Our New Testament reading this hour is Mark chapter two, verses 18 through 22. Listen to God’s word. Now, John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast? And Jesus said to them, can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.

No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is destroyed. So are the skins, but new wine is for fresh wine skins.

The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated. You know, there are questions asked. But sometimes they’re really about something much deeper. We kind of know something of that.

When our mothers have told us to clean up our rooms and we fail to do that and mom says, didn’t you hear me? She’s not asking, did we happen to have the decibels go up and our brain registering that something was being said. The hidden question is, why did you not obey me? A husband asks his wife, why did you say it that way? But underneath the question, maybe hurt or fear or insecurity. A parent asks a child, where have you been? But underneath that question is concern and love and perhaps suspicion. A church member asks, why do we do the things this way? But underneath there might be a deeper question. What does faithfulness look like? before God, and that’s what’s happening here in the passage before us this morning here in Mark.

Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast? But Jesus answers by speaking about a bridegroom, a wedding feast, old garments, new cloth, old wineskins, and new wine. Why? Because the real issue is not merely fasting. The real issue is, who is Jesus? And what difference does his coming make?

So that we know this passage is come after Jesus is called Levi, a tax collector, to follow him. And then Jesus ate in Levi’s house with many tax collectors and sinners. And the scribes and the Pharisees objected, why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners? And Jesus answered, those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.

So now the question is going to shift. First they question his table fellowship, now they’re going to question his disciples’ religious practice. And the Lord Jesus shows us that his coming doesn’t merely add one more religious custom to life. His coming changes everything. He’s not a patch on an old garment. He’s not new wine poured into brittle skins. He is the bridegroom. He brings the kingdom. He fills the promises of God. He creates new covenant life. So let’s hear the passage this morning under four headings. First, the question of religious seriousness, verse 18. Look at it with me.

Now, John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting, and the people came to him. Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast? Now, fasting wasn’t strange in Israel. It had a biblical place in the Old Testament. Fasting was often connected with mourning or repentance, humiliation before God, urgent prayer. Israel fasted in times of distress. God’s people fasted when they were grieved over sin, pleading for mercy, or seeking the Lord’s help.

So the question isn’t a silly one, nor is it entirely wicked on the surface. John’s disciples fasted. Makes sense. John the Baptist’s ministry was a ministry of preparation. He came in the wilderness. He preached repentance. He warned of judgment. He called Israel to prepare for the coming one.

The Pharisees also fasted. Their fasting, however, had often become part of a larger system of religious display. Luke 18, the Pharisee and the Temple Boast, I fast twice a week, I give tithes of all that I have. And for him, fasting had become a badge of seriousness. and indeed for many in the Pharisee party.

But the question really at bottom is this, Jesus, why do your disciples not look as religiously serious as these other groups? That’s still a living question. There are people who measure godliness by visible austerity. They assume that the holiest person must always look the most severe, sound the most burdened, and display the most outward discipline. And they confuse a gloomy spirit with spiritual depth. They mistake a somber face for sanctification. We have to be careful here. There is a false lightness as well.

There’s a worldly cheerfulness that refuses repentance. There’s a shallow spirituality that never mourns over sin, never trembles before God, never fasts, never weeps, never wrestles in prayer. But there’s also, on the other end of false severity, a religion that can fast and still be proud, a religion that can refuse food and still feed on self-righteousness, a religion that can practice discipline and still resist Christ.

So the questions are here coming in comparison of disciples. John’s disciples fast, the Pharisees’ disciples fast, Jesus’ disciples don’t fast. So what kind of teacher is Jesus? What kind of disciples is he producing here? Well, our Lord’s not gonna let the issue remain merely a horizontal apples and apples of one religious group compared to another.

He brings the question back to himself. And that’s always where true religion has come. The question is not first, do I look serious? The question is, am I rightly related to Christ? So the question is not first, how do I compare with other believers? The question is, am I responding rightly to the Son of God.

Well, what we need to understand here, we may read our Bible and still miss Jesus. We may pray and still trust in our praying. We may fast and still feed our pride. We may be known as serious or conservative or disciplined or respectable or unorthodox, and yet use those very things to hide from the Savior. The Pharisees could fast while criticizing the friend of sinners. Let that sink in. They could deny themselves food and still reject mercy. They could appear devout and still be angry that Jesus was receiving sinners.

