New Wineskins

 Jesus went

 out again

 beside the

 lake; the

 whole crowd

 gathered 

around him, 

and he

 taught them. As he was walking along, he saw Levi son of 

Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, 

‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him.

 And as he sat at dinner in Levi’s house, many tax-collectors 

and sinners were also sitting with Jesus and his disciples—for

 there were many who followed him. When the scribes of the

 Pharisees saw that he was eating with sinners and 

tax-collectors, they said to his disciples, ‘Why does he eat 

with tax-collectors and sinners?’ When Jesus heard this, he 

said to them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician,

 but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous

 but sinners.’

 Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting; and 

people came and said to him, ‘Why do John’s disciples and 

the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not

 fast?’ Jesus said to them, ‘The wedding-guests cannot fast

 while the bridegroom is with them, can they? As long as 

they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. 

The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away

 from them, and then they will fast on that day.

 ‘No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; 

otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the

 old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine

 into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins,

 and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but one puts new

 wine into fresh wineskins.’ Mark 2:13-22

New Wineskins

The changes roll over us

we wish to hide and remain

safe behind our walls erected

from a notion, a false belief.

Holding tight to once helpful ways

we burden our children's children

we teach them to resist and hide

rather than to dance and sing.

Seasons change and earth rotates

we hold fast and close the windows

we forget to throw open the panes

invite the warm air of summer here.

As we bend and stretch we become

the limber new bodies of hope

as we throw our arms wide for all

we become the Creator's intent.