Passage: Mark 2:18-22

The Big Idea

The Pharisees fasted to earn God’s favor; John’s disciples fasted in grief. Jesus’ disciples didn’t fast at all, because you can’t mourn at a wedding while the Bridegroom is with you. God’s answer to every desperate prayer is Jesus. And He doesn’t patch up the old religion of effort; He pours the new wine of the New Covenant, His own life, into people made new. New wine needs new wineskins.

Two Prayers

Imagine two kinds of prayers rising in Jesus’ day.

The first, from the Pharisees: “God, do something! Why have You let the Romans rule and mock us? We’re Your chosen people. What can we do to get You to act? Long ago You rebuked our fathers for not caring. Well, we’ll show You how much we care. We’ll fast not one but two days a week. We’re better than our fathers, better than the pagans. We’re worthy of Your blessing. We’ll earn Your favor. We’ll keep trusting the old ways.”

The second, from John the Baptist’s disciples: “God, do something! Why have You let our teacher be arrested? Why haven’t You let his ministry break out into revival across the land? We know our leaders are sinful, our nation is sinful, our own hearts are sinful. But we hoped You’d use us to change the world. Why did You say no? Haven’t we done enough? Sacrificed enough? All we know to do is try harder. Our hearts are broken. Our spirits are tired. So we’ll fast, because sorrow and grief are overflowing our souls.”

Both prayers get answered in this passage. God’s answer is Jesus. How could He be the answer? Don’t worry; it didn’t make sense to the people praying either.

Have you ever prayed those prayers?

“God, things aren’t right. What can I do to convince You to help? What do You want me to sacrifice?”
Or: “God, things aren’t right. I’m disappointed. I feel abandoned. People I trusted let me down. My joy is gone, and I’m full of sorrow, anger and doubt. Look how much I’m hurting!”

God never has any other answer than Jesus. He is our answer. He’s sufficient: our Messiah, Savior, Deliverer, Healer, our Life! His life and death will supply everything we need, even if we don’t yet understand how. He doesn’t need your fasting, your sacrifices or your money.

He’s committed to giving you everything you need through Jesus. Then He’ll take your life and use it. Your life will become a willing sacrifice, not one of obligation. Your giving will be a love offering instead of a duty.

The sacrificial love and new life Jesus wants to produce would crush anyone who tried to produce it in their own strength. We can’t love that much or give that much. Thank God we’re free from trying! We receive it as a free gift of grace.

A Few Thoughts on Fasting

The New Testament doesn’t command fasting as a rule for believers, but it doesn’t forbid it either. Jesus assumed His followers would sometimes fast (Matthew 6:16-18).
Fasting is setting aside time we’d normally spend eating (or on some other physical pleasure) and using it for prayer, Scripture and meditation.
Fasting can flow from right spiritual priorities: the Word and fellowship with God matter more than our physical appetites.
Fasting doesn’t impress God, persuade Him, or earn anything.

(And if fasting from food isn’t wise for you because of health or a history with eating struggles, there are other ways to set aside time for the Lord.)

The Bridegroom Is Here (Mark 2:18-20)

The disciples of John and the Pharisees were fasting. People came and asked Jesus, “Why do John’s disciples and the Pharisees’ disciples fast, but Yours don’t?” Jesus answered, “Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they can’t fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken from them, and then they’ll fast.”

There was something different about how Jesus’ followers lived. They didn’t fast. They couldn’t; they were too busy being happy!

They seemed unconcerned with the things that bothered everyone else.
They were always talking about forgiveness, just like their Lord. They were truly joyful and thankful for what He’d brought into their hearts.
He wasn’t a new religion. He was new life.
He wasn’t patching up Judaism; He was fulfilling it.
Nothing He did fit what they’d grown up with. They’d grown up with rules for trying to look good. He simply was good. He didn’t have to try.

The disciples were peacefully joyful in His presence.

With Him, they didn’t have to earn approval. He accepted and loved them every day. Even when they failed, He was patient and kind.
Being with Jesus was the only way they’d ever known real joy.
He loved them and supplied everything they needed, even things they didn’t know they needed: a father to the fatherless, a brother to the lonely, a leader and provider.

So Jesus used a joyful wedding to answer the question. Imagine going to a wedding and refusing to celebrate, just crying in the corner the whole time. That would be offensive!

The Pharisees and John’s disciples were stuck trying to earn God’s favor. Jesus’ disciples were full of joy as children convinced that God already loved them.

You Might Be a Pharisee If…

You think being a Christian is about the rules you follow instead of a relationship with Jesus.
You’re busier with other people’s conduct than your own shortcomings.
You think everyone should do things your way, and those who don’t are compromisers.
You compare yourself with others to prove you’re better.
You put expectations on others that you aren’t willing or able to meet yourself.
You assume any other church that’s growing must be watering down the gospel.
You think your country is God’s chosen land and your language is God’s chosen language.
Your sins seem small compared to other people’s big, gross ones.
You think any Christian who disagrees with you is compromising.
You care more about external appearances than inner realities.
You’re insulted by the suggestion that you might be a Pharisee.