So Jesus answers the question, not by attacking fasting itself, but by revealing who he is. So notice here in the second place, the presence. of the bridegroom, verse 19. And Jesus said to them, can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as I have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. Now, Jesus doesn’t say, well, my disciples are less disciplined. He doesn’t say fasting no longer matters. He doesn’t say, well, John’s disciples and the Pharisees are exactly the same. He says, in effect, you’ve misunderstood the moment.

A wedding is not a funeral. The presence of the bridegroom determines the character of the occasion. While the bridegroom is present, the wedding guests don’t mourn as though he were absent. They rejoice, they feast, they celebrate, and Jesus calls himself the bridegroom.

That’s a profound claim. In the Old Testament, God often spoke of his covenant relationship with his people in the language of marriage. The Lord was the husband of Israel. Israel’s idolatry was spiritual adultery. The restoration of God’s people was sometimes described as renewed bridal joy.

Isaiah 62.5, which we read, as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God. rejoice over you. And so when Jesus identifies himself as the bridegroom, he’s not merely saying my disciples enjoy my company. He is revealing his divine mission. God has come to claim his people. The long promised salvation has come, it’s arrived, it’s here, the kingdom is at hand. The one to whom God pointed is present. One to whom John pointed is there in their midst.

John understood this in John chapter three, verse 29, John the Baptist says, the one who has the bride is the bridegroom, the friend of the bridegroom, speaking of himself rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. So John clearly says, no, I’m not the bridegroom here. I am the friend of the bridegroom. My ministry is preparatory. Jesus is the real thing. He is the bridegroom himself. So Jesus says, as long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.

Notice that word cannot. It doesn’t merely say they may not. He says they cannot. In other words, fasting would be out of season. It would not fit the reality of the moment. That’s an important insight here. There are spiritual practices that may be good in themselves, but wrongly applied in the wrong season or with the wrong meaning. There is, as Ecclesiastes tells us, a time, a season for everything. There is a time to mourn. There’s a time to rejoice. There’s a time to fast. There’s a time to feast.

And wisdom knows the difference. And gospel wisdom sees all these things in relation to Christ. So the disciples are not being careless. They’re responding to the joy of Christ’s presence. That’s a needed word for the church. We mustn’t think that Christianity is a religion of manufactured misery. Jesus did not come to make his people gloomy. He came to save them. He came to forgive sins. He came to bring sinners into fellowship with God. He came to turn mourning into joy.

Yes, there is repentance. Yes, there is self-denial. Yes, there is cross-bearing. But at the heart of the Christian life is joy in the bridegroom. Believer, do you receive that joy? Some Christians are afraid of joy. They think joy must be shallow. They think seriousness and gladness cannot dwell together. But scripture says what? Rejoice in the Lord always. And again, I’ll say rejoice. It says the joy of the Lord is your strength. It speaks of joy that is inexpressible and full of glory.

Now the joy of Christ isn’t silly. It’s not superficial. It’s not worldly entertainment. It is the deep gladness of centers who have been found and forgiven and cleansed and adopted and betrothed to Christ. The bridegroom has come. And if the bridegroom has come, then the church must not live as though the wedding has never happened. That doesn’t mean that every day feels happy. It doesn’t mean every Christian is naturally cheerful. It does not mean the sorrowful saint is defective, but it does mean that under all our sorrows, there’s a deeper gospel reality. Christ has come for his bride. So bring your sorrows to him. Bring your guilt to him. Bring your weariness to Him. Don’t stand outside the feast trying to prove yourself by your worth, your worth by your hunger. Come to the bridegroom.

He receives sinners. In a third place notice here in verse 20, the sorrow of the bridegroom being taken away. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them and then they will fast in that day. We see the tone changing here. The bridegroom is present now, but he’s not always going to be present in the same way. The days will come. That’s a weighty expression there. A dark hour’s coming. The bridegroom will be taken away. The wording here suggests more than an ordinary departure. He will not simply leave town. He will be seized. He’ll be removed. He will be violently taken.

