OUT WITH THE OLD

Introduction

-{Matthew 9}

-When I was in high school (in the late ‘80s) the first somewhat affordable personal computers were made available, and I remember that my parents got me a Tandy computer from Radio Shack. There was no Windows operating system at the time, so it ran on MS-DOS. It used the old 5 ¼” floppy discs to save and retrieve information. Those floppy discs held about a whole whopping 360 KB of information. Of course, eventually we moved up to the 3 ½” floppy disc that gave 1.44 MB.

~To give you a little perspective there are 1000 bytes of information in a KB, 1000 KB in a MB, there are 1000 MB in a GB, and there are 1000 GB in a TB (terabyte).

~I have a flash drive/thumb drive here that holds 1 TB of information. All you need to do is plug it into the computer and you can copy information from one to the other, and it will hold a TB of information, which would amount to over 1 trillion bytes of information, over 1 billion KB.

~It would take nearly 2,800,000 of those old 5 ¼” floppy discs to hold the same amount of information that is found in this little flash drive.

~Now, suppose that I would want to take this flash drive and try to use it on that old Tandy computer. It wouldn’t work because there isn’t a USB port to plug it into and the computer just would not be able to handle the technology.

~And then suppose that I would try to use that old 5 ¼” floppy disc in my current laptop. That wouldn’t work either because the laptop doesn’t have a disc drive at all and there probably isn’t a whole lot on my hard drive that would even fit on that disc.

~And so, we see that the old technology and the new technology just don’t fit together. You can’t meld them together in any way.

~Oh sure, that old Tandy computer and its technology paved the way for what we have today, but it doesn’t fit the new that has come.

-In the passage that we are looking at today, Jesus used three short parables to contrast the way of the Kingdom of God that He brings against the Jewish ritualistic way of doing things. Jesus uses the parables to declare that the Old Jewish rituals are unable to explain or contain the new Kingdom inaugurated by Christ.

-Yes, the Old Covenant, the Torah, prophesied and pictured Christ who was to come, but they were never meant to be permanent. They paved the way for Christ who would bring with Him a New Covenant and found a New Kingdom that would entail all of God’s people for all of eternity. And the old Jewish way of doing things no longer could contain it. It was old technology (so to speak).

-With Christ and His Kingdom, truly the saying OUT WITH THE OLD, IN WITH THE NEW reigns true.

~And now, we obviously are not Jewish, but that does not mean that we don’t have some OLD in our life that is incompatible with the NEW of Jesus Christ. My prayer is that we would live as the new people we are in the new Kingdom. So, let’s read about it.

READ Matthew 9:14-17

-I want to try to explain the parables a little bit first so we understand what is going on here.

-The Jews would have days of fasting on certain Jewish holidays, and the really pious would also fast two times a week—usually on Monday and Thursday. But the fasting that they did was usually connected to mourning/grieving over something. They fasted on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) to grieve over sin. They fasted in remembrance of the destruction of the temple and various hardships they had in the past and in the present at the time. They fasted to mourn/grieve.

-Jesus used the first parable about the bridegroom to note that the time of fasting to mourn is over. The bridegroom (who is Jesus) has come for His people, it is a new era, and so it is a time of joy. There will be mourning when the bridegroom is taken (in death, burial, resurrection, and ascension), but in the presence of Christ there cannot be mourning, only celebration.

-He used this mark of Jewish ritual to then launch His explanation that the new Kingdom that He brings is incompatible with such forms of piety. The Jewish religion as it was could not contain the Kingdom, could not promote the Kingdom, could not even get people entered into the Kingdom. And he uses the next set of parables to explain why.

-This whole argument was something that, in Matthew’s gospel, He had been building up to. In the beginning of Chapter 9, the paralytic was brought to Jesus, and Jesus first said his sins are forgiven. Well, no Jew could comprehend that because only God could forgive sins. And then Jesus called Matthew to follow Him, and Matthew threw a party for Jesus with all his sinner friends, and the Jews couldn’t figure out why Jesus was hanging out with sinners. And now, Jesus and His disciples aren’t fasting like everybody else. Jesus was blowing up all Jewish expectations.

-So, Jesus explains through parables:

~You can’t patch an old garment with a new piece of cloth. The new piece of cloth hasn’t been washed and shrunk yet. If you patch old clothes with a new cloth, when the garment is washed the new cloth will shrink and cause an even bigger tear. The old and new don’t work together.

