I'm going to ask you please to turn this morning to the Gospel of John chapter 2. John chapter 2. Today in our study of John we come to the second chapter. This morning and tonight we'll be looking at these first 11 verses. So let's read beginning at verse 1. On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee. And the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples. 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. His mother said to the servants, do whatever he tells you. Now, there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification. each holding 20 or 30 gallons. Jesus said to the servants, fill the jars with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And He said to them, now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast. So they took it. And 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. But you have kept the good wine until now. This, the first of His signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee and manifested His glory. And His disciples believed in Him. Let's pray together. Lord, thank You for the privilege it is today to declare Your Word. I ask, Holy Father, that You would fill me with Your Spirit, that, Lord, You would be at work in this place and in this time. that this time of preaching would be a demonstration of Your presence and Your power and Your working. Lord, help us to grasp in our minds and in our hearts the things that You have put before us in Your holy Word. Deal with us, Lord, in a way that changes us. We ask You this in Jesus' name, Amen. We all need to be reminded sometimes, and for some of us here this morning, perhaps you need to be taught this for the first time, that Christianity is not a set of propositions and principles. It is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. The Bible doesn't say whosoever adopts the doctrinal statement will have eternal life. It says that whosoever has the Son has life. And whoever does not have the Son, whoever does not have Him, does not have life. The issue is not a bare set of ideas. The issue is knowing Jesus. This is what it means to be a child of God. This is what it means to be a Christian. This is what it means to have eternal life. It means that you know in a personal, saving way the Son of God. It means that you have Him. And yet, as soon as we say that, we must also say that if you don't know the Jesus of the Bible, if your doctrine of God is wrong, if your doctrine of God's Son is wrong, if your doctrine of salvation is wrong, then no matter what you claim, you don't really have Jesus. There are people who would agree with us this morning. They would say, that's right. To have eternal life is to have the Son of God. And I have the Son of God. I know Jesus. The problem is their Jesus is not the Jesus of the Bible. Their doctrine of God is wrong. Their doctrine of God's Son is wrong. Their doctrine of salvation is wrong. And what you know about someone like that is no matter what they claim, they don't really know Jesus. So I don't want to be misunderstood this morning. We're not saying that there's not a definite doctrinal standard to Christianity. There is. What we are saying is that the doorway to a right understanding of anything about God. The doorway to a right understanding of God's word is God's son. In fact, the doorway to a right understanding of God's son is God's son. You'll never know Jesus if he doesn't make himself known to you. And you'll never know God if the Son of God does not make God known to you. We're reminded of that in this chapter. John tells us here of the first sign that Jesus performed. You'll notice what it says there in verse 11. This the first of his signs Jesus did at Cana in Galilee. The purpose of this sign and the purpose of all other signs that Jesus performed is that we would know Him. And that's what we'll see this morning and tonight. Where I want us to begin this morning is this, the purpose for signs. This morning we're going to sort of look at this sign in an overview sort of way. Tonight we're going to come back and begin to dig into the spiritual truths contained in this sign. The first thing I want us to think about is what is the purpose for signs? John identifies what Jesus did here, this miracle. He turned water into wine. John said it was a sign. That says very clearly that John understood there to be something more at work here than just turning water into wine. There's no doubt it's a miracle. It actually happened. This is something factual that John sets before us. This is not just a story. Jesus actually turned water into wine. That happened. But the reason why it's called a sign is because there's something more here than just turning water into wine, though it's miraculous. There's a message in that miracle. There's spiritual truth, there's a spiritual message in that miracle. In fact, John tells us about these signs because he has a purpose. John tells us later on in this gospel that if he had written down everything that Jesus said and everything that Jesus did, he thought the world could not contain the books that he would have written. And so John, in writing this gospel, writes in a strategic way. And he writes to us about these signs for a spiritual purpose. In other words, if this morning you just get the facts, if