New Testament · Gospel

John 2

Water Into Wine

At a wedding in Cana, Jesus performs his first sign — turning water into wine. It's a quiet miracle that reveals his glory to only a few.

Berean Standard Bible BSB KJV

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1On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there,

2and Jesus and His disciples had also been invited to the wedding.

3When the wine ran out, Jesus’ mother said to Him, “They have no more wine.”

4“Woman, what is that to you and to Me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”

5His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever He tells you.”

6Now six stone water jars had been set there for the Jewish rites of purification. Each could hold from twenty to thirty gallons.

7Jesus told the servants, “Fill the jars with water.”

8“Now draw some out,” He said, “and take it to the master of the banquet.”

9and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not know where it was from, but the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside

10and said, “Everyone serves the fine wine first, and then the cheap wine after the guests are drunk. But you have saved the fine wine until now!”

11Jesus performed this, the first of His signs, at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed His glory, and His disciples believed in Him.

12After this, He went down to Capernaum with His mother and brothers and His disciples, and they stayed there a few days.

13When the Jewish Passover was near, Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

14In the temple courts He found men selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and money changers seated at their tables.

15So He made a whip out of cords and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle. He poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables.

16To those selling doves He said, “Get these out of here! How dare you turn My Father’s house into a marketplace!”

17His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for Your house will consume Me.”

18On account of this, the Jews demanded, “What sign can You show us to prove Your authority to do these things?”

19Jesus answered, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again.”

20“This temple took forty-six years to build,” the Jews replied, “and You are going to raise it up in three days?”

21But Jesus was speaking about the temple of His body.

22After He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this. Then they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

23While He was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many people saw the signs He was doing and believed in His name.

24But Jesus did not entrust Himself to them, for He knew them all.

25He did not need any testimony about man, for He knew what was in a man.

Understand This

John 2, explained

What John 2 is saying

Jesus performs his first sign at the wedding in Cana, transforming water into wine—and not merely any wine, but superior wine in abundance. This inaugurates the Johannine 'signs' narrative, pointing beyond the miracle to Jesus' identity and the arrival of messianic abundance. Jesus then cleanses the temple in Jerusalem, declaring 'Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up'—which John interprets as referring to his body.

The background behind it

Jewish weddings typically lasted seven days, and running out of wine brought serious social shame upon the host family. The six stone water jars 'for Jewish ceremonial washing' held twenty to thirty gallons each—the transformation of purification water into celebration wine carries rich symbolic significance. John places the temple cleansing at the beginning of Jesus' ministry rather than at the end (as in the Synoptics), likely for theological rather than chronological reasons.

Themes running underneath

The Cana miracle signifies the replacement of Jewish purification rites with the abundant joy of the messianic age—old covenant forms give way to new covenant fullness. The temple saying introduces the body-as-temple motif central to Johannine theology: Jesus himself replaces the temple as the locus of divine presence. Both episodes point to transformation and replacement as key Johannine themes.

Why it still matters

Mary's instruction to the servants—'Do whatever he tells you'—models trusting obedience even when Jesus' methods seem puzzling. The temple cleansing challenges every generation to examine whether religious institutions serve genuine encounter with God or obstruct it.

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Scripture text: Berean Standard Bible — used by permission, Bible Hub.