Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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In Father, we come to your
word. And Lord, this is important,
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for it is your word, and
it's important that I carefully exposit it
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to your people, and that I
do not try to go to the writer
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to the left, but that I
try God to be faithful to the text.
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Lord, you were teaching some marvelous
things in this text, and I
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don't want to mess it up,
but I do want to emphasize what you
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were trying to teach us. And
so Lord, I pray that as I
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read your word, and as I
exposited to your people, that you would
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help me to have grace to do
it rightly, Lord, and to indeed
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to be able to speak to your
people in such a way that will edify,
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exhort and comfort them. And so
Lord, we ask for your spirit,
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Oh Holy Spirit, please not only
illuminate and anoint your word, Boord,
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but that which follows as well.
Keep me from sin, keep me
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from falsehood and deceit, but help
me to preach your true word. We
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ask these things in Christ's name.
Amen. Our text this morning comes to
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us from Luke chapter five. The
end of the chapter, we're going to
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be looking at Versus thirty three to
thirty nine Luke Chapter five, thirty three
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the thirty nine here is God's word. And they said to him, the
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disciples of John fast often and offer
prayers and do and so do the disciples
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of the Pharisees. But yours eat
and drink. And Jesus said to them,
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can you make wedding guests fast while
the bridegroom is with them? The
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days will come when the bridegroom is
taken away from them, and then they
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will fast in those days. He
also told to them a parable. No
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one tears a piece from a new
garment and puts it on an old garment.
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If he does, he'll tear the
new, and the piece from that
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new will not match the old.
And no one puts new wine into old
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wine skins. If he does,
the new wine will burst the skins,
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and it will be spilled, and
the skins will be destroyed. But new
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wine must be put into fresh wine
skins. And no one, after drinking
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old wine desires new, for he
says the old is good. Since the
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reading of God's word, please be
seated. So this morning we come to
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the end of Luke chapter five,
chapter that I think has had a lot
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to teach us much for us to
look at in our last text, we
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saw the call of Levi. We
saw that after he had been converted,
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he uh calls this major feast and
invites all of his friends, who,
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as we looked at, are basically
the low life of society because text collectors
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didn't have friends in the upper echelon, so he would invite all of these
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people that many people would not want
to be acquainted with, but Levi invites
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them. And so this morning we
have the third confrontation between Jesus and the
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Pharisees, and these confrontations will continue
into the next chapter as well. There's
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two more coming up in chapter six. But let's start by looking here at
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verse thirty three, it says they
said to him. Now we might assume
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from that, and it says they
that it's referring to the same group as
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in verse thirty where it identifies them
as the Pharisees and the and their scribes.
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But in Matthew's account he says it
is the disciples of John who actually
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come to Christ. With his question, Mark's account combines them says, now
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John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting, and people came and said to him,
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why do John's disciples and the disciples
of the Pharisees fast, but your
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disciples do not fast? So there
is no contradiction here. It's just that
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different writers want to emphasize different groups
that are coming to Christ. And it
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just happens at this time that both
of the groups, the Pharisees and also
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the Disciples of John, are fasting
at this time, and they come therefore
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with his question that that he has
now the reason for the joining together.
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Calvin says that maybe the Pharisees are
attempting to draw the disciples of John away
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from Jesus and into their party,
which they could be doing, and he
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draws this application Calvin does. He
said, this example reminds us that prudence
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and caution are necessary to prevent wicked
and cunning men from sowing divisions among us
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on any slight ground. Now what
we might question, though, is why
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would the disciples of John. I
mean, we understand the Pharisees, but
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why would the disciples of John be
coming to Jesus to question him? After
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all, John pointed his disciples to
Jesus, he said, has he pointed
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at him? Look? Behold,
this is the lamb of God who takes
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away the sins of the world.
