“JESUS CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
  Miracle #1-    Water into Wine (John 2:1-4,5-8,9-11)

Dear Reader, there are church charlatans seeking to be approved of men, by fraudulently attempting miracles, wonders and signs, by turning the things of God into men’s party tricks.

In attempting to be like the most high, these same are exposed for what they are (Isaiah 14:14) … little realising that study to rightly divide the word, is the way to be approved of God (2 Timothy 2:15). “Oh! But I study the word!” they say … with negligible understanding, that the emphasis is on ‘rightly dividing’. Oh yes! They are studying … ‘the Greek’, their church constitutions, men’s commentaries … not the word, indeed the words of God, thereby becoming vain in their imaginations (Romans 1:21; 2 Corinthians 10:5).

It is fitting that Christ’s first miracle was with water.

Countless are the mentions of water and Christ … with Christ being the water and the water being Christ … the two terms being synonymous … the following are a few examples …

1. In Christ’s creation, Christ creates water (Genesis 1:2).

2. Christ says for those who thirst to come unto him (John 4:13-14).

3. The human body can’t go without water for more than three days … an interesting number do you think? (Matthew 27:63)

4. The human body is ninety-five percent water. Man will die without the physical, and indeed, without the spiritual water of Christ.

5. Christ, the water of life (Revelation 21:6), gives the water of the word (Ephesians 5:26).

6. Christ is the Rock in the desert out of which comes water both physical and spiritual (1 Corinthians 10:4)

7. Christ walks on the water (Matthew 14:25)

8. In hell, there is no Christ but there is immense heat and thirst (Luke 16:24)

The significance of water into wine at the Cana wedding.

1. Christ reinforces he created water, by demonstrating his power over water (Genesis 1:2)

2. Christ can turn the water into the last good wine … the physical into the spiritual.

3. Christ can turn water into blood (Exodus 7:19)

4. Indeed, to the knowledgeable at the wedding, this demonstration would remind them that water was ‘equivalent’ to blood with the healing of Naaman’s leprosy (2Kings 5:14). Water, wine or blood, can all be used to show that Christ was God manifest (1 Timothy 3:16).

5. While water can nourish the body and wash it, it is only ‘the new wine’ that can cleanse from sin (1 Corinthians 11:25). The wedding at Cana showed the arrival and commencement, of the new dispensation from, that of physical washing of water to that of the spiritual washing of the new wine.

6. Being hard of seeing and hearing (Mark 4:12), Christ reaches out to Israel via their bodies, with the miracle of the physical wine drink, in order to get their attention. He leaves the food miracles till later (Matthew 14:21; Matthew 15:38). We must remember Christ gave them more physical miracles per square foot than all the rest of the world put together.

Indeed, he heals, feeds, clothes, raises their dead and delivers from devils … all physical … to get a foot in the door, for two things … firstly, to show himself approved unto God, and secondly, to show himself approved?/accepted by men. However, material blessings never permanently assured Israel, with his end being the cross (Matthew 27:25)

7. The waterpots used to purify the flesh (John 2:6) were now to be used by Jesus to signify the salvation of the soul, though temporary while Christ was on earth, was only to be achieved by, and indeed, through him.

8. This good wine, the new wine, the last wine, was only to be found in the fresh pressings (Matthew 26:29), and was not of the curse of the old fermented wine (Habakkuk 2:15), thereby signifying the purpose of Christ’s pure blood (Deuteronomy 32:14)

 9. Christ’s first miracle is only mentioned in the Book of John and not the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. The reason being is this, that while the other three are about the history of Christ as the Son of man and the Son of God, John’s gospel has more of the mystery … with Christ as the “I AM THAT I AM” (John 8:28). It is therefore appropriate to have his first miracle introduced to the world from this aspect.

Yes, Christ showed himself approved unto God, indeed his temporary acceptance by Israel, with this miracle … but wait … there is this added emphasis … there is this ‘double’ quality of his eternal “I AM”-ness only found in John’s account … a sort of double Deity as it were … “This miracle is being performed, not only by God manifest in the flesh … it really is the “I AM” God in the flesh!”

Harley Hitchcock

This website’s front page is:
www.AustralianBibleMinistries.com



DE-MIRACLE-IZING THE BIBLE



JESUS CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
  Miracle #2-    John 4:46-49,50-53,54


CONTACT US

 Australian Bible Ministries, PO Box 5058 Mt. Gravatt East 4122 Qld, Australia
www.AustralianBibleMinistries.com