A time for everything

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,

a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,

a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance. [1]

With the passing of my mother in law last week, we have been experiencing our fair share of weeping. We have also experience ad degree of laughter….the cousins have been able to spend time together and the adults have caught up as well.

The shortest verse in the Bible…”Jesus wept.”[2] … demonstrates clearly that Jesus experienced real human emotions. His good friend Lazarus had died and Jesus experienced what we all experience when someone we love passes away.

I wish I could find “Jesus laughed” somewhere in the Bible. I think if you read between the lines however, I believe you can find numerous inferences. Jesus was after all a Jew….and the Jews have a long tradition of humour. (Why is it that in the USA, where Jews make up 2.7% of the population, 80% of comedians are Jewish?)

I have some observations and musings from Jesus’ first miracle – turning water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana.

- Jesus was invited to the wedding. Did He sit in the corner or did he involve himself in the celebration?

- When Jesus’ mother told Him they had nearly run out of wine his response was “Is that any of our business, Mother, yours or mine?” [3] If I ever addressed my mother as “Woman” I am pretty sure of the swift response – he was 30 years old though.

- When Jesus turned the water into wine He made 680 litres or 900 bottles of wine. This seems to me to be an extraordinary volume of wine – in addition to what they had already run out of.

- In today’s terms, a bottle of ‘best’ wine probably retails for around $20….this puts a dollar value on Jesus’ first miracle at around $18,000. (He probably could have bargained a cheaper price for that volume though - which brings up another couple of questions…WWJB (What Would Jesus Buy?) WWJD (What Would Jesus Drink?)

There is a time to weep and a time to laugh.

[1] Ecclesiastes 3:1-4 – New International Version
[2] John 11:35 – New International Version (and most others I suspect)
[3] John 2:4 – The Message