Living a Life of Faith, Not of Logic | John 2:1-11

Good morning, Watermark. My name is John Elmore. I'm one of the teaching pastors here at church, and I'm so thankful to be with you today. As you can see (spoiler alert), we're going to have some fun today. Are you guys in for it? It's going to be good. Hopefully (there's going to be water involved), I don't short out the entire grid up here. You can pray for that.

This past week… We have an 8-, 6-, and 4-year-old in our family. Our 4-year-old's name is Judd. We were separated from him. Laura and I were on the ground. He was three stories up with a total stranger. We found ourselves in the situation where we're separate, he's with a stranger, he's terrified, and I'm telling him to jump.

We were at Pine Cove family camp. I was teaching there this past week. He goes up the high ropes element thing. I mean, he's 4 years old. He has on the harness as tight as we can get it, and he's backed into that telephone pole. He has never done this before. He has never been on a zip line. He doesn't have a category for what it is because he has never done it, yet there I am down below, shouting up to him to listen to the counselor.

At Pine Cove they all have nicknames. I'm like, "Judd! Do whatever Darth Mader says to you!" He's like, "What? I don't even know this person." So, it's an exercise of faith for him. It's also an exercise of faith for me, because I'm like, "I don't know if that college student was paying attention while they were doing the ropes certification." She's detaching the zip line from the harness that goes to the structure, and I'm watching all this unfold.

All of a sudden, Darth Mader, or whatever her name was, was like, "Unzip!" down to the other college student at the other end. He's like, "Zip on!" I'm like, "Oh, here we go. This is nuts." I'm like, "Judd! Jump!" Little Judd backs off that pedestal. You know when your body won't even do what your mind is saying? Then he just jumps. Just joy on his face. I'm so proud of him, truly, not as much because he did a zip line, but by the leap of faith he took off that platform.

I was proud of me that I took a leap of faith letting my 4-year-old go up there. I'm like, "Everybody wins. What a day of faith." He gets done, and he's so excited. I wrap him up in a hug. That was living, with that huge grin on his face. I share that with you because coming out of 1 Corinthians… As we've walked through that letter, verse by verse, chapter by chapter, it has been so good to evaluate this life of faith and to correctively walk with Jesus in the body of Christ.

I'm excited about the new series we're going to have in the fall, but here, today, what I wanted to share with you and why I'm talking about faith is because, three months ago, I was reading a very familiar passage, and five words jumped off the page by the Holy Spirit and just hit me in a new way that I have not been able to shake.

So, when this Sunday came up, I knew, "I'm going to be teaching John 2:1-11." The five words that struck me are these: "Do whatever he tells you." It's found in this passage. Now, we know from John… John tells us why he wrote his gospel. In John 20:30-31, it says, "Now there were many signs he performed before his disciples that are not written in this book, but these were written so that you might believe Jesus is the Christ…"

He's the Anointed One, the Messiah, the one who was foretold throughout all of the prophecies. He's the fulfillment of that. "…and that by believing in him you might have life." That in believing in the Son of God you might have life. He is the one true Savior. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one goes to the Father except through the Son.

So, John tells us, "This is why: that you might believe." John uses the word believe 48 times in his gospel…belief. I was talking about faith earlier…48 times. Now, you might not have a category. Like, is that a lot or is that a few? Well, the other gospel writers use the word belief 7, 8, and 12 times in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. John, 48 times, this emphasis of belief and faith in Jesus, his life, death, and resurrection, that you might be saved.

So, what I'm talking about today is a life of faith and not a life of logic, because I fear that you might be like me. We were saved through grace by faith, and then after having been saved, we live a life of logic. Like, "Well, you saved me, and now I know what to do. I'll do it by my own gumption, my own know-how, my own wisdom, whatever I can figure out. I can self-actualize." No. We were saved by faith, and we live by faith.

Through Habakkuk, Romans, Galatians, and Hebrews it says the righteous will live by faith. In Romans 8, it says those who are children of God are led by the Spirit of God. It says in Hebrews 11:6 that it is impossible to please God without faith and, in 2 Corinthians 5:7, that we do not walk by sight but that we walk by faith.

