The Old Testament Law only prescribed one day of fasting for the people. It was the Day of Atonement, described in Leviticus 16:29, the annual fall feast where the people fasted in repentance for their sins over the past year. However, over time, the scribes and religious leaders added to this at least four other annual fasts. Zechariah 8:19 makes mention of fasts in the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months. These fasts apparently began to be observed during the Babylonian captivity. According to the Rabbis, the fast of the fourth month commemorated Moses’ breaking of the original tablets of the Ten Commandments in Exodus 22. The fast of the fifth month was to memorialize the destruction of the
Fasting was also observed by pious Jews during periods of personal loss, repentance, prayer, and sometimes in a misguided effort to earn God’s favor. John’s disciples may have been fasting because he had been imprisoned, or perhaps already killed by this point; or perhaps they were fasting in repentance as John had emphasized in his preaching, or even in an effort to emulate his ascetic lifestyle. Whatever their reason for fasting, it coincided at this time with one of the fasts of the Pharisees, for the text tells us that both groups were fasting. Meanwhile, what are Jesus and his disciples doing? They weren’t fasting, for we read in verses 14-17 that they were feasting with the tax-collectors and sinners. Undoubtedly, this caused some questions to arise in the hearts of John’s disciples. Here was the One to whom he had pointed them, but He was not performing acts of religious devotion the way they thought He should. And the Pharisees took advantage of the opportunity to create doubt in their minds as to the nature of who Jesus really was. And so they came to Jesus questioning Him about fasting. “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but Your disciples do not fast?”
Now, had these people really understood the Scriptures they would have realized that this was a senseless question. First of all, as we have already seen, only one day of fasting was required by the Law. Secondly, they would have understood the teaching of Isaiah 58:6-7 and Zechariah 7:1-10, which declared that God was far more interested in love for Him and for others than He was in their literal fasting from food.[4] But their question reveals a deeper issue than just fasting. At the root of this question is the issue of the relation of Jesus to the Law, the customs and traditions of
I. A Portrait of a New Relationship (vv18-20)
Jesus begins to answer the question by asking a question: While the bridegroom is with them, the attendants of the bridegroom cannot fast, can they? The spirit of fasting is mournful. No one mourns in the presence of the bridegroom. Well, almost no one. I was doing a wedding one time for a young couple, and just minutes before the groom and I entered the sanctuary, his grandmother barged into that backroom crying, and she grabbed this young man by the lapels of his tuxedo and said, “You don’t know how much I wish you weren’t doing this!” But that experience was unique. Most of the time, there is only joy. And Jesus says that is the way it should be.
In that day, a wedding was more than just an 18 minute ceremony. After a lengthy period of betrothal, the groom and his attendants would go to the bride’s family home and bring her and all their family and friends to the new home where bride and groom would spend their married life. There, they would begin a week of celebration. Jewish customs exempted those taking part in the festivities from observing religious rituals, including fasts. This was to be a time of uninterrupted merriment, of laughter, of singing and dancing and joyous celebrating.
In this portrait of the wedding celebration, Jesus is showing that His coming inaugurates an opportunity for a new relationship with God, and in this portrait, He paints a picture of His identity, His activity, and His destiny.