He said, he must increase and I
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must decrease. So why why are
they are questioning Christ here? Well,
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we have to remember a couple of
things. Number One, remember John was
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an ascetic. John was someone who
lived in the wilderness, ate very little,
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probably often fasted as well, and
so they would, of course his
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disciples would wonder about that. Why
why would Jesus be doing a different kind
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of lifestyle. And Jesus refers to
this in Matthew eleven, eighteen and nineteen.
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John came neither eating nor drinking,
and they say he has a demon.
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The son of Man came eating and
drinking, and they say, look
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at him, a glutton and a
drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and
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sinners. Yet wisdom is justified by
your deeds. So it would very likely
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be that the disciples of John,
as disciples of a teacher will often do,
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they'll of the practice of their master, and so they of course would
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follow the ascetic practices of John.
And so they might wonder why is it
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that Jesus is not following that particular
procedure. The other thing we got to
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remember is that although John did point
out to his disciples that Jesus was the
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Lamb of God. Not all of
his disciples were present at that time.
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In fact, we're gonna come,
well, we won't, but you can
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when you go further in your Bible
upon a group in x nineteen of disciples
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of John who didn't know anything about
the Gospel or the Holy Spirit. And
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so of course there's going to be
some of those here. And also we
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note that John was really the last
prophet of the Old Covenant and Jesus the
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first of the New. There is
one other possibility for the fasting, however,
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that I'll just mention. We can't
prove this. We don't know exactly
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because Luke doesn't tell us things that
strict chronological order. We don't know exactly
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when John actually died at the hands
of of Herod. We know about the
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story, but we don't know when. And some postulated perhaps, uh,
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the disciples were fasting in mourning because
of the death of John. The possibility
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but certainly not provable. And this
is a question of practice. This is
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not a question of obedience to the
law. It's not that at all.
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The law only required and kind of
obliquely, uh not not really clear,
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But the law only requires fasting of
the Jews one day in the year.
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That day, as I'm sure many
of you know, is the day of
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Atonement. That was the day,
and there it says, and it shall
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be a statute to you forever,
that in the seventh month, on the
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tenth day of the month, you
shall afflict yourselves and shall do no work
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either the native of the stranger who
sojourns among you. In that term,
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afflict yourself is the term for fasting. But from practice, what it appears
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by this time is both of the
disciples of John and the disciples of the
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Pharisees were practicing regular fasting at this
point. You might remember when Jesus tells
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the parable of the tax collector and
the Pharisee. One of the things that
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Pharisee says is I fast twice a
week, and those two fast would have
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been Monday and Thursday that they fasted
together. James Edwards says, although not
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a legal requirement except on the day
of Atonement, fasting had become in Jesus
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day a prerequisite of religious commitment,
a sign of atonement of sin and humiliation
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and penitence before God, and as
a general aid to prayer, and there
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were uh aids and their writings that
would tell people particular times they ought to
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fast, and remembrance is perhaps of
national disasters, is when the tempo had
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been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, And even
during times of crisis, fasting would be
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perhaps um given by the leadership that
they should and and there might be just
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practical reasons that one might fast.
But the danger of fasting, like anything
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else, like it is it can
lead people, which just does here to
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these people, to a kind of
works righteousness, to justifying yourself by works,
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which is not the gospel that Jesus
comes to do. And so um
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we have them coming to the Lord. And remember our Lord had just recently
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finished a forty day fast, okay, so he could have easily said to
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them, which he didn't. But
he could have said, fasting. You
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asked me about fasting, let me
tell you about fasting. And he could
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have he could have enlightened them upon
how much he fasted, but he didn't
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do that. What he does is
he simply exonerates his disciples from the charge
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that they're making. As I mentioned, we read earlier that Isaiah had warned
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about fasting become a works righteousness,
as we read this morning where they said,
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why we fast and humbled ourselves,
and you take no knowledge of it.