And this is one of the early hints here in Mark’s gospel that Jesus’ mission leads to the cross. And already here, the shadow of Calvary falls across the wedding feast. This is the wonder of the gospel. The bridegroom comes to rejoice over his bride, but he obtains his bride by being taken away.

He wins her by his blood. He secures her by his death. He cleanses her by his sacrifice. Ephesians 5 tells us that Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. That’s bridal language. He gave himself for his bride. Why? That he might sanctify her so that he might present the church to himself in splendor. So the bridegroom is taken away so the bride may be brought near.

Gives us some understanding then of how to comprehend Christian joy. It’s not a joy that skips over the cross. It is joy purchased at the cross. Jesus kept that in mind when he goes to the cross, who for the joy that was set before him, that is on the other side, enduring those things, who had himself slain for sinners like you and like me, who suffered and bled and died, who’s dealt with the separation from the favorable presence of the father is joy. that is foreseen on the far side of the atonement.

We rejoice because Jesus has born it. We don’t rejoice because judgment is unreal. We rejoice because Christ has endured it for his people. We don’t rejoice because repentance is unnecessary. We rejoice because repentance leads to the Savior who forgives.

Jesus says they will fast in that day. So fasting isn’t abolished here, it’s restored to its proper place. Christian fasting is not fasting as though Christ had never come. It’s not fasting to earn God’s favor. It’s not fasting to display spiritual superiority. It’s not fasting to pressure God as if hunger could purchase grace. Christian fasting is a fasting of those who know the bridegroom has come, who know that he has died, who know he is risen, He who know he’s ascended and who long for his appearing.

We live between the comings of Christ. The bride has come. Therefore, we rejoice. The bridegroom has been taken away. Therefore, we grieve over sin and we long for his visible presence. The bridegroom is risen. Therefore, we hope the bridegroom will return. And therefore we pray and we wait and we watch and sometimes fast.

So fasting belongs to longing. A Christian may fast when humbled over sin. A Christian may fast when pleading for mercy. A Christian may fast when seeking wisdom. A Christian may fast when interceding for the church. A Christian may fast when burdened for the lost. A Christian may fast as a bodily way of saying, Lord, I need you more than bread, but it must be gospel fasting. It must be fasting shaped by Christ.

So when you practice religious duties, are they full of Christ or full of self? Do you pray to commune with God or to feel superior to those who do not pray as much? Do you read scripture to hear Christ’s voice or do you congratulate yourself that you’re not like others? Do you serve because Christ has loved you or because you need to be seen as useful? Do you grieve over sin because it dishonors God or because it damages your image? The disciples would fast, but they would fast differently after the cross and resurrection.

Christ changes the meaning of everything. Here’s the comfort for us as sorrowing believers. Jesus doesn’t shame his people for mourning when mourning is fitting. There are days when the church fasts. There are days when believers weep. There are providences that press the soul low. There are seasons when the absence of Christ’s felt presence is painful. But even then, we do not fast as orphans. We fast as those betrothed to Christ. We mourn as those who shall be comforted. We hunger as those promised a feast. And then notice here in the fourth place, the newness, the kingdom of Christ brings.

Look at verse 21. No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it. The new from the old and a worse tear is made. It’s a simple image here. You have an old garment, it’s already worn and stretched. Think of a broken in pair of blue jeans. You take a new piece of cloth, unshrunk, and sew it onto the tear. Now at first, it looks like it’s patched, it’s repaired, but when the new cloth shrinks, it pulls away from the old garment and the tear becomes worse. So what Jesus is saying, look, I did not come to be a patch on the old order.

He’s not merely an improvement to Pharisaical religion. He’s not a supplement to self-righteousness. He’s not an accessory added to an otherwise unchanged life. He brings fulfillment. He brings the kingdom. He brings the reality to which all the shadows pointed. Now I have to be precise.

Jesus is not rejecting the Old Testament. He’s not saying the law and the prophets were bad. He came not to abolish them, but to fulfill them, to fill to the brim what they represented, what they pointed to, and it was to him. The problem was not God’s word.

