Homilies on John, Homily 22

“Woman, what do I have to do with you? My hour has not yet come.” [1.] Preaching the word takes work, as Paul makes clear when he says, “Let the elders who lead well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching.” ( 1 Tim. v. 17.) Yet you can make this work light or heavy. If you reject our words, or if you do not actually reject them but fail to put them into practice, our work will be heavy, because we are working uselessly and in vain. But if you pay attention to them and prove it by your actions, we will not even feel the effort, because the fruit our work produces will keep us from noticing how great that effort is. So if you want to stir up our zeal, and not extinguish or weaken it, show us your fruit, I beg you, so that we may see the fields waving with grain and, sustained by hopes of an abundant harvest and counting up your riches, may not grow lazy in carrying on this good trade. The question before us today is no small one either. First, when Jesus’ mother says, “They have no wine,” Christ replies, “Woman, what do I have to do with you? My hour has not yet come.” Then, after saying this, He did what His mother had asked—an action that needs just as much examination as His words. Let us call on Him who performed the miracle, then go on to explain it. These words are used not only here but elsewhere too. The same Evangelist says, “They could not lay hands on Him, because His hour had not yet come” ( c. viii. 20 ); and again, “No one laid hands on Him, because His hour had not yet come” ( c. vii. 30 ); and again, “The hour has come; glorify Your Son.” ( c. xvii. 1.) What, then, do these words mean? I have brought together several examples so that I can give one explanation for them all. And what is that explanation? Christ did not say, “My hour has not yet come,” because He was bound by appointed seasons or required to observe an “hour.” How could He be, when He is the Maker of seasons and the Creator of times and ages? What else, then, was He referring to? He wants to show that He does everything at the right time, without doing everything at once. A kind of confusion and disorder would have followed if, instead of doing everything at its proper time, He had mixed it all together—His Birth, His Resurrection, and His coming to Judgment. Consider this: creation was to take place, but not all at once; man and woman were to be created, but even they were not to be created together; humanity was to be condemned to death, and there was to be a resurrection, but a long interval was to separate the two; the law was to be given, but not grace along with it—each was to be given at its proper time. Now Christ was not bound by appointed seasons; instead, He established their order, since He is their Creator. That is why He says here, “My hour has not yet come.” He means that He had not yet made Himself known to the wider public, nor did He even have His full company of disciples. Andrew followed Him, and Philip after him, but no one else. Moreover, none of them—not even His mother or His brothers—knew Him as they should. For after His many miracles, the Evangelist says of His brothers, “For even His brothers did not believe in Him.” ( c. vii. 5.) Nor did the people at the wedding know Him, since in their need they would certainly have come and appealed to Him. That is why He says, “My hour has not yet come”; that is, “The company does not yet know Me, nor are they even aware that the wine has run out. Let them recognize this first. You should not have been the one to tell Me; you are My mother, and you make the miracle look suspicious. Those who needed the wine should have come and asked Me—not because I need this, but so that they might accept the miracle with complete conviction. Someone who knows he is in need is very grateful when he receives help; but someone who does not recognize his need will never have a plain and clear understanding of the benefit.” Why, then, after saying, “My hour has not yet come,” and refusing her, did He do what His mother wanted? Above all, it was so that those who opposed Him and thought He was subject to the “hour” would have enough proof that He was subject to no hour. For if He had been, how could He have done what He did before the proper “hour” came? Next, He did it to honor His mother, so that He would not seem to contradict her outright and shame the woman who gave birth to Him in front of so many people. He also did it so that He would not be thought to lack power, since she had brought the servants to Him. Besides, even while saying to the Canaanite woman, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and give it to dogs” ( Matt. xv. 26 ), He still gave her the bread because He took her persistence into account. And although after His first reply He said, “I am sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” even after saying this He healed the woman’s daughter. From this we learn that although we are unworthy, we often make ourselves worthy to receive through persistence. That is why His mother stayed nearby and openly brought the servants to Him, so that more people would make the request. And so she added, Ver. 5. “Whatever He tells you, do it.” For she knew that His refusal came from humility, not from a lack of power, and from His desire not to seem to rush into the miracle without reason. That is why