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In other words, Lord, we're
doing the works you've commanded, so
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you should bless us because of that. Jeremiah said in chapter fourteen, verse
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twelve, though they fast, I
will not hear their cry. And it
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seems from what Jesus says in a
sermon on amount that the Pharisees had come
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up with a pretty good way to
show people that they were indeed fasting,
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so you could look at them and
say, oh, look at the way
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they look, they must be fasting. So they made certainly made it into
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a works righteousness for sure. So
in verse thirty four, Jesus begins by
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taking an example from cultural practice.
Now, it is traditional in our culture
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to have a wedding dinner following the
wedding ceremony. That's normally the practice,
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and maybe a dance as well,
that we'll have that. But in the
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days of Christ it went a lot
further than that. Um a wedding party,
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not talking about the people in the
wedding, but a wedding celebration could
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last even up to two weeks that
they were there. That they were there,
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the normal procedure would be a seven
day celebration for a virgin bride and
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three days for a widow. So
the one time that no one, not
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even a Pharisee would think about fasting, was during a wedding. You would
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never ever do that. And you
might know that in the Greek when you
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ask a question, you can ask
a question in such a way that you're
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anticipating what the result and the answer
is going to be. In that so
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I could paraphrase christ question here to
say, you wouldn't make the wedding guest
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fast when the bridegroom is with them? Would you therefore anticipating a no answer?
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Uh? In regards to that,
And Chris Asten thought that Jesus took
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this example of him being the bridegroom
directly from John the Baptist. Calvin says,
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I have no objection to that view, but I did not think it
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rests on solid grounds. But remember
John the Baptist said, the one who
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has the bride is the bridegroom.
The friend of the bridegroom who stands and
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hears him, rejoices greatly at the
bridegroom's voice. And so there John made
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the correlation that Jesus was the bridegroom. And then he says very interesting comment.
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He says, while the bridegroom is
with them. Now it has been
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noted that nowhere in the Old Testament
is the Messiah ever referred to as the
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bridegroom. But there is someone who
is referred to as the bridegroom, and
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that is God. God is referred
to that Isaiah five, I will be
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troth you to me forever. I
will betroth you to me in righteousness and
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injustice, in steadfast love and mercy. And of course the book of Josiah
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that's kind of built around that,
and I will betroth you to me forever.
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I will betroth you to me.
Uh well, actually I copied the
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same verse there, but it's in
jose I won't take the time to look
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it up. But um. But
again, that whole book of jose has
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kind of written around the idea of
Josea taking a wife and all that goes
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along with that. So Jesus,
by saying that he is the bridegroom,
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is not saying necessarily that he is
the Messiah, but what he is saying
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by saying he is the bridegroom,
is he saying he is God? So
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Jesus is the bridegroom, which means
Jesus must be God. So in verse
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thirty, kind of a distressing thought, okay, He tells him the days
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are going to come when the bridegroom
will be taken away from them. And
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this begun several statements in the Ministry
of Jesus where he talks about being destined
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to be killed. This is the
first one that we have in the Gospel
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of Luke. And the word taken
away, the bridegroom will be taking away,
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taken away. That's that's a strong
word in Greek. It indicates taken
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away by force, by an act
of violence. And so Christ will be
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taken from his disciples and taken violently. We can think of Isaiah fifty three
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eight by oppression and judgment he was
taken away and as his force generation who
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considered that he was cut off from
the land of a living stricken for the
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transgression of my people. Or Zachary
thirteen seven. Awake, o sword against
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my shepherd, against the man who
stands next to me, declares the Lord
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of hosts, strike the shepherd,
and the sheep will be scattered. I
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would turn my hand against the little
ones. But we have no idea here
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or indication that the disciples are actually
picking up on that at this particular time.
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But the point the Lord is making
is usually at a wedding feast,
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the people that go away are the
guests. They're the ones that begin to
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go away. But Jesus has saying
in this case, it's going to be
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different. The bride group is actually
going to be taken away from the guest.
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And then he says, and in
those days, my disciples were fast.
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The question is what does he mean
by that? Come back to that
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in a little bit. Let's look
at the versus thirty six or thirty eight.