So, today is going to be about living a life of faith, not a life of logic. Where we're going to be in John 2 is the turning of water into wine. This life of faith. Here's where we're going to be…three parts. You're going to see prayers of faith, obedience of faith, and sharing of faith. So, prayers, obedience, and sharing of faith that will lead to belief and glory unto Jesus. It will all be unto the glory of Jesus Christ. So, with that, let's jump in.

John 2:1-4: "On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee…" Cana was a tiny little town in the region of Galilee. "…and the mother of Jesus was there." Notice how it says the mother of Jesus. This is all focused on Jesus, not even using the names of other individuals, because it's all like, "I want you to behold Jesus and have faith and belief in him."

"Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples." That's important too that the disciples were there, as we'll see at the very end of the passage. "When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, 'They have no wine.' And Jesus said to her, 'Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.'"

1. Prayers of faith. When Mary is confronted with a problem… She's just attending a wedding. It's not hers. She's just there. She realizes they've run out of wine, and rather than going around to the other women, like, "Hey, let's take up a collection and see what we can get. Then we'll run down to our local Spec's and pick up a few cases of wine…"

Instead, she's like, "I'm going to go to my son, because I know exactly who he is. I don't know how he's going to solve it, but I know he has the answer. He's going to be able to figure this out. He's no mere carpenter. I know what that angel told me when I was pregnant with child, that the Holy Spirit would come upon me and that I would bear the one who would deliver his people from their sins. That's not just a carpenter's boy. So when I'm faced with a problem, I go to him."

Now why is it called prayers of faith? Because you have Mary talking face-to-face with the incarnate Son of God, God in flesh. So, as she's saying, "They have no wine. They've run out of wine," that's a prayer. She's talking to God in flesh. She's presenting the problem. She's not ascribing to God, "And this is how you're going to fix it." I think we do that so often. We're like, "Hey, God, I'm lonely, so this is what I need, and this is how you're going to deliver it and when I need it by, and this is what he's going to look like and how tall he's going to be," and all of that.

Instead, she just goes with the problem. "They've run out of wine. They have no wine." Now, in verse 4, he says two interesting things. He says, "Woman, what does this have to do with me?" Now, this is the only time I will ever tell you not to follow Jesus' example. Do not call your mom "Woman." When you go home for Thanksgiving, don't say, "You know what? I've been reading in John 2. Hey, woman! What time is the turkey ready?" Don't do that. Call her "Mom" until the day she's at home with the Lord. You just keep on calling her "Mom."

But here Jesus, I think really intentionally, says, "Woman, what does this have to do with me?" I think because he's like, "Hey, Mom, our relationship is about to change. My public ministry is beginning, and now you're going to be a follower of me. I will now be the authority over you. Woman, what does this have to do with me?" Then he says something else strange. He says, "My hour hasn't come yet."

I think she must have been a little confused too, like, "Wait. No, I said 'wine,' not 'time.' Why did you say your hour hasn't come? I'm not talking about time, Jesus. I'm talking about wine. They ran out of wine, not time. Why did you say, 'My hour hasn't come yet'?" But as you continue on through the gospel of John, there is this refrain of hour. The word hour is repeated, and it has the utmost significance in Jesus' life. Listen to it.

John 7: "So they were seeking to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him, because his hour had not yet come." John 8: "…but no one arrested him, because his hour had not yet come." John 12: "And Jesus answered them, 'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.'" John 12:27: "Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? But for this purpose I have come to this hour."

John 13: "Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end." Then, finally, John 17: "When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, 'Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you…'"

He says to Mary, "The hour is coming. You're telling me they've run out of wine. I'm telling you my hour hasn't come yet, because when my hour comes, I will give wine. I will give wine in abundance, the joy and blessing, but the wine I will give is my blood poured out and shed for the forgiveness of sins." Which no other founder of any other religion has ever done…to lay down his life and then be raised again, proving that he was no mere man; not just a good teacher or prophet, but God in flesh.

We know this from Luke 22:20. "In the same way, after the supper he took the cup…" He's now holding a cup of wine. "…saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.'" She says, "They've run out of wine," and he says, "What does that have to do with me? My hour hasn't come yet."

He's saying he's there. He is the bridegroom, watching a wedding unfold, probably thinking about his own wedding of the bridegroom of the church and how he's going to lay down his life, and he will provide wine. The wine he provides will be his blood poured out for the forgiveness of sins. So he says, "My hour hasn't come yet."

