NEW WINE

                                            “NEW WINE..FRESH SKINS”  Mk 2.22

Jesus does not fit into the categories and niche we prepare for him. He is new, different, challenging, surprising.

The Pharisees try their best to fit him into their categories.  They want him to fast and when fasting to disfigure his face and droop his head.  They want him to keep away from sinners and from celebrations. They want him to pray with raised hands in public. They want him to practice the policy of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. They want him to live by the laws of the Old Testament.

But Jesus is different. He eats with sinners and keeps their company. He goes  alone to the mountain top to pray. He washes his face and combs his hair when fasting. He seeks for the lost and celebrates  when found. He provides new wine “up to the brim”. He challenges the old and proposes the new. “ You have heard it said…but I tell you”.  Go two miles if they ask you for one… give your cloak  as well to those who ask for your coat…if they strike you on right cheek offer the other as well. “I give you a NEW commandment.”  There is newness, freshness, originality, creativity, an element of surprise in the way he was born, lived, and died. Jesus is not a repetition of the old. He is new. His teaching, his method, his commandments are new.  With him starts the New Testament.

 Are you living in the Old Testament times or in the new?   Do you know the Sermon on the Mount ? Do you practice the NEW Commandment or the Old?  Do you follow the Pharisees or Christ? “Follow me” is his new invitation. “Love as I loved” is his new challenge. If you are on the side of Christ be prepared to be surprised. Be ready to be challenged. Be ready to walk one more mile, offer the cloak as well as coat, offer the right as well as the left  cheek.  New wine needs fresh skins.

-        Fr TVGeorge sdb