people had in Jesus.

Before we look at what Jesus' actions might say to us, we might first look to Jesus' mother (who is never named anywhere in the gospel of John). There are times in which we press upon others to resolve problems that are not their responsibility. Maybe we know their capability, and we want them to have a chance to shine. Maybe we want people to be impressed with us because of our association with impressive people. Maybe we have a genuine concern that the problem gets resolved, but we doubt our own capacity to address it in any meaningful way. Whatever the case, sometimes we over-function by demanding that other people over-function. Our anxiety provokes us to want the situation resolved, and we put expectations on others to resolve it so that our anxiety will go away.

Needless to say, this reactive tendency to place demands and expectations on others often doesn't stem from our deep values -- it's not a prompting of our deepest, most noble selves. We just want not to feel anxious. When we find ourselves tempted to volunteer others to resolve issues that make us anxious, we can make a few small adjustments to how we handle that anxiety. First, we can calm down. Whatever helps us to start thinking clearly in moments of anxiety needs to be our first step. That may look like taking a few deep breaths, or stepping away from the situation for a moment, or even thinking through our guiding principles. If we've taken the time to get some clarity about those principles or values, and we can frame them in short, memorable phrases, they can guide us out of anxiety.

Once we are calm, we might talk through things with the people around us -- particularly the people we are tempted to conscript into service. Something like, "This is the issue as I see it, and this situation is not what I would prefer. I think of you as a competent individual. Is there something that you would be willing to do in the current situation to help make it better?" And then, most importantly, we accept the response whatever it is. If the person says, "No, I'd prefer not to get involved," we accept it. Maybe we say, "Thanks for considering it." If the person says, "Yes, I'd like to help if I can," then we let that be a free decision rather than an obligation or compulsion. If we learn to calm down and invite people into action, with no demands or expectations, we are likely to live out our guiding principles more often.

When we look at Jesus' response to his mother, however, we see the other side of this equation. We don't know what's going on inside Jesus' head, but we may be able to relate to the situation. When we are pressed to respond to a situation that's making someone else anxious, we have at least a few possible choices.

(1) We can say no, set a boundary, and stick to it. We can choose to maintain the boundary calmly and without hostility, or we can become belligerent in how we defend that boundary. The more emotionally mature response, of course, is to calmly set our boundary and let other people be responsible for their own anxiety. It's tough to be emotionally mature when someone is persistent in making demands, though. That takes a bit of practice.

(2) We can give into someone's pressure, essentially giving up what we want in order to meet someone else's demands on us. When we do this, we give other people inappropriate power over our behavior, and we take on responsibility for someone else's anxiety. This is not an uncommon reaction, but it also isn't a very intentional or principled response. When we are intentional about living in alignment with our principles, we take responsibility for our actions and our anxiety, and we don't assume responsibility for other people's actions or anxiety.

(3) We can also choose to accommodate someone's request, even if they are being pushy, out of a sense of love or compassion rather than out of a sense of obligation. Even when someone is being forceful, we can choose to do something based on our principles. We don't have to resist something we actually want to do just because we don't like how we're being asked to do it. When we are thoughtful, we can sometimes see compelling reasons to take action based on our own deep guiding principles -- our own deepest, most noble self.

In the narrative, Jesus sets a boundary, his mother persists, and then -- we don't know why -- Jesus takes action. That, in and of itself, does not give us anything to emulate. Maybe he gave in and resented his mother's pressure. We may be tempted to draw a different conclusion based on a preconceived notion about Jesus, but the story doesn't tell us what's going on in Jesus' head. From the perspective of the author, though, we can assume a high opinion of Jesus. So, perhaps it is implied that he thought about the situation and decided from a clear and principled perspective that he wanted to help out. He could have done the same thing out of a position of obligation and giving in to his mother's demands, or out of a sincere expression of his values. From the outside, those two positions might not look any different. The difference is with regard to his integrity -- whether his actions are sourced by his authentic identity.

In our own lives, we have our own ways of turning water into wine. Our abilities and areas of competence might look extraordinary to people who don't share our training or experience. When I tell people that I am a pianist or a composer, they are often amazed at that ability, because it isn't a skill they possess. From their perspective, they are as likely to turn water into wine as they are to learn how to create music. From my perspective, I worked for many years to become adept in these musical abilities. There is nothing miraculous or mysterious about it. We all have some abilities or skills that are like that. They seem very ordinary and comfortable to us, but to someone who doesn't share that skill, it borders on miraculous.

The people who know us well -- who understand our abilities and are a bit impressed by us -- might try to convince us to act when we don't really feel like it. They might even pressure us to deal with a situation that really isn't our responsibility. When this happens, we have choices. Our typical automatic reaction to being pressured by someone is probably not our best option. When we can get back to our guiding principles, we have a better chance of responding thoughtfully and authentically to any situation.