you just get that water was turned into wine, you might very well miss the message because that's not the message. The message is not just that Jesus can turn water into wine. It is what this miracle says about him, about his person, about his purpose, about his work. So what is the purpose for signs, not just this one, but all the signs that John records? Well, there are two purposes that we can mention. First of all, the purpose for a sign is faith. John records this. Jesus performed this in order that men might know who He is. Jesus is and might trust in Him as Messiah, as Savior, as Lord, as King, as God. Jesus performed miracles in order that we might know that He is the Son of God, the Savior of the world. In Acts chapter 2, verse 22, Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost, he said, Men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God. I declare to you today, Jesus of Nazareth, I want to tell you about Jesus, Peter said, and I want you to know he was a man. He is God. He was a God man. He's a man attested to you by God. God testified concerning his son. How did he do this? Peter goes on to say this with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst as you yourselves know. God was at work in His Son when these miracles were being performed. Why was God at work through His Son performing these miracles? God was attesting to us. God was testifying concerning this man, Jesus of Nazareth, that He really is the Son of God. That He really is the Messiah. That He really is the Savior of the world. In fact, when John writes about why he records these signs, This is what he writes, John chapter 20, verse 31. But these are written. In fact, look over there with me for just a moment. John chapter 20. You know it well, but I want to remind you, John chapter 20. And look at verse 30. Now, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book. Jesus did many other signs that are not recorded here for us. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His name. If you believe, you have life. If you do not believe, you do not have life. And John recorded these specific signs so that in seeing these things, hearing these things, reading these things, you would come to believe in Jesus as the Son of God, as the Savior, as the Messiah, as God in human flesh. And that by believing in His name, God would give you eternal life. So what is the purpose for signs. One purpose is faith, that we would come to trust in Jesus as Lord and Savior. But there's another purpose. Not only the purpose of faith, also the purpose of knowledge. These signs teach us spiritual truths that have to do with the knowledge of God and the knowledge of His Son. One of the key verses in John's Gospel is found in chapter 1. Back there, John 1. Look at v. 16. John 1, v. 16. Let's back up to v. 14, "...and the Word became flesh." The eternal Word of God. This is who Jesus is. The eternal Word of God. Jesus, always having been God, became flesh, and the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, tabernacled among us, and we have seen His glory. Glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. How would you describe the person of Jesus? He is full of grace and truth. John bore witness about Him and cried out, This was He of whom I said, He who comes after me ranks before me, because He was before me. Though Jesus was born after John, He preceded John. He preceded John because He has always been God. Verse 16, Here's the key verse, And from His fullness we have all received grace upon grace. John is writing this as a believer. You and I as believers, do you realize we have received grace following grace, grace following grace. Our life, since we've come to know the Savior, is an endless string of graces from God. Or another way to look at it is grace piled upon grace. God has blessed us in a way that we can't even describe. that we don't even fully conceive, much less fully express. God has stacked grace up upon grace. Where is all this grace coming from? It is coming from the fullness of the Son of God Himself. We have received from Jesus and we go on receiving from Jesus. And God communicates this grace to us, listen, through the knowledge of His Son. Do you realize the very life that you have as a Christian is the very life of Jesus himself? That the life you have, eternal life, is described in the word of God as knowing him. What is the essence of eternal life? It's not learning a doctrinal statement, though doctrine is vitally important. The essence of the Christian life is not trying to live a certain lifestyle, though God will certainly change the way we live. The essence of the Christian life is knowing God and knowing His Son, Jesus Christ. It is having a personal relationship with the Son of God. That is eternal life. John tells us this. Go over to John 17 for just a moment. John chapter 17. And look at verse one, 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, since you have given him authority over all flesh. To give eternal life to all whom you have given him, what an awesome verse that is. You understand what that verse just said? You understand that the Son of God has authority over all mankind to give eternal life to every single person who has been given to the Son of God by the Father. Now, Christian, I