Tasting the New Wine in the Touch of Life

Matthew 9:18–26 ESV

18 While he was saying these things to them, behold, a ruler came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.” 19 And Jesus rose and followed him, with his disciples. 20 And behold, a woman who had suffered from a discharge of blood for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment, 21 for she said to herself, “If I only touch his garment, I will be made well.” 22 Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well. 23 And when Jesus came to the ruler’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, 24 he said, “Go away, for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. 25 But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose. 26 And the report of this went through all that district.

Last week we saw how Jesus describes the New Wine of the new covenant that he is coming to bring.

Things will be fundamentally different than they were before

Matthew 9:17 ESV

[N]ew wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.”

The new wine can’t be contained in old vessels.

The new promises that He will seal with his own blood.

The new promise that will be grounded and found in His atoning work.

What is this “new wine” like?

What will the flavor of the “new wine” be like?

The New has come.

The New wine will only be possessed by Faith in Jesus Christ.

The New Wine of the New Covenant is the touch of cleansing and resurrection life to all those who come in faith.

Matthew 9:18 ESV

18 While he was saying these things to them, behold, a ruler came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.”

Story about Silas

During Covid, my wife’s sister’s family suffered a great loss.

They are farmers.

One day they were out on the tractor and a little boy named Silas fell off the back of the tractor.

Silas was only eight years old.

The loss was unimaginable.

It takes your breath away to think about an eight-year-old boy losing his life.

The horror of that situation rested a community.

I’ve never met Silas’s dad, but I can imagine the panic and horror that it was to hear that my son was gone.

I tell the story because we must feel the weight that this young girl’s dad must have felt.

This kind of desperation is exactly what drove Jairus to Jesus.

Jairus and His Daughter: A Desperate father and a Compassionate Savior

A dignified ruler typically never ran.

They would walk in a reasonable way.

They would speak calmly.

They had a reputation to uphold.

His daughter just died.

His doesn’t come to Jesus as a dignitary.

He comes a needy man who believed that Jesus could make her live.

This religious ruler would’ve been well known by the Pharisees.

Imperfect faith of a desperate father.

What did the scribes and Pharisees think of this—this posture, this request?

What is our Jairus doing?

How can it be that our colleague, one of the pillars of the Jewish community, is groveling at the feet of some unordained popular preacher, some demon-empowered miracle-worker from the lowly town of Nazareth?

“My daughter has just died, I don’t know who you are but I think you can help!”

“My daughter has just died, I believe you can do something if you just touch her!”

“My daughter has just died, You seem like a prophet (like Elijah or Elisha), heal my daughter!”

Just like that…

Matthew 9:19 ESV

19 And Jesus rose and followed him, with his disciples.

New wine begins with imperfect faith in a compassionate Savior.

On His way to heal this young girl, Jesus encounters a young woman.

To understand this story correctly, we must step away from our hyper feminized culture.

Like a fish swimming in water easy to think that things have always been this way.

But we must step above the water for a moment and see the utter uniqueness of this story.

If you go to India, right now you’re not able to get an ultrasound of a baby because of the fear that if you found out, it was a girl you would try to abort the child.

This horrifies us, as it should, but illustrates something extremely important for us.

It’s only the world-view that Christ ushers in that gives true significance to women.

In our own hyper-feminized culture that tries to see women as an oppressed group, it’s hard to hear the biblical story.

In Greco Roman cultures, women were viewed like property.

“Woman, being imperfect and a mutilated creation, is prone to weakness and deceit, her nature a shadow of man’s, unfit for rule or reason.” —Philo in “On the Creation”, 151-152

This is why it was so scandalous when the Christians asserted that women were the first ones to the tombs to witness the resurrection of Christ.

Even the Apostles struggled to believe the women (Luke 24:10-11)

Our feministic culture wants to say that the only way to exalt women is to make them equivalent with men.

That’s NOT how the Bible exalts women.

To approach femininity by just making men and women equivalent essentially destroys women altogether.

Jesus doesn’t bring value in that way.

In a culture that looked down on women, Jesus gives them dignity.

We must never forget the roots of the value of women.

Women historically have been so devalued that they were viewed virtually as property.

Jesus brings great dignity to this woman.

A woman who would have been otherwise an outcast, He brings value to her.

A Women with Chronic Bleeding: The Touch of Cleansing Life

Matthew 9:20–21 ESV

20 And behold, a woman who had suffered from a discharge of blood for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment, 21 for she said to herself, “If I only touch his garment, I will be made well.”

This woman’s discharge of blood had serious societal consequences.

She may have had serious health issues.

She very likely did not have children because of her health issues.

She had serious cultural barriers because of her bleeding.

She would’ve been viewed like many we’ve seen in Matthew so far as unclean.

Uncleanness is not the same as sinfulness but it represents the presence of death on a person which cannot be in the presence of God.