~You can’t put new wine into old wineskins. New wine has just begun to ferment, so it will expand and grow. Old wineskins are not pliable, and they are brittle. The new wine would expand and cause the old, brittle wineskin to explode. You have to put new wine into a new wineskin that is able to expand with the wine.

-The old ways of doing things are not compatible with the new Kingdom.

-What in the world does that have to do with us:

A Kingdom-focused life will not fit with old patterns of thoughts or beliefs that are based on worldly values or personal comfort, but it is an invitation to a revolutionary shift of values and priorities.

-The world’s thoughts on religion and the place of religion and the way to do religion are incompatible with a gospel-proclaimed, Kingdom-focused Christianity.

~But because of this kind of thinking that is so prevalent, even in our own churches, we find that our supposedly Christian culture has lulled us into lives of mediocrity, lukewarmness, and laziness that are antithetical to the true Kingdom. We need a return to the radicalness of the new Kingdom introduced by Christ.

-How does the new Kingdom way of things do that. First, it gives us a:

1) New center

-The Jewish way of religion and thinking was focused on outward appearances and self-righteous smugness. The center of religion was doing rote rituals that looked good on the outside, but often left the inside untouched. The self was front and center, maintaining a veneer of piety, leaving one self-satisfied in one’s own accomplishments.

-But Jesus proclaimed that self was not at the center of the Kingdom. Rituals and holidays were not at the center of the Kingdom. Going through motions was not at the center of the Kingdom. Jesus Himself is the center of the Kingdom. He is the King to whom all people owe loyalty and commitment.

-Our culture, and even the modern day evangelical Christian culture, has fallen into much of the same trappings as the Jews. As long as you are able to check off certain boxes, centered on your own actions and goodness, we accept you as a Christian in good standing.

~If you are against abortion, against LGBTQ, and vote Republican, we will declare you a card-carrying, bona fide evangelical Christian.

~Not that being against abortion or LGBTQ is bad, (because both are sinful and bad) but too often those issues take center stage while Jesus Christ is left out in the cold.

-But now in American Christianity, the pendulum has swung the other way as well. If you take up the current social causes, count yourself woke, and vote Democrat, we will declare you as a card-carrying, bona fide, evangelical Christian.

~Again, social causes are good when they are gospel-driven, but again too often those issues take center stage while Jesus Christ is left out in the cold.

-We see all sides posturing on social media. I hold these views, I’m a real Christian and you’re not. Well, I hold these other views, so I’m a real Christian and you’re not. The views and the politics and the causes take center stage, just like with the Jews when their rituals and their manmade laws and their heritage took center stage.

-None of these things will hold the New Kingdom of Christ. They are all old garments and old wineskins. In Christ’s Kingdom, Christ is center stage. He is the focus. He is the subject. He is the everything. Then, we also see with the New Kingdom that there is a …

2) New life

-What it means to have life has changed. The Jews thought that being a physical descendant of Abraham and sticking closely to the law gave them life—that it was by these things that they were close to God and guaranteed eternal life.

~Strangely enough, Jesus said and Paul wrote that physical descent meant nothing, and Paul also wrote that the law actually brought death because it condemns all people since all have broken the law.

~Again, the Jews’ emphasis was on external things, but Jesus came to bring life to the inner man and woman—someone finds life when their heart is touched and changed by Jesus, not by doing this, that, and the other thing. You can do the external and be cold and dead on the inside.

~That is why Jesus said in the Sermon of the Mount: YOU HAVE HEARD IT SAID OF OLD (IN THE LAW) DON’T MURDER, BUT I TELL YOU NOT TO BE ANGRY (it’s about the heart)…….YOU HAVE HEARD IT SAID OF OLD (IN THE LAW) DON’T COMMIT ADULTERY, BUT I TELL YOU NOT TO EVEN LUST AFTER A WOMAN (new life gives you a new heart)

-This emphasis on the external unfortunately has happened quite often in the history of the church—people with hearts of hate and lust and envy and full of the desire for power and control claimed that because they went through the motions of religion they were saved. And that still happens today.

-But strangely enough, our day and age has also moved the pendulum to the exact opposite side, where life and truly living is found within the self. There is a great emphasis on self-fulfillment, self-improvement, self-positivity—things that you can work up while relying on the self.