The problem is human sin, human tradition. and an old order that has reached its appointed fulfillment in Christ. So the shadows, the types, the ceremonies, the preparatory forms must now be interpreted through him. The question is no longer, how do we maintain the old system with Jesus added to it? The question is, how does everything find its fulfillment in Christ?

That was the issue with fasting. See, it looks like they wanted Jesus to fit into their existing categories. Jesus says his coming requires more than just a small adjustment. And that’s one of the great dangers in religion, trying to use Jesus as a patch. People want to do this all the time.

A man wants Jesus to patch his reputation, not to rule his heart. A woman wants Jesus to patch her anxiety, but not govern her desires. A family wants Jesus to patch its problems, but not reorder its loves. A church wants Jesus to patch its decline, but not renew its repentance, prayer, and worship, and mission. A sinner wants Jesus to patch guilt, but not crucify pride.

But Jesus is not a patch. He does not come merely to improve the old garment of self. He comes to clothe us with his righteousness. He comes to make us new. You cannot simply sow Jesus onto self-righteousness. You cannot add him to man-made religion. You cannot use him to reinforce a life still governed by pride. And then, Notice in 22, another parable, and no one puts a wineskin into old wineskins.

If he does, the wine will burst the skins, the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. New wine is for fresh wineskins. In the ancient world, wineskins were made from animal skins. New wine continued to ferment and to expand. and the fresh skins have elasticity. They could stretch. Old skins have become dry and brittle. New wines and old wine skins would burst them. The wine would be lost, the skins ruined.

Well, the point is similar, but it deepens here. The life that Jesus brings has power. It expands. It cannot be confined in brittle forms of externalism and self-righteousness. The new woman is a reality of the kingdom of Christ. It is the joy of sins forgiven. It’s the life of the new covenant. It is fellowship with God through the bridegroom who dies and rises. It’s a gift of the spirit. It is the new obedience that flows from grace.

The old wineskins are not the Old Testament as God gave it. They are the rigid structures of unbelief and formalism and manmade religion that cannot receive the newness of Christ. And that has some direct application to us. Churches can become old wineskins, not because they sing old hymns, not because they have reverent worship, not because they love confessions and catechisms.

They may be filled with rich blessings when governed by scripture and filled with Christ. A church becomes an old wineskin when its forms remain, but its heart grows brittle. When tradition is protected, but Christ is not adored. When order is prized, but prayer is absent. When orthodoxy is confessed, but sinners are not welcomed to the Savior. when the church knows how things have always been done, but it’s lost the wonder that the bridegroom has come. Well, not only churches can be affected that way, individuals too. A person who becomes spiritually brittle when he can’t be corrected by scripture, when she can’t rejoice in grace given to others, when he represents mercy, he resents mercy being shown to sinners. when she clings to control more than Christ, when he wants religion without repentance, when she wants comfort without surrender.

The new wine of Christ will not be contained in the old skins of pride. But there is grace here. Jesus gives what he requires. He doesn’t merely say, become fresh wine skins. He makes people new. He gives the new birth. He pours out His Spirit. He takes away the heart of stone, and He gives a heart of flesh.

That’s why the Gospel is better than moral reform. Moral reform says, patch the garment. The Gospel says, be clothed in Christ. Moral reform says, preserve the old skin. The Gospel says, receive new life from the Spirit. Moral reform says, try harder to look religious. The gospel says, come to the bridegroom who was taken away for sinners and raised for their salvation.

So we circle back to this original question. Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast but your disciples do not fast? Jesus’s answer is because the bridegroom is here. The great issue is not fasting. The great issue is Christ. Do you know him? Not merely do you practice religion? Do you worship? Not merely do you hold correct doctrine? Not merely do you have serious habits? Do you know the bridegroom?

He came into this world promised by the prophets. He welcomed sinners. He ate with tax collectors. He touched the unclean. He forgave sins. He called the unworthy. He rejoiced as a bridegroom among his guests. Then he was taken away, betrayed, arrested, condemned, mocked, crucified, buried. The bridegroom gave himself for his bride. He bore her guilt. He paid her debt. He washed her with his blood. Then he rose again. And now he gathers his church. He sanctifies his bride. He feeds her by his word. He meets her at his table. He teaches her to rejoice, to repent, to fast, to pray, to hope, and to wait.

