Do Whatever He Tells You

    Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend yet another marching band competition, this one in Brentwood Tennessee at the John Overton High School.  You see, my daughter is one of the drum majors.....no wait, that is a term from my generation when the person who led the band actually marched out in front of the band and wore a HUGE furry hat and carried a HUGE javelin-length baton.  (Now they are called field commanders and direct from high in the air on an elevated platform...but I digress.)
 
     Anyway, after the preliminary competitions they had something called a "drill down."  Now this was new to me the first time I heard about it. (But then the first time you hear about something is always new...that is the essence of "new", but I digress.)

     Drill down is where the participants line up on the field in good old-fashioned style and the person in charge (in this case NOT a field commander) gives them rapid-fire instructions that they must follow to a tee.  Similar to "Simon Sez" if they fail to follow the commands precisely, they are eliminated from the competition.  This goes on until the last participant is standing.  In the case yesterday it happened to be a young man from my daughter's band (who, parenthetically, was the first boy to kiss my daughter while she was on a band trip a couple of years ago, which made my blood boil when I heard about it, but I digress).

     C'mon Pastor Dave, get to the point...try PROgressing for a change...OK I'll try.

     In my Sunday morning Bible Study class yesterday, we read the passage in John 2 where Jesus turned the water into wine at the wedding feast at Canaan.

     Pastor Dave, what does a band drill-down competition have to do with turning water into wine?
I am glad you asked!

     In that story,   Mary, Jesus' mother, turned to him to inform him that the wine was running out.  In true first-child fashion Jesus replies, "Why are you telling me this?"  Well actually his words were, "What has this concern of yours to do with me woman?" (John 2:4)  (Now when I was a young man, if I had called my mother, "Woman" I would have come away sans a few teeth, but I digress.)

     So Mary turns to the people who were serving the food and said to them, no doubt pointing to her son, and said, "Do whatever he tells you." (John 2:5)

     Now it was a good thing that they were obedient because the next thing that happened was that Jesus told them to basically fill up the bathtubs with water.  Seems a little odd to be asking someone to draw a little bath water in the midst of a wedding feast, but they obey.  (OK, I know they were water JARS but they were used for ceremonial washing so "bathtub" is a close analogy, but I digress)

   The next thing you know, they have a bathtub filled with fine wine. 

   So hears the point:  (Finally, whew)   "If you're a Christian, then, during your lifetime, Jesus will ask you to do many things that seem fantastically audacious" (I quoted that from my Bible Study book because it has the word "audacious" in it, but I digress)

    When he tells you to do something, no matter how crazy it seems, you need to just "Do Whatever  He Tells You" because you may be the next person through whom he is preparing to do something miraculous.

     It is always a good thing to obey your mother.  It is even better to obey your Savior and Lord.  so...

Do Whatever  He Tells You!

(By the way, someone suggested that I might be a little ADHD, but you don't think so, do you? But I digress.)