So, when we are asked to act or intervene in our particularly skillful way, we can thoughtfully choose to say yes or no. We can consider the situation -- and our ability and willingness to engage it -- without it needing to mean something about the person doing the pressuring. If we say No to our mothers, it doesn't mean we don't love our mothers. It might just mean that they are asking us to do something that is not authentic for us. Learning to say No or Yes because of who we are rather than because we feel pressured is a huge step in developing emotional maturity and living into our authentic selves.

A Little Experiment: How do you turn water into wine? What are the areas of expertise or ability that other people find impressive? If you know what those things are, you might better understand how you can make a meaningful contribution to any situation. You can also predict the sorts of things other people might pressure you to do, and you can rehearse setting boundaries or responding thoughtfully and authentically. Practicing ahead of time might help us stay calm and less reactive in moments of pressure.

Another Little Experiment: Say no and mean no. Set a boundary with someone without getting defensive, and without being compelled to be inauthentic. Let it be about something simple, like, "No, I'd rather not eat at that restaurant today." Being willing to set simple boundaries about less important things will help us set more challenging boundaries about really important things.

One More Little Experiment: Say yes and mean yes. In alignment with your deep values -- your guiding principles -- agree to do something for someone else, without resentment or a sense that they owe you one. Go to a movie or a restaurant you don't really want to go to because you value spending time with someone. Run an errand for someone else just because you care about that person, without framing it as an inconvenience or holding it over someone's head.

When we can say Yes and No authentically, our relationships are transformed. It can even seem miraculous, like changing water (or vinegar) into wine.

Isaiah 33: Selective Well-Being Is Not Genuine Well-Being

People make enemies. Usually, people make enemies by their reactivity, when fear drives the bus and prompts people to act in ways that don't align with their deepest values. The leaders of Judah made enemies through political decisions intended to preserve power and protect resources. Unfortunately, their adversaries were operating under an equally false impression of power and well-being. The tyranny of emperors has never been sustainable in human culture, but that still doesn't stop tyrannical people from thinking that they will be the exception to the rule. Tyranny is based on fear, just as Judah's defiance of the Assyrian Empire was based on fear. Of course, when we talk about "Judah's defiance," it isn't as if an entire country rebelled with a common sense of purpose. The entire country suffered, but it was the decision of a single leader (informed by his counselors) that determined the fate of the people he governed. It would be a mistake to assume that everyone in Judah was in agreement about international relations, primarily because most people didn't know that much about the specifics of politics.

Many people are satisfied with not suffering. They don't necessarily care what is going on politically, and especially in other parts of the world, as long as they are not personally suffering. We concoct excuses why other people are suffering while we are not, and we practice behaviors designed to protect what we have and preserve the power we have over our lives and possessions. If we get too attached to having more power than some other people, more wealth than some other people, or (bluntly) more well-being than some other people, we run the risk of making enemies. Being comfortable with a status quo in which some people have greater well-being than other people is not far from being comfortable with the idea that some people are worth more than other people. This is not a path to mutual respect or peace.

Isaiah 33 issues a promise of deliverance from enemies. As many of the promises in the prophetic books, this one is empty. It is an empty promise because it relies on an external supernatural to take care of human problems. This is rather like a child expecting that a parent will clean up any messes and whisk away any consequences that result from the child's behavior. In other words, it is devoid of personal responsibility. The problems that human beings create must be addressed by human beings, and they must be addressed more responsibly than just waiting for a supernatural to decide that it's time to fix things. A supernatural is not going to be your salvation in time of trouble. If we have any salvation, it is in human beings and our capacity to make better decisions than what we have made in the past.

If we take the definition of divinity as something that is within every person -- an inherently human characteristic -- then we might create a workable interpretation of Isaiah 33. Without any attempt to retain the poetic nature of the original text,

People who seek to destroy or betray others in order to preserve an imbalance of power create only the illusion of well-being for themselves. They have to live in perpetual fear of reprisals and spend so much time protecting what they have that they never learn to use it wisely.

Our deepest, most noble selves influence us in a different direction and reveal the values that will lead to more authentic well-being. We cannot lose the voice of our deepest, most noble self; there is no way for us to blot out our truest selves completely. This voice of truth, beauty, and creativity within us shows us the path to mutual well-being, equity, and justice. The counsel of our deepest, most noble selves offers stability in our lives and in our relationships, boundless integrity with ourselves and reconciliation with others, and sustainable insights toward lives free of irrational fear.

People will lose all of the things they try to hold on to out of fearful self-interest. There is no strategy born of anxiety that will pay meaningful dividends. Peace, justice, and genuine well-being come from other sources.