want to ask you a question. When were you given to the Son of God by the Father? From all eternity. From all eternity you were chosen by God for salvation. You were given by the Father to the Son for the purpose of redemption. The Son of God came into the world and gave His very life for you to pay for your sin. to reconcile you to God. He's been raised from the dead. He's ascended to the right hand of the Father. Now, the Holy Spirit goes out through the world and is at work through the preaching of the Gospel, calling those people to the Son of God who were given by the Father to the Son before time began. And the Son of God gives eternal life to every single one of those people in time and history. as it's being worked out, as God's saving purpose is being worked out. He has given to you eternal life. Now, I want to ask you, what did He give you? What have you received from the Son of God? Look at the next verse. Look at John 17, verse 3. And this is eternal life. If you've ever wanted a definition, if you've ever wondered how to define it or what it is, the Son of God defines it for us. And this is eternal life. That they know you. The only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. What does it mean to have eternal life? It means you really know God. It means that God has made Himself known to you. He knows you. It means that though it is a relationship of faith, it is still a real relationship. And it is a personal relationship that we've been brought into. We really know God because we really know His Son. Though we've never seen our Savior, we love Him. And though we've never seen our Savior by faith, we know Him. Now listen, here's the purpose for these signs. Not only to bring us to faith in Christ, but also to teach us who our Savior is. That we would know Him. You realize in these Gospel records, we get to know our Savior. We get to learn about Him, to know Him in a personal way. We learn about His character. We learn about His nature. We read about how He actually conducted Himself on this earth. What He said. What He did. What His manner was. And as we take this all in, as we listen to our Savior's words, As we watch His manner, as we notice how He lived, we get to know Him better and better. Let me say this very clearly. In order to really know the Son of God, you're going to have to know Him from the Scriptures. There's no other way to know Him. God has given you His Word that you might know the God who saved you, that you might know the Savior to whom you belong. This is how we get to know Jesus. It's from passages like this, from the Word of God. I'm afraid there are many, many people who only know a Jesus of their imagination because their Jesus doesn't match the Jesus of the Bible. Many will claim to know Him, Even on that great day one day, that day of judgment, it's going to be apparent. Many who claim to know and don't know him. Right. And many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, and have we not done this in your name and have we not done that? And did we not teach and didn't we do this? And what does the Lord Jesus say to many on that day? Depart from me, ye who work iniquity. I never what? Knew you. You claim to know me, but I don't know you. And so there are many people saying, Lord, Lord, and they claim to know Jesus, but the Jesus they know is a Jesus of their imagination. They don't know the Jesus of the Bible. For example, if you're Jesus, don't you sort of cringe when people talk about my Jesus? He is our Jesus. But He is our Jesus. He's not just my Jesus. Even the Lord Jesus when He taught us to pray. How do we begin? What's the manner of our prayer? Our Father who art in heaven. I belong to a family. You belong to a family, don't we? And if we're saved, we have the same Jesus. But if your Jesus is chiefly concerned with social needs, if He's just concerned with you feeding people and clothing people and being kind in His name and giving out water in His name and food in His name, and there are a lot of people that that's their conception of Jesus. They're not really concerned with preaching a gospel message. They're just concerned with going out and building houses and feeding people and clothing people. And to them, that's what Jesus would have them to do. But realize, if that's your Jesus, what do you do with the Jesus of the Bible who rebuked people for following him just because their bellies were full? You remember that occasion? He says, you're not following me because you believe. You're following me because I fed you. What do you do with that, Jesus? If your Jesus would never speak a word of judgment, if He would never speak a word of warning about hell and about the wrath of God, and there are many preachers right now, very popular in our generation, that you will never hear them speak of hell. You will never hear them talk about the judgment of God. You'll never hear them talk about God's wrath. And they glory in it. They pride themselves in it. You see, their Jesus is a Jesus who only encourages. He always smiles. He never talks about judgment. But I want to ask you, what do you do with the Jesus of the Bible who talked more about hell than He did about heaven? What do you do with that Jesus? If your Jesus never talks about hell, you have a Jesus