Now doesn’t the same thing so often happen today? --THINK about it!  So many folks nowadays are depending on what we may call wine.  They’re convinced that their precious beverage will last them all their lives.  But suddenly they find that the vintage vanishes.  And it’s terribly PAINFUL for them, because, unlike Jesus and the guests at the wedding feast of Cana, they’re ADDICTED to their wine.  Indeed, they’ve made it their god, are slaves to it!

    This wine comes in many forms:  for example, the RIPE, RED WINE OF SIN—and BY this I mean “Saturday-night sin.”  Don’t get me wrong!  When the Bible mentions sin, it’s speaking of something much greater than Saturday-night drunkenness, immorality, and general wildness.  Those sins and usually are symptomatic of a brokenness far greater.  The essence of sin is estrangement – separation from God, from others, and from our better selves.  But, for the moment, when I say “ripe, red wine of sin,” I AM referring to the Saturday-night kind of vices.   Some folks are BENT on drinking the full cup of life’s forbidden pleasures and lusts.  Yes, DETERMINED to break all society’s taboos.  Like the British soldier in Rudyard Kipling’s Mandalay, they cry, in effect:


    Yes, these folks drink the FULL CUP of the ripe, red wine of IMMORALITY and LICENTIOUSNESS -- only to CHOKE on the bitter dregs at the bottom!  And after the big blast’s ALL OVER, in the sad hangover period, all that’s left is GUILT, EMPTINESS, and perhaps DISEASE!

    But consider a SECOND kind of addictive wine that people often drink today: THE INSIPID WINE OF INDIFFERENCE -- yes, the flat, tasteless wine of apathy!   Here, of course, I’m speaking of those folks who show absolutely no interest in God, even though they may once have been active in the life of Christ’s Church!  Yes, ALL AROUND US today -- and even in the misnamed “Bible Belt,” where I was raised -- you and I can see so many people going about their lives raising families, working, playing -- but NEVER pausing to consider spiritual things.  Yes, drinking the wine of apathy towards the Christ they once professed to follow.  And, sadly, so often it’s only when the wine FAILS -- only when the DREAD STORMS of life arise, when TRAGEDY strikes, when they’re faced with the GRAVE (their own or that of someone they love), with its huge question mark stamped on it, that SOME of them come to their senses and turn to the One whom they’ve so long ignored!

    But isn’t there a THIRD wine that folks today are hooked on? -- What about the BITTER, DEADENING WINE OF ESCAPE? --I’m NOT just talking about ALCOHOL or DRUGS, either.  THIS particular vintage comes in MANY varieties.  GAMBLING, for example!  Or SEX.  Tiger Woods, according to the rumor, is now in rehabilitation for this addiction. Still OTHERS get hooked on their WORK.  Or CLUB-joining.   I could name scores of other things.
       
    In Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie young Tom Wingfield feels so tyrannized by his neurotic mother Amanda, who has cowed his lame sister Laura and made life miserable for him, that every night he goes out to the movies, to escape into a world of celluloid.  And towards the END of the play Amanda stands on the steps of their St. Louis tenement and screams after Tom, as he walks down the street:  “Just go, go, go--to the movies!. . . .Go to the moon. . . !”

    Yes, friends, movies, TV, the internet, all sorts of electronic devices and games — EACH can become a WAY of escape to us.  So many of us have never learned to FACE UP to life with all its problems, to cast ALL our cares on the God who LOVES us.  And so, MANY of us keep on trying to ESCAPE from life and from God.  And we don’t STOP until we’ve run down some BLIND ALLEY.  Until escape’s no longer possible.  Until the vintage VANISHES!

    But isn’t there yet ANOTHER kind of wine that folks today are addicted to? -- YES, the DELICIOUS, SWEET WINE OF PLEASURE and the ENJOYMENT OF LIFE!  And, after, all nothing’s really WRONG with that kind of beverage, is there?  In fact, that’s the kind of wine Jesus and his friends are enjoying here, at the wedding feast of Cana!

