[0:00] Well, good morning again. Edwin Hubble is a name that you might be familiar with.
[0:11] ! It's probably most famously known today for being the namesake of the Hubble Space Telescope. Lots of incredible images. It was named after this Edwin Hubble, who at the turn of the century, into the 20th century, in the early 1900s, was an incredible, as a kid, an incredible student, an incredible athlete, and became an incredible astronomer.
[0:44] It was through Hubble that we came to know that there was more than just the one galaxy. In the early 1900s, we only knew of the Milky Way galaxy.
[0:54] We didn't know there were other galaxies. So through his research and study observation, he was able to determine there were actually many more galaxies. The other thing that he also discovered was that the universe is continuing to expand.
[1:11] And all of that, of course, gives glory to God. But he wasn't known for that. He wasn't a believer in any way. But his life was remarkable just on the face of the astronomy and the astrophysics that he was so known for.
[1:31] But as a young man in high school, he was also a very good athlete. In one track meet, he won five separate events, the pole vault, the shot put, the discus, the hammer throw, and the high jump.
[1:43] And he set the high jump state record in the state of Illinois while he was in high school. In college, he went to the University of Chicago where he studied physics.
[1:54] And he also played on their college basketball team, which won the Big Ten title during his day. I know they're not part of the Big Ten today, but apparently back then they were.
[2:05] And he was among the first of Rhodes scholars, and so he was able to study in Oxford as well.
[2:16] And he was very famous. He was the second famous scientist during his day. The first was Albert Einstein. And then people were also fascinated with this Edwin Hubble.
[2:27] But for some reason, all of this fame and notoriety and the achievements that he legitimately had for himself, it wasn't enough.
[2:40] And he felt like he had to embellish his resume, if you will. And so for a while, as he was older, claimed to be a prodigious lawyer in Kentucky when he was in his 20s.
[2:59] He was never a lawyer in Kentucky in his 20s. He was actually a high school teacher in Indiana in his 20s. But he wanted to be known for something more than what he was.
[3:13] He told the story of rescuing drowning swimmers that he never rescued. He would talk about his exhibition with a world-class boxer, where during this exhibition, he fought him and actually knocked him down.
[3:31] And it never happened. It just didn't happen. And then, perhaps the worst of it all, the stolen valor of claiming to be a World War I hero.
[3:45] And while he was in France during World War I, that he led a number of soldiers to safety across battlefields. Well, he did.
[3:55] He was sent to France right at the very end of World War I, but he never saw any action. And so he made this claim. And what is it about human nature that makes us want to appear better than what we really are?
[4:17] We embellish our own stories to make it seem as if what we've accomplished is better than and bigger than and more important than what really happened.
[4:29] When Jesus entered the scene after his baptism by John and began his public ministry, Judaism itself was basically a race to try to embellish your religious resume, to make it seem as if you were really better than what, perhaps on the inside, you knew that you were.
[5:00] And the one group that was running the race above any other group were the Pharisees. And they were excellent at making themselves appear to be more religious than really what they were, more spiritual than really what they were.
[5:17] And here early on in the ministry of Jesus, we see Jesus already beginning to expose their hypocrisy, to let other people see the inconsistencies and the hypocrisies and the fake religious nature of the Pharisees.
[5:40] They were known for long prayers in the community. They were known for their long list of rules and regulations.
[5:51] They were also known for having long faces. They even would try to use makeshift makeup to make themselves look more pale, more drawn in, so that people would think, oh, they're really suffering for their religion, for what they believe.
[6:12] They must really be fasting. They must be really spending time with God. And they wanted to build this religious resume. And really what they were known for was joylessness.
[6:26] And Jesus was confronting that. And we see that head on in our passage today. So Jesus is exposing them and he's inviting, actually he starts with inviting another young man to be one of his disciples.
[6:46] Luke 5, 27. After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi. Now, we come to know him later on as Matthew, the author of the Gospel of Matthew.
[7:02] But here in his Jewish name is Levi. And he's sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, we'll get to that.
[7:14] You can see what he said to him, but we'll get to that in just a moment. Imagine what this must have looked like. Because Levi was a tax collector.
[7:28] And a tax collector in that culture was like the scum of the earth, the worst part of their community. They were traitors in every way.
[7:42] The Gospels talk about tax collectors and sinners. Tax collectors had their own special category of sinfulness. They were excluded from public life in Israel.
[7:55] They were excluded from going to the synagogue. They couldn't. They couldn't vote. They couldn't take part in public life really in any way.
[8:06] They themselves, their families, they were ostracized and put out. They were rich. What do you want to trade off to be rich?
[8:18] But that's what they were. The Romans used nationals, people that they conquered. They would go in and they would divide a city or a village up, depending on the size of the city or the village.
