Mark 2:18-22

Change will do you good! 

We will never get new results with old behavior.

The metaphors in the two parables were drawn from the culture of the times. When patching a garment the patch had to be washed prior to placement or it would shrink and tear away from the garment it was sown onto, likewise, if new wine was placed in old wineskin the fermenting of the fruit would eat away at the brittle skin and cause it to burst. The same holds true today.

A pliable new wineskin can take the expansion.

The new wine of the Holy Spirit requires a shift in paradigm. Jesus called for change in our worldly way of looking at the world to discerning everyday life spiritually. We need to break free from the fear of change.

The comparison implies that the newness of His message, and of the new covenant to follow, cannot fit into the old molds of Judaism. The Old Testament was preparation for the new.

^{Mark 1:15: "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."}

^{Paul understood this. To his friends in Rome, he said, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds" (Rom. 12:2). And to those in Philippi, "Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5).}

^“I believe the Lord wants to unleash a gushing river of new wine into the church today, but He is directing us to prepare our wineskins. What is old must be renewed by the Spirit, what is outdated must be remodeled, and what is ineffective must be replaced. God wants to do a new thing. Don’t resist it.

~ ”New Wine, Old Wineskins and the Fear of Change J.Lee Grady

Mark 2:18-22

¹⁸ The disciples of John and of the Pharisees were fasting. Then they came and said to Him, “Why do the disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but Your disciples do not fast?”

¹⁹ And Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them they cannot fast. 

²⁰ But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days. ²¹ No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; or else the new piece pulls away from the old, and the tear is made worse. ²² And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine bursts the wineskins, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins.”