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We've been looking at parables that are
fellowship groups that I'm leading, and
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here Jesus gives us two of the
shortest parables that we have. Um,
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I could say, I could say
even that this whole idea of the wedding
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feast and the wedding uh and the
groom and all of that is also a
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parable of sorts. But the parable
and verse thirty six concerns two pieces of
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fabric and old and a new now
when I read it this morning in the
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attack, some of you might have
picked up on it, because I think
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we're much more used to hearing the
way it's phrased in Matthew or Mark than
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it is in Luke. And you
might have said, oh, wait a
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minute, I don't think that's what
he said. It seems like he said
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something else. So in Matthew and
Mark, the point is that if you
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put a new garment that is not
shrunk, they didn't have pre shrunk in
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those days. And if you if
you have, if you take a new
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garment and you put it on an
old one to patch it, when when
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that new piece would start to shrink, it would tear away from from the
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old piece. That's the point that
he makes in those uh in those gospels.
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But in Luke the point seems to
be more. By taking a path
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from a new garment, you're ruining
the new garment, and the piece that
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you're gonna put on the old one
will not even match that one. And
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that seems to be the point here. Now you might say, well,
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you know, why why does it
say something in Matthew and Market says something
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different than Luke? And you know
again, is their contradiction. No,
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Jesus is just doing what what good
pastors do or should do. Now,
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Um, what we do sometimes,
And I've gone to other churches and and
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filled in for them. I'm almost
all. I've almost always preached sermons that
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I've preached before. Um, I
haven't done that here. I determined that
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I wouldn't do it because I knew
I needed to keep my feet to the
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fire and studying and doing those things. So I determined I would continue on
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the series I've been preaching before I
came here. Um, which is too
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bad for you, because I got
some really good sermons you could hurt.
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But uh joking um anyway, Um
so so, but Jesus again, Uh,
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and when we do this and we
reworked thing, I am reworking the
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parable study on the fellowship groups,
I'm reworking them, but I'm using old
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material and doing so. But oftentimes
when we red a servant, we we
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tailored to our audience and we changed
some applications and some things that are there.
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So Jesus, of course, as
a good pastor, would have done
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that same thing to illustrate the same
truth. But the truth and the application
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is the same, which is we
can't fit the new into the old.
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In other words, the Lord is
saying, what the Pharisees have done to
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the religion? Now what what?
What is the old religion? What they
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have done is something that can't be
patched. We just can't make it better.
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It's a garment like job, says
a job man. Waste away like
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a rotten thing, like a garment
that is moth in. And then the
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second parable concerns wine and wine skins, and here the parables are much closer
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in Matthew, Mark and Luke and
again and telling the parable. The point
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here is that if they used old
wine skins, and they had already been
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they had already been used um to
uh to the wine to fill in them.
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And so then as the wine expanded
uh in the new When they were
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new, they would have expanded with
the wine. But now if you take
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those same wine skins and reuse them, they won't shrink this time. So
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if you fill it with wine and
the wine expands, it's going to break
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the wine skins, and you're going
to uh lose the new wine as well.
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And so that that is the point
that we have here. And then
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in verse thirty nine, look gives
as saying that's not found in Matthew or
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Mark. So this is interesting as
well. And the point can be missed.
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Jesus said, and no one after
drinking old wine desires new, for
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he says the old is good.
Now. I don't know about you,
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but when I read that, my
mind goes to the fact that says,
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well, of course the old wine
is better. Old wine is always better,
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right you know you don't you don't
go to the story by wine and
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and it's a hundred dollars because it
was just you know, vented this year
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or something like that. But but
you might do that for a very old
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wine and do that much. So
it could say, well, of course
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the the old wine must be better
because it's been aged more. But the
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point he's trying to make is maybe
you should have your mind open. Maybe
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the new is better, and you
don't know unless you try. And so
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the overall point that our Lord is
making here is I am bringing something completely
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new. And of course you're thinking
is that the old is always going to
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be better. But I want you
to consider that possibly in this case,
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the new wine is better. And
what I am bringing to you by both
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my words and my actions is proving
to you that the New is better the
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BT I've troubled with his name always, but on your b away says,
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we cannot have the Gospel, which
just a little touch of law and legalism
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we cannot have. We cannot have
the law with just a few ounces of
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Jesus poured in. Now, I
want to say, Jesus isn't trying to
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overthrow the Old Testament. He's not
saying, yeah, just get rid of
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that, there's nothing there. No, he comes to fulfill all that.