[8:33] A city, for instance, like Capernaum, where they're at, might have had like, let's say, five precincts. I don't know how many precincts they would have had.
[8:44] But the Romans perhaps would have divided up Capernaum into five precincts. And then they would basically determine how much money they should collect in taxes from each precinct.
[8:56] And then they would look for bidders, basically, from among the people who lived there. And they would say, okay, we expect, and they didn't use dollars back in the day, but let's just pretend like they did just to kind of get the story, to understand the story.
[9:13] Let's say they thought that one precinct in Capernaum was worth $100,000 to them in collected taxes. And so they would then offer that precinct to the community, and a tax collector then, or a wannabe tax collector, could say, I'll take that precinct, kind of like at an auction, I'll take that precinct.
[9:36] And then the Roman government would basically say, okay, you go and you collect the taxes. We're expecting $100,000 from you. Anything that you can raise over and above that is yours to keep.
[9:46] So no one really knew what their tax burden might be, and they would get taxed on everything. There would be a cart tax if they took their cart to market.
[9:58] There would be a tax on the wheels of the cart. There would be a tax on the goods that they would purchase at the market. There would be a tax on their land. There would be a tax on their animals.
[10:09] There would be a tax like a bridge tax to go over a certain bridge. They were overtaxed, and they hated these, what they would consider traitors, who sold themselves to the Roman government just so that they could have wealth.
[10:28] So here's Jesus, probably in the same town, probably in a similar neighborhood, or the very same neighborhood that Peter and Andrew and James and John and their families might have been in.
[10:44] They might have known Matthew personally, and if they did, they would have hated him. And Jesus now, on this day, goes into the marketplace, and he's got a number of his apostles now with him.
[10:59] And he goes and he sees Levi, the tax collector, and he approaches him at his job, at his workplace, the place that people would have identified as not only as Levi or Matthew, this terrible person, but he's also working in the place that represents the tyranny of Rome.
[11:27] And as he approached and Jesus calls his name, I can just imagine Peter and Andrew and James and John and maybe even some of the other guys, because everybody hated tax collectors.
[11:43] I can just imagine they were like, okay, Jesus is really going to let him have it. Right? I mean, I hope he just really gets in there and socks him a good one because of what he's done to Israel.
[11:55] I mean, that guy that had leprosy, I hope Jesus takes that leprosy and just puts it on him. And wouldn't it be awesome to see this guy just disintegrate right in front of us?
[12:09] But, as you can read in the text, that's not what Jesus did. Jesus approached him and basically just says, follow me.
[12:23] Do you want to be all in on this? Do you want to come and join the rest of us? Levi, and we have no idea what he may have heard.
[12:48] The rumors that have been circling about Jesus. Maybe he was able to stand outside the house where the paralytic was healed and was forgiven of his sins.
[13:02] Maybe he knew about the leprous man who was healed. Maybe even he knew him personally. We don't know. We don't know what he may have heard from Jesus. We don't know the stories he may have known.
[13:15] But he had to know something. Because when Jesus invites him, when Jesus says, follow me, exactly, that's what Levi does.
[13:25] He leaves everything behind. And he rose and he followed him. Now, this is different from Peter and John and James and Andrew. Because they left behind their boats and their fishing nets, right?
[13:41] And that's not so big of a deal. Because if they go and follow Jesus and Jesus turns out to be some kind of clown and some kind of fake or fraud or whatever it is, a few weeks in, they could go back to their fishing.
[13:58] They could go back to their families and take back their boats and just jump right back in. But not Matthew. When Matthew leaves behind his tax collecting job and his booth, it's gone and it's gone for good.
[14:16] It's gone forever. And it's exactly what happens with Matthew, with Levi.
[14:27] He leaves it all behind. And then there's a great feast. Because Levi still has some wealth at this point. I mean, he would have been the wealthiest of all the other disciples, right?
[14:40] You get that. He would have had the most money of all the other guys. And he would have had a nice place to live. And he would have been able to throw a feast like this. And to invite all of his tax collecting buddies.
[14:55] His colleagues, if you will. And other people who were considered sinners would have been invited. They would have been pals. They would have buddied around.
[15:06] And Levi made him a great feast at his house. And there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at the table with them. So get this.
[15:16] Jesus is reclining at the table. And you got Matthew there. You got other tax collectors. Other people who would have been considered sinners there.
[15:27] They're all reclining. I don't know about the disciples. Are they feeling comfortable enough to sit down in a tax collector's house sitting at a tax collector's table?
[15:39] No. Because if you were a good Jewish boy, the last thing you would ever do was go into a tax collector's house. Because if you went in, or if he came into your house, you would be considered unclean.
[15:55] We went through that with the leprous man. So they would have to go through all of this hoop jumping through to get to be considered clean to be able to go to the temple once again.