(Brought to you by a recovering Pharisee!)

How do I know if I’m slipping into Pharisee religion?

Whenever the emphasis is on what we must do for God, rather than what God has done for us in Jesus.
Whenever we impose man-made rules on people as the way to holiness.
Whenever we see sin in others but not in ourselves.

A Pharisee can’t be happy. When they see others enjoying a party, they wonder what sin could produce such unholy joy! For religious people, fun is sin. For carnal sinners, sin is fun. Jesus created us for neither.

The more sour the saint, the more spiritual they think they are!

New Wine, New Wineskins (Mark 2:21-22)

Jesus had a solution for them, and they weren’t going to like it: “No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, or the new patch pulls away and the tear gets worse. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins, or the wine bursts the skins, and both the wine and the skins are ruined. New wine must go into new wineskins.”

They had to be made new for the new, living life to be poured into them.
They couldn’t simply be reformed.
The old way of law and rules as the way to relate to God couldn’t be kept around. It had to be superseded by a new way.
The old way of our efforts and sacrifices had to be fulfilled by Jesus’ effort and sacrifice. The gospel must replace the Law as our way to God. The new must replace the old.
There’s no keeping both or trusting in the old.

Jesus is offering new wine! What does that mean?

In Scripture, wine pictures blood, and blood is life. New wine is new life.

Can you think of a time Jesus said His blood was giving us something new? At the Last Supper, He took the cup and said, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you” (Luke 22:20).

The New Covenant.

The Pharisees and John’s disciples were living Old Covenant religious lives: “What can I do to please God? What can I offer or sacrifice?” Can we ever do enough? Can we keep every law perfectly? Can we love God and people the way He deserves? Are we perfect?

But Jesus gives us a new and living way, a New Covenant, based not on our performance, obedience, works or faithfulness, but 100% on His performance, obedience, works and faithfulness.

That’s the gospel! The New Covenant! The new wine!

But warning: new wine can only go into new wineskins. He can’t pour new life into a heart still trusting the Old Covenant. The only way to be rid of an Old Covenant heart is death. We have to die to that way of living, to crucify the old self that trusted works, fasting, or anything other than the person and work of Jesus.

Even good things like praying, singing, going to church and reading the Bible can become lifeless routines when the focus is on the ritual and not on the Lord. That’s Old Covenant, performance-based religion. We don’t need old religion. We need new life!

And Jesus is in the business of giving new life to anyone who calls on Him in simple faith.

Do you feel the joy and life of the new wine in you? Or are you still stuck in performance-based religion?

Are you a Pharisee or a disciple? Are you at a party or a funeral?

John’s Disciples Should Have Been at the Party

Look what their own teacher had told them! John said, John said the bride belongs to the bridegroom, and the bridegroom’s friend simply stands nearby, listening and overjoyed to hear his voice; that was John’s joy, and it was full (John 3:29).

John told them Jesus was the Messiah, the source of all joy and grace.
But they didn’t believe or follow, and they lived with the consequence: sorrow.
John had the joy; they missed it. We can be so close to the truth (going to church, reading the Bible, praying) without actually receiving it in our hearts and being set free.

Paul says we died to the Law through the body of Christ, so that we might belong to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, so that we might bear fruit for God (Romans 7:4).

We died to the Law so we could be alive with Christ.
We were crucified with Him, and so we live with Him too.
Marriage again!
God is waiting to be united to us.
You aren’t married just by knowing someone, or dating, or living together, or even taking their name.
Only when you say “I do” and receive their love into your heart are you truly married.
Every marriage is a picture of the Creator’s deepest desire: a life of union with you!

Hebrews says we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way He opened for us through the veil, that is, His flesh (Hebrews 10:19-20).

There’s usually a veil at a wedding! In everything we get a picture of Christ to rejoice in.
Do you want in? Do you want the new wine, the new life and new Spirit?
Enter! By the blood, by faith in the blood.
By a new and living way, not the old, dead way of self-effort.
His flesh is the veil we enter through. It was torn at the crucifixion so we could enter the loving embrace of our heavenly Bridegroom.
In His arms is fullness of joy.

Grace Takeaway

God’s answer to every anxious or grieving prayer is Jesus, the Bridegroom who turns fasting into feasting. You can’t patch the old religion of effort onto the gospel; Jesus pours out new wine, the New Covenant in His blood, into hearts He makes new. Die to the old way, step through the torn veil by faith, and join the wedding celebration.

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There’s No Fast Way to New Wine