We know from the rest of the story that he's going to turn water into wine. We know there's more to the story, so even though he gives a "No" to Mary and says, "There is a time coming when I will," he's also going to do it. A principle you can take from this is just because, as you offer prayers in faith, as Mary did… "They've run out of wine. They have no wine." As you offer prayers in faith, just because you haven't seen God move yet does not mean he won't ever.

Just because you haven't seen God move yet as you go to him with your prayers of faith does not mean it's the end of the story, as shown here in John, chapter 2. There is more that is going to happen. We'll pick up again here in verse 5. "His mother said to the servants [who were standing by], 'Do whatever he tells you.'" Those are the five words. Those five words in verse 5 just hit me, jumped off the page like I'd never seen them before, even though the passage is so familiar. "Do whatever he tells you." Oh, that I would live my life like that.

"Now there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons." This one is literally of biblical proportion. It's 26 gallons. This is about what they would have had…six of these. "Jesus said to the servants, 'Fill the jars with water.' And they filled them up to the brim."

1. The obedience of faith. They've laid their request before the Lord, and now Jesus is going to ask people to act in faith. This is super strange, because he says, "Woman, what does this have to do with me?" which is implicitly nothing. "This has nothing to do with me. I am the Messiah. I'm not the sommelier or the winebibber. I'm not the master of the feast. I'm not the waiter. That's not what I'm here for. Woman, what does this have to do with me?"

Yet it's as if she's like… She just kind of listens to him, and then she turns to the servants and is like, "Uh-huh. Do whatever he tells you." I'm sure he's like, "Mom!" But then he says, "Fill the jars. Fill them up to the brim." It's really strange, because on one hand, he had just said, "No." Then when she says, "Do whatever he tells you," he acts on it. So what's going on there?

I think what's going on there is she offered prayers of faith, and now he's asking people for obedience of faith. This is really akin to the Canaanite or Syrophoenician woman found in Matthew 17 or Mark 7. See if it's a familiar passage to you. There's a woman. She's a pagan, and her child is demon-possessed. As Jesus and the disciples are walking through, she's crying after them that Jesus would deliver her child from the demon. So much so that the disciples are like, "Rabbi, Lord, she's crying after us. Send her away."

So he turns to her and says, "I have come for the lost sheep of Israel, and it's not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs." It's like, "Oh!" I'm sure the people are cringing, like, "Jesus, you just called her a dog." She could have been like, "Why did you call me that? How dare you call me that?" Instead, seeming to understand, like, "I understand. You're the Jewish Messiah. You've come for the Israelites, and then the church will be born, and it will be for all people…"

She says, "Yes, but even the dogs eat from the crumbs that fall from the master's table." He's like, "Great is your faith, woman. May it be done as you have requested." In that hour, the demon left her child. It's the same way when he says, "No" to his mother, and she turns to the servants and says, "Do whatever he tells you," and he does. I think he saw her faith, the obedience of faith, and was like, "Okay. Okay. I see that faith. That faith is what I'm after."

So, you have Mary now telling the servants, "Do whatever he tells you." If I'm the servant, I'm like, "Hold up. I have a boss, and you are not her. Our boss (as we'll know later from the story) is the master of feasts. I don't know who you are, woman from Nazareth, but I don't answer to you. Furthermore, I don't answer to your carpenter son who came here with all his boys. I don't report to you. This isn't my job. Who are you to tell me what to do, and especially to delegate that nonexistent authority to your son for him to tell me what to do? What's going on here?"

Let me break it down for you, those five words that struck me that moved those servants to record the very first miracle that ever happened. The five words: "Do whatever he tells you." If we could only live by those five words, there's no telling the miracles that would unfold in our lives. So let's break it down.

Do is don't think about it. Don't wait until you're ready. Don't pray for months on end. When you know the Lord has commanded you to do something, you do it. I've heard it said that obedience, biblically speaking, is RICH. It is radical. Do you know how radical it is when you're lacking wine to fill up a jar with water? It makes no sense at all. It's radical.

