Good Morning.
Often the Gospel stories don’t follow
in tight chronological order, but the story today clearly happened shortly after
the wedding story that we read yesterday.
Cana was a village about 15 miles west of Capernaum, which was on the
northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee.
Jesus is in Cana and some “royal official” came from Capernaum to find Him.
The official’s son was near death, and he came to ask Jesus to heal his
son.
Many of the people whom Jesus
encountered wanted to see some proof of His power before they would consider
believing in Him. That hasn’t changed
much in 2000 years. Apparently the man
wanted Jesus to come back to Capernaum with him and “do a healing.” Jesus often tired of people asking Him to
give some miraculous proof of His power.
He told the official that it wasn’t necessary for Him to go to Capernaum
and perform a visible miracle. The fact
that he came to Jesus to ask for help demonstrated some faith in Jesus, and
Jesus told him to just go back home and he would find that his son had been
healed.
How often do we wait for God to
accomplish something for
us? The whole of scripture is filled
with stories of God carrying out His ends through the most unlikely of
people. God works not for us but through us. God works his way through people, people who
have believed that God would use them to accomplish God’s purposes. That’s still the same today. God can use YOU to accomplish God’s purposes
if you are willing to let God use you.
Abraham, Moses, Elijah, Noah, Joshua, Jonah, Paul, Peter, and even Jesus
Himself doubted the possibility of God achieving God’s purposes through
them. When the angel came to Mary she
was terrified and couldn’t comprehend how she could possibly fit into God’s
plans. In the end she said: “Here am I,
the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” In the end Jesus said: “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup
from me; yet, not my will but yours be done.”
Each of us has a role in living out
God’s will “on earth as it is in heaven.”
Sometimes we are frightened.
Sometimes we feel inadequate.
Sometimes what God wants just doesn’t suit us. If this last is where you are, then I call
upon you to rethink the way you are leading your life. If you are frightened or feel inadequate to
the demands that God places on you, remember that God won’t ask you to do
something that you can’t do. God may ask
you to do something that you don’t believe you can do. If that happens then God will give you the
strength to do what you must. It must
start with faith – with trust – in the promises of the Lord. Doubting your ability to carry out your role
in God’s plan is neither sinful nor damning.
It’s natural. It happened to Mary
and to Jesus. But in the end we must
respond with their same faith: “let it be with me according to your word;”
“yet, not my will but yours be done.”
Let us pray: Heavenly Lord, use us for Your purposes. Use us to witness to Your will. Use us to carry out Your will. Give us the strength to live this day as
creatures of Your reign, set here in this world as Your ambassadors, Your
agents, to fearlessly promote your justice and righteousness, mercy and
compassion. Let us say with all the
saints through the ages, “Here am I, send me.”
In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
Today’s readings are Isaiah 59:15-21; Revelation
2:8-17; John 4:46-54; Psalm 117, 118, 112 & 113.
Blessings.
Pastor Jim
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