Setting aside old wineskins

LOUISVILLE — Relying on Matthew 9:14-17, Jesus’ admonition not to put new wine into old wineskins, the Rev. Dr. Ray Jones III spun a hopeful and pastoral sermon Wednesday for those in the Interim Unified Agency attending Chapel Worship online.

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“There’s change everywhere, y’all,” said Jones, director of Theology, Formation & Evangelism in the IUA. “There’s change in our lives and in our country. Lord have mercy.”

Immigrants seeking a better way of life or fleeing oppressive regimes “are being met with cruelty under a lie they are criminals coming to this country. This breaks my heart,” Jones said. But we’re promised new life in Christ, the title of Jones’ homily, the promise of a new thing that goes back at least to Isaiah. “I think that’s a good word for us today,” Jones said. “God is doing a new thing among us today, in our world and in our church.”

There’s no single program or strategy to make the new thing happen, of course, but we already have the three things we need, according to Jones: one another, the Holy Spirit, and the way of Jesus.

The way of Jesus “is all about new life, about God doing something new,” Jones said. “I love Matthew 9. To me, it’s like a rushing stream of new life,” with accounts of Jesus healing a man dealing with paralysis, a girl restored to life and a woman healed, and healing for two men with blindness and another who was possessed by demons and was mute.

In the middle of all this new life is this question for Jesus: John’s disciples fast. The Pharisees fast. Why aren’t your disciples fasting?

“There’s all this new life bubbling up around them, and they are tempted to take the new life and put it in an old container,” Jones noted. “Jesus says to them and to us, ‘You can’t put new wine in old wineskins.’ You have to put new wine in new wineskins. What does that look like for us?”

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Early on in Jones’ ministry, he served a church with a small youth group that wanted to grow its youth program by building a gymnasium. “We built a gym and paid for it, and that was beautiful,” Jones said. The church began working with town officials to allow community members to use the gym for basketball practices and games, even changing the church’s approach to Sunday evening youth group meetings to call it “Bible and Basketball.”

The youth group swelled from four members to 30 and then 50. Youth and their families began attending and joining the church. “But we were putting a new thing into an old system,” Jones said. “We’d never had a conversation about what needed to change for this new thing to remain alive.” The deacons noticed some scuffs on the gym floor and decided to erect a sign that prohibited running in the gym. “This was painful and a little humorous,” Jones noted.

“We had one another, the Holy Spirit was moving and we had the way of Jesus, but we never talked about and prayed about the way to hold this new life in our midst,” he said. When Jones heard another call and left that church, the church decided to shut down the program with the city, and the youth and their families soon stopped attending church.

“I don’t have a strategic plan, but I do know we can figure this out together,” Jones said. “I believe something good is going to happen in our country, but the good thing that’s going to happen, we can’t put it in an old system. We need to figure out new ways to be a country and be the church.”

“Here’s the thing, y’all: In the church and in this country, our hearts are going to have to break. Maybe they’re already breaking, and that’s a good thing,” he said. At the end of Matthew 9, Jesus has compassion for the “harassed and helpless” crowd. The Greek origin of “compassion” refers to our internal organs, which include a heart that’s broken, Jones said.

“That’s our way forward, a broken heart. We have all we need — one another, the way of Jesus and the Holy Spirit,” he said. “If we ever doubt we are doing the right thing, all we need to do is check in with one another to remind us we are following Jesus, who included everyone.”

“My heart still grieves” amid the current chaos, he said, “but I am hopeful that in the way of Jesus we can be the church and support the church in this time so that all people are welcomed, justice is done and all people have the opportunity for healing.”

The question is not the age-old “If you died tonight, do you know where you’d spend eternity?” Jones said. “What if the question is, ‘Do you want to be healed? Do you want to be made whole? Do you want the world to be a more just place?’ If you do, please join us and join in what God is doing to heal, make whole and bring justice and hope into our community. And you know what?” Jones said, reciting lyrics familiar to many Presbyterians: “They will know we are Christians by our love, by our love. Yes they’ll know we are Christians by our love.”

The Rev. Dr. David Gambrell, Associate for Worship in the Interim Unified Agency, offered up a prayer for the 35 or so people gathered for worship, and Jones delivered a benediction and charge including these words: “As we go into our day, let us be mindful of the healing that’s happening, the inclusion that’s happening, the opportunity for people to experience wholeness and the new thing God is doing to reconcile all things and repair what is broken. … Let’s help one another to not be tempted to put the new thing back into the old container. … Let us know the fierce love of God, the overwhelming grace of Jesus Christ, and the power of the Holy Spirit to fill us up and light our way. Amen.”