Mark 2: 21-22 (NLT)
“Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth? For the new patch would shrink and rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the wine would burst the wineskins, and the wine and the skins would both be lost. New wine calls for new wineskins.”
If any piece of Scripture is crammed into the wrong division, it appears to be this one. Jesus is teaching about fasting when he abruptly ends that stream of conversation and throws this parable on the people. While short on content, its value is priceless.
Parables are simply stories Jesus shared to convey both an earthly and heavenly lesson. Both word pictures teach the same meaning, but let us take a look at the second. (The “wine” is a symbol for the Holy Spirit, which will fill the believers shortly after Jesus ascends to heaven. See Acts 1 and 2.) People in those days often put their wine into pouches made of skin. The pouch would then take its shape from the amount of wine so that by the time it was empty, the pouch had to be done away with. If one attempted to pour new wine into the pouch, it would split, spilling the wine. It couldn’t handle the pressure.
So what does this mean for us?
It simply means that Jesus doesn’t “patch” us up or try to fill us drip by drip so that we won’t burst. It means he makes us completely new, a new creation. The Holy Spirit must thoroughly transform us in order to enter.