It is immediate. It says he said it, and they did it. They filled it up to the brim. It's also costly. These servants could have been fired on the spot, like, "What are you doing listening to this guy and this woman? Get back to work. We're out of wine. You need to do something productive instead of fetching water." It's costly. Lastly, obedience is holy. Obedience, biblically, walking in faith unto the Lord, is a holy act of worship. Obedience is RICH.

Whatever is whatever. It might not make much human sense what a holy God is asking you to do, but that's precisely what he's after. He's not after a life of logic. He's after a life of faith. So, the "whatever" he asks you to do is what we do in faith. It's whatever.

Then, also, it is he. He is Jesus. We have a lot of competing voices and noise in our lives, from news to social media and outside influences, in the culture, in this fallen, moral landslide of a world that we're living in…all the noise, all of the voices. There is one singular voice: Do whatever he (Jesus, the Lord, the Messiah, the Anointed One who has sent his Spirit who dwells in you)… He is your authority.

He is your kurios, your Lord, and what he says goes, what he tells. You see, we're not deists. The Lord speaks. He speaks by his Spirit. He speaks through his people. He speaks through his Word. He speaks through circumstances, but the Lord speaks. We aren't just following deism with a mute God, but we have a living, speaking God, a living hope. So, what he tells. It says in Job 33:14, "For God speaks again and again…" Or another translation says, "One way and another." "…though people do not recognize it." Because of the noise. He's speaking.

"Do whatever he tells you." In this case, Mary was saying this to the servants. In the New Testament, it says all throughout that we are also servants, that he is Lord and we are his servants. We're his ambassadors, his anointed ones, his sent ones, sent out to share the good news and hope of Jesus, the gospel, the good news. The Greek word is diakonos. It's a servant of a king, one who fulfills the commands of another.

So, here you have these servants fulfilling the commands of another, filling up these water jars, and they had no reason to. They'd just met this guy, delegated authority by a mom they had just met. They had no reason, yet they followed him in faith. So, then you have to think about the servants and their mindset.

They're like, "Okay. All right. First, you have no authority over us. That doesn't make sense. We don't answer to you. We have a master of the feast. Who are you? Furthermore, we aren't out of water. You've told us to fill these water jars, like, for ritual cleansing with water? We're out of wine, not water. You're not hearing right. This doesn't make any logical sense."

Then, thirdly, and maybe most audacious of it all, these were for ritual cleansing. They were purification jars. You could never drink from these. That would be sacrilege. This is from Mark, chapter 7. This is funny. The Pharisees and the elders, the scribes, rebuke the disciples. They're like, "Hey, Rabbi! How come your disciples don't wash their hands before meals?" This wasn't because they were afraid of getting the common cold or something.

This was ritual cleansing, because they thought the entire world was unclean, and as they went out about it, the only way they could get clean again was to get some of that ritual cleansing water to clean not only their hands but also the cups, the vessels, the copper kettles, and even the dining couches they sat on. That's what these were for. Jesus in Mark 7 says, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you, because you honor me with your lips, but your hearts are far from me."

It's elsewhere where he would say, "Hey, you cleanse the outside of the cup, and on the inside you are full of filth." He's like, "It's dead religion. Those jars are dead religion, but I'm about to give them a miraculous conversion as you walk in faith." It would have been sacrilege to fill these up and use them, yet they do. They weren't concerned about a life of logic; they were doing a life of faith.

We can fall into that same trap where we don't do the life of faith. Instead, we're like, "You saved me by grace through faith, and now I'm living this life of logic," but the Bible is full of examples of people who lived a life of logic, and it went really, really south really, really quickly. You have Abraham, who is promised to be the father of many nations, to have children as numerous as the stars in the sky, a blessing to every nation, yet he and Sarah try and try and try, and they wait and wait and wait, and nothing.

So, in that moment of weakness, rather than living a life of faith, they start to live a life of logic. Sarah is like, "You know what? Take my handservant Hagar. Maybe the child of promise will come through Hagar." Life of logic. You have Ishmael, and then the child of faith Isaac, and they're at enmity together for generations upon generations because they stepped out of faith and started living by logic.

Or what about when God said, "Hey, you're wandering in the wilderness. I'm going to give you something to eat. When you wake up tomorrow, the ground is going to be covered with bread, but only have enough for one day, because I'm going to give you daily bread. You're going to walk by faith. Don't get more than enough, just for today, because if you do it'll rot."