    To enjoy God’s gifts that delight us is fine.  But, friends, to get ADDICTED to that kind of wine can be deadly!  You and I live in a society that CONSTANTLY tells us:  “ENJOY yourself!  You’re NUMBER ONE!”  Buy “the best” home in “the best” neighborhood, join “the best” club, send your kids to “the best” school, associate only with “the best” people.   Just pick up your Sunday newspaper and out will fall scores of colorful ads that tell us we’ll all be complete if we only buy the biggest and the best of a thousand and one products on the market.
 
    “The secret to true happiness is MATERIAL THINGS!” says Madison Avenue.  Thus so many of us launch ourselves on an acquisitive binge.  We drink the wine of materialism until it sours in our mouths, and we’re left only with empty BOREDOM.  The vintage VANISHES.  And, with anguish, we finally ask, with Jesus, “What will it profit. . .to gain the whole world and forfeit [your] life?”

    Tell me, what about you?  Are you perhaps addicted to one of these wines I’ve mentioned this morning? The ripe, red wine of sin?  The insipid wine of indifference?  The deadening wine of escape?  The sweet wine of pleasure?  If so, I pray that, for you, the vintage has vanished!  I pray that today you realize that your wine’s given out.  Because, you see, it’s only when you know it’s failed that you can be delivered from its slavery!

    Look again at our story of the wedding feast.  What does Jesus do when the vintage vanishes? -- He calls the servants, and gives them a very strange order:  ‘FILL THOSE STONE JARS OVER THERE WITH WATER!”

    Astounded, they, nevertheless, fill them up to the brim.  ‘NOW DRAW SOME OUT,” Jesus commands, “AND TAKE IT TO THE CHIEF STEWARD of the feast.”

    The servants are afraid.  “What will the headwaiter THINK if we bring him a cup of plain water?-- He’ll fire us, or worse!”  But the servants again obey.  And to their astonishment, when the headwaiter raises the dipper to his lips, it’s no longer water but good, sweet Manischewitz or Mogen David!  (Admittedly not my favorites.  But, in Cana, maybe the wine was something like these Jewish ritual beverages of today.)

    What about YOU? --You who may realize now that your own vintage has vanished?  -- Jesus can do the very same thing for you!  He asks you, simply, to trust him.  To take the risk of obedience, the step of faith!  And he promises to break the chains that bind you to your wine.  Yes! -- The chains of the ripe, red wine of SIN, the insipid wine of INDIFFERENCE, the sweet wine of PLEASURE, and even the bitter, deadening wine of ESCAPE.

    And what will Jesus put in PLACE of that empty beverage you’ve been drunk on too long? --He’ll replace it with the NOURISHING, RICH WINE of ETERNAL LIFE!

Prayers:
    Loving God, we acknowledge that often we’ve greedily gulped unworthy spirits, instead of your good wine of eternal life.  Deliver us from all addiction to them.  Cause our vintages to vanish, that we may turn to you alone for our fulfillment.
    Gracious God, you call us to be the Church of Jesus Christ.  Keep us one in faith and service, breaking bread together, and telling good news to the world, that people may believe you are love, and live to give you glory.
    All-powerful God, send peace on this troubled earth, and especially to lands and regions torn by strife and warfare.  Direct those who rule and judge the nations, particularly the leaders of the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth of Nations, and every state on earth.  Grant that, led by your wisdom, ALL those in public leadership may guide their people in ways of righteousness, justice, and freedom.
    Merciful God, you look with compassion on those who suffer pain.  Stand with the suffering people of Haiti, especially those who have lost loved ones and friends, and those who are severely injured and disabled from the earthquake.  Save, heal, and help them, Lord.  We lift before you those of your sons and daughters who this morning bow in this holy place while hurting in body, mind, or spirit. Strengthen, comfort, and relieve them. And cheer us all by your promise that, in your coming Realm, there will be no more pain or crying;
    God of our fathers and of our mothers, we praise you for your servants who, having been faithful to you on earth, now live with you in heaven.  Keep us in fellowship with them, until we meet with all your children in your perfect presence, in Jesus Christ, through whom we offer each of our prayers.  Amen.