[16:07] And here's Jesus. He's just like, whatever. I'm coming in. And we're going to recline at the table. And we're going to eat together.
[16:19] And Matthew's there. The other tax collectors are there. They're all reclining at the table. Before we move on, I want to talk about this call to follow Jesus.
[16:32] Because what was true of Levi or Matthew, what was true of Peter, James, and John, and Andrew, of all of them at this point, is that no one can follow Jesus without leaving something behind.
[16:48] You're going to leave something behind when you make the decision to follow Jesus. It might be a way of life. It might be a particular sin.
[16:59] It might be friendships or relationships that you do differently. It might be a number of things. Or anything that you would end up leaving behind.
[17:14] Now, if you came to Christ, if you trusted Christ as your Savior, if you decided to be a follower of Him at a young age, it might not seem like you gave up anything. But the reality is, when you choose to follow Christ, you do give up something to follow Him.
[17:34] There is no, I don't have to give up anything. I'm just going to believe in Jesus. That's not how it works. There's nobody in the Bible and the Scriptures who chose to follow Jesus that didn't give up something in some way.
[17:47] And then the other part of this is there's no reason for us to follow alone. I don't know how long it took for Matthew to be accepted among the other disciples.
[18:04] I imagine it took some time. I imagine, you know, from the initial shock of it to Jesus, are you sure you want to do this?
[18:17] Are you mistaken? Jesus, you can't do that. He's a tax collector. He's a tax collector. Until to the point where, hey, we're together and we're brothers in Christ and we're serving the Lord together in this way.
[18:30] That same dynamic, that serving together, that can also happen in the local church. You might come to a local church where you might be in one side of the business world and there's other people in the church who represent a different side of your business interests outside.
[18:48] And you might consider them competitors or different or the enemy in that sense. But as fellow people in the body of Christ, you set that aside for the sake of the gospel.
[19:02] And you become one in Christ with other believers. And so we may have differences of opinion among us.
[19:12] We may have different political opinions. We may have different financial opinions or backgrounds or where we're at in terms of our own society and who we are friends with.
[19:29] And all of that might be different. Our employment might be different. But in the body of Christ, we come together and we live and we serve one another together in the body of Christ.
[19:41] And so we see that here with the disciples and with Matthew in particular. The story goes on. They're sitting at the table.
[19:52] They're reclining at the table. So think of a table that's lower than your normal dining room table. Think of a table more like a coffee table but bigger. And pillows around.
[20:04] And they're just kind of laying on the floor reclining around the table, eating what's there on the table. And the Pharisees and the scribes, they were grumbling at the disciples.
[20:17] This is what makes me think that I don't know that the disciples were there at the table enjoying the festivities. Because I don't think they were there yet. They were themselves, I think, still reserved, still trying to figure out what's going on.
[20:34] And because they're kind of watching, the Pharisees and the scribes are also kind of standing beside and probably egging them on and saying, How could your Jesus do this?
[20:47] And they go on and they're saying things like, Why do you guys eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?
[20:58] Why do you fellowship with people like this? It's going to make you, it's making you unclean to be here. What are you doing? How can you do this?
[21:10] How can Jesus be associated with? How can Jesus fellowship with these tax collectors and sinners? But Jesus, we don't know, again, do the disciples come and ask him this question?
[21:27] And so he addresses it in a way that's loud enough for those standing and viewing to hear it? Or if Jesus hears it himself and then begins to answer their question?
[21:39] And he says, Those who are well have no need of a physician. But those who are sick, right? I mean, we get that, right?
[21:51] If you're feeling well, you're not thinking, Oh, I need to call the doctor because I feel good today. We don't think that way. But if we're sick, if we're feeling sick enough, some of us, you've got to feel pretty sick to finally get to the point where you go see a doctor.
[22:05] But you understand that when you're sick that you go see a doctor. That's kind of how it works. And then Jesus adds this.
[22:17] I have not come to call the righteous, but I've come to call sinners to repentance. And so right there, as he's sitting among the tax collectors and sinners, and you've got the Pharisees kind of on the edges, watching and observing and complaining and questioning.
[22:43] And Jesus now says, Right there in front of everybody, it's not the well. It's not the people who are doing well physically who need a doctor.
[22:55] It's the sick. And I can kind of just imagine a pause in the action as the people who are sitting there around Jesus are thinking to themselves, Wait a minute.
[23:08] Did he just call us sick? Are we sick? Is that what he's saying? He's calling us sick? Well, if you think about it, yeah, I'm pretty sick.
[23:23] And I need a doctor. I need a savior. People who are sick, people who are sinful, they know it.
[23:38] And if they're willing to admit it, that's when God can do something in their life. That's when God can do something in your life. When you finally admit, Okay, when it comes to my relationship with the Lord, I'm not doing well at all.