The people are like, "Man, I've never seen this before. It just rained bread. Here's enough for today, and I'm going to stock some up for tomorrow, because I don't know. When's the last time it rained bread?" The next day, it was full of maggots and had a stench about it as it rotted, because they started living by logic.

Or the 10 spies who went into the land. They were like, "Hey, there are giants, by the way. We're like grasshoppers to them. We are going to get decimated. If we go in there, we're getting wiped out." They planted these seeds of doubt throughout the Israelites who were supposed to walk in by faith, and the Lord would displace all of those other ancient Near East countries. Instead, they tried to logic their way out of it, so they never entered into the Promised Land.

Or Achan's treasure. Jericho falls, and they're not supposed to take any of the spoil. Instead, Achan is like, "I'll get a robe and a little bit of gold, because we just came out of Egypt. What would be the harm in that? We don't have anything. We're kind of destitute. We're going into the Promised Land. This stuff is all going to get thrown away anyway." So he takes it, but they were the items devoted to destruction, so Achan and all his family were destroyed, because he started operating by logic instead of by faith.

You think about Saul when they were like, "Hey, we want to be like all of the other nations. We're kind of a laughingstock. They're like, 'Who's your king? Who do you follow?' and we're like, 'God,' and they're like, 'Right.' We want to be able to walk in, see a person on a throne, ask a request, he do something about it, and lead us into battle." He's like, "No, you're supposed to be a theocracy. You're supposed to follow God." They're like, "No, we want a king." He's like, "All right. Fine. You want to live by logic? Here. You get Saul," a prideful man who would lead them into sin.

Or another example of life by logic… Let's go New Testament where Peter… "Peter, who do you say that I am?" He says, "You're the Christ, the Son of the living God." He's like, "Blessed are you, Simon Peter Bar-Jonah, for it is not flesh and blood that has revealed this to you, but the Lord." Then moments later, Jesus says, "The Son of Man, by the way, the one you just acknowledged me as… He has to be betrayed, crucified, and handed over to be killed."

Peter says, "Far be it from you, Lord! May it never be!" He switched over into logic instead of faith, and Jesus says, "Get behind me, Satan. You have in mind the things of man and not the things of God." You see, it was their trapping and it is our trapping, that we will be saved by faith and then creep into this life of logic rather than being saved by faith and then live by faith. We have to live by faith.

So, I want to show a little bit of what this looked like. The reason I do this… You guys know I'm a visual learner, so this stuff just helps me, because I think that as we read John 2… It's the foe of familiarity, where you're so close to it… You can imagine a little felt board with Jesus making water into wine. We read it like folklore, almost like it's a myth. It's words on a page. So, I hope this will place us into the story and, honestly, the ridiculousness of what they were doing in faith, their obedience in faith.

They were putting water into a ritual purification jar when they said they were out of wine. Just think about this. They're out of wine, and these servants are fetching water. Not only that. They're putting it in a vessel that has a completely different purpose. There's not just one of these; there are six of them. Think about the time this would take. They're now being pulled off task. "Lord, I'm supposed to be doing something else, and you've got me here doing this." But they weren't operating by logic; they were operating by faith.

Like a life of logic and all of the examples in the Scriptures, there are so many examples where God asks people to do things that are completely counterintuitive. It's a life of faith. Not by sight but by faith. So, you think about the Passover when the Israelites are trapped in Egypt…two million people. It's like, "God, how are you going to get us out? What are you going to do, God, to get us out? Are we going to revolt? Are we going to overthrow these people? Are we going to sneak out? What's the plan?"

He's like, "Here's the plan. Here it is. Are you ready? Have a seat. We're going to have a big feast."

"Wait. That's how we're going to escape? We're going to have a feast?"

"Yeah, it's going to be a feast. We're going to have a big dinner. Oh, and when you slaughter the lamb, put some of the blood on your door."

"What? Put the Egyptians' blood on the door? Like, kill the Egyptians and put their blood…?"

"No, the lamb. Eat the meal, and then you're going to go free."

And they did. It was not logical; it was faithful. So they stepped in that regard. Or you think about Jericho. As they're going into the Promised Land, the oldest inhabited city in the world, a walled city… It's like, "What's the plan, God? Are we going to go up against it? Are we going to set fire on it? Are we going to do bows and arrows and spears? What do you want us to do?"

