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This new year we’re starting a series on the parables of the Messiah. There are approximately 40 of them. Lord willing, we’ll be going through them in order as they appear in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
The Lord Yeshua is known for teaching in parables. Why did He teach in parables? Several reasons:
A parable is a story that is easy to understand which is used to explain things that are harder to understand, especially spiritual truths. Parables are interesting. They’re easy to remember. Messiah taught in parables to make the truth clear to those who were willing to hear and obscure to those who lacked genuine spiritual interest.
The first two parables: Don’t use new cloth to patch an old garment and don’t put new wine into old wineskins. They’re found in Mark 2, also Matthew 9 and Luke 5. I’m using Mark 2.
First, the background for the parables: Mark 2:18: Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Yeshua, “How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but Yours are not?”
The Pharisees were religious elites. They were very dedicated to practicing their religion. John the Baptist was the first prophet in 400 years. He was the Messiah’s forerunner. He called the nation to repent so we would be ready for the Messiah when He arrived. John was very dedicated to practicing his faith. His disciples were also very serious about practicing their religion. Even though the Jewish people were only required to fast on Yom Kippur, John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fasted much more often. How often?
In another parable, Yeshua said this: Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: “God, I thank you that I am not like other people – robbers, evildoers, adulterers – or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.”
Based on the Lord’s words, it’s reasonable to think that some of the Pharisees fasted once a week, and some even twice a week. John’s disciples probably fasted weekly as well.
It was common knowledge that fasting was part of the religious practices of the Pharisees and John’s disciples. People also knew that Yeshua and His disciples were serious about practicing Judaism. However, they didn’t fast. Why wouldn’t they fast like John’s disciples and the Pharisees who were so dedicated to practicing their faith? Were they less dedicated?
Messiah knew. Yeshua answered, “How can the guests of the groom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them. But the time will come when the groom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.
Yeshua knew who He was: the Son of God, Immanuel – God With Us, the Seed of the Woman, the Messiah, the Lord, the Savior.
He understood His importance. He understood the significance of His life and ministry.
He understood His mission: to proclaim the Good News about Himself; to reveal God in a greater way than God had ever been revealed before; to die a sacrificial death, and then rise from death – so human beings could be reconciled to God.
Yeshua understood He was in the process of making a New Covenant – a new and better relationship between God and people – because of His divine and human natures, His sinless life, His death, His resurrection and ascension and the giving of His Spirit.
He understood He was in the process of creating a radically new community of the sons and daughters of God made up of the faithful remnant of Israel and the peoples of the nations who would join us.
He understood that His arrival was momentous – the culmination of 4,000 years of divine preparation. With His arrival, a new age of the world was starting.
He understood that the Son of God becoming a man and living among us was a thing of extraordinary importance. It was a great thing, an amazing, wonderful, awesome thing – an exceedingly joyous thing.
So, why would His disciples fast, which is more in keeping with sadness and mourning – when Immanuel, God With Us, was with them, revealing God to them, teaching them extraordinary things, doing many great miracles and proclaiming the true message of hope and salvation and eternal life?
With such momentous things happening and radical changes on the way, it was not a time for practicing religion as usual. Fasting while all these great things were happening was as inappropriate as guests fasting at a wedding. However, Yeshua also knew that things would change. He would die. He would be taken from His disciples. Then, after He returned to the right hand of His Father, it would be appropriate for His disciples to fast – but not while He was with them.
That’s the background for Yeshua’s first two parables: Here’s the first one: No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. Otherwise, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. Clothes deteriorate over time. They wear out. They get holes. They need to be patched. And after they been repeatedly washed, the cloth shrinks. If an old garment develops a hole or tear, and new, unshrunk cloth is used and sown on the garment, the old and new cloths will shrink at different rates. The new cloth will shrink faster and pull away from the older cloth. That will make the tear worse. Therefore old garments should be patched with old cloth. Old garments should not be patched with new cloth.
This is easy to understand. So, what are the truths that are harder to understand that Yeshua wants us to know?
The old garment is the Judaism of the Sinai Covenant, including the traditions like fasting, that were associated with it. The new cloth is the Judaism, or the Christianity (same thing), of the New Covenant.
The New Covenant must not be considered to be like a patch, like a minor addition to the Old Covenant. It’s too new, too important, too radically different for that.
Messiah’s second parable reinforces these truths. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.