[23:55] Matter of fact, I know I'm lost. I know I'm without hope. I know that I'm sick. And I need someone who can save me.
[24:07] That's what Jesus is looking for from us. there's another aspect of this that that's quite interesting and that's this what about jesus and the party crowd right because the tax collectors and the sinners and those guys that would they they would have been considered the party crowd right and you have people today who look at jesus and they say well jesus didn't hang out with the religious people that's why i don't go to church thank you very much he liked to hang out with the party crowd the kind of crowd i like to hang out with and and and that's kind of what they see or how they would interpret a passage of scripture like this but that's not what's going on if the tax collectors and sinners and the people that jesus gathered with on this day were considered the party crowd if you will let's take a look at why jesus was willing to sit with them and eat with them and partake with them jesus didn't hang out with the party crowd simply because he liked them oh jesus would like me because i'm the life of the party and i like the party crowd and so i'm going to be like jesus and just no that wasn't it he hung out with the party crowd because they were sick and they knew it and that makes all the difference in the world the fact that they knew it meant jesus could do something with them meant jesus when he came and he offered them the gospel they were in a place where they could accept it because they recognized their own need now the the flip side of this is also interesting jesus didn't avoid the religious crowd because he didn't like religious people that wasn't it at all matter of fact if you would compare the the the doctrinal statement of jesus what he believed theologically and you compared that to the doctrinal statement of the pharisees what they believed theologically they would have matched up they would have matched up very well thank you very much so at first glance you might think that jesus would fit right in with the pharisees because they were already alike in terms of what they believed but not in behavior not in what was going on at the heart see the problem with the religious people in jesus's day the pharisees in particular their scribes the teachers of the law that sort of thing they too were sick but their problem was they wouldn't admit it they might not recognize it they might think hey i'm doing very well thank you very much i mean look at me i fast this many days a week and i pray all this time and people see me in public and i have long prayers and i have lists of do's and don'ts and i've got listen i'm doing with i'm doing very well with god thank you very much and all these other people over here nah they're all going to hell they're no good people they're not like me kind of like the the pharisee and the the the old king james word is publican who came to the temple to pray one day and the pharisee is like oh lord aren't you glad to have me as one of your followers and oh aren't i'm so glad that i'm not like this this guy here
[28:13] he's a terrible guy and lord i just know you're going to bless me and i'm just wonderful for you and i'm one of your favorites thank you very much and the other guys over there beating his chest saying i'm not worthy and even the pharisees could understand that the one that god heard his prayers was the one who was recognizing i don't have it i'm lost i need a savior so that was the problem the pharisees were so wrapped up in themselves and so full of pride religious pride and arrogance they couldn't even recognize i mean they had like the number one job their number one job for their whole existence was this idea of hey messiah is getting ready to come we need to recognize him that's up to us to be able to say yes there he is and they're standing there looking at him and missing it and saying no way because they wanted to keep whatever standing or position or pride that they had and so even though they were standing right in front of the messiah they missed it they missed him and so that's the problem and and listen we can have this same kind of thing happening with people today with us today if we're so full of religious pride that i'm better than and i've got this figured out and god must be pleased to have me on his team and that kind of mindset we can be just as lost and just as in the dark as what these what these pharisees were so the story goes on they're not done questioning jesus at this point so why does jesus hang out with these sorts of people well because the sick need a doctor and i've come to be with those who are sick all right well they said to him the disciples of john they fast and they do it often and they offer prayers and so they just do the disciples of the pharisees people who want to be like us we teach them to fast and to pray and all this other stuff how come you guys yours your followers your disciples eat and drink he didn't they're not saying that this this disciples didn't pray they're they're saying they didn't fast what's up with that how come your guys don't fast but ours do ah this is an interesting interesting thing that happens that jesus and it helps us to understand what he what he how he begins to answer this and the parables the two parables that he teaches right after this help us to understand the transition between old and new okay so follow along here jesus said to them can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them how would you answer that question it's it's a wedding feast you're invited to a wedding feast are you going to fast during the wedding feast no as a matter of fact if as a pharisee you had said well i fast every tuesday and thursday those are my days to fast but then you were invited to a wedding feast that sometimes would last a whole week you would be exempt from having to fast
