New Wineskins

After this Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up, left everything, and followed him. Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house; and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others sitting at the table with them. The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered, “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 to repentance.” Then they said to him, “John’s disciples, like the disciples of the Pharisees, frequently fast and pray, but your disciples eat and drink.” Jesus said to them, “You cannot make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you? The days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.” He also told them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise the new will be torn, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine will burst the skins and will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new wine, but says, ‘The old is good.'” Luke 5:27-39

Most of us find it hard to transition form one job to a new one or even one season to a new one. The routines we have developed help us get through the day without having to think too hard. When we face new challenges and new identities, we are often nostalgic for the way it used to be, even if used to be wasn't great. We fight against the new. The religious leaders didn't fancy John, but then they held John's ways up to Jesus as the standard. In this new season, may we have the faith to move into our new places and ways with joy.

Gracious God, you see us struggle with changes

you old up the world and her changing seasons

teaching us to roll and move with the changes

yet we fight and rally against your new blessings.

The world needs your disciples to live into the new

our now demands a new wine and new wineskins

we cling to the old, deteriorating fabric of our ways

even when those ways no longer hold us safe.

Help us to stand up and face the breaking dawn

make us ready to sing new songs and embrace the new

let us be remade as new wineskins for this time

so you love might feed the people in our care. Amen.