of the imagination. You don't have the Jesus of the Bible. If your Jesus would never confront false teachers, if He would never confront false teaching, false religion, then you don't know the Jesus who drove money changers out of the temple and who called Pharisees and Sadducees sons of the devil and liars. At one point, Jesus said, if I were to say that I don't know Him, then I would be a liar like you. Jesus confronted false teaching, didn't He? He confronted false teachers, didn't He? He confronted false religion, didn't He? Is that the Jesus you know? Then again, if your Jesus would have you to have zero interaction with lost people, Let's go to the other end of the spectrum. There are people who believe that their Jesus would have them never be around lost people at all. Their idea of serving Jesus is coming out of the world, separating themselves from every lost man or woman in the way that they live their life. What do you do then with the Jesus of the Bible who was falsely accused of being a glutton and a drunkard? Because when people would be saved and forgiven of their sins and invite him to these parties full of sinners, where was Jesus at? He was there. And why was he there? Was he there to, I say it reverently only to teach, was he there to party? No, he was there to lead lost men and women to himself, wasn't he? But I still say Jesus, Jesus didn't shy away from being around lost people, did he? In fact, in John 17, when he prayed for us, he made it very plain, Father, I'm not asking you to take them out of the world. But that you would keep them from the evil one in the midst of the world. Paul had to correct the Corinthians misconception, he said, I didn't when I wrote to you, I didn't mean that you would withdraw from all sinners, but then you'd have to go out of the world. But rather, if someone claims to be a brother. If they claim to be a believer and they're living in these sorts of sins, you withdraw from them. We live in this world. Our Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible, would send us forth out into this world, interacting with sinners. Not in their sins. Not getting into their sins. But you have to be around people to lead them to Christ. You can't lead them from a monastery to Christ. You can't lead them from a tower to Jesus. You have to be there among them. If your Jesus gives you no compassion, no gentleness, then you don't know the Jesus of the Bible who wouldn't extinguish even a smoldering wick of spiritual hope. And so on the one end of the spectrum, you have people with no biblical standards and they talk about the Jesus they know. On the other end of the spectrum, you have legalists who have no heart for lost people, who walk in great pride and arrogance, who have no gentleness and no compassion. And both of these groups give evidence they don't know Jesus at all. The way we get to know Jesus, beloved, is we go to the word of God. And we watch Him in the Word of God. And we listen to Him in the Word of God. And we take it all in. Every part of who Jesus is. Everything that Jesus said. Everything that Jesus did. We take it all in. And we listen. And we believe it all. And we pay attention to it all. And we follow it all. That's what it means to know our Savior. And so the purpose for signs like this One, if you don't know Jesus, that you would come to know him in a saving way. But then if you know Jesus, that you would get to know your Savior. That you would understand something about his character and something about his nature and how he worked when he was here on earth and what he did when he was among men that you might follow in his footsteps because you're his disciple. If you're a Christian, you're his disciple. Now, something we can say about this knowledge that we receive about our Savior is this is how we are changed. This is the essence of eternal life to know Him. But this is also the essence of sanctification. Eternal life is knowing the Son of God, knowing God and knowing His Son. But this is also how the Lord grows us. This is how we're being changed into His image. It's by beholding Him. It's by getting to know Him. It's a personal way that God changes our life. It's not an impersonal way. It's not learn this set of statements and memorize it and then walk in this set of disciplines and this is how the Lord is going to change your life. No, we're going to learn doctrine. We're going to learn truth. And we're going to pay attention to what the commandments of God say to us. But do you realize none of that is to take place outside of this realm of a personal relationship with Jesus? So that as we get to know the Son of God, that's how God changes us. Keep your Bible marker here, please. And go over to 2 Corinthians chapter 3. 