And that’s where we come now. The Lord’s Supper is not an empty religious form. It’s not a mere custom. It’s not a badge of outward respectability. It is a covenant meal given by the risen Christ to his church. Here the bridegroom feeds his bride. He says before us by visible signs, the same gospel we have just heard in his word. His body given for us, his blood shed for the forgiveness of sins.

At this table, we don’t come pretending that we are strong. We come confessing that we are needing. We don’t come boasting that we’ve made ourselves worthy. We come trusting the worthiness of Christ. We don’t come to patch an old life with a little bit of religion.

We come to feed upon Christ by faith, asking him to renew us by his spirit, to strengthen our repentance, to deepen our joy, and to make us more fully his. This table also teaches us to wait. It’s a feast, but it’s not yet the final feast. It is communion with Christ, but not yet by sight. It is nourishment for pilgrims, not the marriage supper in its fullness.

Every time we eat this bread and drink this cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. And one day he will return. And then fasting will give way to feasting forever. Longing will give way to sight. The bride will be presented without spot or wrinkle. The marriage supper of the lamb will come in fullness. So until then, let us live as those who know the bridegroom.

Let our repentance be full of Christ. Our fasting be full of Christ. Our worship be full of Christ. Our traditions serve Christ. Our obedience flow from Christ. Our joy rest in Christ. Let our longing be for Christ. Don’t use Jesus as a patch for an unchanged life.

Don’t try to pour the new wine of his kingdom into the old white skins of pride and self-righteousness and formalism. Come to him. Come to him in the word preached. Come to him at the table spread. Come to him not as the worthy, but as sinners trusting in the worthy Savior. Come not to an empty ceremony, but to the risen Christ who gives himself to his people by grace. The bridegroom has come. The bridegroom was taken away. The bridegroom is risen. The bridegroom will return and blessed are all called to the marriage supper of the lamb. Let’s pray together. Our gracious father, we thank you for sending your beloved son, the true bridegroom of his people. We praise you that in him, the kingdom has come near. Sins are forgiven, sinners are welcomed, and the joy of salvation is open to all who believe.

Forgive us, Lord, for the ways we have trusted in outward religion, while our hearts have been far from Christ. Forgive us for measuring godliness by appearance, for comparing ourselves with others, for using spiritual duties to feed pride, and for trying to add Jesus as a patch to an unchanged life. Make us honest before you, Tear away our self-righteousness and clothe us afresh in the righteousness of Christ.

Teach us to rejoice in the bridegroom. Let our faith not be gloomy, cold, or merely formal. Give us the deep gladness of those who know that Christ has come, Christ has died, Christ has risen, and Christ will come again. Yet also teach us to mourn rightly over sin. to hunger and thirst for righteousness and to long for the day when we shall see our Savior face to face.

Make us fresh wineskins by your spirit. Renew our hearts, keep our worship and traditions, our prayers and fasting, our service and our obedience under the Lordship of Christ and filled with the life of the gospel. Preserve us from brittle formalism and empty habit. Make us a people who love your word, who welcome repentant sinners, who cherish the Savior, and wait with holy longing for his return.

And now as we come to the table of our Lord, feed us by your grace. Lift our hearts from the outward signs to the crucified and risen Christ, whom they signify and seal to us. Grant that we would not come carelessly or proudly or unbelievingly, but with repentance, faith and gratitude and love, strengthen weak believers, comfort wounded consciences, humble the self-righteous, draw wandering hearts back to Christ. Make this supper a true means of grace to your people. And for any who do not yet know Christ, grant that they would not hide behind religion or respectability or self-improvement. draw them to the bridegroom who was taken away for sinners, crucified for our guilt, raised for our justification, and who now calls the weary and heavy laden to himself.

Feed us now by grace, send us forth in joy, repentance, hope, and obedience, and hasten the day when this supper shall give way to the marriage supper of the Lamb, when fasting shall give way to feasting, longing to sight and faith to everlasting communion with Christ. And we ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Bridegroom. And God’s people say.