God’s Wineskin: The New Testament According to the Bridegroom of Heaven
God’s Wineskin contains instructions as to how we may receive certain gifts from God, gifts that we desperately need, and gifts that are meant for our eternal joy. These include the forgiveness of sins, rescue from the peril of eternal punishment, adoption into the family of a loving heavenly Father, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, free access to God’s throne in prayer, a blessed assurance that he is ordering all events for his children’s good, slow but steady progress in holiness, wisdom and strength for daily living, the sure hope of heaven when we die, and the ultimate hope of eternal life with God in a brand new world that Christ will create at his return. Again, Jesus taught that we all need these gifts; and he knew that many of us thirst for them. Accordingly, he promised that all who drink from God’s Wineskin—and respond to its contents with simple childlike faith—will find that their thirst is slaked once and for all (John 4:13-14).
Note: When I wrote this essay a few years back, my goal was to provide non-Christian readers with a winsome introduction to the New Testament. However, in perusing it afresh, I found myself thinking it might also serve as a helpful reminder to older believers in Christ (including yours truly). Is your first love flagging? Does your walk with the Lord seem more of a burden than a blessing? Have you perhaps forgotten—or not quite fully seen—that the New Covenant is, above all else, a marriage covenant? If so, please join me pondering the word of the Bridegroom of heaven concerning the new wine of the new covenant.
Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples don’t fast at all?” So Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn while the bridegroom is still with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment and the tear will be made worse. Nor do men put new wine into old wineskins, for if they do, the wineskins burst, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. Instead, they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.” —Matthew 9:14-17
The New Testament—a single long book comprised of 27 short books, written over a span of some 40 years by eight or nine chosen followers of Jesus Christ, telling us who he was, what he did, what he taught, how he died and rose and ascended into heaven, and what all of this means for Israel and the nations—may aptly be called God’s Wineskin. The New Testament text cited above helps us to understand why.
When the disciples of John the Baptizer came to Jesus, they brought both a question and (it would appear) a complaint. “Why is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples don’t fast at all?” Jesus’ answer—cordial but firm—is twofold.
The King Has Come!
First, in light of his current presence in the world, it isn’t proper that they should fast. He is the Bridegroom—the long-awaited Savior, King, and spiritual Husband of Israel. How can the friends of the Bridegroom fast when he is right there with them? This is not a time for mourning, but for celebration!
Note, however, that Jesus himself casts a shadow over the celebration: “But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken from them, and then they will fast.” With the benefit of hindsight, we know what he means. Through treachery, injustice, mob madness, and a shocking death by crucifixion, he and his friends will soon be separated, seemingly forever. And that indeed will be a proper time for fasting. Nevertheless, on the subject of joy and celebration, Jesus is not yet finished. Far from it!
A New Covenant is Coming!
For now he tells them (and us) something further, and something staggering to the Jewish mind. There is another reason his disciples cannot fast: God is now doing something new, something that calls for uninterrupted celebration; indeed, for eternal celebration. He is fashioning a new patch of cloth. He is stitching a new wineskin. In other words, he is now revealing a new and definitive body of spiritual truth. What’s more, by means of this new body of truth he is also unveiling a new and definitive covenant (or spiritual agreement) between himself and everyone on earth who is willing to enter into it.
In the days ahead Jesus will have much more to say about this new covenant. For the moment, however, he is focused on one of its outstanding characteristics: its fundamental incompatibility with the old covenant. And so he says, “No one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment and the tear will be made worse. Nor do men put new wine into old wineskins, for if they do, the wineskins burst, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. Instead, they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.” Why did Jesus press this point? Why was he so keen on exalting the new wineskin above the old, and on separating the two once and for all?
The Old, the New, and the Eternal
The rest of the New Testament supplies the answer. The Old Covenant was instituted through mere men: Abraham and Moses; the New Covenant will be instituted through the incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ.
The Old Covenant was an agreement solely between God and Israel; the New Covenant will be an agreement between God and all who trust in Christ the whole world over.
The Old Covenant pictured, promised, and prepared for the things of Christ; the New Covenant gives us the things of Christ themselves, and Christ himself.
Under the Old Covenant, life was characterized by much spiritual failure, sorrow, and penitential fasting; under the New Covenant, life will be characterized by much spiritual victory, joy, and celebratory feasting . . . with persecutions (Mark 10:30).
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In Him, All Things Hold Together
His moment-by-moment sustaining of all of being outside of himself is immutably consistent with the attributes and power manifest in the first week of creation. Because he is unchanging, perfect concurrence exists between the first utterance of his words of creation, his careful forming of his image-bearers initially for the dust, and his present upholding of “all things by the word of his power” (Hebrews 1:3).
I delivered my mail to the Pewee Valley Post Office. I drove up to the exit from the parking area to the two-lane road that never wavered in its faithful path to the entrance to our sub-division. I looked to the right and left, needing to cross one lane safely and merge into the opposite with an equal outcome of safety. Judging the speed of the vehicles and how I could go across one lane and slip in behind another car approaching from the right with no danger to myself or the car approaching from the left, my perceptive faculties seemed intact and were coordinated with my motor skills without any sense of alarm. With the amount of pressure on the accelerator to achieve the amount of thrust that I had learned was needed in this vehicle, I successfully moved across one lane, navigated with virtually perfect momentum, and angled into the second lane and followed the line of cars now in front of me to the entrance to my subdivision that still was where it had been for the past quarter of a century. This progression in perfect safety, with no alarm to other drivers, no dangers to any of the cars on the road, with virtually omniscient predictability was truly amazing. It will not make news but it is testimony to the intelligence, beauty, symmetry, creativity, immutability, and power of God both in creation and in present consistency.