He's like, "I've got it. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to walk around the city one time a day for six days and just blow a horn. Then on the seventh day, do it seven times. After you blow the horn, then… Are you ready for this? Shout." I'm sure they were like, "We are going to get waylaid. Are you kidding? Shout? That's the plan? Have you heard of bow and arrows? We're going to get struck down." But they shout, and the walls fall flat in Jericho.

I want you to think about Jonah. God sends Jonah to the Ninevites, to the capital city where the king is. The Ninevites were the Assyrians. They were the superpower of the world at that point in time. You know Jonah is like, "Hey, God, you know they're the people who stack the heads of their enemies in pyramids as a thing of horror. They take their enemies and impale them on stakes as a warning sign to anyone who would come and threaten them, and you want me to go and tell them to repent? Just me." It's no wonder he fled and got spit out by a fish.

But he walks into that city, and do you know what he's armed with? He's armed with five words also. It wasn't "Do whatever he tells you." These were, in Hebrew, five words that were "Yet 40 days and Nineveh will fall." The whole nation repents…sackcloth, ashes, fasting. They didn't even let the animals eat or drink. The whole nation repents. Talk about faith over logic.

Then let's go New Testament. You have the fishermen, the disciples. They haven't caught anything all night. There's a dude on the shore, and he's like, "How's your catch?" They're like, "Terrible. Terrible night." He's like, "Cool. Hey, throw your net on the other side." They're like, "Yeah. Stay in your lane, carpenter. We're fishermen. That's not how we do this. It's a dragnet that we put below the boat. The fish swim into it, and we pull them up. So it doesn't matter if the net is on this side or on that side. They're not going to be in the net if they're not on this side."

But in faith, they pull up the net and drop it on the other side, completely illogical, and they catch so many fish they have to call in the other boat because the fish are swamping that boat. Biggest catch. Or here's the last one I'll share. Jesus goes up to the temple. He doesn't want to make a stumbling block, so he's like, "Hey, we need to pay the tax." They're all checking their money. They don't have anything in their Venmo account.

They're like, "Oh man. We're fresh out. What do you have?" They're like, "Well, you had us quit our jobs and leave the tax booth, so we don't have anything, actually." He says to Peter, "It's no problem. Go throw your line in the water with a hook, and the first fish you catch, I want you to look in its mouth." I'm sure Peter is like, "What? I said 'tax.' We need the temple tax."

Yet Peter catches a fish, pulls it out, and what's in there is a shekel, which just so happened to be the exact right amount for the temple tax, four drachmae, for Jesus and Peter to get in. Just the right amount. It says they filled it to the brim in faith. I'm sure they were like, "Okay. Great. Now what? Now we have 180 gallons of water. Awesome, Rabbi. Great. Thank you. That was a colossal waste of time."

1. Sharing of faith. Verse 8: "And he said to them, 'Now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast.' So they took it." Do you see the immediacy of that? But do you know how ridiculous it is? They've just filled this with water, and now he's like, "All right. Now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast." Now they're really like, "Oh, I'm for sure getting fired. I haven't been doing my job for a while, and now I'm going to take him some water out of this sacrilegious jar and tell my boss to drink it, or my boss' boss' boss. I'm so never going to work again in Cana as a bartender."

"When the master of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom and said to him, 'Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine.'" This guy is a professional party thrower. He knows how it works. "But you have kept the good wine until now."

That's the sharing of faith, the insanity of it. The wine had run out. They fill it up with water, and then they walk it over and are like, "Here, master of the feast. Try this." What that man tasted was better than any other wine he had ever tasted before. Look. I'm a recovering alcoholic. I've tasted a lot of alcohol in my life. Whatever Jesus made blew this guy's category. The master of the feast was like, "Okay. Nobody does what you just did. I thought that was the good stuff."

You know the bridegroom was like, "That was the good stuff, and that's all of it. It's gone. We're in trouble." He was like, "Whatever that is is the best." So it is with you and your offering of faith, your sharing of faith with others, that they will taste Jesus and be like, "Man, I've been drinking the world my whole life. I've been drinking men and women and money and status, and all I got was anxiety and trouble and depression."