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And he said not one jot or
tittle would ever pass from the from that
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Old Testament. So he's not doing
that. But what he's trying to do
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is change with the Pharisees. And
the saddest season this ribes had made out
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of the Old Testament. They had
missed so many points. They were not
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doing it right until Jesus is trying
to tell them, uh, it's different
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right now. And so we have
to realize that they had made it into
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a legalism thing. And so Jesus
has said, is it possible that what
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I'm bringing to you is actually better? Well, I want to make some
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applications this morning. The first one
is we come to application. I wanted
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to deal with the question of fasting
among Christians. This is a question that
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I find different opinions by different very
respected UH Gospel teachers that I see.
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The problem in this text concerns what
Jesus is referring to when he says the
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days will come when the bridegroom will
be taken away and then they will fast.
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So exactly what days is that that
he's talking about. There are some
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who would say that the days he's
speaking of and the only days proper to
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fast are those days between his crucifixion
and his resurrection. G. Campbell Morgan
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says, the days did come,
and they did fast. That was local
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and transitory. This has no application
to us. Why, because he is
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with us, he has not taken
away. When he came back by the
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spirit to abide with them, the
need for fasting past. So, in
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other words, his view is fasting
is not for today. And we might
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look at the passage that Jesus refers
to a John sixteen and says this the
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period he's talking about in versus nineteen
and twenty, he entered he uh it
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intimates that the time is not going
to be long. He said Jesus knew
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they wanted to ask him, so
he said to them, is this what
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you are asking yourselves? What I
mean by saying a little while and you
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will not see me? And again
a little while and you will see me.
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Truly, I say to you,
you will weep and lament, but
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the world will rejoice. You will
be sorrowful, but you're sorrow will be
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turned into joy. And so is
that what Jesus is saying. It's just
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that period of time when Christ is
taken from them by crucifixion, and tell
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the resurrection that they would fast.
Others have a different view. Charles Spurgeon
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says, and what is fasting for? That seems the difficult point. It
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is evidently practiced oftentimes by our Lord, and advised by him to his disciples.
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Not a kind of religious observance in
itself meritorious, but a habit,
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when associated with the exercise of prayer, unquestionably helpful. I am not sure
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whether we have not lost a very
great blessing in the Christian Church by giving
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up fastening. Another name you may
have heard before, John Calvin says,
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according to the need of the times, pastors should exhort the people either to
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fasting, or to solemn supplications,
or to other acts of humility, repentance
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of faith and faith. So both
of these two giants of the faith are
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saying that they believed that fasting is
still helpful for the Christian Church. So
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should Christians practice fasting or should they
not? For myself, I do believe
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that the scriptures indicate and mask that
fasting is something that the church should um
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should practice. Uh. There are
several different scriptures, including our text that
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is there, and of course that
dependspend how you take our text. But
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an ext thirteen to concerning the church
auld Antiacht. When they were getting ready
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to ordain people to ministry, it
says, while they were worshiping the Lord
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and fasting. This is well after
the resurrection of Christ, while they were
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worshiping the Lord and fasting. Later
on and Act fourteen twenty three, and
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when they had appointed elders for them
in every church, with prayer and fasting,
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they committed them to the Lord in
whom they had believed. Paul says
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of them s off in Second Corinthian
six five in stripes, in imprisonments,
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in tumults and labors, and watchings, in fastings. Some might say that
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those were forced fast and where Paul
had no way to get food, and
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that's possible, I think, But
I also think that Paul fasted other times
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as well. Then we have a
couple of scriptures where, if you have
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a King James version, fasting is
mentioned, but if you don't, it
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probably not mentioned. First countin seven
five some manuscripts, that says, where
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Paul is speaking of married couples in
their conjugal conjugal relations defrauging not one the
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other, except that you would consent
for a time that you may give yourselves
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to fasting and prayer. But the
later versions don't have fasting there. Matthew
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sev concerning the disciple's question as to
why they were not able to cast out
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a demon, Jesus said, howbeit
this kind goes not out but by prayer
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and fasting. The later versions do
not have fasting in that passage. But
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I think to me the rightist argument
for fasting is jesus own words in the
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Sermon on the Mount, he said
to them, and when you fast,
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so, in other words, if
it's not the time now, which Jesus
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said in our Texas Morning, to
fast, there is coming a time when
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it would be proper to fast.