2 Corinthians chapter 3. And look at verse 18. Actually, let's begin with verse 15, 2 Corinthians 3, verse 15. Yes, to this day. Whenever Moses is read. The Old Testament scriptures avail lies over their hearts. Paul's Israelite brethren, for the most part, still blind. Verse 16, but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now, the Lord is the spirit and where the spirit of the Lord is, there's freedom and we all with unveiled face." Now he's talking about those of us who've seen, those of us who've been saved, those of us who've turned to the Lord, those of us who've been set free. Notice, we all with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. How do you grow in the Christian faith? The Holy Spirit of God takes the Word of God in hand and He shows you the glory of God and of His Son. And as you behold His glory, you are being changed into that same image from one degree of glory to the next. It's as you see the Son of God, it's as you know Him, it's as you understand Him, it's as you relate to Him that you are changed in the Christian life. I wonder, is that Christianity to you? Is that what you call Christianity? Is that what you have? Are you really His disciple? If you're His disciple, that means you know Him personally. Are you really His disciple? If you're His disciple, that means you're being trained by Him personally. He's at work in your life, training you, teaching you. He's your teacher. It's a personal relationship. In fact, even when the Word of God is at work in our lives, it's being handled by God personally. Look over to the book of Hebrews chapter 4. I want to show you this. Hebrews 4. We often quote these verses, but as we do with many verses, we tend to stop one verse short. Hebrews 4 and look at verse 12. For the Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." And every believer in this place can say what? Amen. That's what the Word of God does. It deals with us in the deepest part of our being. It gets to the core of who we are. It reveals even the thoughts and the intentions of our heart. But notice something about this operation of the Word of God. Look at the next verse. And no creature is hidden from His sight. But all are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account." Here is this exposing work of the Word of God. And why is it that the Word of God exposes us like it does? Because He is at work in the working of Scripture. The One who knows it all, the One who sees it all, is the One who makes us known even to ourselves as His Word is at work in our lives. He's dealing with us personally. We're taught the Word of God and our hearts are dealt with and God deals with our lives. Do you understand? It is true to say God is dealing with our lives. He is present. He is present. His hand is upon you. The One who knows everything about you is the One who's making you known to yourself through the activity of His holy Scriptures. God is at work in the preaching of His Word, and in the teaching of His Word, and in the reading of His Word, and in the Word of God that is brought like a lightning bolt sometimes into your mind as you're out living your life. God is at work as you interact with His Word. This is a personal relationship. If you're his disciple, you know him personally. If you're his disciple, you're being trained by him, personally taught by him. If you're his disciple, you are the product of his working. He explains you. How did you become his disciple? He made you one of his disciples. We talked about this a week or two ago. You know, Jesus said to his disciples on one occasion, he said, you did not choose me, but I chose you. and ordained that you should go forth and bring forth fruit. And that can be said of every disciple in this room this morning. You didn't choose Jesus. He chose you. And so you are the product of his working. I love the way that the book of Acts begins. Luke tells us that he's already recorded much of his knowledge of Christ in a gospel record. But he has more to record. And listen to how Luke describes it in Acts chapter one, verse one. In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus, and I love this, began to do and teach until the day when he was taken up after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. All that Jesus began to do and teach. What is the record of the book of Acts? It is a record now of what the resurrected and ascended Son of God is doing in this world. He's doing it through the Holy Spirit. He's doing it through men as they preach the Word of God. But make no mistake about it, what's being accomplished in this world right now is still the work of the Son of God. So that He chose you. He made you His disciple. And He is the one who makes God known to us. Look back in John. Look at chapter 1, verse 18. Another key verse in the Gospel of John. John 1, verse 18, no one has ever seen God. The only God who is at the Father's side, He has made Him known. Not only is it true to say that these signs are meant to bring us to faith and these signs are meant to teach us about our Savior and give us the knowledge of Him, it is that knowledge of our Savior that changes us. And He is personally involved in us knowing Him. He brought us into a relationship with Himself. He's at work through the teaching of His Word, training us, teaching us, correcting us. We are the result of His work. We are the product of His working. And He is making God known to us. I ask you again, is that what you have? Some people only have propositions and principles. They say, well, this is what a Christian believes, so I believe it. I subscribe to the doctrinal statement. And someone else says, well, this is how a Christian should live. This is what a Christian should do and this is what a Christian shouldn't do. And so I do what I should do and I don't do what