I like wine. I enjoy drinking wine. I like learning about wine. I even know a little about making wine. When wine is being made, yeast eats the sugars in the grape juice, and a gas, carbon dioxide, is produced. If this fermentation process takes place in an enclosed container, like a wineskin, the gas produces pressure on the container. If an old wineskin is used, the new wine can create enough pressure on the old wineskin so that it bursts and the wine and wineskin are ruined.
Old wine can safely be put into old wineskins. New wine needs to be put into new wineskins. This is easy to understand. What are the spiritual truths Yeshua wants us to understand?
The old wine and old wineskins are the Judaism of the Sinai Covenant. The Sinai Covenant had teachings – the wine. The Sinai Covenant had forms through which those teachings were expressed – the wineskin.
The new wine and new wineskins are the Judaism, or the Christianity (same thing) of the New Covenant.
The New Covenant has teachings that are new and powerful and radically different from those of the Old Covenant. Those teachings need new forms through which they can be expressed.
If the teachings of the New Covenant are forced to fit into the forms of the Old Covenant, they won’t work.
Think of it this way: think of the Old Covenant as the constitution of the Chosen People. It’s laws governed the economic life and political and religious life and institutions of the nation. God designed the Old Covenant to regulate the life of the Chosen People. The New Covenant was designed by God, not to governed the economic and political and religious life of one nation, but to govern the faith of chosen individuals from all nations – chosen Jewish individuals and chosen Gentile individuals.
The New Covenant is radically different from the Old Covenant and the way it is expressed must be radically different. The focus of the New Covenant is radically different from the focus of the Old Covenant. The focus of the New Covenant is Messiah dead, and Messiah alive and full of life and power. The focus of the New Covenant is about Messiah living in us, the hope of glory.
The Old Covenant was about laws and rituals and ceremonies, and institutions like the temple and the priesthood and the sacrifices. The New Covenant is different. It’s not about commandments and rules and regulations and ceremonies. It’s not about what we eat or drink or wear or taste or touch. It’s not about sabbaths or holidays that we might choose to observe or not observe. The New Covenant is not focused on observing laws. It is a message of freedom from law.
It’s about having a radical awareness of God’s reality. It’s about having a sense of wonder, amazement, about the reality and presence of Yeshua in our lives, and the salvation He brings and the power He brings to enable us to live a righteous life. It’s about righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. It’s about having our sins forgiven. It’s about being reconciled to God. It’s about having the Spirit of God taking up residence in us, living in us, creating a new nature in us. It’s about being born again. It’s about becoming a child of God. It’s about being filled with the Spirit, being led by the Spirit; walking and living in the Spirit. It’s about being alive to God in our hearts, aware of Him, thinking about Him, talking to Him. It’s about having a new love for God and a new love for people. It’s about being filled with the Holy Spirit so that we are able to love God and love people.
The New Covenant has a radically different way of living for God, a radically different way of sanctification, of holiness. It’s not based on laws – “thou shall not.” It’s not based on the 613 commandments. It’s not based on the Ten Commandments. It’s based on being filled with the Spirit of Messiah and becoming like our holy Messiah.
When facing a temptation, we pray: Lord, fill me with Your Spirit so I have the power to resist the things that tempt me. Walking by the Spirit is the way to overcome the desires of the flesh – not trying to follow laws.
Not understanding that the New Covenant is radically different from the Old Covenant was the problem of the party of the circumcision, the early Jewish believers who insisted that the Gentiles be circumcised and follow all the laws of the Old Covenant.
Not understanding that the New Covenant is radically different from the Old Covenant was the problem of the Galatians, who started by hearing the gospel by faith and receiving the Spirit, and then got sidetracked into Torah observance and legalism.
Not understanding that the New Covenant is radically different from the Old Covenant is the problem of the legalists like the Seventh Day Adventists, and the Two House heretics, and other groups of legalists.
Not understanding that the New Covenant is radically different from the Old Covenant is the problem of many of the congregations in the Messianic movement today which focus on Torah observance, whose worship services mimic Orthodox Jewish worship services and add a little patch of Yeshua to it.
Let’s pray:
Lord, help us to not view our religion as religion as usual. Help us understand the radical newness of the New Covenant. Help us drink that new wine deeply, be radically changed and express our faith in radically new ways of thinking and living. Help us to be new creatures who live radically new lives, not based on following laws and rituals and ceremonies and traditions, but based on knowing You in a very real way at a very deep level. Help us be those worshipers who worship You in spirit and in the truths of the New Covenant.