I wrote this a year ago, and have let it age for a bit.
The gospel is strange.
Its strange like the rainforest is strange. Rich, deep, restorative, good fruits.
Take a peek.
Oh, and we know that Holy Spirit experience is often known as ‘new wine’; there can be a parallel realm of intoxication, and it can be startling, abrupt, to the cultured palate. And that Jesus of course turned water into wine.
A friend dropped my daughter off last night. They’d all been together after school.
The friends daughter is at the local high school. They’re all bright, joyful girls, with the normal ups and downs. They’ve found something in their faith that many adults would envy, more up than down, but deep as well. Happy kids, who like playing music, games, chatting online. And who love God.
The older girl and another friend are in the same language class at the local high school. A couple of days ago, they were studying at lunch time. It must have been a bit dry, and they giggle about a memory of something.
Others want to know what’s funny, so they open up on the unlikely topic. The private joke was a reference to a word that one of them found themselves repeating once, in a recent spiritual encounter. The rolling currents are still close to the surface. So they’re bold enough to own the moment, and disclose it, not particularly needing to sidestep the raw, potentially awkward material of tongues.
So the exotic story – a repeated word in a God encounter - is met with typical year 8 scepticism in the high school.
“So, if God is real, turn this water into wine. Jesus could, right?” says one, pushing forward a water bottle.
There’s a current of joy running through these two. A little intoxicated perhaps, from touching on that high moment from a week or so previous.
They’re a little taken aback at the challenge but don’t melt in panic and fear. They’ve seen a lot of unusual things in recent months. And not playing the deferral game.
They look at each other. The bell goes for end of lunch.
“Well, we can pray. Don’t blame us if it doesn’t happen though. God might not want it to”.
So, they get the original sceptic who issued the challenge, to pray. Which initially sounds like.
“Yo, Jesus my homey, turn this water into wine”
“No, you’ve got to pray like you mean it”
The classmate, maybe getting a bit influenced by these two now, gives it a go. “Jesus, if you’re real, please turn the water into wine”
One of the believing pair tastes the water. “Nup, still water” .. .and passes it to the sceptic. Who also tastes it. Her eyes widen. “Its wine”.
The first takes it back – and the smell, and the taste, confirm a change has taken place. The third friend also tastes, and all three agree, and double check, against any shadow of emotional delusion, that the goodness has materialised in the bottle.
I know how reliable this account is, can triangulate other aspects, of family, character, occasional taste of wine at dinner. It will be third hand to any reader, but I know they're not smelling bubble gum and imagining things.
Taste and see that the Lord is good.
So … the kids finish a quarter of a water bottle between them.
When I hear the story later that day, I wonder what the school policy should be. “In the case of students turning water into wine, they should refrain from intoxication. “. Although the Education department is probably more afraid of proselyting than alcohol, it seems.
They don’t need to worry – the students don’t think to keep any of the wine, to prove anything to a wider circle. As if scientific models of proof and widespread conclusions are how they were thinking, or what this organic moment needs. No, its like in the original story, the “first sign by which Jesus revealed his glory”, as John puts it. It’s an inner event, intimate, off the radar of the crowd around them. That story makes the point that only the servants, behind the scenes, knew what really happened. The terms of this event have a similar obscurity.
So no demonstrations to the principal’s office or at assembly. Just a little moment with a few year 8 friends. And they just go off to maths when the bell brings, leaving the chips to lie where they fell.
The friend who tasted the wine wants to come along to a meeting with the group who has help spin up this faith.
I happen to hear all this, from one of the girls, later in the day, after afternoon tea has fed the teenage hunger. She had already told the story a couple of times to Christian friends –happens to be the day they all meet after school, and so engages in the story again, and yet, in a balanced way, also not thinking too extravagantly about it. No artifice and no wide eyed hype.
“After all, we do believe in God”. And “Well, mum, we couldn’t not try … its just normal to share”. Mum, who hadn’t expressed her own faith in high school in this outward manner, doesn’t think its normal, and is drawn to a fresh wonder at what’s happening with these teenagers. She believes its like Jesus to do this, feels like Him, but seeing it, on a normal Tuesday, is another thing.
We have all seen a lot of healing miracles in recent months. Their idea of ‘normal’ is moving into a different place.
(Interestingly another Christian in the class had been rather offended at the initial conversation. Not at the ecstatic tongues – she knew about that. But “you cant just pray for a miracle to happen”. Something to follow there .. .what patterns did she think were being broken in this direct and bold faith.)
And a footnote for those who might like a stronger taste of reflection.
Those used to the refined wine of reflection, might think up other ways to frame this. For example, the account of Babel, a Genesis story, might still have some cultural credibility in some circles (though possibly not at the state high school). Thus, Melbourne Uni’s language studies building, has long been named the Babel Building – an ironic reference to the original story where God fragments language, in order to frustrate humanity’s unified but fallen attempt to build a tower into the heavens.
And we might help them pause and reflect that the original Acts 2 outpouring of the Spirit, can be seen as a reversal of that Babel division, with all the diaspora Jews hearing the “praises of God in their own language(s)” – a sign that babel is undone, and new foundational unity is blessed, as the church is born. Thats for reflecting on later, perhaps.
They actually might be interested in all that context - they're tuning in deeply, and it is a language class after all - but in the moment the wine of encounter is too fresh, has too many bubbles fizzing, for that sort of reflection. These two students just moved with the experience, not sliding this moment onto the table with some clever references. That can come later. The new wine is fresher than that, probably fresher in them because served without any of that.