As we have seen from other characters in this section of Matthew, this woman understands that Jesus is her only hope.

Matthew 9:21 ESV

21 for she said to herself, “If I only touch his garment, I will be made well.”

Imperfect faith of an unclean woman.

The word that this woman uses for, “I will be made well” has it’s root in the word “to save” or “to rescue.”

Matthew’s readers would’ve understood the significance of what she was saying.

This woman’s expectation was to be healed.

To be rescued from her current situation.

The woman with the discharge of blood would have been kept from worshipping in the temple based upon passages like Leviticus 15:25-30

Leviticus 15:25–30 ESV

25 “If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, not at the time of her menstrual impurity, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her impurity, all the days of the discharge she shall continue in uncleanness. As in the days of her impurity, she shall be unclean.

But what about if you’re always bleeding?

She was Always unclean.

In the OT, there was some superstition based around a person’s garment.

Not because the Bible made that superstition but because of the tradition associated with it (Numbers 15:38).

The tassels were visible reminders to obey what God had spoken in the Old Testament.

Jesus wore the conventional clothing of His day and yet the tradition asserted a kind of superstition around the garments.

The kind of folk tradition that says,

“If I only touch His garment, then I’ll be made well!”

“If I touch just one tassel, then everything will be put right!”

This woman didn’t have pure motives.

This women had mixed understandings.

But Jesus sees this poorly-taught woman and He honors her.

“Even though you have much misunderstanding, you’re touching me in faith!”

“Even though you think you’re doing something else, you’re touching my garment by faith!”

He turns the conversation from talking about His garments to noticing her faith.

While defective faith is all around, Jesus sees past it.

Impure, sin covered faith, in a Pure Savior.

Faith brings salvation as it reaches for our Lord.

Even her mixed faith rested in the Sure Savior.

The Sure Savior is what heals.

When we think about doing discipleship with those in our church body, there will be new believers.

And often new believers are tempted to think something like this,

“I still struggle with so much sin.”

“I know I’ve come to faith, but my struggle against my flesh hasn’t quit.”

And we need to be able to tell them that it’s not the pure faith of an individual that brings us to Christ.

It is the surety and purity of the Savior that makes our effective.

Romans 5:6 ESV

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

If Jesus would’ve waited of us to have pure faith, none of us would’ve come.

It is only weak faith in a strong that truly and saves.

Matthew 9:22 ESV

22 Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well.

The touch of dignity in a world of shame.

We don’t often think about how important the concept of touching another person is.

Most of the time we bump into strangers and immediately apologize.

For some of us, maybe we try to keep our distance from people all together.

We realized quickly during Covid the importance of physical touch.

Meaningful, intentional, life-giving touch is a true gift.

Especially in our weakest moments, the hug of a friend or the calm, steady hand of assurance brings great comfort.

But only one intentional touch that grabbed His attention.

Luke 8:45 ESV

“Who was it that touched me?”

Everyone was pressed against Him.

Luke 8:45 ESV

“Master, the crowds surround you and are pressing in on you!”

But only one person was touching His garments believing that He alone could help.

Luke 8:46 ESV

“Someone touched me, for I perceive that power has gone out from me.”

Jesus speaks with this woman with great kindness.

The word “To save” or “To rescue” again is used two times in this one verse.

Unbelievers

Jesus may be the first person in 12 years that this woman touched and was not repulsed by her.

If you’re not a believer, I wonder what you?

Is the Jesus you see here in this story like the Jesus you think of?

Or maybe the Jesus that you have heard preached about and spoken of is much more harsh and demanding.

“If you don’t clean your act up, I’m gonna cut you off!”

If the Jesus we have in our mind doesn’t line up with the Jesus of scripture, then something is wrong.

This also goes for the person that thinks that Jesus demands a level of cleanliness in order to come to him.

If the Lord is drawing you here today, I know how you feel.

Dirty.

Stained.

The remedy that Jesus brings to this woman’s shame is the dignity of touch.

Intentional, cleansing touch.

Her uncleanliness left her as the living dead, but from one healing touch of the redeemer this woman received life.

This story presents a very unique comparison.

A story that contrasts two very unlikely individuals.

The only thing that this woman and Jairus share is they are both in desperate need and apart from Jesus they don’t have any hope.

Jairus approaches Jesus from the front and to His face.

Jairus holds a position within the Synagogue.

He is a respected individual within the Jewish community.

He has children and would seemingly be viewed as blessed within the Jewish community

He was wealthy enough to have a home.

On the other hand…

The unnamed woman comes up from behind Him (Mark 5:27)

The unnamed woman would have been considered ceremonially unclean.

She was likely unable to have children with menstrual bleeding (Mark 5:25).

New wine of cleansing life brings life from the “dead.”

