The Third Sunday after the Epiphany (January 22, 2023)

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be alway acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our Strength and our Redeemer. Amen.

The thing about children is that they want what whey want when they want it. This is something we’ve had to go over in our home lately as Jude and Rowan are learning to share. Just last night, Jude was all decked out in his Buffalo Bills helmet and Rowan walked in the room, saw him wearing it, and immediately began demanding it. Kids want what they want when they want it.

And guess what? Us adults, we aren’t that different. Many of us want what we want when we want it. We’re not patient. It’s interesting because delayed gratification brings with it a number of benefits. Neuroscientists and psychologists believe that being able to control your response to desires can makes you a more productive worker, provides great mental stability, makes you more socially competent, and most important of all, reduces engagement in harmful and addictive behaviors.

This doesn’t come naturally to us, but it is commanded of us. We saw that in this morning’s epistle reading: vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. In other words, don’t seek revenge; that tit-for-tat way of being in the world is ultimately the inability to delay gratification, it’s an impulsive desire to get yours. Yet, God in his great wisdom, has arranged our salvation to occur in a way that unfolds; it’s not something that happens instantaneously, but rather we become who we’re supposed to be as we learn to participate with the grace he gives us. Redemption is gradual and progressive. It happens in God’s time. The Christian life is about trusting in him.

In our Old Testament reading from Isaiah, the prophet is speaking to Israel in the future, during their exile from their homeland. And in the midst of that exile, he emphasizes themes of comfort and assurance, reminding them of their history. Israel descends from Abraham, God’s friend. God is with them even in the midst of their troubles. He exhorts them not to fear or dismay because God is with them. And finally, he looks forward to a time when they would return form the corners of the earth back to their land. To describe this, he uses the metaphor of springs in the desert, a theme we looked at during Advent. This is an interesting moment in Israel’s history because God is promising their restoration but it’s not there yet. They have to wait, they have to anticipate.

Similarly, we see this kind of looking forward in the Gospel reading from today where Jesus turns water into wine. The story is a familiar one: the wedding party runs out of wine, Jesus turns the water into wine, and the wedding coordinator is shocked at how good the wine is. Typically, you use the good wine first and then once people get drunk, you can introduce the lesser quality because they won’t know the difference. But Jesus doesn’t do this; he saves the best for last. This is true of the wine at the Wedding Feast and it’s also true of what happens in us.

It’s true that a great change in a person happens when they’re baptized. According to Romans 6, the baptized person dies with Christ and is raised a new creation. The baptized person is a Christian. At the same time, we also use child development as a template for Christians: someone who was just baptized is a baby Christian or a toddler Christian before they grow into full maturity. There is an already/not yet tension in the Christian person: we have already been decisively incorporated into Christ via baptism; we are not yet what we should be and the culmination of Baptism, the thing that’s promised to us there, is yet to come. What God says about us in Baptism becomes actualized, though that happens in an arduous process with many fits and starts. Redemption is gradual and progressive. But, as our Collect says, God will stretch for his right hand to help and defend us, despite our infirmities. Any and all progress in the Christian life is made from this starting point, the acknowledgment of our complete dependence on him.

There are two paths ahead for us in the Christian life: a way of anxiety and a way of trust. The anxious Christian thinks they have the power in and of themselves to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. They think by acting nicely or being good that they can convince God to love them. The downside of this way of thinking is what happens when we don’t act nicely. If we make God love us through by being good, what happens when we’re bad? I think God makes the Christian life a progressive venture to cure us of this way of thinking. If you’ve been a Christian for any length of time, you know that not only is this not how it works; it can be unhealthy.

And that brings us to the second path. Instead of being anxious, we can trust in him. We can trust that he knows what he’s doing when he saves the best for last. We can trust that beautiful promise from God through Paul in Philippians 1:6 “ that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:” We can trust that the deserts of our hearts will become fertile ground filled with springs as we depend on the grace he gives to us.

A lot of people have a lot of opinions about how to grow churches. A proliferation of programs, gimmicks, light shows, charismatic, and celebrity personalities are often put forward as “evangelism.” But these are really more symptomatic of that anxious Christianity. What Isaiah tells us is that when God works in us, people can “see and know and consider and understand together that the hand of the Lord hath done this, and the Holy One of Israel hath created it.” By trusting in God to do what he does, by participating with the grace he offers us, we become icons of the Gospel, we become magnets who draw people to God. That is what we’re about. As God grows us, we become fruitful and bring others to him. Thanks be to God!

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.