[32:15] on that tuesday and thursday during the wedding feast because you're at a wedding feast how rude would that be to be fasting how hard would that be to be fasting during a wedding feast during the party they didn't they didn't do honeymoons like like what we do today they had wedding feasts and they would go on for days depending on their wealth and so they had an exemption and they had different things that were that they had exemptions from from their fasting so jesus is telling them can can you make a wedding guest fast while the bridegroom is with them what's jesus saying the bridegroom is here the bridegroom is on the scene and he's preaching a gospel it's the gospel of the kingdom the kingdom of god is at hand the kingdom of god is looking at you right in the face the kingdom of god is not a city or a country it's a face it's jesus it is a person jesus the kingdom of god and all that goes with that it's right here in your midst it's party time isn't that what he's saying this is not the time for fasting it's the time for celebration feasting a party so we're not fasting come on guys you ought to get this it's not the time for it time for fasting when you were looking for the messiah when you didn't know the messiah was here we get that fasting would have been appropriate the days will come jesus said when the bridegroom is taken away from them and now he begins to for the first time in the gospel of luke he begins to give a hint he's not there for the duration he's not there to set up a army and a kingdom that would destroy rome and retake all of the promised land and king on the throne that's not his agenda because the bridegroom is here now but when the bridegroom is taken away from them then they will fast in those days that will be the appropriate time when the when the bridegroom is taken away that's an odd way of saying something like that it's not that when the bridegroom goes away it's when the bridegroom is taken away interesting this passage in
[35:18] Colossians chapter 2 verses 16 and 17 give us some understanding of what Jesus is trying to teach Paul Paul writes this and it's as if he takes this passage of what Jesus is teaching and also the parables that are to come and he's saying here let's tease this out a little bit let's show you what's what's happening here now in this New Testament Christianity thing okay Paul writes therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink remember they were saying hey you guys eat and drink what's up with that don't let don't let anybody pass judgment on you now this would be this was written to a New Testament church in the city of Colossae and it's something that you and I today in 2025 can take and have direct application to us okay so this is for us to understand and apply in our current situation here we are
[36:29] Mason County Michigan in 2025 let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink okay guys don't let anybody do that to you don't let anybody pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath what day of the week do you want to work you worship on don't let anybody judge you on that stuff okay because that's tense that's that's so yesterday it's it doesn't impact us today these rules and regulations these are a shadow ah these are but a shadow is the shadow something that's real how many of you when you were a kid did you like chase a shadow or wonder where shadows came from or whatever it is can you hug a shadow you know you know what bear in the big boo house you can hug a shadow
[37:41] I think when you're a kid imagination right but shadows aren't real but there's something real that's casting the shadow okay these Old Testament rules and regulation the ceremonial laws the Sabbath the festivals that came with it do you guys notice that we don't practice the same festivals that they did in the Old Testament we don't worship on a Saturday like they did in the Old Testament we don't have these rules and regulations regarding food and all of that kind of stuff these are a shadow of the things to come but the substance the reality well that's Jesus belongs to Jesus all of that stuff that sometimes people today would say well hey you guys say that you're supposed to do this and that well how come you guys still eat lobster and how can you eat bacon and how come you do this and you dress with clothes that have different fabrics on it and how come you don't follow these
[39:00] Old Testament laws and expect other Old Testament laws to be obeyed and we don't because there is shadow it's not reality Jesus fulfilled all of that I'm clinging to Jesus not the Old Testament regulations and laws that's what I'm holding on to this is what Jesus is now trying to teach us trying to show us and he explains it further with these next two very short parables okay so he also told them a parable okay parable is is is is a story is a teaching about something that's not real that teaches us about something that is real so he doesn't have and for instance he doesn't have two pieces of cloth one that's old and one that's new to show them he's just saying hey guys you know this and he gives two two parables one and and if
[40:17] I might be so bold as to say one is for the women one is for the men okay I know that's stereotyped I know please I'll get over it you'll get over it too no one tears a piece from a new garment no one gets a piece of cloth from a new garment and puts it on an old garment we don't do that except for now with jeans jean jackets right it's cool to have holes in your jeans and scratches and stretch marks and right it's you pay extra money now for that what I mean what a deal for these people that sell jeans hey this old beat up thing we're going to get twice the money for that they pay people to beat up jeans I don't get it but it makes sense you don't you don't take a new patch of cloth and use it to patch up an old garment why is that well because the old garment has already shrunk when that new piece of cloth begins to shrink from use and wash and all of that it's going to tear the patch away from that old cloth so it'll ruin the garment so if you're going to patch an old garment you get your patch from an old piece of cloth not a new does that make sense okay so if he does he will tear the new and the piece from the new will not match the old it doesn't work that way you don't take a new piece of cloth and use it to patch an old garment now here's the next illustration the next parable and no one puts new wine into old wine skins now
[42:20] I have to clarify something here in the New Testament and New Testament Greek Greek the language that the New Testament is written in is one of the most expressive languages even up to this day in terms of how one word can sometimes take several English words to convey what the one Greek word means it's very expressive but the one place where and I'm sure there are others but one place where that's not the case is this word new wine they do not have a word in the Greek to describe grape juice like we know today that if you have grape juice juice from grapes and you let it sit around what's that grape juice going to do it's going to ferment right and it's going to become what wine okay they didn't have grape juice well they did but they didn't have a word for it it was just wine so if they wanted to describe grape juice they just added the word new to the wine so when you see new and wine what do you know grape juice so you don't take new wine grape juice and put it into an old wine skin you can't do that and we're sitting here like huh why not well he explains why not if he does the new wine will burst as it ferments it will burst the skins of that old wine skin and it will be spilled!
