Untangling Life's Knots

 

Untangling Life’s Knots

Untangling Life's Knots - Audio/Visual 

There was a wedding in the village of Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there. Jesus and his disciples were guests also. When they started running low on wine at the wedding banquet, Jesus’ mother told him, “They’re just about out of wine.” Jesus said, “Is that any of our business, Mother — yours or mine? This isn’t my time.” She went ahead anyway, telling the servants, “Whatever he tells you, do it.” Six stoneware water pots were there, used by the Jews for ritual washings. Each held twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus ordered the servants, “Fill the pots with water.” And they filled them to the brim. “Now fill your pitchers and take them to the host,” Jesus said, and they did. When the host tasted the water that had become wine (he didn’t know what had just happened but the servants, of course, knew), he called out to the bridegroom, “Everybody I know begins with their finest wines and after the guests have had their fill brings in the cheap stuff. But you’ve saved the best till now!” (John 2:1-10)

Imagine yourself in a dark room with the windows closed, the curtains drawn, and the blinds blocked. It’s hard to believe in the darkness that there’s daylight outside those drapes. So, you grope around, trying to feel your way across the floor. You take a step – disoriented and unsure of where you’re headed. Progress is slow and the journey’s painful: stubbed toes and bruised shins. It’s hard to walk around in a dark place. It’s harder still to walk around in a dark world. But we try, don’t we? And we get wounded in the process – tripping over problems, bumping into each other in the shadows, and ramming into walls.

But occasionally one of us makes a discovery. Reaching through the blackness, a hand finds the curtains and then the window latch. “Hey, the walls have windows!” And then the drapes are pulled back, the window’s opened and sunlight floods the room. What was dark is now bright. What was opaque is now clear. What was stale is now fresh. With the light comes a peace, a power, a desire to move closer to the light, and a confidence to step forward. Our timid steps are replaced by a certainty to our walk; a certainty in moving through the corridors of life, opening one window after another to illuminate the darkness. And all it took was opening the curtains and raising the window.

Prayer does the same thing. Prayer is the window that God has placed in the walls of our world. If we leave it shut, the world becomes a cold, dark place. But throw back the curtains and we see God’s light. Open the window and we hear God’s voice. Open the window of prayer and we invoke the presence of God in our world. Here’s what I mean.

Imagine that you’re at your best friend’s wedding reception. The two of you have talked about this day since you were kids, and now it’s finally here. The ceremony was great, and the wedding was beautiful; the minister was flawless, and the vows were honest. What a day! “I’ll take care of the reception,” you had volunteered long ago. So, you planned the best party possible. You hired the band, rented the hall, catered the meal, decorated the room, and asked Aunt Tessie to bake the cake. (Yes, I had an Aunt Tessie)

Now the band is playing, and the guests are milling about, but Aunt Tessie’s nowhere to be seen. Everything’s here but the cake. So, you ring her up. She’s been napping. She thought the wedding was next week. Great. Now what do you do? Talk about a problem. Everything’s here but the cake. Sound familiar? Well, it might. It’s exactly the dilemma that Jesus’ mother, Mary, was facing – sort of. The wedding was moving, the guests were celebrating, but the wine was gone. Back then, wine was to a wedding like cake is to one today. Can you imagine a wedding without a cake? Well, they couldn’t imagine a wedding without wine. To offer wine was to show respect to your guests. Not to offer wine at a wedding was … well … an insult.

Mary faced a social problem. You know. A foul-up; a snafu; a calamity on a somewhat common scale. No need to call 911, but you can’t sweep the embarrassment under the rug, either. And when you think about it, most of the problems we face are similar in scope. Seldom do we have to deal with dilemmas of a national scale or have world import. Seldom do our crises rock the Richter scale. Usually, the waves we ride are made by pebbles, not oceans. We’re late for a meeting; we leave something at the office; a co-worker forgets a report; mail gets lost; traffic gets snarled. Generally speaking, the waves rocking our lives are not life-threatening. But then again, they can be because a poor response to a simple problem can light a fuse. What begins as a snowflake can snowball into an avalanche unless proper care is taken.

