Feasting on the Abundance – Tom Mundahl reflects on what happens when we love all life and care for all living beings.
Care for Creation Commentary on the Revised Common Lectionary
Readings for the Second Sunday after Epiphany, Year C (2022, 2025)
Isaiah 62:1-5
Psalm 36:5-10
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11
As we continue the Season of Epiphany our festivity does not abate. This week’s readings point us toward an even greater focus on celebration. Perhaps an appropriate theme for our worship and preaching is suggested by the antiphonal verse for the appointed psalm: “They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights” (Psalm 36:8). Despite the power of self-interest and deceit described in Psalm 36:1-4, God’s steadfast love (hesed) carries the day (Psalm 36:5-10). And it is clear that this abundance is not limited to those who have mastered temple liturgy: “All people may take refuge in the shadow of your wings” (Psalm 36:7b).
In fact, the scope is even wider: humans and animals “may take refuge in the shadow of your wings” (Psalm 36:6, 7). This abundance of steadfast care has its source “in the fountain of life” so bright that “in your light we see light.” The creator is the one who makes the very notion of epiphany—the manifestation of God’s glory and steadfast love– possible. Not surprisingly, the language (“the river of delights,” v. 8) points us to Eden and creation itself. (James L. Mays, Psalms. Louisville: John Knox, 1994, p. 157) No wonder feasting is central.
This week’s reading from Isaiah (62:1-5) reminds its audience of festive joy in an oblique way. If Third-Isaiah (chapters 56-66) confronts the problem of a community that has returned from exile and is sagging in its efforts at rebuilding and renewing core religious practices, we are reminded that the prophetic poetry of the earlier Isaiah is still in play. Feasting and celebration are clearly integral to the community’s new beginning. For example, Second Isaiah alerts the freed exiles, “Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion! Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, holy city” (Isaiah 52:1). The prophet continues, “Sing, O barren one who did not bear; burst into song and shout, you who have not been in labor! . . . for your descendants will possess the nations and will settle the desolate towns.” (Isaiah 54:1, 3) “For your maker is your husband, the LORD of hosts is his name . . . .” (Isaiah 54:5). As a result, the prophet calls all to a festive celebration: “Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy, and eat” (Isaiah 55:1) (Paul D. Hanson, Isaiah 40-66. Louisville: John Knox, 1995, pp. 148-150).
Clearly the message of this week’s reading from Isaiah depends and builds on the power of this earlier tradition to support a community engaged in the tough work of rebuilding. Remember who you are: “My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married. For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your builder marry you; and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.” (Isaiah 62:4-5) No longer, suggests the prophet, will foreigners drink your bread and wine. That is surely reason for the feasting described with such energy in the final chapter of Isaiah. “Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad for her, all you who love her; rejoice with her in joy, all you who mourn over her—that you may nurse and be satisfied from her consoling breast; that you may drink deeply with delight from her glorious bosom” (Isaiah 66:10-11).
As we consider this week’s reading from 1 Corinthians (12:1-11), we hear a cautionary note seemingly unsuitable for festivity. Yet, Paul’s critique of a community infected by competition among spiritual superstars, where adepts boast of their spiritual gifts, is a necessary corrective leading to the restoration of wholeness. This competitive spirituality destroys any possibility of community cohesion.
To counter this dangerous tendency, Paul contrasts charismata (gifts of the Spirit) with pneumatika (alleged manifestations of the Spirit) that create community tension. In a beautiful example of primitive functional trinitarianism, Paul writes: “Now there are varieties of gifts but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but the same God who activates them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (1 Corinthians 12:4-7).
For Paul it is not a matter of achievement and recognition, but service resulting in the common good. This is no simple totalitarian unity; it is based on the amazing diversity of gifts (charismata) distributed by the Spirit. As Hays writes, “Paul is emphasizing the importance of diversity in the church. The creative imagination of God is so many-faceted that God’s unitary power necessarily finds expression in an explosion of variegated forms” (Richard B. Hays, First Corinthians. Louisville: John Knox, 1997, p. 210).
