Luke 5:27-39 | Isaiah 43:18-21
Expect the unexpected. Or, at least try not to expect certain things. Or the right things. Yes, that’s it. With Jesus, change your expectations to the right things.
The vignettes in our passage today each demonstrate Jesus doing something unexpected. Asking a greedy cheater to follow him. Eating in the home of said tax collector and with other ruffians. God coming to earth not for the righteous, but for those enmeshed in sin. And so on.
This is why following Jesus is a daily journey of newness. This is why we return to the gospels again and again. The spirit of God continues what Jesus began: surprising, challenging, taking us in directions outside of our regularly-rutted paths.
What new wine skin is he calling you to?
Luke 5:27-39
Afterward, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at a kiosk for collecting taxes. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.”
Levi got up, left everything behind, and followed him. Then Levi threw a great banquet for Jesus in his home. A large number of tax collectors and others sat down to eat with them. The Pharisees and their legal experts grumbled against his disciples. They said, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”
Jesus answered, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor, but sick people do. I didn’t come to call righteous people but sinners to change their hearts and lives.”
Some people said to Jesus, “The disciples of John fast often and pray frequently. The disciples of the Pharisees do the same, but your disciples are always eating and drinking.”
Jesus replied, “You can’t make the wedding guests fast while the groom is with them, can you? The days will come when the groom will be taken from them, and then they will fast.”
Then he told them a parable. “No one tears a patch from a new garment to patch an old garment. Otherwise, the new garment would be ruined, and the new patch wouldn’t match the old garment. Nobody pours new wine into old wineskins. If they did, the new wine would burst the wineskins, the wine would spill, and the wineskins would be ruined. Instead, new wine must be put into new wineskins. No one who drinks a well-aged wine wants new wine, but says, ‘The well-aged wine is better.’”
Isaiah 43:18-21
Don’t remember the prior things;
don’t ponder ancient history.
Look! I’m doing a new thing;
now it sprouts up; don’t you recognize it?
I’m making a way in the desert,
paths in the wilderness.
The beasts of the field,
the jackals and ostriches, will honor me,
because I have put water in the desert
and streams in the wilderness
to give water to my people,
my chosen ones,
this people whom I formed for myself,
who will recount my praise.
Prayer
God,
I feel like it’s my job to open up myself to your work in my life. But can you help me stretch it out a bit? Broaden my horizon. Give me vision beyond my peripheral. Exercise my muscles in ways they’ve not yet known.
It’s not that I’m looking for adventure. It’s just that I know you’re bigger than I know. I want to go beyond myself. Help me with my prejudices of other people. Surprise me with the capacity of others I otherwise assume to be limited. I’m so ignorant. Give me your view of diversity. And soak it all in love, Lord.
By your spirit & in Christ,
Amen.