New Wineskins
Very often we tackle "new normals" with old plans. Having a depth of experience or being nostalgic about past victories are often drawbacks when we find ourselves in changed realities and uncharted territories. We can't approach "new normals" with old and second-hand faith.
Jesus used a powerful parable to address this...
The parables of the cloth and wineskins are the first of six parables that are found in three gospels. The repetition indicates the impact and the centrality of the parables in the overall thrust of Jesus' message.
The message of these two parables is both simple and profound. In a nutshell Jesus is saying: "To digest my message, you will need to let go of the past, abandon preconceived ideas and become more flexible."
If He had only told the parable of the cloth and patch, then the apparent solution would be to get rid of the patch, but second parable refutes this. One does not want to get rid of new wine, and so it is clear that the issues are the old garments and the old wineskins.
God's love and goodness and the message of His kingdom could not be contained in the rigid traditionalism of the Pharisees and Saducees. Their religion had become a cage that limited the goodness and glory of God. Their thought systems were dominated by rules and sacrifices that left them unable to cope with grace.
The danger is that even today we easily create old garments and old wineskins in our thought systems. We hear the message so often that it seems mundane to us. We are constantly in need of antidotes to the calcification of our faith and our inability to grasp the magnitude of God's goodness.
God's Word, God's Goodness, and Jesus' Life and Message will always be a new patch and new wine. If we bring crusty old cloth hearts and stale wineskin lives to try and contain the message, we will not cope. We need to understand that we cannot be the same after the message has been received.
The cloth patch of faith shrinks the areas of darkness and fear and the new wine of faith ferments and bubbles to expand our hearts. If we ever hope to contain the glory of God in our hearts we can be sure of one thing...
...He will always exceed our expectations!
So bring on new garments and new wineskins!
...He will always exceed our expectations!
So bring on new garments and new wineskins!
| No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins. (Mark2:21-22) |