As we learn more about the mutual interdependence of the faith community, we cannot help but think of the ecological mutuality of the wider creation. One is reminded of Aldo Leopold’s description of the natural community as he develops a “land ethic.” Leopold writes: “ . . . quit thinking about decent land use as solely an economic problem. Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and esthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community.” (Ado Leopold, A Sand County Almanac. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1966, p. 262)
This suggests that the Pauline notion of community must be extended to the non-human world since . . . “humans are undoubtedly and inalienably dependent not only on each other but also on a whole range of other organisms. It has become increasingly evident that these networks of interdependence include not just our intestinal flora, the crops we might grow, and the animals we might keep, but relationships at great distances. To breathe we depend upon photosynthesis for our oxygen, to eat protein we are dependent ultimately on the fixation of atmospheric nitrogen by legumes, but far less obviously, for example, we are dependent also on the recycling of atmospheric sulfur by marine algae.” (Horrell, Hunt, and Southgate, Greening Paul: Rereading the Apostle in a Time of Ecological Crisis, Waco: Baylor University Press, 2010, p. 212)
This interdependence based on a life of self-offering that uses the gifts of the Spirit for the building of the commons—human and biotic—frees us for festivity. Ironically, as we look farther ahead to Lent, it is also the basis for fasting. As Norman Wirzba suggests, “People should feast so they do not forget the grace and blessing of the world. People should fast so they do not degrade or hoard the good gifts of God. In short, we feast to glorify God and we fast so we do not glorify ourselves” (Norman wirzba, Food and Faith: A Theology of Eating. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011, p. 137). This is “the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (1 Corinthians 12:7).
We see this common good boldly affirmed in John’s narrative of the Wedding at Cana. It may be as Raymond Brown suggests that provision of wine was one of the obligations shared by guests at a Jewish wedding. Since Jesus and his followers had totally failed in this requirement, Jesus’ mother’s chiding may be understandable (Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John, I-XII. New York: Doubleday Anchor, 1966, p. 102).
While the narrator does not share Jesus’ mother’s reaction when the water for purification becomes the choicest wine in prodigious quantity, we are able to share the joyful surprise of the steward of the marriage feast: “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now” (John 2:10). The celebration of new creation in the Word made flesh (John 1:14) goes beyond calculation and represents a first step (“sign”) in the evangelist’s project to reveal Jesus replacing the Temple as the center of worship and meaning. (Brown, p. 104)
The Russian novelist, Dostoevsky, was so taken by this Johannine story that he devoted a chapter to it in his final novel, The Brothers Karamazov. As the Elder Zossima lies on his bier during the monastery’s period of mourning, the monks are shocked that his body has begun to evidence the stench of decay, something not expected from such a holy man. Novice monk, Alyosha Karamazov, is initially in despair. But as he returns to the funeral vigil he hears Father Paissy reading scripture, this time the story of the Marriage at Cana. Suddenly Alyosha’s heart lifts as he understands, “Ah that miracle, that lovely miracle! Not grief, but human joy Christ visited when he worked that first miracle, he helped bring joy . . . . He loves us, loves our joy . . . .” And how many times had the Elder taught just this? (Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov. Pevear and Volokhonsky translation, San Francisco: North Point Press, 1990, p. 360).
Young Alyosha now recalls that his mentor had shocked him by revealing that Alyosha’s calling was to bring joy by serving as a monk in the world. Suddenly all became clear. As he embraced his new vocation, he left the monastery and ran into the forest, joyfully falling to his knees to embrace the earth with its fecundity and decay. Dostoevsky writes, “He fell to the earth a weak youth and rose up a fighter, steadfast for the rest of his life . . . . Three days later, he left the monastery, which was also in accord with the words of his late elder, who had called him to ‘sojourn in the world’” (Pevear and Volokhonsky, p. 363).
In a sermon given on this text at St. Andrews University, Richard Bauckham claims that this sign reminds us that salvation is more than healing; it is also enlivening. He goes on: “To live life more fully is to love all life, to care for all living beings against the threats to life: against poverty, sickness, enmity, death” (St. Salvator’s Chapel, January 15, 1995). Kierkegaard’s scathing critique of the church allegedly included this aphorism: “Christ turned water into wine, but the church has succeeded in doing something even more difficult: it has turned wine into water.” But Jesus’ enlivening sign remains and points toward the source of all life and celebration.
This theme of joyful festivity is picked up by Pope Frances in Laudato Si’. In the context of reflecting on being at home in creation, he suggests that the integrity of the ecosystem needs to be reflected in home and community. “An integral ecology includes taking time to recover a serene harmony with creation, reflecting on our lifestyle and ideals, and contemplating the Creator who lives among us and surrounds us” (Laudato Si’, 225). Perhaps this may move us to a more festive embrace of the Earth!
Hymn Suggestions:
Gathering: “Rise, shine, you people” ELW 665
Hymn of the Day: “Jesus, Come! For We Invite You” ELW 312
Sending: “The Spirit Sends Us Forth to Serve” ELW 551
Petition for Prayers of Intercession:
Creator God, you enlivened the celebration at Cana with the gift of wine. Teach us to love one another and all that you have made so that this shared joy may be of the richest vintage. God, in your mercy; Hear our prayer.
Originally written by Tom Mundahl in 2016.
Saint Paul, MN
tmundahl@gmail.com