she brought the servants. Ver. 6, 7. “Six stone water jars stood there, in keeping with the Jews’ practice of purification, each holding two or three firkins. Jesus said to them, Fill the water jars with water; and they filled them to the brim.” The Evangelist has a reason for saying, “In keeping with the Jews’ practice of purification”: it is so that no unbeliever might suspect that wine sediment had been left in the vessels and that water poured in and mixed with it had produced a very weak wine. That is why he says, “In keeping with the Jews’ practice of purification,” to show that these vessels were never used to hold wine. For because Palestine is a country with little water, and streams and springs could not be found everywhere, they always kept water jars filled, so that if they became defiled at any time, they would not have to hurry to the rivers but would have the means of purification at hand. “And why did He not perform the miracle before they filled the jars? That would have been far more marvelous, since changing existing matter into something of a different quality is one thing, and creating matter out of nothing is another.” The latter would indeed have been more wonderful, but most people would have found it less believable. That is why He often deliberately makes His miracles less extraordinary, so that people will accept them more readily. “But why,” someone asks, “did He not produce the water Himself, which He afterward showed to be wine, instead of telling the servants to bring it?” For the very same reason, and also so that those who drew it could testify that what had happened was no illusion. If anyone had been inclined to deny it shamelessly, the servants could have told them, “We drew the water; we filled the vessels.” Besides the reasons we have mentioned, He also uses this to overthrow doctrines that arise against the Church. For some say that the Creator of the world is someone else, and that visible things are not His works but those of a certain other god opposed to Him. To restrain these men’s madness, He performs most of His miracles on matter already at hand. For if its creator had been opposed to Him, He would not have used someone else’s property to display His own power. But to show that He is the One who transforms water in the vines and turns rain into wine as it passes through the root, He accomplished in a moment at the wedding what takes a long time in the plant. When they had filled the water jars, He said, Ver. 8–10. “Now draw some out and take it to the manager of the feast; and they took it. When the manager of the feast tasted the water that had become wine and did not know where it came from, (but the servants who drew the water knew,) the manager of the feast called the bridegroom and said to him, Everyone serves good wine at the beginning, and when people have drunk freely, then the inferior wine; but you have kept the good wine until now.” Here again some people scoff, saying, “This was a gathering of drunken men. The judges’ senses were impaired, and they could not taste what had been made or judge what had happened, so they did not know whether what had been made was water or wine. For the manager himself,” they claim, “showed by what he said that they were drunk.” This is utterly ridiculous, yet the Evangelist has removed even this suspicion. For he does not say that the guests gave their opinion on the matter, but “the manager of the feast,” who was sober and had not yet tasted anything. Of course you know that those entrusted with managing such banquets are the most sober, since their one job is to arrange everything in an orderly way. That is why the Lord called on such a man’s sober senses to testify to what had happened. For He did not say, “Pour it out for those dining,” but, “Take it to the manager of the feast.” “And when the manager of the feast tasted the water that had become wine and did not know where it came from, (but the servants knew,) the manager of the feast called the bridegroom.” “And why did he not call the servants? That would have revealed the miracle.” Because Jesus Himself had not revealed what had happened, but wanted the power of His miracles to become known gently, little by little. And suppose it had been mentioned then: the servants who told the story would never have been believed. They would have been thought mad for testifying in this way about someone whom most people at that time regarded as an ordinary man. Although they knew from their own experience that it had certainly happened, (for they were unlikely to disbelieve their own hands,) they could not convince others. So He did not reveal it to everyone, but to the person best able to understand what had happened, leaving a clearer knowledge of it for a later time, since once other miracles had been revealed, this one too would be believable. Thus, when He was about to heal the nobleman’s son, the Evangelist shows that it had already become more clearly known. For it was chiefly because the nobleman had learned about the miracle that he appealed to Him, as John indicates in passing when he says, “Jesus came to Cana in Galilee, where He made the water wine.” ( c. iv. 46.) And it was not merely wine, but the best wine. [3.] For Christ’s miraculous works are like this: they are far more perfect and better than the workings of nature. This can also be seen in other