[44:04] new wine must be put into fresh or new wine skins so what are we talking about with wine skins let me show you so it's not like this okay a lot of times when we think of wine skins we think of like a personal little wine skin flask kind of a thing made of leather that kind of thing one looks a little newer than the other they have these plastic mouth tips they didn't have plastic okay so I'm not sure this just erase this this is not what is in view even though that's what we often think of here is a wine skin from back in the day it's a goat or a sheep it's the skin of a goat or a sheep and the throat neck area becomes the place where you pour it out okay that becomes your nozzle if you will so you can kind of see where this this guy he's he's full of wine right and he's got you can almost see four little legs right it's just the skin of the leg that's been tied up and then hung this way and now they're going to leave it like this for a while until it becomes old wine or from from their perspective fermented wine that's what they wanted they wanted they wanted the fermented wine not the grape juice okay so this is how they would do it so this would be an image of this is either an old goat skin or an old sheep skin
[45:51] I don't know if they did a normal goat or a sheep that now looks like it's kind of been fattened but that's just because the wine that's been put into it and it's been fermenting and because it's new the skin is able to expand and it's able to absorb if you will the fermentation process so it's able to grow with the fermenting grape juice this would be a picture of an old wine skin okay this guy looks like I mean I think we're looking at the butt end here okay I don't know if I can say that in church but here we go but you can see the front end of the neck area that's been tied off right and you can see kind of where the legs are and but this guy is old if you put new wine into this guy he's already been stretched out to the limit end up bursting and you ruin the wine skin and you lose all the wine so you wouldn't dare right you wouldn't dare put new wine an old wine skin like this now if it's already fermented and stuff you can use this as a container for that but not during the fermentation process where you're going to you're going to lose it that's just this how it now
[47:21] Jesus concludes this little parable with this little statement that, huh? You're going to read it, you're going to go, huh? Okay, let's look at it together. Okay. This is verse 39, last verse of the chapter. And no one after drinking old wine desires new. For he says, the old is gooder, better. That's the word here. The old is better. Now there's a couple of ways you could see this.
[47:55] One is to say, well, I don't give you no grape juice. I want some stuff that's a little stronger than the grape juice. You could, one after drinking the old wine, no one after drinking old wine desires new. That's not actually what Jesus is saying here. What Jesus is saying is once someone is set in their ways in the old way, will they accept a new way?
[48:29] We are, and we're the same way, right? Any of you, especially if you're starting to get some age on you, how many of you would say, yeah, I'm kind of set in my ways, right? How many of you are willing to admit that with me? I'm kind of set in my ways. Oh boy, am I set in my, I'm set in my ways.
[48:50] I like, I like, oh, come on now. Are we willing to admit it now? This, this is what's going on. This is what's happening. Now, understand what Jesus is doing here. In each of the cases that Jesus is presenting to us, he's giving us two things that just do not mix. Okay. You can't put these two things together. They don't work together. So the first thing he talks about is the wedding feast.
[49:25] You can't put fasting and feasting together, right? It doesn't work. You can't, you can't do that. You can't, you just can't have the two together. If it's a time for feasting, it's not a time for fasting.
[49:41] And that's what Jesus is saying. I'm here. I'm standing in front of you. The bridegroom has arrived. It's time for a feast. That's why my guys don't fast. Okay. Because it's not time for that.
[50:04] You, you, you, you can't mix an old garment and a new patch. They don't go together. If you do, you ruin it. You just, you just, you can't do it.
[50:19] You kind of get, I hope you get where I'm going with this. You can't mix an old wine skin with new wine. They, they don't, they just don't go together. By the way, I don't, I don't have this on your notes. I don't know if, but this is the point. This is the point that Jesus is, is making. This is the point of Colossians chapter two.
[50:41] This is the point of Hebrews chapter eight. It's basically the whole point of Hebrews period. The whole book of Hebrews is basically this point. But particularly Hebrews eight, you can't mix the old covenant law, the old Testament way of doing things with a new Testament message.
[51:06] They don't go together. Not because they don't fit, but because Jesus fulfilled it all and made it obsolete.
[51:20] He made the old Testament law obsolete, not because it was something you could disregard, but because it was something that Jesus fulfilled.
