©Bonnie LaBelle
Chapter 13:12-14 (ESV) - “You shall speak to them this word: ‘Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, “Every jar shall be filled with wine.”’ And they will say to you, ‘Do we not indeed know that every jar will be filled with wine?’ Then you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the LORD: Behold, I will fill with drunkenness all the inhabitants of this land: the kings who sit on David's throne, the priests, the prophets, and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And I will dash them one against another, fathers and sons together, declares the LORD. I will not pity or spare or have compassion, that I should not destroy them.’”
Question to consider: Where else in scripture is there an image of jars of wine?
I am not a Hebrew scholar, but the Hebrew TNK (old testament torah, writings and prophets) is presented without vowels. The translators for today’s passage take the word containing the Hebrew letters: Lamed (ל), Beth (× ), and Nun (ב) and agree that it was probably nê·á¸‡el which is the word for bottle or jar. It makes sense because a bottle or jar is something that would be filled with wine. There are other words which use these same letters which can make for some interesting wordplay in scripture. One such example would be nabal which is the word for fool. In this case, we could translate the phrase, “Every fool shall be filled with wine.”
This is a reasonable wordplay since the LORD followed up His statement that He would fill with drunkenness all the inhabitants of this land. The idea behind this statement was to say that everyone would be amply supplied with wine so that they would be caught off guard and drunk when the Babylonians came. Jesus warned against being caught up this way when talking about the judgment which would come upon Jerusalem in AD 70, “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap.” (Luke 21:34)
Personally, I think today’s passage infuses meaning into the miracle performed by Jesus at the wedding feast in John 2:1-12. In this case, Jesus provided the wine by having the servants fill purification jars with water and bringing it to the head of the ceremony who recognized it as the best wine. The celebration was a holy wedding feast instead of the sinful revelry of drunkards worshiping pagan gods.
Christ Himself has purified us and given us this wine to drink and bread to eat with all the church on earth and in heaven. This wine is a foretaste of the feast to come, and in it we wait in anticipation that Christ will put an end to sin and death.
Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who desirest not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should turn from his evil way and live, we beseech Thee graciously to turn from us those punishments which we by our sins have deserved and to grant us grace ever hereafter to serve Thee in holiness and pureness of living; through Jesus Christ Thy Son, our Lord. Amen.