cases. When He restored an impaired part of the body, He made it better than the healthy parts. That what had been made was wine, then, and the best wine, could be confirmed not only by the servants but also by the bridegroom and the manager of the feast; and those who drew the water could confirm that Christ had made it. So although the miracle was not revealed then, it could not remain unmentioned forever, since He had provided so many compelling witnesses for the future. He had the servants as witnesses that He had made the water wine, and the manager of the feast and the bridegroom as witnesses that the wine He had made was good. We might expect the bridegroom to reply to this, (the ruler’s speech,) and say something, but the Evangelist, hurrying on to more pressing matters, has only touched on this miracle and moved on. What we needed to learn was that Christ made the water wine, and good wine at that. He did not think it necessary to add what the bridegroom said to the manager. And many miracles that were somewhat obscure at first have become clearer over time, as those who knew about them from the beginning reported them more precisely. At that time, then, Jesus turned water into wine, and both then and now He never stops changing our weak and unstable wills. For there are—yes, there are—people who are no different from water: so cold, weak, and unsettled. But let us bring people with this disposition to the Lord, so that He may change their wills to have the quality of wine, so that they will no longer be watery but will have body and bring gladness to themselves and others. But who are these cold people? They are those who set their minds on the fleeting things of this present life, who do not despise this world’s luxury, who love glory and power. For all these things are flowing waters, never stable, always rushing violently downhill. Someone rich today is poor tomorrow; someone who appears one day with a herald, a belt of office, a chariot, and numerous attendants is often in a dungeon the next, having unwillingly left all that display behind to make room for someone else. Again, when a gluttonous and self-indulgent man has eaten to bursting, he cannot retain even for a single day the nourishment supplied by his delicacies. Once it has been used up, he must put in more to replenish it, no different from a torrent. For just as one body of water passes through a torrent and others follow in turn, so in gluttony, once one meal is gone, we need another. Such is the nature and fate of earthly things: never to be stable, but always to pour past and hurry away. With luxury, however, it is not merely this flowing and hurrying away; many other things trouble us too. The violence of its course wears away the body’s strength and strips the soul of its manliness. The strongest river currents do not eat away their banks and cause them to collapse as easily as luxury and sensual indulgence sweep away all the defenses of our health. If you enter a physician’s house and ask him, you will find that almost all causes of disease arise from this. For moderation and plain food are the mother of health, and that is why physicians have given them this name. They have called not eating your fill “health,” (because not eating your fill is health,) and they have described a light diet as the “mother of health.” Now if eating less than your fill is the mother of health, it is clear that fullness is the mother of sickness and weakness, and produces attacks beyond even physicians’ skill. For gout in the feet, strokes, dimness of sight, pains in the hands, tremors, attacks of paralysis, jaundice, persistent fevers and inflammatory fevers, and many more diseases besides these, (for we do not have time to go through them all,) are the natural offspring of gluttony and overeating, not of abstinence and a moderate diet. And if you look at the diseases of the soul that arise from them, you will see that greed, laziness, depression, dullness, impurity, and every kind of folly originate here. For after such banquets, the souls of those who live in luxury become no better than donkeys, torn apart by wild beasts like these (passions). Should I also tell you how many pains and frustrations those devoted to luxury endure? I could not list them all, but I will make the whole matter clear through one main point. At a table of the kind I am describing—a lavish one—people never eat with pleasure. For abstinence is the mother of pleasure as well as health, while overeating is the source and root of displeasure as well as disease. Where people are fully satisfied, there can be no desire; and where there is no desire, how can there be pleasure? That is why we would find that the poor not only have better understanding and better health than the rich, but also enjoy greater pleasure. As we reflect on this, let us flee drunkenness and luxury—not only luxury at the table, but every other kind found in the things of this life. Let us exchange it for the pleasure that comes from spiritual things and, as the Prophet says, delight ourselves in the Lord: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart” ( Ps. xxxvii. 4 ); so that we may enjoy good things both here and in the next life, through the grace and loving kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom, to the Father and the Holy Spirit, be glory forever and ever. Amen.