Turning Water to Wine

A little while back I read something that pulled the rug out from under me. It was an interview with Dr. Burgdorfer, the researcher that discovered Lyme's disease back in the seventies. It's a long story and honestly I don't have the emotional energy, and I doubt you have the focus for the whole convoluted story. Suffice to say, he coyly alludes to there being much about this disease that is not being discussed, shared, etc. Somehow, can't say how, it sucked the life out of me. Not immediately, but bit by bit over days, the way a helium balloon slowly loses, well, helium.

It started a train of thoughts, some very bitter. Some of these thoughts went along the lines of, "I suppose it doesn't really matter what happens to me." Ten plus years of illness and doctors and unknowns and hope, so much hope. I suddenly felt utterly listless; pajamas had become my outfit of choice. Meals were nice, if they happened, but cereal sufficed. It has seemed to me for a very long time, like I was trying to stop a gradual dissent.

I have looked for scriptures on bitterness, many of them talk along the lines of needing to know the bitter in order to recognize the sweet. Much can come of the bitter experience - empathy, compassion, tolerance, grace, patience, endurance, faith and more faith. Some bitter experiences do not fit neatly into a moment or a month, some last and compel you to grapple with them over and over again. There is no satisfactory gaze back where one sees all that has been gained by the experience. Don't we all have at least one of these in our lifetime? Something we must revisit over and over again, never sure whether the tally of endurance is in our favor or against.

In looking to my scriptures, I thought it interesting that the first of Christ's miracles that we know of was when he turned water to wine for a wedding feast. Transformation from one thing to another. To completely alter the basic molecular identity of water into wine. These experiences that can be bitter unto themselves can transform us; create a new creature, but only through the abilities of Jesus Christ. This is what I'm holding out for.