[51:32] And that makes all the difference in the world. Let me take you to Hebrews chapter eight. And we're kind of jumping in on the middle of this discussion that the author of Hebrews is, is having talking about the transition between old and new Testament.
[51:50] And he uses the word they, and that's to describe the old Testament priesthood. So the old Testament priesthood, they serve a copy, not the original.
[52:03] They serve a copy and a shadow. There's our word again of heavenly things of the heavenly things. In other words, when Moses was instructed to build the temper, not the tabernacle with the Holy place, the instructions that he were given were instructions.
[52:22] He was instructed to make a copy of what existed already in heaven. So even the old Testament law is a copy, is a shadow of something that already exists in heaven, a heavenly tabernacle, a heavenly temple.
[52:42] So the priesthood, then the old Testament priesthood, they serve a copy and a shadow of heavenly things. For when Moses was about to erect the tent, the, the, the tent of meeting, the, the tabernacle, this tent, he was instructed by God saying, see that you make everything according to this pattern that was shown you on the mountain.
[53:08] So everything that he was instructed to do in building this tabernacle was following a pattern. You guys ever build something off of a pattern or you, you, you build a model off of a pattern or you, you sew up a dress out of a pattern.
[53:26] That's what Moses was instructed to do. He wasn't making something new. He was copying something that already existed. And what he was making was simply a shadow of what already existed.
[53:45] Verse six, but as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old.
[53:58] Jesus is bringing something or Jesus brought something that is much more excellent than the old way, the old Testament way, and this old copy, this old pattern.
[54:16] As the covenant he mediates, it's better. Since it's, since it is enacted on better promises.
[54:28] Let me ask you a question. The promises that we, that we have, that we've been given as new Testament believers, it's better than promises given to old Testament believers. Yes.
[54:39] Would you agree with that? Oh boy. If you don't understand that question, if you're not quite sure how to answer that question, that's why we need to study our old Testaments.
[54:51] Not because we need to reenact all those old Testament things, but by understanding the old Testament, we have a much better understanding of the promises that we have been given as new Testament believers.
[55:07] Oh my. And it is so much better. If you don't know the answer to that question, just like, thank you, Lord.
[55:18] I don't completely understand it, but thank you, Lord, that I'm living in the new Testament age. And I'll just give you the one off the top of my head right now. You have the Holy spirit living within you.
[55:32] Old Testament believers did not have that. That alone is worth everything right there alone. Okay.
[55:43] So it's better. It's better. It's better. It's better. For if that first covenant had been faultless, think about what Jesus is telling the Pharisees.
[55:55] Think about what the Pharisees are struggling with. Think about what the readers of Hebrews, the original readers, readers, these, these new Testament Jewish believers who were struggling with because of persecution.
[56:10] Well, maybe we should go back to the old ways. And the author of Hebrews is saying, don't do that. Jesus is better than Moses. He's better than the angels.
[56:22] He's better than the old Testament law. He's better than the old Testament sacrificial system. Jesus is better in every way. Don't go back to that.
[56:38] Because that first covenant had fault. Didn't it? Do you struggle with someone telling you the old Testament has a fault?
[56:53] Rich, you're saying the old Testament, there's something wrong with the old Testament. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. The old Testament system had a problem. And that problem was every year at the day of atonement, they'd sacrifice an animal, shed its blood, send it on its way, or no, they burn it up.
[57:15] They had a scapegoat that they would send on its way. They went through all of that. Did it forgive their sin? No. All it did, all it did was serve as a credit card.
[57:27] Okay. The word redeem is a financial term. Okay. So the old Testament sacrificial system, all it did, all it did to pay for salvation was to put it on a credit card, putting it on a credit card.
[57:42] Does that actually pay the bill? No. Cause you got to pay the credit card when it comes due. Well, every year that credit card came due and they just put it, they just put it off for another year on the credit card.
[57:53] And then the next year they'd put it off again on the credit card. The credit card was the old Testament sacrificial system. They just put it off on the credit card, put it off on the credit card year after year after year. That was the fault.
[58:05] It didn't actually pay the penalty until Jesus. Jesus came and did away with the credit card. The whole sacrificial system.
[58:18] Obsolete. Because Jesus paid it all. Forever. Once and for all. So in speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one.
[58:32] What's the word? Ah. Obsolete. Ah. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
[58:48] So what's Jesus telling the Pharisees? Guys, it's party time. The bridegroom is here. The old way of doing things.
[59:00] It's past. It's over. There's a new show in town. There's a new savior who has arrived. The groom, the bridegroom of this thing that Jesus isn't revealing yet, but this thing called the church, which is you and I.
[59:21] He's our bridegroom. He's coming again for us. And all of this Old Testament system, with its rules and regulations and festivals and Sabbaths and all of this, it's all past tense.
