Note: This transcript is AI-generated and may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for the most accurate information and meaning.
Introduction: Seeking Newness
Thank you, Jesse. I appreciate that. You can be turning to the text for today, which is in Luke’s Gospel. We’re looking at a series as the new year begins, “New Year, New You,” as the saying goes, right? We use that turnover of the calendar as a way of sort of resolving for a new leaf, a new system, getting things better, back to normal, whatever. We’re trying to figure out a way to get newness in some respect.
The one thing the Bible is very clear about, and the Gospel is very clear about, is that there is nothing new under the sun. Nothing new under the sun. As long as you’re looking for newness under the world we have, in the human capacity, in the horizontal plane, you’re not going to find it. The best authors and the best wisdom over history have told us: there’s nothing new. You’re not going to find what you’re looking for.
But if you live outside of the sun, beyond the sun, there is newness. And then the stuff down here makes better sense. If you use the stuff—the reason this stuff is not new and doesn’t satisfy is that it doesn’t produce what we hope it will. But there is something, there is hope and newness beyond the sun. When that fills and satisfies the deepest longings, then the stuff down here becomes usable, enjoyable, and pleasant.
The Gospel’s “New Wine”
So today, we’re looking at many of the “new” things the scriptures offer, because the Gospel and the grace of God provide “new” in so many ways. This morning, we’re looking at the fact that it offers “new wine.”
Let’s turn to Luke 5:33-39:
“They 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.’
Jesus answered, ‘Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.’
He told them this parable: ‘No one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch an old one. Otherwise, they will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, “The old is better.”‘”
This is God’s word. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God stands forever. Let’s pray.
Father, be with us this morning as we look at your word. Give us clarity in our minds, a powerful captivation in our hearts and emotions, and lead us to a greater sense of submission and service in our will, that we would sacrifice for you and for those around us. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
The Wedding Analogy
A bunch of years ago, Becky and I got an invitation to a family wedding. We were actually surprised we were invited because it’s one of those family members that’s “out there,” but you don’t really spend much time with them. We didn’t know how we got on the list, but we were happy to be included. Becky and I have never been the sort of people—well, I’ve done a lot of weddings and attended a lot of weddings—but people get touchy with weddings sometimes. Like, “Why wasn’t I invited?” Becky and I have never been that way; the fact that we get invited to any wedding is a surprise to us. Even our own children invited us to their wedding—it was fabulous! But our expectations are very low.
So, we get this invitation and we’re chatting with other family members. I don’t usually talk about weddings with anybody because maybe they didn’t get invited, and I don’t want to be in on that conversation. But it came up at a family thing, and my sisters were saying they were going and they’d had more contact than I had. I found out through that process that at this wedding, there wasn’t going to be any food and there wasn’t going to be a bar.
I said to my sisters, half-joking, “Well, I guess we’re not going!” They said, “Oh no, we’ll probably go,” and I asked, “What’s that all about? No food? No wine? Then why go?” To go all that distance, bring a gift, and all that… why go if there’s no celebration? To go to a wedding and not have some level of celebration is kind of weird, right? Am I the only one who thinks it’s weird? You can have whatever celebration you want, but no food? No drink? No punch? Something!
Religious Rituals vs. Joy
Jesus is saying the same thing here. The religious leaders, the Pharisees, were saying to Jesus: “How come your disciples don’t act religious? How come John the Baptist’s disciples are all about fasting and prayer and obligation, and our disciples are all about being devoted and contemplative?” Fasting often accompanied mourning and lamenting a situation. The religious people were asking, “Why aren’t your disciples like that? They’re just eating and drinking with all kinds of crazy people all the time! They don’t look religious like we do. They look… happy. They don’t look dour and in despair.”
Jesus tells them the answer: “How can you tell the people at a wedding they can’t celebrate? How do you say, ‘No, you’re at a wedding, let’s mourn’?” When you’re at a wedding, when the bridegroom is with them, how can you expect them not to celebrate? Jesus is referring to himself; while he is with them, they celebrate. He is predictive here, too, saying there’s a time coming when the bridegroom will be taken away, and then there will be mourning. He’s referring to the cross. They were in mourning then; they all ran from the scene and were a mess. But then he comes back on the third day, and the celebration occurs again.
The Fermentation of Grace
As long as you have the bridegroom, you have celebration. This is the nature of how wine operates. The Gospel he is bringing is like “new wine.” It’s in the context of celebration. We don’t mourn, we don’t fast—we enjoy, we engage, we celebrate. The Gospel of grace provides new celebration.
New wine is fermented. If you’ve ever been to a church that has both wine and grape juice in the tray, and you forget the wine is in the middle and the juice is on the edge… you take a sip and go, “Ooh!” That feeling is the fermentation. That sense of something sweet but also bitter and tangy—that’s the fermented process. It takes on a life of its own; it’s expansive. In the process of making wine, they would take the new wine, put the yeast in, and it would ferment and expand.
They would store wine in skins. New skins can stretch. As the wine fermented and expanded, the skin would stretch with it. Then they would put it into another new wineskin and it would expand further. But you would never take new wine and put it into an old skin that had already reached its final expansion. That new wine would ferment, grow, and burst the old skins.
The Incompatibility of the New and Old
Why is that important to the Gospel? Because the grace he is bringing, the faith he is bringing into the world, is so different than what they’ve already had that there’s no way to contain it in the present systems. He’s saying to the Pharisees, “If you’re trying to understand what I’m bringing in the context of your system, you’re never going to understand it. It’s going to blow your system out of the water.” Their minds were being blown! It didn’t fit; it was fermenting and expansive and celebratory.