He said, do not look gloomy like
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the hypocrites, for they disfigured their
faces. That they're fasting may be seen
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by others. Truly, I say
to you, they have received their reward.
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But when you fast, anoint your
head and wash your face, that
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you're fasting may not be seen by
others, but by your father who is
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in secret. And your father,
who sees in secret, will will reward
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you there as I said, Jesus
says, when you fast. Now,
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I can tell you in my own
personal life that for many years, fasting
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was a regular part of my Christian
life, and and I tried to do
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several lengths to fast and in my
life, and I would say it was
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very beneficial. But in the last
several years, and I'd say many several
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years, I have not fasted at
all. I have used my health as
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an excuse that the doctors would say
that being diabetic, it's not a good
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idea for me to fast, I
shouldn't do it. Um And I could
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say, that's a really convenient excuse
for me, so it works out really
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nice. But either way, I
do think it is proper and good for
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Christians. Too fast. But I
have to give you some caveats in saying
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that. First, the New Testament
sets no time where we are commanded too
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fast. There are two scriptures I
read to you that seemed to indicate that
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they did fast when they ordained leaders. But there's no command to us anywhere
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in the New Testament as to when
we should fast. However, I think
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it's certainly okay for churches to ask
for a voluntary fast from their members for
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a time, and I've done that
in years past. Many years ago,
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back in the nineteen eighties, we
had a time when three major families in
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our church decided to leave the church, and they all they all left.
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They felt that they needed to be
part of a home church, and so
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they left our church. I met
with them, I tried to persuade them.
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I could not persuade them, and
so they left the church. So
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I called for the church to come
together for a night of prayer. And
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as we prayed together, I told
the church, I think it would be
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proper for us to fast uh starting
tomorrow, however long you would want to
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fast. I didn't put any length
on it for anybody, or any stipulations
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on it. I just said,
I think it would be good for you
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to fast, and we can do
this as a church, and asking God
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that they would restore these families to
us. Now, one dear lady the
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next morning, so that was Thursday. The next morning I called people to
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start fast on Thursday. She called
me ten thirty Thursday morning, said past
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her. I fasted. I fasted
breakfast. So now I'm meeting my lunch
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right now. It's that I wasn't
real long and fast. I guess to
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go to ten thirty in the morning. But nonetheless, but many of the
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church did fast for for an extended
period of time. And and it's one
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of those times, you know,
you call me a heretic, kick me
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out, And I'm not saying this
is proper right for anybody. But I
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just knew in my heart at the
end of that time that those families would
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return to us. I had no
doubt, there was no question in my
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mind, and I knew and they
did. Indeed they did. Indeed,
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all three of them returned to the
church. Now, I'm not trying to
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put any kind of merit on fasting. I'm not trying to say, well,
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if you really need this answered,
you should fast. You should.
387
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I'm not trying to say that,
I'm just saying sometimes it's proper. Sometimes
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it is a way of approaching God. Uh that that indeed is proper to
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do. And um, I just
I want to be careful. I would.
