people are in need and deals with that need in unexpected ways. The transformation from water to wine is of course meant by John to signify the effect that Jesus can have, can still have today, on people’s lives. He came, as he says later, that we might have life in all its fullness (10:10). You might want to pray through this story with your own failures and disappointments in mind—remembering that transformation only came when someone took Mary’s words seriously: ‘Do whatever he tells you.’ One