For that reason, please note how Mary reacted to the situation. Her solution is a practical plan for untangling life’s knots. “They’re just about out of wine,” she told Jesus. (John 2:3) That’s it. That’s all she said. She didn’t go crazy. She simply assessed the problem and gave it to Christ. Charles Kettering, the famed inventor and head of research for GM said, “A problem well-stated is half-solved.” Mary would have liked that because that’s what she did – she defined the problem. Now, granted, she could have exploded: “Why didn’t you plan better? There’s not enough wine! Whose fault is this anyway? You guys never do anything right. If anything is to be done right around here, I have to do it myself!” Or she could have imploded: “This is my fault, I’ve failed. I’m to blame. I deserve it. If only I’d majored in the culinary arts. I’m a failure in life.”

It’s so easy to focus on everything but the solution, isn’t it? But Mary didn’t do that. She simply looked at the knot, assessed it, and took it to the right person. “I’ve got one here I can’t untie, Jesus.” When they started running low on wine …, Jesus’ mother told him, “They’re just about out of wine.” (Id.) Please note that she took the problem to Jesus before she took it to anyone else. An acquaintance of mine told me about a tense deacons’ meeting he once attended. Apparently, there was more agitation than agreement, and after a lengthy discussion someone suggested, “Why don’t we pray about it?” to which another questioned, “Has it come to that?” What causes us to think of prayer as the last option rather than the first? I think there’s at least two reasons: feelings of independence and feelings of insignificance.

Sometimes we’re independent. We begin to think we’re big enough to solve our own problems. For instance, at our house we’ve had a banner year. Our youngest daughter just finished college; another daughter got a promotion resulting in more pay and benefits; and another is a mother of two and taking steps toward a career change – other than being a mother.

Our youngest son and his wife are doing well in the entertainment industry; another son is to the HVAC industry what MacGyver was to tinker toys; and another son’s an attorney and the office/youth minister at church. My wife and I have applauded and celebrated each accomplishment our children have made. Their maturity and mobility are good and necessary, but I hope they never get to the point where they’re too grown up to call their mom and dad. God feels the same way about us.

Other times we don’t feel so independent; we feel insignificant, instead. We think, “Sure, Mary can take her problems to Jesus. She’s his mother. But God doesn’t want to hear my problems. He’s got famines and earthquakes to deal with. I don’t want to trouble him with my messes.” If that’s your thought, consider this: “Because he delights in me, he saved me.” (Ps. 18:19) And you probably thought he saved you because of your decency. You thought he saved you because of your good works or good attitude or good looks. Sorry. If that were the case, your salvation would have been lost when your language went south, or your works got weak. There are many reasons God saves you: to bring glory to himself, to appease his justice, to demonstrate his sovereignty. But one of the sweetest reasons God saved you is because he’s fond of you. He likes having you around. He thinks you’re the best thing to come down the pike in quite a while. “As a man rejoices over his new wife, so your God will rejoice over you.” (Isa. 62:5)

Note the sequence of events in those three verses about the wineless wedding: Jesus ordered the servants, “Fill the pots with water.” So, they filled the jars to the top. Then he said to them, “Now fill your pitchers and take them to the host.” So, they took the water to the host. And during the journey from spigot to sommelier the water had become wine. (John 2:7-9) See the sequence? First the jars were filled with water. Then Jesus instructed the servants to take the water (not the wine) to the master. Now, if I’m a servant, I’m thinking I’m not too crazy about that idea. I mean, how is that going to solve the problem? And what is the master going to say when I give him a cup of water? But these servants were either naïve enough, or trusting enough, to do what Jesus said. And so, the problem was solved. Note that the water became wine after they had obeyed, not before.

What if the servants had refused? What if they’d said, “No way”? Or, to bring the point closer to home, what if you refuse? What if you identify the problem, take it to Jesus, and then refuse to do what he says? That’s possible, right? After all, God is asking you to take some pretty gutsy steps. For instance, money is tight, but he still asks you to give. You’ve been offended, but he still asks you to forgive. Someone else blew the assignment, but he still asks you to be patient. You can’t see God’s face, but he still asks you to pray. These are not commands for the faint of faith. But then again, he wouldn’t ask you to do it if he thought you couldn’t. So go ahead. Next time you need to untangle life’s knots, follow Mary’s example: Identify the problem. (You’ll half-solve it) Present it to Jesus. (He’s happy to help) Do what he says. (No matter how crazy) And then get Aunt Tessie a new calendar.

Grace,

Randy