A. The Identity of Jesus
While it is certainly true that Jesus was using a situation from daily life to which everyone could relate, He was also reminding the disciples of John the Baptist of a statement John had made concerning Jesus. In John 3:28-29, John denied being the Christ, but said, “I have been sent ahead of Him. He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice. So this joy have mine has been made full.” In that statement, John told his hearers that Jesus had come to them as a bridegroom. In so doing, he was reminding them of a recurrent theme in the Old Testament. God had spoken through the prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Hosea declaring Himself to be a Husband and a Bridegroom to His people. John declared that the Bridegroom had come, and Jesus here picks up the imagery to say, “I am Him. I am that Bridegroom.” In making this declaration, He identified Himself as the God who had betrothed His people to Himself. No longer did the people need to view God as cosmic and distant, approachable only through external rituals. He is the bridegroom, and the celebration of marriage has begun. For centuries, people fasted in expectation of His coming. That time is now past, for He has come in the person of Christ. Now is not a time for fasting, but for feasting. And this brings us to…
B. The Activity of Jesus
Jesus says that the Bridegroom is with His attendants. These are the ones who are aiding Him in the planning of the celebration, and who will accompany Him to go and receive His bride. He and His disciples were carrying out this mission of gathering the bride for the wedding. Who is the bride? The bride is every person who turns to Christ in repentance of their sins and faith in Him. Paul will say later in Ephesians 5 that the bride is the church, and we will read later in the book of Revelation about the Marriage Supper of the Lamb where Christ and His people will be permanently united for eternity. But here, He and His attendants are going out to make their final preparations for the wedding and to gather the bride and bring her in for the party. That is what they were doing over at Levi’s house. They were handing out wedding invitations. Every person who hears the gospel call is receiving an invitation to the wedding – but not just as a guest, they are invited to be the bride—to be united with Christ for all eternity. Therefore, it is not a time for mourning, weeping, and fasting, but a time for celebrating.
Now, as wonderful as that wedding day will be, there is a delay between now and then. Jesus puts an interesting twist in the plot of this parable by including a picture of …
C. The Destiny of Jesus (v20)
The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. This is a jarring surprise to those listening to the story. Never have they been to any wedding feast where the bridegroom was taken away. The guests leave, but not the groom. But He does not leave on His own, He is taken away. The word Jesus uses here is a Greek word that means “to lift up and carry away,” and implies a note of force or violent removal. The word is used in this parable in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and is used nowhere else in the New Testament. However, when the Old Testament was translated into Greek two centuries before Christ’s birth, this is the word that the translators used for Isaiah 53:8--By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? Here Jesus uses a word straight out of the vivid prophecy concerning His suffering and death on the cross. Here in the midst of the wedding celebration, the bridegroom would be seized and taken away, lifted up on a rugged cross to suffer a violent death and be cut off from His people. And it is then when His disciples will fast. This is a prophecy not a command. He is not saying we have to fast now, but that we will. We fast because He will no longer be physically present with us. Though He will send His Spirit to dwell within us, we will not be able to see Him with our eyes or touch Him with our hands again until we behold Him face to face in glory. And the longing for that moment ought to occasionally become so consuming in us that no earthly delight will satisfy us. And so we fast out of a desire to be with Him and to know Him and to behold Him in all His glory, like a bride longs for the groom who was seized away from her in the midst of the wedding.
And so with this parable of the Bridegroom, Jesus does more than just answer a question about fasting. He paints a portrait of a new relationship that is possible in this New Era of His Kingdom which has begun because He has come into the world. He follows this miniature parable with another one in v21, and with it, He paints …
II. A portrait of a new righteousness (v21)
We live in a disposable world today. If something breaks we throw it away and buy a new one. If a garment tears, we don’t usually patch it; we just discard it. But in Jesus’ day, that would be unthinkable. Garments were too expensive, and so most people wore things that were patched. And just as everyone understood what it meant to be a part of a wedding celebration, so everyone knew that there was a right way and a wrong way to patch a garment. And no one, Jesus says, puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If a person were to do such a thing, once they washed the garment, the patch would shrink and tear away from the seems that held it to the garment, making a bigger tear than it was intended to cover up. Now, remember Jesus is not giving laundry instructions here. He has been asked a question about fasting, and a larger issue of where He and His followers stand in relation to Jewish customs and traditions. So this laundry lesson is really a miniature parable that answers that question, like the parable before it. Only this time, the parable is not a portrait of a new relationship, but of a new righteousness.
Do you remember what Adam and Eve did in the garden after they sinned? They began piecing together leaves to try to cover themselves up. Now, ever since that moment, in religions practiced all over the world, people have been trying to do the same thing. Knowing that they have sin in their lives, they have tried to piece together a patchwork garment of good things that will cover up all of their bad things. They stitch a patch of ritual performance together with a patch of financial contribution, and attach a patch of kind acts, and a patch of praying, fasting, or some other deed that they do to try to make themselves righteous in the eyes of God. But this patchwork approach to righteousness was not enough for Adam and Eve, and it hasn’t been enough for any of their descendants down through the ages.