The “new wine” of the New Covenant is no longer centered upon “clean or unclean” but on faith in the Son of God.

“Clean and unclean” don’t disappear.

They shift.

They shift from ceremonial cleanliness to cleanliness in Messiah Jesus.

All those who are in Christ are clean.

John 15:3 ESV

Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.

Uncleanness will be all those outside of Jesus.

Galatians 3:23 ESV

Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.

The Old Testament was characterized by ceremonial cleanliness.

This woman revealed the radical shift of “until the coming faith”.

An unnamed woman who would have been regarded as “cursed” because of her ceremonial uncleanness and inability to conceive is now blessed because of her faith publicly.

A woman who was once alienated from the presence of God has been brought near with holy fear and trembling before Jesus (Mark 5:34).

Whereas a young girl is raised from the dead in private because of her father’s unbelief which is eventually leads to faith in Jesus (Mark 5:36).

The Old Covenant which was characterized by “cleanliness and uncleanliness” is being done away with.

Galatians 3:24–26 ESV

So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.

Instead of being made unclean Himself, Jesus cleanses and brings to life that which is dead.

This woman stands as an example of the in breaking of the New Covenant.

Galatians 3:27–29 ESV

For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.

The New Covenant will be characterized by faith in the Son of God.

Faith in the Son of God will be the new marker for the covenant community.

A Little Girl Raised from the Dead: The Touch of Resurrecting Life

Matthew 9:23–24 ESV

23 And when Jesus came to the ruler’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, 24 he said, “Go away, for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him.

A Little Girl Raised from the Dead: The Touch of Resurrecting Life

Professional mourners and flute players were paid during times of mourning and loss.

They would play around the dead as a sign of their mourning and weeping.

This is the scene Jesus walks in on.

He walks in on a funeral procession that would happen for days.

This would be virtually the equivalent of walking into a viewing and walking up to the casket and saying,

“Don’t worry everybody, they’re just asleep!”

Jesus isn’t confused about what is actually happened.

He’s not trying to make a medical statement that she somehow in a coma.

He’s showing what he’s about to do for her.

The crowd’s unbelief in the face of the impossible.

The crowd’s response to Jesus was one of laughter and mocking.

Jairus came to Jesus publicly, and openly.

Jairus would have drawn a huge crowd.

Matthew 13:58 ESV

58 And he did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief.

Matthew 9:25–26 ESV

25 But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose. 26 And the report of this went through all that district.

The intentional touch for resurrection from the dead.

Jesus is bringing the intentional touch of resurrection life.

John 11:25–26 ESV

“I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.

But the resurrection that Jesus is bringing will come at a cost.

Isn’t it interesting the new wine will bring resurrection life?

In the OT, Isaiah describes the LORD as a Divine Warrior.

The LORD promised to defeat their enemies before them.

But how?

Isaiah 63:2 ESV

Why is your apparel red, and your garments like his who treads in the winepress?

The Divine Warrior treads down the winepress.

When you step on a winepress, all of the grapes splash upon the one who treads.

Isaiah 63:3 ESV

3 “I have trodden the winepress alone, and from the peoples no one was with me; I trod them in my anger and trampled them in my wrath; their lifeblood spattered on my garments, and stained all my apparel.

Isaiah 63:6 ESV

6 I trampled down the peoples in my anger; I made them drunk in my wrath, and I poured out their lifeblood on the earth.”

Now Isaiah looks forward to the final day of judgment.

But he also captures something profound of the Lord Jesus’ death on the cross.

The Lord Jesus will die under the sins of His people.

He will die in the place of rebels and sinners and under the full wrath of God.

And He will bleed on their behalf.

And all who turn from their sin and trust in Him will be counted as righteous.

This is why Jesus shows up to a battle in the book of Revelation already soaked in blood.

Revelation 19:13 ESV

13 He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God.

When Jesus touches this little girl and raises her to resurrection life, we must not forget what allows Him to do that.

Not only is He the One who has all life.

He is the One who will bear the sins of His people.

New wine of resurrecting life brings the dead to life.

Go back to that story of Silas at the beginning.

It’s heartbreaking to think about a little boy taken far too soon.

We may be even stand back and wonder…

“Jesus, why didn’t you do anything for Silas?”

“Jesus, where were you at?”

We must never forget that this little girl who was resurrected from our Lord, also died.

Lazarus, who was raised from the tomb, died later on.

Jesus is not merely our fountain of youth.

Silas’ story reminds us that loss is real, but Jesus’ promise is bigger.

The New Wine isn’t just healing for today—it’s resurrection for tomorrow.

What he demonstrated in that young girl reveals the trajectory of all those who follow him.

It’s not a long and happy life here.

It’s resurrection from the dead.

The New Wine of the New Covenant is the touch of cleansing and resurrection life to all those who come in faith.