If we heed the voice of our deepest, most noble self, it will be impossible for others not to notice. Our lives will look so different from the lives of those who live by fear that it cannot leave the world unchanged. 

Here are some specifics: our actions would have obvious integrity with our values and our words would be impeccably honest, we would find ways to have what we need without supporting the oppression of other people, we would seek what creates the greatest good for the greatest number of people rather than what provides immediate gratification in our own lives, we would not accept violence as an acceptable solution to human problems, and we would not justify abusive behavior by the ends it is intended to achieve. When we do what we know to be right, by the testimony of our deepest, most noble selves, we will create well-being in every dimension of our lives, and we will promote multi-dimensional well-being in the lives of the people around us. 

The world cannot be sustained by fear. There is no hope in the priority of preserving power and control of resources among an elite few. We don't have to learn what justice and well-being would look like. We already know these things. Yet, there is no point in resentment against those who have lived out of fear. The way forward creates a better world for everybody, where everyone has enough and no one has reason to be afraid.

None of this is to say that it is easy to live with integrity, or even to know what our deepest values are if we have never really thought about it. It takes time and practice to allow our deepest, most noble selves to have greater influence in our lives than the irrational fear and anxiety by which we are accustomed to living. Our greatest strength is that we already know what justice and well-being would look like. We just operate under the impression that it would be impossible to have true justice and well-being for everyone. Maybe we have to start small -- in our own lives and in our own neighborhoods -- so that we can develop greater hope for more people. We know what justice and well-being look like. We just have to commit ourselves to creating that to whatever extent we can.

Thus, it is not the case that power and wealth and well-being are bad things. When our goal becomes preserving our own power and protecting what we have, then we go off the rails and cease to have integrity with our guiding principles. However, it is possible for us to recognize the resources at our disposal and allow our deepest values to determine what we do with those resources. The reality is that some people have more power than other people. Some people have more money than other people. Some people have more intelligence than other people. Some people have advantages in some facet of well-being that others do not have. The point is not to reject what we have haphazardly, but to use the resources at our disposal to create something better than current reality. Rather than trying to preserve and protect what we have (or gain more to hoard for ourselves -- another fear-based reaction), we could be using what we have in ways that align with our deepest values.

Nor is this an entirely selfless position. The underlying message of Isaiah 33 is that what some people think of as security and well-being is just an illusion. Piling up wealth and power for oneself isn't going to create lasting meaningful benefits. True well-being for ourselves requires the well-being of the people around us. When we share our resources with our own neighborhoods, we create better environments for our own lives. When we share our resources with other parts of the world, we create a better future to live into. Our deepest, most noble selves do not encourage us to sacrifice our own well-being for the benefit of others, but to sacrifice our false sense of scarcity and our irrational fears about other people and ourselves, so that we might have genuine well-being in our own lives.

Mark 1:9-14: Trials and Temptations, and Recognizing the Challenges that Matter Most

All mythological heroes, from Sumerian tales through modern movies, face what Joseph Campbell has termed the "Road of Trials." In the prototypical ordering of hero myths, this time of testing begins after the hero has crossed the threshold of normal life and experienced a "rebirth" into a heroic identity. In the Jesus story, baptism by John the Baptist serves as this crossing of the threshold. Jesus' heroic identity is announced, and he immediately goes into the wilderness to be tested.

The Gospel of Mark is the earliest written Jesus myth that made it into the canon of the Bible. In just a couple of verses, we learn that the Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness, where he was tested by an adversary, and that angels tended him during this time when he lived with wild animals. Mark indicates that Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days, which in terms of Jewish storytelling was a shorthand for "a very long time." It is also thought that the number 40 referred to a period of testing or punishment, which makes it perfect in the context of the Jesus story.

In the Gospel of Matthew, the story becomes fleshed out a bit, with three specific temptations indicated, and the author of the Gospel of Luke borrowed heavily from the Gospel of Matthew for his version. (Incidentally, the writers of the Gospel of John had little use for the temptation story.) Many people have extracted lessons from this story about Jesus' character and how to follow his example. For instance, some people observe that Jesus used scriptural references to resist the temptations, and thus assume that knowing the Bible inside and out will lead to a more "holy," temptation-free life. In the Gospel of Matthew, however, there is a constant effort to prove the identity of Jesus by referring back to Jewish scripture, often taking the original scripture completely out of context in order to legitimize Jesus as the Jewish "messiah" of legend. Perhaps more significant is the implication that Jesus understood the temptations of wealth (bread is frequently symbolic of money in Jewish literature), fame, and power, and realized that these things frequently distract people from true wisdom and happiness. More on these things in a moment.

