How Many to Make a Miracle

2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

In this week’s Gospel Jesus performs his first known miracle: turning water into wine at a wedding reception.  Jewish wedding receptions lasted 5-7 days; it was the third day of this wedding reception and they’re already running out of wine – it would have been a complete humiliation for the newlyweds. For this miracle, however, Jesus didn’t magically become aware of the wine shortage, snap his fingers and fix it all in an instant.   Rather, this miracle involved a number of people: noticing a problem, bringing it to Jesus, persevering through seeming rejection, carrying out laborious and seemingly useless orders, all backed by a trust that it would turn out OK in the end.  What would have happened if one link in that chain had been broken by someone stopping from discouragement or doing something other than what Jesus asked because it would have been the more logical or sensible thing to do?   The miracle probably wouldn’t have happened.  This week: how will you fit into that chain of events as God tries to use you to work a blessing, even a miracle, in the life of someone else?