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And again, don't don't look at
fasting. Secondly, don't look at
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because you faster, your holier than
other people. That was a Pharisees argument.
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Is not that we don't become holy
because we fast. It's not that
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that at all. Calvin says,
if anything pleases us, we forthwith desire
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to make it a law that others
may live according to our pleasure. Then
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he says, let us first learn
not to place holiness in outward and in
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different matters, and at the same
time to restrain ourselves by moderation and equity.
397
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That we may not desire to restrict
others to what we approve, but
398
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allow everyone to their own freedom.
And so again, it doesn't make us
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holier. And thirdly, we shouldn't
believe in any way that fasting has anything
400
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whatsoever to do with our salvation.
We're always tempted to make our salvation a
401
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matter of works, even those of
us who exult free grace and talk about
402
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God's salvation and God's electing us,
and God call calling us uh. All
403
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of those things that we use,
we're still tempted to go back into works
404
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righteousness. Colossian said, if with
Christ you died to the elemental spirits of
405
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the world, why if you were
still alive in the world, do you
406
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submit to regulations do not handle,
do not taste, do not touch,
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referring to things that all perish as
they're used according to human precepts and teachings.
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These have indeed an appearance of wisdom
in promoting self made religion and asceticism
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and severity to the body, but
they are of no value in stopping the
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indulgence of the flesh. So there
again would be want to be very very
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careful, because whenever we get our
hands on religion, we want to make
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it into some kind of works based
thing. Years ago ago, I think
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this relates. I thought of this, and then I thought, maybe it
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doesn't. But I like this saying
so much, I'm gonna say it anyway.
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Um. Someone said, the Romans
made out of Christianity a good religion,
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the Germans made out of Christianity a
good theology, and the Americans made
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out of Christianity a good business.
I think that's true. And again I'm
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trying to relate it and make I
don't know if I can't, but anyway,
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again, we want to fashion our
religion according to us and according to
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our own works. And and the
fourth thing, I'd say, I believe
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it's possible to relate fasting to other
things besides just food. Calvin again says
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in addition, there's another sort of
fasting, temporary and character, when we
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withdraw something from the normal regiment of
living, either for one day or a
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definite time, and pledge ourselves to
a tighter and more reached severe restraint in
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diet than ordinarily. So we might
choose to give up the television for a
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period of time, we might choose
not to look at our phone for a
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period of time, or other things
that we that we might do with some
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recreational activity that we enjoy, we
might we might want to do that.
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And so, looking at what Jesus
said about it in our text this morning,
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the question is is this a day
of feasting then, or is this
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a day of fasting? And I
would say, yeah, it is.
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It's a day of feasting, and
it's a day fasting. Sometimes we feast.
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Sometimes we've asked. Now, I
want to say also two more things
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about new, and then I'll close
here. I don't think we should have
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Jesus saying here that what he's trying
to teach us whatever is new is better,
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because that isn't always true. In
fact, it probably is rarely true.
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There are people today that look at
anything new in the church, and
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there's a lot of new stuff in
the church today. Anything new is good
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00:33:36.039 --> 00:33:38.720
because it's new wine. And people
that don't think it's good, well,
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you know, you're just funny duddies
and you don't understand the newness, and
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00:33:43.319 --> 00:33:46.359
you you're you're you know, you
don't know how to receive new wine into
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all of that. And so there's
people that do that. Now, there's
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also people who think that anything that
is new is bad, and they are
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equally wrong in that as well.
We can't go that way either. There
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are many different things in the church
that are new. Some are good,
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some are bad, and we need
to be discerning and figure out what those
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things are. We have to walk
a line. We don't want to remove
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the old landmarks, as a scripture
tells us, but we don't want to
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also just give up on things because
somebody else does them and we don't like
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it. Well, there's a lot
to be said there, but I don't
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have enough time, so I'll just
say with Thomas Brooks, the great Puritan
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00:34:23.719 --> 00:34:28.320
writer, often would say, you
are wise and know how to apply it,
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so I will leave it for you. But let me make a final
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application about the newness. Why with
people by the millions reject the Gospel of
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Christ, why would they reject the
offer of what is really really good for
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them? Why would they do that
simply because in their mind the old is
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better. You see, sometimes all
we know is the old. That's all
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we have to go by, and
we might decide we kind of like the
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old. They live in sin.
