John 2:11, A Sign of Glory

11 This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him.

Why did Jesus perform this sign, this miracle? To elicit belief in him from his disciples by manifesting his glory, his divine nature. John already told us that all things were created through Jesus, the Word. He has the unlimited and unbounded power of God. He uses that power intentionally to point people to himself so that they may come to faith in him.

This is the first of seven signs in John’s gospel. The number seven in Hebrew is a perfect number, the symbolic number of completion. Because the creation account records seven days, it is a number of completion. John, being Jewish, therefore selects seven signs to record in his gospel. As God created the world in seven days, John records the re-creation of the world by Jesus using seven signs of testimony. (There is, actually, an eighth sign—the resurrection—but I am getting ahead of the story!) These signs all point to who Jesus really is, and this first sign manifests his nature and confirms him as the Creator.

This has important implications for us. When we consider God, we must always have Jesus in the center of our approach to God because Jesus reveals God to us. Our thinking about and relating to God changes because of Jesus. That he is God means he is to be worshipped and obeyed as God. Jesus’ disciples come to this conclusion over time. It is the intention of this Gospel that you and everyone else will too.

Spend some time now worshipping the Lord, and in that moment of worship, give your obedience to him and ask him to make you even more obedient to him today.