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Four Essential Elements of Theology
These four essential elements of theology are at play whenever you do serious theological study. You may think “I have to examine what the text says” (vertical side) or “I need to think about how these texts fit together” (reflective side) or “I need to check my conclusion with the elders at my Church” (corporate side) or “how do my conclusions line up the the historic confessions?” (temporal side). Consciously and explicitly including each of these four aspects into your own theological study will help you come to more robust conclusions and have more confidence that what you are seeing in Scripture is indeed what God intended you to see.
Everyone does systematic theology: you fit together large amounts of Biblical texts in your mind to come to conclusions and you answer tough questions with Scripture. The question is, how do you go about answering these questions? What are the essential elements of theology that you should consider as you come to conclusions from Scripture? I recently started reading through Louis Berkhof’s Systematic Theology and, in one of the early chapters, he defines what systematic theology is and the different facets of it. Upon my own reflection of Berkhof’s insights, I think there are at least four essential elements of theology that you should think through when doing a topical or systematic Bible study.
1. The Vertical Side: God’s Authoritative Revelation
Fundamentally any attempt to “do theology” must start with God’s authoritative revelation. Your questions, your conclusions, your doubts, your insights, your applications all must be brought before the inerrant, inspired word. As Berkhof helpfully puts it, the Christian doctrine of revelation assumes thatThere is a personal God who communicated knowledge
There are truths that cannot be known apart from divine revelation
Humans can understand this revelationSo theology is not, at its foundation, humanity “figuring out” God. Rather, theology begins when the transcendent God reveals Himself to mankind. The vertical side of theology does not point from earth to heaven, but from heaven to earth. Therefore, your theological investigation will lead to a dead end until you take up the Word and read what it says. Even God’s revelation through His creation won’t be interpreted correctly without the corroborating and explanatory testimony of the Word. The first essential element of theology is God’s authoritative revelation.
2. The Reflective Side: Your Spirit-Empowered Synthesis
However, the Bible itself is not a systematic theology per se. As you read and study, your mind will naturally seek to fit together different texts and synthesize them into conclusions. Understanding what the Bible teaches about the deity and humanity of Jesus, for example, is a large and important theological topic. You cannot hope to understand this topic fully by merely reading one or two texts. Rather, your conclusions will require you to read, study, understand, and synthesize a large quantity of Biblical data from different literary genres.
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Christ-Centered Sex Talks
The hope is that our children will perceive these sex talks not as a “one-and-done,” circumstantial matter, but as gospel truths spoken in a love organically connected and matured as we, by the Spirit of God, live as those who adore Jesus Christ.
Over the years, I’ve talked with children who said they had the “sex talk.” Some have spoken of it as like a pep talk while others have told me what they think with a distasteful tone of disapproval. They say, “I know I should be more careful. But everyone in my school is doing it. So what?” “Why make it a big deal if you can always use protection?” “What’s wrong with me loving someone deeply enough to have sex?”
Though we might struggle to admit it, such forward-moving questions are loaded with power. The child’s inner confidence echoes a bravado that claims a greater knowledge than the wisdom that you—parent, teacher, or leader—yearn to provide.
In a world of TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram, our voices are dim. The destabilizing winds of our culture push and pull us and our children; we feel overwhelmed, without much to hold on to. Tired of arguments and restless with debates, we sigh—we love our children and care for their future that seems, at times, so uncertain. To a degree, we’ve all been defiant to our parents, teachers, and leaders. I remember standing as such a son to my parents when I would sarcastically tell them to “go to sleep” or “talk to the walls.” I believed they had nothing to offer my selfish self.
Furthermore, our society continues to march toward an increasingly relativistic moral structure, in which making absolute judgments on topics like sex is off-limits. We live in a world that’s more affirming than discerning, defiant instead of obedient, and hungry for self-praise rather than ready for self-sacrifice.
Nevertheless, as believers, we’re called to proclaim the gospel, fighting boldly against Christ-opposing lies. For Christ Jesus is the source of all truth. In him, we can live in this world without fear and model a Christ-centered life before our children.
Christ-Increasing
Just as raising a child requires continuous engagement in their lives, how we talk to them does, too. Rather than a one-and-done sex talk (which often has peculiar and questionable timing), we need an ongoing dialogue with our children that stems from our humble allegiance to our Father in heaven whereby we decrease, and he increases (John 3:30). A Christ-increasing relationship has his love as the core, giving meaning and direction to how we nurture our children. By God’s grace, may they realize—even by the tone of our voice—the importance of listening to us as they see Jesus through our lives.
Yes, a Christ-increasing life is vital. We don’t emphasize this enough! We become preoccupied with the means to an end and forget to acknowledge what truly matters in the care of our children: Jesus Christ. We should consider our relationship with Jesus and pay close attention to how we live as believers before considering how to engage in ongoing sex talks with our children. Are we wholly dependent on the gospel for such talks? Our children will be the first to see the work of the cross manifest in our lives—or not. Whether as parents, teachers, or leaders responsible for them, our life is an inevitable witness. Our time will pass away, but their memories of us and, most importantly, our standing before the Lord, will remain. Just as we were once the ones looking up to the adults in our lives, so will they do the same.
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