The Wine at Cana:
The Modest Water Saw Its God and Blushed
Recommended listening: Going Up the Country by Canned Heat
John 2
The newly-minted Para-Apostle Mortar tasted the wine that the head steward had proclaimed the best wine saved for last and he cried out, “Sacrebleu! (Holy Mackerel!) Exquisite! Chateau LaTour ’61, n’est pas?! (Isn’t that right.)”
And the steward, who heard Mortar’s identification of the rare vintage, replied, “Oui, monsieur, c'est cela! (Yes, sir. That’s it exactly!.)”
The servant who had served Mortar leant over and told him, “Better than that. A few short moments ago it was but water. Monsieur Jesu turned the water into the wine.”
“You don’t say.” said the Mortar.
“Yes, I do say. In vino veritas! (In wine is truth.)” replied the servant.
“But wait! You can’t serve it immediately! First, the wine must breathe!” cried Mortar, “And the…” He broke off mid-word when it was obvious that no one was listening to him.
Mortar then worked his way over to where Jesus was sitting and he said, “Jesu, my man, A votre santé. (To your health). And he clinked glasses with Jesus. “If my palate’s not mistaken that’s a genuine Chateau LaTour ’61. How did you do it?”
“Du rien, (it’s nothing) Mortar, du rien.” said Jesus deprecatingly, “it was a favor to my mother.”
“’Du rien’, he says. Can you, ah, do this ‘nothing’ again?” questioned Mortar earnestly, “Maybe a little bit of the bubbly this time, a nice Merlot or even a little aqua vite, or…”
“Say that again.” said Jesus quickly.
“Say what, bubbly, Merlot, aqua vite?” said Mortar.
“Yes, that. Aqua vite. The water of life. Water… life. Life water. Life water. Living water. My man, you’re a genius, I think you’re on to something. Let me write that down. Tuck it away for future reference. ” said Jesus with a thoughtful look. Jesus pulled out his notebook and quickly scribbled a few words and he quickly returned the notebook to his satchel.
“Never mind that!” exclaimed Mortar. “Bigg, I mean B-I-G-G bigg idea! We could open up a little wine bistro and with your ‘logistical capabilities’, shall we say, we could keep the overhead real low. I do the cooking and you keep the bar! You’ve got the makings of a great bartender. It’d give you a chance to sharpen your people skills. The rest we can train you for. Maybe we can get Matthew to keep the books for us. Martha can wait tables.” Mortar put one arm around Jesus’ shoulder and with the other made a wide, sweeping gesture with his other arm as if to conjure in the air an image of this instant dream. “We could call it ‘M & J: A Little Wine”
“Whoa, Mortar, slow down.” Jesus said, “My head is spinning and it’s not the wine! We’ll talk about it later. C’mon let’s go to the Cigar Club tent. Bring your glass. By the way, did you hear about the man who sat on a grape? It gave out a little whine/wine!”
