How awkward is it when you come across someone living in the past?
…Someone living in the glory years – living off of old memories. Like Uncle Rico in Napoleon Dynamite
… there are people get stuck in the past, all their stories decades old, their jokes, mannerisms and even dress painfully out of date.
The same is true of our spiritual lives… there are people who live with an old faith. I would contend that many Americans are living on old faith (old customs, old forms, old convictions, old liturgies, old theology)
· There are some who one day wake up and recognize it. They realize their religion is stale and useless and turn cynical. Walk away from organized religion altogether.
· There are others who go the other direction…they pine for it. they are the Uncle Ricos of the church…nostalgic for the old days when believing in God was so much simpler.
· But most people do neither… they aren’t antagonistic nor nostalgic about their old faith they just let their old faith become part of the wall paper of their lives. Keep just enough tradition to say they are marginally religious. And they join the ranks of the bland religious majority; they meld into the 66% of Casual Christians in this country.
Old faith is anemic and passive. Old faith has no teeth. Old faith has no life. Old faith will not change the world. Old faith cannot contain the dynamic of the Kingdom of God.
You can’t live on old faith if you intend to follow Jesus.
That in a nutshell was what Jesus was trying to tell his naysayers in yet another confrontation in Galilee.
Luke 5:33
33 They (Pharisees) said to him, "John's disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking." 34 Jesus answered, "Can you make the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? 35 But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast." 36 He told them this parable: "No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. 37 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. 38 No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. 39 And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, 'The old is better.'" Luke 5:33-39
Review where we are in the narrative: Legacy 3. (north to Galilee, reframes his mission, recalls his followers, does some spectacular miracles and gets in loads of trouble for it)
Per usual his trouble is with the Pharisees = “separated ones”
· 200 year old religious party – most influential of all groups.
· Lived by the Torah and the traditions formed over many centuries
· Talk about old faith! they clung to their old systems and customs…one of which was fasting
o Fasting, almsgiving and prayer where the big 3 in Judaism.
o Technically only once in the law but expanded greatly over the years in their tradition.
· Purposes of fasting: acts of piety/holiness, act of repentance, act of hope and anticipation…and…it was an act of boundary making…a defining behavior
o an act whereby you were proved different than the rest of the rabble.
The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men--robbers, evildoers, adulterers--or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' Luke 18:11-12
· therein lied the rub…because Jesus disciples did just the opposite…they didn’t’ separate themselves from evil doers…they were Vs.33 “eating and drinking”
o Eating and drinking didn’t infer partying (hammered and gorging) but relationship – who they hung with.
Jesus obviously had instructed his followers to ignore old fasting traditions and he did so himself…and adopted a new policy in line with the Kingdom of God – eat and drink with sinners.
Why? Why did he reject aspects of the Old Faith?
Two analogies…why it was not only OK but proper for his followers to break from tradition:
1st analogy - The presence of the bridegroom:
34 Jesus answered, "Can you make the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? 35 But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.
· a wedding was an event of great joy primarily to celebrate along with the one getting married. (the bridegroom). It would have been unthinkable to be solemn on this occasion. Fasting was the last thing people did at a wedding.
· Clearly Jesus was identifying himself with the bridegroom. The most important event in the history of the world had occurred (the Messiah/King had come to establish the Kingdom of God). It was time to change tactics…
· Interestingly he does hint that a day would come when fasting as an act of anticipation would occur in the future as his followers once again would fast wishing for his return.
Jesus point – it’s time to change tactics at least while I’m around!
2nd analogy – Cloth patches and wineskins:
36 He told them this parable: "No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. 37 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. 38 No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins.
· the clothing analogy simply states that new fabric doesn’t’ match old fabric and implies that as new fabric shrinks it might tear the old garment.
· A wineskin was made of animal hide.
· Wine is a fermented drink - yeast interacts with sugars in grape juice to create ethyl alcohol, and carbon dioxide (as a by-product).
· As that happened and the new wine fermented the animal skin would expand. Thus new actively fermenting wine might destroy an old dried out brittle animal hide wineskin.
His point:
· people do like old wine - 39 And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, 'The old is better.'"
- you think your old faith is better and you prefer your old winskins like fasting and other traditions
but…they cannot contain the new wine of the Kingdom.
· Jesus life, teachings and Kingdom were certainly revolutionary, and groundbreaking…it was new faith, new garment, new wine
We have never seen anything like this! Mark 2:12
Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel. Matthew 9:33
Nobody has ever heard of opening the eyes of a man born blind. John 9:32
· Jesus life and Kingdom does not fit in old wineskins…old faith…old patterns…it is expansive and innovative:
o instead of separating from all that would contaminate – engage with those who have been shunned
o instead of rejecting the lost – seek the lost
o instead of faith being about just religious practice it was now about aggressive action
o instead of being concerned only about managing sin Jesus was calling for the world to be changed
o instead of faith simply being personal (me and God ) it was now communal (us and God) – love one another
Jesus was re-engineering the mission of God in the world:
- This radical of a shift required way more than a minor adjustment but a sweeping overhaul…this new wine required new wineskins
You can’t live on old faith if you intend to follow Jesus.
- You need some new faith clothes
- you need a new faith wineskin
This theme of radical re-invention became a repetitive idea both in Jesus teaching and the early church:
Jesus declared, "I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again." John 3:3
If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 2 Corinthians 5:17
...put off your old self… and put on the new self, Ephesians 4:22-24
So, to adopt a new wineskin you must experience a deep, sweeping, far-reaching personal conversion.
You can’t live on old faith if you intend to follow Jesus. You must surrender to Jesus.
And following that surrender comes the on-going re-orientation of one’s everyday life…in order to hold in your life the new wine of the life of Jesus and his kingdom:
What does new wineskin look like? What does discipleship to Jesus look like?
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ practice surrender to God and trust in Him.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ practice disengagement from their routines and
distractions in order to commune with God.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ practice self-denial.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ seek the call of God on their lives.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ practice moral integrity.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ engage in lifestyles of justice and mercy.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ practice material generosity.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ study the Word of God and take in good Biblical
teaching that will transform their lives.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ lead others to follow Jesus.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ love others well.
Ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ are committed to living in a spiritual community
through the local church.
If your desire is to move from the 66% of casual Christians to the 14% of revolutionary faith and become a disciple of Jesus … you have to lose the old wineskins…the old patterns…the old comfortable things…
And put on the new garment…adopt the new wineskin of discipleship.
You can’t live on old faith if you intend to follow Jesus.
And one more thing…
The best place for people who want to live out new wineskin faith is to be deeply connected in a new wineskin church.
Grace church is a new wineskin. This is not what most of us grew up with. In no way could I have imagined this. None of us could have.
When we began this church we started with a blank pad of paper and a pen and said to God – what do you want to create? And he did.
I am not suggesting that this church is the best, or the only place to live out your faith but I’m telling you that this church has developed into a powerful new wineskin that can contain the pulsing energy of the expanding Kingdom of God.
You want to experience new faith and revolutionary discipleship then look no further. The new wine of the kingdom is flowing here. So, come closer…connect deeply…serve passionately …grow rapidly …and experience a new faith unlike anything you’ve known before.