Skins, Patches and Wine

Luke 5:36-39

Back to Levi’s party. He’s cast his lot, so to speak, with Jesus. He’s cashed in his corrupt, tax revenuing trade to follow this new spiritual guru. And he’s invited all his old nasty friends to party and meet Jesus. All except the Pharisees and teachers of the law who stand outside Levi’s boisterous house and cast verbal stones. Jesus has already faced down these spiritual know-it-alls who’ve attempted to set the record straight that Jesus is Spiritual Lite.

Now Jesus shares a story, a favorite communication means of his. Parties are great times for stories. And I’m sure Levi’s friends quiet down to hear what Jesus tells these religious guys outside.

Recently I watched as a parade of people young and old walked across a Sunday stage, cardboard placards in hand, silent testimonies to the work of God in their lives, one and all.

One young fellow, happened to be a guitarist in the worship band, held up a sign which told in a handful of words how he who had once been burned by religious organizations was now befriended by Jesus. I can see Levi holding up such a sign the night of his party.

Jesus explains to the people of his day who know well how to patch up threadbare clothes that you don’t tear a patch from a new outfit and sew it onto an old one. If you do, you’ve ruined the new clothes and the patch won’t match the old one anyway.

He adds, in the same way you don’t put new wine into old wineskins. I have to admit this story is culturally ambiguous to most modern teetotalling readers like me. I haven’t the foggiest notion what Jesus is talking about. But astute reader that I am I get the idea. New wine bursts old wineskins and ruins both the skin-bottle and the wine. Wine has a way of expanding, I gather, kind of causing an explosion if the material is worn. No, Jesus says, you put the new wine into new wineskins.

And then comes his bottom line: no one after drinking old wine wants the new, because the old tastes better. I guess. All I know is my grandmother used to jokingly accuse my grandfather of letting the cider sit too long!

What’s your point, Jesus? You’ve got a party staged by a new follower named Levi and some party poopers who are accusing you of being unspiritual and you are saying don’t mix old and new?

Jesus is saying that if you want to reach guys like Levi, you’ve got to do things new. You can’t use old structures and old programs, pews filled with poopers like these Pharisees and teachers of the law. They may know it all, but they have no idea how to include Levi and his ilk in the Kingdom of God.

Take your pick. Go with the tried and tired or go with the new and true. Given the choice, which he has being Master, Jesus goes with the new. He parties with “Levi and the Ilk” and creates a whole new paradigm.

To see a great model of how this new wineskin model is working in a contemporary setting, go to mosaicportland.org/worship/about-mosaic/story/, read the story and watch the video. Here’s a case where old meets new and all catch a surprising vision for how the party can begin, a party that is still going strong. The young man I mentioned earlier with the cardboard sign is part of that party Levi-style.