I shouldn't do. And for them, that is Christianity. It is the doctrinal statement and the disciplines. But I say to you, if all you have is a doctrinal statement and disciplines, you don't have Christ. That's not Christianity. At its essence, Christianity is knowing Him. Eternal life is to know the only true God and Jesus Christ His Son. And then the doctrinal statement will have meaning to us. And the life that we live will be a life empowered by the Holy Spirit of God Himself as He lives in us. Do you live with the awareness that He knows you? That He's with you? That He's training you? That He's instructing you and correcting you? Do you live your life with the awareness that the Son of God is there? That His hand is upon you? That He's training you? Is that your idea of Christianity? So, this is the first thing we see here. The purpose for signs. Let me quickly now move to a second thought. Some particulars associated with this sign. What I've said so far can be said of all the signs recorded in Scripture. But now let's talk about this sign. What do we note about it? First of all, we're told very clearly this was a sign. As I said earlier, this is more than just about turning water into wine. This is more than just about helping a family out of a wedding problem. What is at the core of this sign? Verse 11 tells us in chapter 2, notice, Why Jesus did what he did, verse 11, this the first of his signs, Jesus did it Cana in Galilee and did what manifested his glory. This is about the manifestation of the glory of the Son of God, this is that we might know him. But also we see in that 11th verse that this was for the faith of his disciples, it says, and his disciples believed in him. Now, we've already seen the five whom He called. We know these were believing men. They already had to have a measure of faith in order to be called His disciples. Yet, the Bible says that the result of this sign was that these men who already believed in Him to some degree, believed in Him. They believed in a greater way. They believed in a more sure way. They believed, no doubt, in a more accurate way, in a clearer fashion because of what they saw. And you realize that hasn't stopped. You and I, we are believers, but we need to grow as believers. Our faith must increase. We get to know our Savior better and better as we walk with Him every day. And the more we see the Lord do in our lives, the more that we understand of His Word, the more that we see Him at work in this world, what happens? We grow in our belief. Though we are believers, we go on believing. And He strengthens our faith and He grows us. as we see greater and greater revelations of His glory, greater and greater manifestations of who He is. So this was a sign. We're also told this was His first sign. I think that calls for some special attention. John tells us this is the very first sign worked by the Son of God. He didn't have to tell us that, but He did. This is the first one. Now, I want to ask you, before we look at this, If you had been in charge of the Lord's schedule, if you had designed the way that the Son of God would make Himself known as Messiah, what would you have designed to be His first sign? And then compare that thought, whatever it is in your mind, with what we see here. What do you see about this first sign? What can you say about it? Well, one thing we can say is, in many ways, it was ordinary. It was ordinary. Now, turning water into wine isn't ordinary, but many other things about this. It was very ordinary. Took place at an ordinary wedding. This was not some dignitary being being wed. This was just some ordinary person, perhaps even a family member of the Lord's family, Mary, somehow kin to Mary in some way. It had to be. We would guess a poorer family because they didn't have sufficient wine for the guests. Just an ordinary wedding. Took place in an ordinary community. This was small, little Cana of Galilee. There was more than one Cana, but this wasn't even the greater Cana. This was the little Cana. The insignificant Cana. Ordinary wedding in an ordinary little community. with little exposure. I don't know how many people were at this wedding, but this was no crusade. This was no packed out stadium. If I had been in charge, I think I would have had an advertising campaign at a time. Packed out a stadium. The Lord is going to perform His first sign. But that's not what the Lord did, is it? Ordinary wedding. Ordinary little community. Not much exposure. It was an ordinary problem that gave occasion for it. They didn't have enough to entertain their guests. This isn't raising a man from the dead. We don't have a dead man here. We don't have a blind man here. We don't have a deaf man here. They just need wine. That's the occasion for this first sign. They just need wine. What do we learn from that? Ordinary sort of things that characterize this first son, what do we learn about it? I think we learn this to be spiritually minded, our Lord, certainly that to have a spiritual mission, our Lord certainly had that doesn't remove us. From ordinary and temporal matters of this life. Here is the savior of the world, he is on mission. But he's at a wedding. And you and I need to realize that though we are spiritual men and women, if we've been saved and that we have a