Joy at Cana

In The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky there is a powerful passage about Christ’s miracle of Cana.  One of the main characters, Alyosha, was sitting in a room where his mentor, Father Zossima, was in a coffin and another monk was reading John 2 out loud over the dead body.  Alyosha was drifting to sleep as he heard it and thought, “I love that passage: it's Cana of Galilee, the first miracle.... Ah, that miracle! Ah, that sweet miracle! It was not men's grief, but their joy Christ visited, He worked His first miracle to help men's gladness…. His Mother, knew that He had come not only to make His great terrible sacrifice. She knew that His heart was open even to the simple, artless merrymaking of some obscure and unlearned people, who had warmly bidden Him to their poor wedding.”  Alyosha then was suddenly there at the wedding in his dreams, and Father Zossima was alive and spoke to Alyosha: “We are rejoicing. We are drinking the new wine, the wine of new, great gladness; do you see how many guests?... He has made Himself like unto us from love and rejoices with us. He is changing the water into wine that the gladness of the guests may not be cut short. He is expecting new guests, He is calling new ones unceasingly for ever and ever.”

             I had never thought of this miracle in that respect before reading this moving description.  In this miracle Christ had not aided men in their grief like so many other miracles of healing the sick and raising the dead and giving sight to the blind; instead, in this the first miracle he had helped people be happier at a celebration.  Miraculously providing more wine didn’t alleviate any suffering but rather deepened their joy at the occasion.  It certainly wasn’t the kind of miracle that was desperately sought by someone in need, and yet Christ thought it within His mission to help to bring more happiness to those at a wedding feast—He worked the miracle to “help men’s gladness.”  Of course there is much symbolism in the story and we can understand it at so many levels, but at least one of the lessons from Cana is that Christ wants to help us be happy.  As He told the apostles shortly before His death: “Ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full” (John 16:24). 
             His time among the Nephites also showed this part of His ministry as He sought to bring joy to the people.  After He had taught and healed them, He was about to leave but chose to stay to bring more happiness to them.  He gathered their children together, prayed, and the multitude saw miraculous things and He declared, “My joy is full.”  The people themselves similarly said, “No one can conceive of the joy which filled our souls at the time we heard him pray for us unto the Father” (3 Nephi 17:17,20).  The next day he did something similar and as He was among them, “Jesus blessed them as they did pray unto him; and his countenance did smile upon them, and the light of his countenance did shine upon them” (3 Nephi 19:25).  Again He did not just teach what they needed to know; rather He brought them unspeakable joy.  His mission was to save us from sin and to bring us know true joy as the Father has.