~And yet this has been found to leave an emptiness inside—because we are the problem, so we can’t be the solution.

-Jesus said:

I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. (John 10:10 ESV)

~John earlier in the gospel said:

In him [Jesus] was life, and the life was the light of men. (John 1:4 ESV)

-It’s by your identity in Jesus that you have life. You want fulfillment and meaning and purpose and positivity, then you look to Jesus. He gives life. And with that life, we see He also gives…

3) New joy

-Our day and age is the most stressed and depressed generation that has ever existed. The prescription of anti-anxiety and anti-depressant meds are at an all-time high. [And in no way am I condemning or looking down at that or saying to avoid need medications, I’m just stating statistics to make a point.] There is a darkness and depression hanging over our heads.

-When you look at all the murmuring and complaining that goes on in social media or the news or politics, and unfortunately even in churches, you get blasted with the inner turmoil and negativity that presides in so many hearts in a good portion of society and even the church.

-Remember, Jesus said that with the bridegroom there is not mourning, but there is joy. The Bible tells us that:

[He makes known to us] the path of life; in [His] presence there is fullness of joy; at [His] right hand are pleasures forevermore. (Psalm 16:11 ESV)

-The world wants you sad and mad—the devil wants you angry and just about ready to throw your hands in the air and give up, because it gets your eyes off of Jesus. But Jesus’ Kingdom brings with it a joy that can outweigh and overtake the sorrow. And we can claim that joy and let it infect every area of our life. You can have joy if you so choose.

Joy is not only a fruit of the Spirit, but it is a watershed characteristic of being a Kingdom-minded Christian. It is one of the marks that sets us apart from the rest of the world.

~One author gave a fair warning:

All Christians would do well to reflect on whether their demeanor, life-style, and words convey to others, especially the unsaved, this joy of salvation and the lively presence of Jesus or whether they communicate, even unwittingly, a dour, judgmental attitude that is quicker to point out the wrongs of others.

-Joy is a gift given to the Christian that we can choose to accept and to live. While scarce in the world and works-based religions, joy can be a daily reality as part of the Kingdom of God. But His kingdom also brings with it a…

4) New perspective

-Everyone has a worldview by which they look at the world and they made decisions. The Jewish worldview looked at the world and God and ministry a certain way. For its time in history, it was what God had given them so in itself was not bad, although they twisted what God said and marred His intentions.

~But that worldview could not contain what Jesus brought in His inauguration of the Kingdom. They were so stuck into some of the unimportant minutia of their worldview, they failed to see how their religion was but the steppingstone for what God would bring next. We could say that they made themselves so self-important that they completely missed God moving in their midst.

~While they focused on the rituals and traditions and self, God Himself came amongst them. But as John says early in His gospel, THE WORD CAME AMONGST HIS OWN PEOPLE AND THEY DID NOT RECEIVE HIM. Their mindset and perspective caused them to miss God Himself. And if we are not careful, our mindsets can cause us to miss God as well.

-We Americans are so wrapped up in self and comfort and entertainment that we join the Jews in much of their perspective. God exists for me and my comfort. Jesus died for me so that I can pursue my dreams.

-But the Kingdom brings a new perspective. I am called to mirror the heart of Christ who came to save sinners. He called us to follow Him so we could become fishers of men, not so we could have our best life now.

~Jesus calls us to service and sacrifice even if it means suffering, He is not calling us to concern ourselves about our self-image or self-fulfillment.

~The radicalness and revolution of the Kingdom is found in Christ who makes all things new.

Conclusion

-The Kingdom of God is a new reality that Jesus ushered into this world that is antithetical to the old. When you believe in Christ, you become a part of that reality, but it is a choice if you actually want to live according to that new reality.

~To live in the new reality of the Kingdom means taking a radical step of tearing oneself away from the ways and values of the world, as well as the mediocrity of a religion that stands for being satisfied.

~Christians should never be satisfied—we should want more of this new Kingdom, we should want more people to join us in this new Kingdom, and we won’t stop until we have our fulness of Christ.

-Christian, if the old ways of world and religion have chained you down and you would rather live in the revolution of the new, come to the altar and pray that God breaks the chains of lukewarmness and brings you to a place of living in the new reality.

-But you are not part of this new reality outside of Christ…