[59:40] It's all gone. So, when it comes to understanding the old versus the new, the shadow versus the reality, and what we've learned from Hebrews chapter eight, we need to understand some things about our New Testament religion, our New Testament Christianity.
[60:02] You don't need a priest to enter into the presence of God, because Hebrews tells us that you come by the way of Christ. He is your mediator. There's all these passages.
[60:13] I'm running late. I know it. All these passages. You just got to read the book of Hebrews. You read the hooker, you get all of this in the book of Hebrews. You don't need a priest. You have that in Christ.
[60:24] You don't need to confess your sins on a given day of the week, on a Saturday, on a Sabbath day. No. Because you have direct access to Christ, we can confess our sin immediately and directly through Christ.
[60:42] We don't need a priest to be absolved of sin. That's done away with. And if any of you guys have any background in a certain kind of religion that exists today, you kind of know where all of this is headed.
[60:59] You can see this. You don't have to sacrifice an animal to atone for your sin. We don't do that anymore, do we? I mean, when's the last time you came to church and we had a lamb up here and we slit its throat and burn it on fire?
[61:13] They'd take me away to jail if I did that now. We don't do that. We trust the final sacrifice of Christ forever forgiving our sin.
[61:26] And what many people don't understand about a mass is that in every mass they crucify a fresh Jesus.
[61:45] Jesus. And they keep whatever bread and wine, they keep that bread in a little locked up area.
[61:58] I don't know if you guys have ever been there, seen that. That little locked up area is a tabernacle. They put Jesus back in the box until the next week where they crucify him again and again and again.
[62:20] No, sir. He's crucified once and for all. Yes. Amen. Amen. Your relationship with God isn't restricted by diet or ceremony or circumcision.
[62:38] That doesn't define your relationship with God at all. You've been set free. We have been set free in Christ. And by the way, prayer is something that you see happening.
[62:53] Old Testament, Gospels, rest of the New Testament, we're taught how to pray, Jesus taught us how to pray. Paul talks about prayer, what we should be praying for, all of this other stuff. What you don't see is fasting.
[63:06] You see Old Testament fasting. You see Old Testament in the Gospels, in the book of Acts. But then the rest of the New Testament, it's like it disappeared. Not that we should never fast.
[63:18] Fasting is something that God can use in our lives. But it's not something that there's any instruction on how to, where to, where to, when to. It is between you and the Lord.
[63:31] You have complete freedom. When you want to be close to him, when you've got something going on in your life and you need him.
[63:42] Fasting is like a shot in the arm access to him. Where you can, all right, Lord, I've got time.
[63:52] I'm not even eating. I'm just focusing on you. Purpose of fasting is not to lose weight. Although you can lose weight with fasting. But that's not the purpose of fasting from the biblical perspective.
[64:03] It's, it's, it's, it's to get in touch with the Lord. It's to increase the intensity of your prayer life with him. Okay. So don't let anybody tell you, you can't eat this or you can't eat that.
[64:17] And this is when you shouldn't eat. And this is when you should eat. And no, that's, that's not from the Lord. That's from mankind.
[64:28] All right. We'll have to do another study on fasting another time. Jesus answered them. And this is what it boils down to. No need. Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick, that's, that's who needs it.
[64:43] I've not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. What Jesus came to do. He didn't come. To do cosmetic surgery.
[64:56] That's the one kind of surgery that well people do. He came to do heart transplants. And this is great news.
[65:06] It's good news for the sick who want to change and know they can't. They're helpless. It's bad news for the sick, but for those who won't admit it.
[65:21] And last thing on your notes, then, can you tell I'm rushing? Christianity is the only club where you have to be unqualified to get in.
[65:37] Qualified people don't make it. I don't deserve it. Can't earn it. Let's pray.
[65:48] Lord, we thank you so much for your word. How you teach us and. Help us to understand.
[66:00] All of these things that we, we read. And at times we don't know how they get put together, but. Lord, your word helps us to understand your word.
[66:12] Lord. We thank you for that. Thank you for this truth that we don't live in the old Testament era any longer.
[66:22] We don't live by old Testament ways of doing things any longer. That we are a new Testament church and we are a new Testament people.
[66:36] And that Jesus, you are. Our answer. You are everything. You fulfilled everything. You lived a perfect and sinless life.
[66:49] You willingly went to the cross and paid the penalty. Everybody forever, forever. Once and for all. My debt has been paid.
[67:00] Our debt. Has been paid. And it just simply. Requires that we believe. We trust you.
[67:13] We trust what you've done on the cross for us. We trust. Yes, you did indeed rise again from the dead. And through that. We have new life.
[67:28] So Lord, thank you so much for all that you have done for us. We love you. And we praise you. We ask it all now in Jesus name. Amen. Thanks for coming guys.
[67:40] Have a great week. We voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy voy