They think this is good. I'm enjoying
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00:35:04.840 --> 00:35:07.679
it. I'm enjoying myself, and
so I don't want to hear what you
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00:35:07.719 --> 00:35:12.639
have to say there. Why would
I give up what I have now and
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live a life that would be lived
to the glory of God, When when
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00:35:15.880 --> 00:35:19.880
I can live my life for me, this is a good life. Why
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00:35:19.880 --> 00:35:22.480
would you change your life to where
you gotta be in church one day a
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week, or or give ten percent
of your income to the church. Or
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00:35:27.400 --> 00:35:30.000
or any of those other things.
Why why would you do that? I
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00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:31.760
mean, who would want to do
that? That doesn't make any sense at
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00:35:31.760 --> 00:35:37.840
all. Why would you give up
your life now to a life that asks
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00:35:37.880 --> 00:35:44.840
you to serve and to sacrifice?
Why would anybody do that? And all
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the saints of God say, because
it's glorious, because it's the only fulfillment
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00:35:51.920 --> 00:35:55.599
we have that we've come to.
We finally found our life to find complete
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00:35:55.599 --> 00:36:00.400
fulfillment. It finally changes us in
such a way. We can't understand why
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everybody doesn't sip of this new wine. Why doesn't everybody think of it?
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This is the greatest thing ever,
This is the most wonderful life in the
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00:36:07.199 --> 00:36:12.119
world. This is so great.
Yes, tribulations, yes, everybody has
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them, But oh the glory of
following God and following Christ and living for
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00:36:16.760 --> 00:36:22.559
him. It's so glorious. But
some can't understand it, and they say
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00:36:22.840 --> 00:36:28.000
the old is better. But my
challenge to you is, if you've never
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00:36:29.000 --> 00:36:32.840
tried the new, if you've never
turned to Christ and his death on the
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00:36:32.840 --> 00:36:38.840
cross as the fulfillment of your salvation, I would say you'll find in it
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a glorious thing that will change your
life. Forever and you'll never want to
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00:36:44.599 --> 00:36:49.559
go away. And so the new
when it comes to the Gospel, when
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00:36:49.559 --> 00:36:53.760
it comes to Christ, the new
is better. Let's pray love me thank
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00:36:53.760 --> 00:37:00.480
you for your word and many practical
lessons as well as spiritual since we can
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00:37:00.519 --> 00:37:04.280
apply to our lives. Help us, Lord, is your people, that
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we would know the balance between doing
what is new and old and understand that
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00:37:08.880 --> 00:37:15.519
balance. Help us, Lord to
be willing to proclaim to those around us
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00:37:15.400 --> 00:37:20.920
the new wine and what it means. And Lord, help us to be
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00:37:21.239 --> 00:37:25.239
like Levi in our text last week
invited all their friends to come and see
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the Lord. Lord, help us
to point others to Christ as well,
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and in our own lives. Lord, just make us evangelist and help us
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00:37:35.280 --> 00:37:39.079
Lord to follow you in the way
that you've called us to. And we
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pray God that it would use us
in this way to bring others into the
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Kingdom of God as well. We
thank you Lord for the cross. We
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00:37:47.719 --> 00:37:51.880
thank you Lord that you have made
a way that does not require us to
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work to earn our salvation, but
simply ask us to trust in You and
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00:37:58.000 --> 00:38:02.800
believe in your death, and then
we will find new life. We thank
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00:38:02.840 --> 00:38:07.519
you for this, Lord, in
Jesus name Amen might,
