The New Wine

My message last week was about wilderness in the Christian Walk. This message is about the on-going changes in our walk with Him when we follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. Please read last week's message first.

As we walk in obedience to Him we'll soon discover that wilderness is also where God is about to bring forth a fresh move of His Spirit. All through Scripture, the new wine speaks of God's presence in the life of His people. New wine and oil speak of the new anointing and the fresh move of God's Spirit.

The Lord said to His people, "Behold, I will send you grain and new wine and oil, and you will be satisfied by them; I will no longer make you a reproach among the nations" (Joel 2:19, NKJV, emphasis added).

God uses the new wine and oil to bring about changes in the life of His people. They will be satisfied with the presence of Lord and the new move of the Holy Spirit. Unless His people will not resist changes and willing to flow will His Spirit they will remain in the wilderness and miss what God has provided for them.

The Lord said, "Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth; shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert" (Isaiah 43:18, 19, emphasis addeed).

Notice that "wilderness" speaks of dryness or darkness and "rivers" speaks of the "the rivers of Living Water" which is the Holy Spirit. God admonished His people not to cling on to the old things (old wine) but to move on and enjoy the new wine.

Paul said, "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord" (2 Cor. 3:18, emphasis added).

In order to know Him and be obedient to Him we must change or be transformed "from glory to glory" to the image of Him in our walk with Him. Divine changes bring us closer to Him.

Religious spirit resists change

Human, by nature resists change because it affects our comfort level. Once our life patterns are established it becomes very uncomfortable to move outside this set life-style. This happens more apparent in the area of religion. Religious strongholds and traditions are formed early in a Christian's Church life. Some traditons are good, but when a believer responds merely from his emotion (part of his soul) and not from his regenerated spirit, then he is going through lifeless motion. He must let his spirit yield to the Spirit of God without the hindrance of his emotion and feelings. A believer who has a religious spirit is one who has an outward form of godliness (2 Tim. 3:5), holding fast to what God had done before, while resisting what God is doing presently.
The Pharisees and Scribes

In Jesus' time, the people who resisted change were the Pharisees, Scribes and other religious leaders. They boasted that they were Abraham's Children and sons of the covenant. They claimed to be disciples of Moses; holding fast to what God did according to their understanding of the Old Testament Scripture, but resisted Jesus, the Son of God standing in their midst. They were zealous for their traditions and manner of worship. They would reject anything that was not done according their way.

However, when Jesus came He challenged every area of their comfort, complacency and stability. He made it clear to them that they could not put God in their box, and instead they have to fit in His. They resisted this change and clung to their traditions.

Jesus said, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees" and called them hypocrites, eight time in Matthew and six times in Luke.

Their religious spirit resulted in prejudice and, eventually, hatred and betrayal if it is not checked. This was exactly what happened in Jesus' time and has happened throughout Church History and is happening now.

Wilderness before great Ministry

God leads a person to the wilderness to prepare him for ministry. This truth is seen in the life and ministries of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ, the Son of God and other great men of God.

John the Baptist

All that we know of the period between the time he was named "John" by his father and the beginning of his ministry is contain in a single verse of Scripture:

"So the child grew and became strong in spirit, and was in the deserts till the day of his manifestation to Israel" (Luke 1:80, NKJV).

It was in the wilderness (deserts) that God prepared John and subsequently called him; not in any accepted "Bible school" of his day where the scribes and Pharisees went. God knew religious school would not help anyone chosen to prepare the way for the Lord!

"The word of God came to John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness. And he went into all the regions around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins" (Luke 3:2, 3, emphasis added).

All the land of Judea and those from Jerusalem went out to John to hear the word of the Lord. A new move of the Spirit was beginning to blow, across the wilderness, and not in the religious places. Those who were fed up with the religious hypocrisy and traditions went out to John, with hearts willing to change in preparation for the appearing of God's Son.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God

Before Jesus began His public Ministry He sought baptism at the hand of John the Baptist in river Jordan. Even though John protested this, Jesus said He must identify Himself with those whom He came to redeem (Matt. 3:15).

