SteveF wrote:Actually that wasn't what I was trying to say at all. I guess I did worse that you thought.
I guess you did then. Incidentally, would you recap exactly the point you were trying to make? Because all I have is this:
RND, in Luke 5:39 Jesus was using a well known fact to integrate a point into his parable. The fact that people prefer old wine is not a parable it is a fact.
The "fact" (that I agree with BTW) that people prefer "old wine" as opposed to "new wine" is indeed a simple fact. No disagreement whatsoever. That may explain why a newly minted 64oz. bottle of grape juice retails for about $4.00 while a top notch premium wine aged for several years fetches $400.00 a bottle or more. I get that. It's clear. I understand. Old is better than new.
However, to suggest that Jesus was using this fact in His parable in Luke 5:36-39 outside of the specific point He was making in comparison to the other verses of Luke 5:36-38 is a greater leap than the chasm that is the Grand Canyon!
The comparison in verse 39 that Jesus is making is that the "old nature" of man is more desirable to man that the "new nature" a man must take on to enter into the Kingdom.
Luk 5:36 And he spake also a parable unto them; No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old; if otherwise, then both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was [taken] out of the new agreeth not with the old. 37 And no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. 38 But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both are preserved. 39 No man also having drunk old [wine] straightway desireth new: for he saith, The old is better.
This from Matthew Henry:
"So Christ would train up his followers gradually to the discipline of his family; for no man, having drank old wine, will of a sudden, straightway, desire new, or relish it, but will say, The old is better, because he has been used to it, v. 39.
The disciples will be tempted to think their old way of living better, till they are by degrees trained up to this way whereunto they are called. Or, turn it the other way: "Let them be accustomed awhile to religious exercises, and then they will abound in them as much as you do: but we must not be too hasty with them."
This from the Bible Explained:
"In the context we read at v27 Jesus' call to Matthew who was a publican prompting the Pharisees to accuse Him of having bad company. Jesus responded in a way that they could not argue against. Then they criticized the disciples for attending social dining events while their disciples fasted. Jesus could have argued that the fasts were worthless without heart commitment but argument would have only detracted from truth. He then told them about the futility of patching an old garment and of filling old wineskins (containers).
Even though the wine would be good, people would complain. In other words, (a) His teaching and ministry could not be a patch on what they had already decided to be truth, and (b) they would not be happy with His teaching because they had already determined that their old way was the only way."
Steve everyone loves "old wine" but that it was used in the sense that the "old nature" of man is in clear opposition to the will of God and that the "new nature" man must put on is as clear as a summer day at the Grand Canyon!
Hence Paul stating: "Therefore if any man [be] in Christ, [he is] a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." "Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with [him], that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin." "Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds;"