The scriptures say that wine is meant to make the heart glad. There’s a value in it. That fermented process—have you ever been the person who, after a drink, is just happier? You’re smiling and fun-loving. They call it “liquid courage” because it makes me able to celebrate in ways I might be more subdued without.
Alcohol—fermented experience—makes it easier for the inside to get out. It’s also called “truth serum.” It takes away the inner filter, so what’s inside comes out. Jesus uses this as an example of what the Gospel provides: it takes what’s on the inside and brings it out.
Internal Change vs. External Washing
Wine is not water. In John 2, Jesus’ first miracle was at a wedding where he turned water in ceremonial cleansing jugs into wine. Those were jugs used for ceremonial washing. The wine of the Gospel is not the water of cleansing. Cleansing water can only wash the outside; it has no internal effect. You have to keep washing and cleansing in a treadmill of performance. But wine goes in and changes the inside.
The old system was outside-in: wash the externals, but it doesn’t affect the internal. The Gospel is putting something on the inside that has an internal effect and expresses itself outwardly, predominantly through celebration. If you’re not celebrating regularly because the bridegroom has changed you on the inside, you’re missing the new wine.
The sign that you’ve had the wine is that you celebrate. But if you’re not experiencing the celebration, or you’re complaining about other people celebrating—like the older brother in the parable of the Prodigal Son… he wouldn’t go in. He said, “I’ve slaved for you all these years and you didn’t even let me have a young goat to celebrate, but this son of yours squanders your wealth and you give him the fatted calf!” He wasn’t experiencing the celebration, so all he could do was complain about someone else’s.
The Unique Motivation of the Gospel
When that Gospel of grace frees us, when it changes the inner man, it’s not about conforming to an outward pattern. It’s coming from within. You can’t help but celebrate that. Christianity is unique from every other religion because every other religion tries to effect change from the outside in. Religion is my attempt to conform to a system or principle. I can use religion to effect external change, but it can never effect internal system change.
External religion turns me into a person who has to do a particular thing. Only the Gospel can turn me into a person who wants to do a particular thing. The new paradigm tells you to rest from your labors rather than work. Trusting rather than doing. The man asks Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” and Jesus gives him a “faith” answer: “Believe in the one he has sent.” Jesus is saying, “Your paradigm is off. I can’t explain what to do because the doing is the problem. You have to surrender from the doing and trust me.”
It’s a love-based system of wanting, not a legal-based system of having to. It’s a joyous victory rather than a dour struggle. You don’t “do” the Gospel; you trust the Gospel. You let Jesus come in and you celebrate the forgiveness of your sins. You celebrate that his righteousness counts for you right this minute, so you don’t have to try to get him to approve of you. He already approves of you!
Conclusion: Living from Grace
Now that you have those benefits, it’s not a carrot and a stick anymore. The carrot is what I put in front of the donkey to get him to plow. The Gospel is not a new carrot; Jesus gives you all the benefits up front. I’m not going to bribe you to move forward; I’m going to love you so deeply that that internal, fermented love is going to expel you forward.
It doesn’t just have an external effect; it has an internal effect. But like all internal effects, it takes time. It’s a little imperfect when it comes out because it’s coming through a system that is still changing. God is patient with us. He doesn’t simply want external conformity; he wants internal continuity. He wants new life inside that seeps out. He’s turning us from cucumbers into pickles. That is an internal process. You’ve got to soak it up, let the grace of God in, and the more you soak in it, eventually, you are a pickle. Some pickles are tangier than others. We old-timers have been sitting in the vinegar for a lot of years, so we’re real tangy!
But this newness, this wine, is not comfortable. Jesus says in verse 39: “And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.'” Our old system wants to boot up “DOS” every day—that old operating system without pictures, just a blinking prompt on a black screen. We want to go back to the old system because it’s familiar. “I’d rather just earn my way. I’d rather just do it myself.”
The human system is “You scratch my back, I scratch yours.” We like that because it’s tangible. But when the Gospel says, “I’m going to give you all the benefits up front,” the first question people often ask is, “Well, then what’s the motivation?” Exactly. Now you’re getting it. Your old motivation was obligation, threat, fear, guilt, and condemnation. Now I’m giving you an internal power that is fermented and based on celebration. Love is going to drive you to do it rather than guilt beating you to do it. I’m going to woo you to me rather than drive you to me.
That different system throws off everything. It’s uncomfortable because we’re used to “I do this, I get that.” But that’s dishonest because you think you’re doing it, but you’re not. You’re grading yourself on a curve. In the new system, I can be honest that I’m not living up to how God calls me, but he gives me the forgiveness to step forward with his grace. Out of gratitude and love, I can live and sacrifice for him and for the people around me.
To make new wine requires Jesus to produce it in his own soul. At the beginning of his ministry, he talks about wine. In the middle, he talks about wine. And at the very end, at the last meal he ever had on earth, he says, “This wine is me; it’s my blood.” His blood is that internal, fermented power inside of you. Unless you internalize it, you have no part in him. internalize the wine which is faith in the cross he offered. He paid for it, now drink up! We celebrate because we have the Savior back. This table represents the death of Jesus, but it is the Resurrection; his body goes on living and giving life and hope and favor to his people. That’s the joy of the Gospel.
Thank you, Father, for what you’ve offered to us here. Wrap our heads and minds around this process. Let it ferment in us deeply, even though we yearn to go back to the old system of obligation and fear. In your patience, you wait on us and empower us by your Spirit. You tell us to abide in you, and as we abide in you, you will give us new life in this relationship. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.