It was necessary for Jesus' ministry to come forth with the anointing and power of the Holy Spirit:

"It also came to pass that Jesus also was baptized; and while He prayed, the heaven was opened. And the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon Him ...." (Luke 3:21, 22).

Jesus was then filled with the Spirit and was immediately led into the wilderness. The Scripture is very clear that when Jesus was led into the wilderness, He was filled with the Spirit, but after the forty days of testing and temptation, He returned from the wilderness in the power of the Spirit to start His Ministry.

Abraham in the wilderness

Between the first time God made a Covenant with Abraham, and the time the promised son, Isaac was born, Abraham was in the wilderness for about 25 years.

Moses in the wilderness

Moses was forty years old when he decided to visit his fellow Israelites. He went into exile for 40 years in the land of Midian in the desert (wilderness) between Egypt and Canaan before God appeared and called him from within the burning bush.

New Wine in new Wineskins

At the beginning of Jesus' ministry, the disciples of John the Baptist came to Jesus and said to Him:

"Why do the disciples of John fast often and make prayer, and likewise those of the Pharisees, but Yours eat and drink" (Luke 5:33)?

The men were fasting because John was in prison. Their fasting and prayers were outward signs of mourning because their master had been taken away from them. They had not made the transition or change from the ministry of John to the ministry of Jesus. They failed to move on from the old to the new - what the Spirit of God was doing. Religious spirits caused them to hold on to the old methods of worship and ministry. They resisted the change brought about by Jesus even though John, their leader declared:

"He must increase, but I must decrease" (John 3:30).

Jesus said to them, "Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them then they will fast in those days" (Luke 5:34, 35).

Notice that Jesus' Words were prophetic. Jesus is the Bridegroom of His bride, the true Church of Jesus Christ. His disciples during His time were not the Bride but the friends of the Bridegroom. Fasting from food, which brings a believer into a position to hear easily what God (or Jesus) is saying, and prayers, were obviously not needed while Jesus was with His disciples. They could ask Jesus face to face for their needs. But, when Jesus was taken away from them, they would need to fast and ask the Father in Jesus' Name (John 14:13, 14).

Then Jesus spoke a parabel to John's and the Pharisees' disciples:

".... And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine will burst the wineskins and be spilled, and the wineskins will be ruined. But new wine must put into new wineskins, and both are preserved" (Luke 5:36 - 38).

Jesus was saying you cannot put new wine, which is a fresh move of God's spirit, into old wineskins (old vessels).

In Jesus' time wine vessels were made of sheepskin. When the wine was put into the wineskins the skins were flexible and pliable. They stretched easily and would yield without resistance. But, if the old wine was pured out, the old wineskins quickly became dry and it would not be able to take in new wine because the old wineskins had become brittle and hard. And due to the fermentation process of the new wine it would burst the old wineskins. Therefore new wine requires new wineskins.

This parable speaks of the new teaching of Christ, the Gospel of the Kingdom which could not be contained within the forms of the Law, but must be expressed in a new way. A flesh revelation had come in Christ, which demanded a different form of worship.

This is symbolic to the Christian walk. We must be willing to change with the flesh move of the Holy Spirit from time to time. Christians must be sensitive and flow with the new anointing and new move of the Holy Spirit. Christians who become rigid and inflexible are people who stop seeking God. They are the old wineskins with rigid methods of ministry, worship, prayers and doctrine etc. They are set in the formula that they themselves have devised from previous experiences. They stay in the wilderness and miss experiencing the the New Wine!

The Lord is in the last stage of preparing His Bride. He is pouring out the old wine and replacing it with the new wine. He expects us to be the new wineskins prepared for the new wine. Otherwise, we shall remain as friends of the Bridegroom and miss being the Bride!

True Christians need the New Wine as they journey from the Church age to the Kingdom age!