The Pharisees approached fasting as they approached many other tasks – they thought doing it was earning them credit with God. That is why, in Matthew 6:16-18, Jesus took issue with the way they fasted. They put on a gloomy face so that people would take notice of them, and say, “Oh my! Look how spiritual they are! They are fasting!” And people were impressed. God, however, was not. God sees through our patchwork coverings. So when God confronted Adam and Eve, He gave them a more permanent solution. He took away their patchwork leaves and gave them a covering of skin. An animal was slain as a sacrifice for their sins, a substitutionary death, and they were covered with the skin of that animal. And in this act, God was pointing them forward to a day when a greater sacrifice of a greater substitute would take place.
Christ has not come to add a new patch to our old and worn out efforts to cover ourselves. He has come to give us a new righteousness. Jesus Christ did what you and I cannot do – He lived a completely perfect life and satisfied the demands of God’s holy standard. And then He died the death that we deserve for our sins. But He offers us a great exchange. If we will acknowledge our sinfulness, He points us to the cross, where those sins were punished in Christ, and gives us in exchange the very righteousness of Christ as a covering – a new skin to clothe us, not patched together by the futile efforts of our own deeds to cover ourselves, but a complete covering. This is the core of the gospel – the doctrine of justification. Justification involves three realities. When a person is in Christ, his or her sins are removed because of Christ’s death. He or she is pronounced not guilty before God. And then the very righteousness of Jesus Christ is imputed or transferred to him or her. So, because of justification, we who otherwise would stand before God covered in sins, stand instead covered by a righteousness that is not our own, but that was earned for us by Jesus Christ. This is what Paul was saying in Philippians 3:9 when he said that he desired to be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith. If we are saved, it is not because we have added the Jesus patch to our piecemeal covering, but because we have turned in our patchwork efforts in exchange for the righteousness of Jesus.
Walter Wangerin wrote a fictional allegory entitled Ragman that tells this story beautifully. The story is told from the perspective of an onlooker who observes a tall and strong man walking through the city streets crying out, “Rags! New rags for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!” The Ragman comes upon a woman weeping, her tears being collected in an old handkerchief. The Ragman takes her handkerchief, and gives her in exchange a bright and clean linen cloth. And the onlooker notices that the woman is no longer crying, but now the Ragman walked away, blotting His own tears with her handkerchief. He watches as the Ragman goes to a girl whose head was wrapped in a blood-soaked bandage. The Ragman took that bandage off of her head, and placed on her a new yellow bonnet. Gone are her wounds, but as the Ragman wrapped his own head with her bandage, his head began to flow with his own blood. Next, the Ragman came to a man with one arm, and the Ragman exchanged jackets with him. When the man put on the new jacket, he found that he had a new arm, but the Ragman walked away, with only one arm. And the onlooker watches as the Ragman makes his way to the city landfill, and climbed upon a garbage heap there. He lays himself down, cushioning his bleeding head with the handkerchief and the jacket, and there the Ragman died. The onlooker was so caught up in what had been done that he could not leave the scene. He fell asleep there, overcome with emotion, but he happened to wake up three days later in time to see the Ragman come to life again, completely restored, bearing only the scar from the wound where his head had bled. And the onlooker says, “I lowered my head and trembling for all that I had seen, I myself walked up to the Ragman. I told him my name with shame, for I was a sorry figure next to him. Then I took off all my clothes in that place and I said to him with dear yearning in my voice, ‘Dress me.’ He dressed me! My Lord! He put new rags on me, and I am a wonder beside him. The Ragman, The Ragman, The Christ.”[5]
This is what Jesus has done for us! He does not want us to use Him to patch up our old garments, but rather to lay those old garments down at His feet and take up the new and complete righteous covering that He offers us by His grace. This is a brand new righteousness that Christ has come to offer us which we could not earn by all the fasting, praying, or works we could ever attempt to do on our own.
