Monday, May 3, 2021

A Wine Lesson

 By: Joanne Viola


I am not a wine drinker, so when I kept returning to a story about wine, I became curious what the story held for me to learn.

Jesus and His mother were attending a wedding when the wine ran out. Weddings were a big thing, often being a week long celebration. Running out of wine would be a huge source of embarrassment for any family.

Mary came to Jesus and said, “They have no more wine.” Jesus performed His first miracle, transforming the water in the jars into wine. Now that’s the story in a very condensed fashion. You can read it for yourself in John 2:1-11.

Going back to read this for several days, I learned a few things and none of it was about the wine:

  1. State the problem. Mary noticed the empty wine jars and immediately realized there was going to be a crisis for this family. She did not discuss it with the disciples or other guests. No Facebook or Twitter rant. She went right to the One who could remedy the situation and told Him of the problem at hand.
  2. The jars are filled. Jesus took care of the problem – in His time, in His way. Nothing will destroy us quicker than an emptiness of our soul. It is then we often seek to fill the void outside of and apart from Christ. We need to take the burden off those around us and place it on the only One able to truly meet our needs.
  3. Repeat. We must come to Him each and every day to share our burdens and to be filled by Him.

“No love of the natural heart is safe unless the human heart has been satisfied by God first.”
(Oswald Chambers)

May we be like Mary …
State our problem and then,
may He alone fill and satisfy our hearts.

 

Photo by Gabriel Tovar on Unsplash


 

 


 

8 comments:

  1. Repeat. Yes, yes! Daily, hour by hour, moment by moment.

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    1. It's so true! How we need to come before Him every day.

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  2. This is so good! I love what you did with the wine story - and when you say this: "We need to take the burden off those around us and place it on the only One able to truly meet our needs." It is not for others to make us O.K., fix us, fill us up, make us happy - only God can do that. I wish someone had told me that when I got married - it sure would have made for an easier first 10 years until I did learn this! But then, I was raised to fill everyone's o.k. tanks - and that wasn't healthy. I had a lot of behavior-unlearning to do!

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    1. Thank you so much, Maryleigh. It has taken me a long time to learn this lesson and to be honest, at times, I am still learning.

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  3. I love Mary's confidence that Jesus could and would take care of the situation. May we rest in such confidence!

    A former pastor pointed out that Mary's words here are the last ones recorded of her: "Do whatever he tells you." We see her later in Scripture, but this is the last thing we hear her saying. How fitting!

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    1. Barbara, I did not realize these were Mary's last recorded words. Thank you for sharing that as I love learning these little facts!

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  4. Oh, how easily I lay my burdens down for the Lord to handle and then pick them right back up, trying to fix them. I need this reminder often. Thanks you so much.

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    1. You make such a good point for us to remember - we need to lay our burdens down and leave them there for the Lord to handle.

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