When they taste Jesus, they'll be like, "That's like nothing else. Everybody else serves the good stuff. I've been drinking the good stuff, but you saved the best for last. Whatever you just brought me… That's from Jesus, and it's the best." The sharing of faith. Now, also (you have to note this), God's plans often only make sense in hindsight.

Everything they were doing… It wasn't until the moment the master of the feast tasted it that it all made sense and they were like, "Oh! That's why we were doing that," because that's a life of faith. If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew why God was having you do what he was having you do, it wouldn't require faith.

Our director of pastoral care, Aaron Harder and his wife Kellie… They'd just finished the Watermark Institute. He was in an incredible role at an incredible church, yet he comes to me and is like, "Man, I think we're being called to Colorado. I think we're supposed to go to Colorado." I'm like, "Really? Tell me about it." He's like, "Well, we don't have a place to live. They aren't able to pay me. I don't have a salary, and my wife Kellie doesn't have a job yet, but we're supposed to go." He turns in his notice and takes this huge step of obedience and faith.

Do you want to know why they did that? Because of the darkness that exists in Colorado. They wanted to not only pray with faith and obey with faith; they wanted to share Jesus in faith there in Colorado. So they went. Three weeks later, after they took that step of faith, Kellie got a job. They had a free place to stay within walking distance of her job, and all of their needs were met through support raising for this small church he would be a part of, only the second person on staff at this church. I've never been prouder of the guy. I was so proud of him as he stepped in faith.

What you can kind of think is "But, God, I'm just this broken vessel. I'm weak. I don't have much to offer. I don't have the gift of evangelism. I don't have very much money to give toward this. If I show up to serve, what good will I be? Will I really move the dial?" Well, what if the little boy who had the fish and loaves would have said that? What if he would have been like, "Well, it's only just a little bit of lunch. What good is this? At least I could eat if I kept it." Instead he was like, "No, you have it." Jesus will take your meager offering and multiply it to bless others and that others would believe and that it would result in the glory of God.

What if the widow would have said, "Well, I only have these mites. That's all I have"? Yet when she dropped those in, Jesus said, "I tell you the truth. She gave more than all of the others." Or what if it was just that mustard seed of faith? Jesus said, "With that you can move a mountain." Because it's not up to you. It's not about your offering. It's that you would take that meager offering and share it in faith, and in that meager offering, Jesus will multiply it and create a miracle of faith in the life of others.

You see, everybody at that wedding got some of that wine…180 gallons. We're not talking Franzia in a box. When you find a need and fill it in faith, everyone will be blessed. People will believe in Jesus, and he will be glorified. He will transform what you offer, just like he transformed you. It doesn't stop. He transformed you when he saved you, and every time you make an offering in faith, he will transform that to expand the kingdom. So, the question isn't if he's able. The question is…Are you willing?

Watch this in verse 11. Here's the conclusion: "This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him." It manifested his glory, and his disciples believed in him. Everybody got blessed, but his disciples came to faith, all through a prayer of faith, obedience of faith, and sharing of faith. Blessing, belief, and glory for Jesus Christ. May we all live a life of faith and not a life of logic. May we find a need and fill it in faith, knowing that God is going to do something more than we can ask or expect or imagine as he multiplies that meager offering.

You remember Judd jumping off that zip line. That's not the only thing he did that required faith. He also got on this huge banana boat. We pulled him behind a boat, and he was tubing, first time ever, which was nerve-racking as well, to see your 4-year-old out there all alone hitting these things. At the end of the week, we were walking up into the cabin, and he goes, "Dad, I want to live here." He was done with the old life. He was like, "This life of faith, where I just jump on, jump out, hold on, this wild ride… I want to live here."

May it be for us too, that we would stop living a life of logic and we would be like, "No, I want to live here. I can't see what you're doing. I don't know the 'connect the dots,' like, what this is actually going to shape out as you draw with my life, but I'm trusting you. I'm going to live a life of faith. I'm done living a life of logic." May the miracles unfold, people come to faith, and Jesus be glorified. Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you and praise you for what you have recorded in John so that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that in believing in him we would have life. May we never stop this life of faith and trade it for a life of logic, but instead, pray in faith, obey in faith, and then share you in faith. Lord, we love you. We sing to you now for all your glory, amen.