But there is one final portrait that Christ paints for us in this passage.
III. A Portrait of A New Receptacle (v22)
No one puts new wine, that has yet to ferment, into an old wineskin. In Jesus’ day, an animal would be skinned, and that skin would be kept in tact, partly tanned, and then stitched into a container which would be soft and pliable. As the wine fermented, the skin would expand as gases were emitted in the fermentation process. But after repeated usage, the skin would become dry and brittle, and it would lose its elasticity. Once it reached that point, it could not be used anymore because the new wine would expand as it fermented, and the skin would burst, ruining both the wine and the skin. Now remember, Jesus is not giving a lesson in wine-making. He is answering a question about religious customs and traditions like fasting.
The point Jesus is making here is that the new life He has come to give us won’t fit in old forms of religion. His followers would become indwelt with His Spirit. Did you know that when you gave your life to Jesus, He moved in. He took up residence in your life in the person of the Holy Spirit. If you are a follower of Christ, you have become a receptacle for the very presence of God. Now, if you expect God to take up residence in your old sinful life, that life that is stretched out to the max from much religious striving, you are sorely mistaken. He won’t fit! He must take up residence in a new vessel – and that is the promise of the gospel. Not just that He comes to fill your old stuff up, but that He has come to make you brand new. In Christ, you become a brand new vessel, a new receptacle fit for His habitation. And as the fermentation of Christlikeness takes place, you expand and grow in holiness as He permeates every fiber of your being. What does 2 Corinthians 5:17 say? Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. He won’t fit into the old sins and old systems of life. He makes all things new as He comes to take up residence in us.
Jesus Christ has come to usher in a New Era of life in His Kingdom. It is a life of new relationship – that of a bride and her groom; it is a life of new righteousness – not a patchwork covering of our own deeds, but the complete righteous perfection of Jesus Himself imputed to us by grace through faith; it is a life of a new receptacle – new wine filling and expanding a brand new wineskin.
Listen to how James Edwards sums up the teaching of this passage: “The question … is not whether the disciples will, like sewing a new patch on an old garment or refilling an old container, make room for Jesus in their already full agendas and lives. The question is whether they will forsake business as usual and join the wedding celebration; whether they will become entirely new receptacles for the expanding fermentation of Jesus and the gospel in their lives.”[6]
That’s it. That’s what it is all about. Perhaps today you recognize that you have been trying to approach God with your own works, or with traditions and customs that you have inherited from generations past. And Christ says to you today, “it will never do.” Lay it all down at His cross and become brand new in Him. Enter into the joy of wedded bliss to Christ as He clothes you with His righteousness and fills you with His Presence. Turn from sin and self, and call upon Christ as Lord and Savior, surrendering yourself to Him and allow Him to do this work of grace in your life if you never have before. And if you have, do not think that you have got this licked. Remember that Paul warned the Galatians that they were being bewitched into thinking that they could begin this new life by grace and then perfect it by works. No it is all of grace. Whether we fast, or pray, or do some religious deed, we must always remember that we are not accepted before God because of these things. Someone put it well who said that the Christian life is not spelled D-O, but D-O-N-E. We are not accepted because of what we do, and we do not become more acceptable by the doing of more things. We are accepted because of Jesus and what He has done for us. And we rest in that, knowing that His grace is sufficient, and all that we DO, we do because of the gratitude and joy that fills our soul in response to what He has DONE for us.
[1]
[2] R. T. France, The New International Greek Testament Commentary: The Gospel of Mark (
[3] Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1993), 455.
[4] William Hendriksen, Exposition of the Gospel According to Mark, 100. Cited in Louis Barbieri, Moody Gospel Commentary: Mark (Chicago: Moody, 1995), 69.
[5] Walter Wangering, “Ragman,” in Calvin Miller, The Book of Jesus (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996), 85-87.
[6] James R. Edwards, The Pillar New Testament Commentary: The Gospel According to Mark (
No comments:
Post a Comment