Some people are fond of the idea of being tested. After all, overcoming challenges makes us stronger and more capable people. When we prove ourselves to other people, we might get a promotion or a closer relationship or some other desirable privilege. Some of these challenges are very clear, with distinct rewards for success, and we choose to take them on because we want the reward. Of course, some individuals focus on how to get the rewards with a minimum of effort, overlooking that the designated trials are often intended to reflect inward character. We can go through our lives as if our only goal is to pass the next test in a long series of trials, neglecting our responsibility to infuse our lives with meaning. It might be said that part of the test is knowing how unimportant some tests are.

Of course, if we interpret tests as being spiritually significant, we can perceive a great deal of importance -- even eternal importance. There are those who believe that if they pass the trials of this life, they will be rewarded with greater joy and pleasure in an afterlife. Obviously, failing the trials of this life will yield a different result, but most folks believe that Hell is reserved for other people. Reward or punishment in an eternal afterlife certainly seems to be more motivating than anything that could happen in our temporally restricted physical life on Earth. Here's the thing though: there is a lot of good that can be done in this life, and there is a lot of joy and gratitude and satisfaction to be felt in this life. We don't really need to use belief in an afterlife as motivation. If we are doing the things that align with our deepest selves and honor our connection to the people around us, we will be creating what the gospel writers called the "kingdom of God." Since this term was often put in Jesus' mouth, we'll have more time to explore it in later entries. For now, the appropriate point is that there is no great trial-giver in the sky sending tests into our lives and scoring us on our successes to determine any sort of eternal destination.
 
We can absolutely test ourselves, setting goals and action plans that challenge us. There may be a great deal of personal satisfaction in overcoming challenges, even when the tangible rewards are slight. Sometimes building our sense of our own capability is an effective reward. When we start looking at our lives as a series of tests from something beyond ourselves, however, we risk losing that sense of our own capability. Not everything in life is a test. Illness is not a test, for instance. We cannot overcome most actual illnesses simply by our own efforts -- we rely on doctors to prescribe medicines and treatments so our bodies can heal. Illnesses may occur for any number of reasons, but there is no intentionality behind an illness -- no one decided to give us an illness to test us.

Likewise, things that happen because of someone's irresponsibility are not necessarily tests either. Being injured in a traffic collision because someone ran a red light is a result of human carelessness, and while we may face challenges as a result, our circumstances are not designed by anyone just to test us. We may find it challenging to pay our bills on time, and we may justifiably consider it an accomplishment when we pay off our last credit card and become debt free. However, there is no one orchestrating those financial challenges as some sort of Herculean trial. There are many things in life that are simply facets of living. We exist in a complex society with a lot of other people, and there are very real challenges that emerge in that system. That in no way implies an intelligence on the other end of these challenges waiting to reward or punish us. We ultimately decide which challenges in life we will tackle, and what our success will mean to us.

Which is why the story of Jesus' trials in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke are potentially more spiritually valuable for us than the earlier version in the Gospel of Mark. The spiritual truth in the tale has nothing to do with an intelligent spiritual adversary who is out to trick us -- we do well enough at tying our own spiritual shoelaces together in knots. The spiritual truth in the tale has nothing to do with how well we must memorize the scriptures of a particular religion. There are plenty of spiritual leaders who know their scriptures very well and still wind up in scandalous or violent headlines. Being able to recite words does not necessarily guarantee that we understand their meaning. The interesting spiritual piece in the temptation story is about the temptations themselves.

We are still living in a society that glorifies wealth, fame, and power over other people. It has apparently been a reality of human community for a very long time if these three things were considered the primary distractions from spirituality two thousand years ago. As many people have said, none of these three can provide happiness or satisfaction in life. Money is only as valuable as what one does with it, and the same goes for fame and power. The more time we spend worrying about our popularity or our bank accounts or our titles, the less time we have for the things that are truly meaningful. Money and popularity and power are not bad things, though, despite what one may infer from the gospel writers. These three temptations simply have incredible distraction potential. When we give them too much importance in our lives, we run the risk of missing the things that have true value: our integrity, our relationships, our connection to the world around us.

In the hero-myth of the gospels, Jesus knew what was important to him. He had a level of self-awareness that comes from intentional, honest introspection. While wealth, fame, and power hold some allure, there are more important things in life. At a very deep level, we know that, but we often forget it. We might try to fool ourselves with the justification that we can do more good in the world if we have more resources, but the truth is that we already have enough. The challenge of knowing what has value in life is not a test from on high, nor is it trial we can bluff our way past. It is a challenge issued from deep within ourselves, and if we answer that challenge with a life that focuses on what matters most, our rewards will be immeasurable, not in some distant afterlife, but here and now.