spiritual mission in this world and we do, it doesn't mean that we separate from all of its ordinary and from all of its normal and from all that is going to take place in this temporal world. Doesn't mean separation from all that. We're still going to have jobs. We're still going to have schools. We're still going to have to do the things that we have to do in this temporal world. Yet, listen, what it does mean is a transformation of the ordinary. It's not a separation from it, but it is a transformation of it. Jesus took what was ordinary, an ordinary wedding in an ordinary community, with an ordinary need. They need more wine. And He transformed the ordinary into the spectacular by performing His first sign there. We need to learn there is in a sense nothing ordinary for the believer. For in the most ordinary situations, the glory of God can be manifested to us and through us. It's a wonderful thing when you see God take ordinary things and use them for eternal good. When you can have a relationship with somebody through baseball, or you can have a relationship with somebody through school, or through work, and through those ordinary relationships and those ordinary things, God brings eternal life to people. It saves them. The first thing we say about it, this first sign, is it was ordinary. In many ways, another thing we say about it is it was it was done quietly. There was no great fanfare, was there? Did Jesus make an announcement? Excuse me. I have everybody's attention, please. I'm back for my first son. Is that what he did? No. His mother went about it quietly and then the Lord Jesus went about it quietly. In fact, the man who tasted the wine didn't know what had happened. The servants knew. It was quiet, yet it was strategic. It accomplished exactly what he meant for it to accomplish. God's time and God's purpose was marching on perfectly. What I'm trying to point out this morning is God's way of working doesn't really match our conception of how he ought to work. Many times we think differently than God does. God is not working things out according to our estimation of things or according to the world's estimation of things. God is not working to impress men. He's not working to win the world's favor and applause. He's not working to make a name for Himself as the world would conceive of that. God's just working at His saving purpose so that His Son's first sign was ordinary and quiet, but strategic. We tend to think in big ways. Let's advertise. Let's fill a stadium somewhere. Let's make it big and loud and impressive. But that's not what our Lord purposed to do. And if you look at His entire life, it wasn't like that. He was born in a little town, Bethlehem. He was born of a poor virgin girl, Mary. He was born in a stable. He would be known as the son of a carpenter. He himself would be a carpenter. He would not attend the rabbinical schools of his day. He wouldn't even have the honor of his world's credentials. Nothing was like what we would have expected. If it had been our plan, he would have graduated with honors from the greatest schools and had the most lucrative profession and run in the highest circles, but this wasn't God's plan. And you know what? Nothing has changed. You know what's sad? The church goes on seeking after worldly honors. All the while, God has told us that He has chosen to magnify His wisdom by working through foolish means. What's the purpose for signs? That we might believe in the Son of God. And that by believing, we would know Him. And that by knowing Him, we would be changed. That's Christianity. To know God and to know His Son. Do you know the Son of God? You might have propositions, you might have principles, you might have a doctrinal statement, you might have a lifestyle. Do you have him? And unless you have him, you don't have life. He came, he lived, he died, he was raised in order to reconcile sinners to God. Have you come to the Son of God for the forgiveness of your sins and for a right relationship with God? Let's pray together. Father in Heaven, thank You for Your Son. Thank You for our Savior, our Lord, the Lord Jesus. Thank You, Father in Heaven, that You bring us to know Him. And then after You've saved us, as we look at Him and listen to Him and watch Him in Your Word, we get to know Him better. And as we get to know Him better, He makes You known to us. Father in Heaven, help us to see that we reveal what we really believe about Jesus by what we think, what we say, and how we live. Father in Heaven, may we throw away any false imaginations about Jesus and cling to that sure knowledge of our Savior that is found in the Scriptures, that we would not be deceived that we would really know Him and truly, truly have life eternal. I pray for those in this place, Lord, who do have eternal life, who have come to know the Son of God. Lord, grow us in our knowledge of You. Change our lives through it. And I pray for anyone in this place who doesn't truly know the Son of God. Father in Heaven, would You even this morning convict them of their lostness and break their hearts over it? and bring them with a broken heart and a broken will before Your Son and have them kneel before Your Son and by faith receive Him in love to be saved forever. We ask You this, Lord, in Jesus' name, Amen.