Putting Off the Old, Putting On the New
#newwineskinseries
(This Weekly Prayer Summary was written by Lisa Ang, assistant director of the CBC English Prayer Ministry, and edited by Brigitta Tedja)
What a special Sunday it is as we witnessed 10 of our brothers and sisters in Christ make their membership commitment to City Blessing Church. Thank you, Jesus for our new family members!
Today’s sermon is summarizing all the previous Sunday sermons in the new wineskin series. Pastor Dion opened the sermon sharing about St. Peter Basilica in Italy, which was a church built in the Renaissance era to replace the older St. Peter Basilica church built in the 14th century. While Wikipedia says this building is a church, but is it really a church? The church is not a building, the church is us, the people! When you travel around Europe, you will see many museums in buildings that used to be a church. They are no longer a church, because the content -which is the people- are no longer there. The building is just a container, when the content is taken out of the container, the container serves a different purpose. Thus, when the people of God are taken out of the building, that building is just a building.
The same thing for us, we are a “container” for the Spirit of God. If the major content that is supposed to be in us (Jesus) is not there, then we are just an empty container. The content is more important than the container. When talking about the new wineskin, the container dictates what type of content can be put in it. For example, you will not put water into a brown paper bag.
Luke 5:33-39 NIV “They said to him, ‘John’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.’ Jesus answered, ‘Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.’ He told them this parable: ‘... no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.’”
Wineskin represents the container, it represents us—the people. It refers to our hearts, mindsets, traditions. What kind of wineskin we are determines what we can receive from the Lord. The above verses in Luke talks about the newness of grace that we received when Jesus died on the cross. We are a new wineskin because of what Jesus did. We are made new in Jesus.
Some of us have yet to see the breakthrough and/or delayed fulfillment of God’s promises in our lives. Jesus’ power is there but it is up to us to make the environment ready to receive those promises. This is an important concept, because it is no longer up to God, the power of God has been released, but it is up to us to catch it.
In the Luke 5:33-39 context, Jesus was talking about fasting.
Is fasting good? Is praying good? Is giving good?
The answer is “it depends”. The Bible records many stories about the right actions but with the wrong motives, they end up receiving nothing.
1 Kings 21:8-10 NIV - Naboth’s Vineyard
“So, she wrote letters in Ahab’s name, placed his seal on them, and sent them to the elders and nobles who lived in Naboth’s city with him. In those letters she wrote: “Proclaim a day of fasting and seat Naboth in a prominent place among the people. But seat two scoundrels opposite him and have them bring charges that he has cursed both God and the king. Then take him out and stone him to death.”
As you read the story about Naboth’s vineyard and how Jezebel conspired to get Naboth’s land, you can see here that Jezebel ordered a day of fasting, but what was Jezebel’s motive? People in occults fast to curse others, they did not fast to seek the Lord, but to seek harm or death to other people. What about prayer? There are people who pray in one direction, asking God to do what they want to do, instead of seeking what God wants to do. In terms of giving, there are many people who give with the wrong motivation, for example, to look wealthier than others.
Pastor Dion continued with another example of a man selling a very rundown house with higher than marketplace value. To his surprise, someone is willing to pay that high price. The owner felt bad and ended up spending some money to fix some parts of the house to make it descent. Yet, to the owner’s surprise, the buyer said that he should not have done that because he was going to completely rebuild the house.
You cannot put new experience in the old structure.
Likewise, we should not put old things in the new structure.
Once the house is rebuilt, you cannot bring furniture from the old house into the new. When we receive Jesus, He is not just doing some patch-work (changing the windows, doors, or repainting). Jesus does a complete overhaul. He buried our old lives with Him. The old us is dead and the new us is risen with Jesus. Many times, our mistake is we bring our old lives into this new live with Christ.
SYNCRETISM
Syncretism means reconciliation or fusion of differing system of beliefs.
The book of Corinth mentioned that they have a temple with many big statues from different belief systems. When Christianity became the official religion of Rome, they carried their old traditions into their new Christian ways. They used to build statues for their gods, so when they became Christians, they made statues of Jesus. This is syncretism, meaning, fusing something that should never been fused.
As Jesus’ follower, we need to be pure,
we cannot plug-in or mix-in things from other belief systems.
NEW WINE FOR NEW WINESKINS
Old wineskins are rigid, it is no longer flexible. When you have new wine, it released gas and expands, so if you put new wine into old wineskins, the wineskin will burst because it has no more capacity to grow.
Joel 2:12-13, 18-19 NIV
“’Even now,’ declares the Lord, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.’ Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity. Then the Lord was jealous for his land and took pity on his people. The Lord replied to them: ‘I am sending you grain, new wine and olive oil, enough to satisfy you fully; never again will I make you an object of scorn to the nations.’”
New wine in the verses above comes from the word "tirosh", new wine is always unfermented. Another reason why you cannot put new wine in the old wineskin is because old wineskin was used to store old wine, which was fermented. The old wineskin contains traces of fermentation (yeast), thus if new wine (unfermented) is put in the old wineskin, the new wine will be contaminated. Yeast represents sin. What was pure (new wine) is no longer pure, because it is now contaminated with the yeast from the old wine.
Remember that the container determines what things can be put in it. When we have a certain way of thinking, it limits what we can receive. The limitation is the container. We are the vessel of the Holy Spirit. What kind of vessel are we? Can we be a vessel that Holy Spirit can dwell in and use?
Joel 2:28-29 NIV
“And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days.
Prayer Points:
Ask Holy Spirit for revelation and understanding of different areas in our lives that causes us to not be able to catch the blessings and promises that God gave us. Ask Holy Spirit to check our motives when we pray and fast and give. Is our motive in line with God’s Word? Or do we pray and fast and give asking for “my way” or “God’s way”? Pray for God to change our hearts, our mindsets, our perspectives, so that we will be in the proper alignment with God to see those promises manifested in our lives.
Identify any old habits, mindset, traditions, addictions, that are mixed into your new lives with Christ. Are they in line with God’s Word? Do you say curse words? Do you follow any superstitions or old wives’ tales? Do you still visit that temple from your previous belief system? Do you own any charms ir amulets? Any addictions that crept in? When you receive Christ, you are a new creation. The old is dead, you are in the new. Pray for obedience, pray for willingness to change the old ways. The old ways do not belong in your new life with Christ.
Pray for God to break all the limitation that we put on ourselves that causes us not to be able to see the fulfillment of His promises.
Pray for God to pour out His Holy Spirit upon you.
Pray for the advancement and building progress of the Training Center; no delays, obstacles, accidents, pushback, or interruptions. Pray for wisdom, a hedge of protection, and unity upon the Strategic Planning Team.