New Wineskins: Embrace the Holy Spirit’s Transforming Power

Aug 01, 2026

Devotional

Day 1: New Wine Demands Stretching, Not Snapping

The call to hold spiritual renewal requires flexible hearts ready to expand. Like stiff wineskins cracking under fermentation, rigid minds shatter when truth challenges familiar patterns. Jesus confronts systems clinging to man-made rules over divine purpose. Spiritual growth demands surrender to the stretching work of the Holy Spirit, not preservation of comfortable traditions. True transformation happens when we stop protecting our "folders" of assumptions. [03:26:51]

"But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, ‘The old is good.’" (Luke 5:37-38, ESV)

Reflection: What familiar thought pattern or tradition have you defended more fiercely than God’s voice? How might the Spirit be inviting you to stretch today?

Day 2: When Algorithms Outpace Altar Calls

Our digital echo chambers often drown out heaven’s frequency. Just as social media feeds reinforce existing biases, religious minds filter truth through preloaded grids. The Pharisees’ scrolls became mirrors reflecting their preferences rather than windows revealing Messiah. Spiritual blindness persists not from lack of data but resistance to disruptive grace. [02:55:06]

"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." (Romans 12:2, ESV)

Reflection: What uncomfortable scripture or conviction have you instinctively scrolled past? Where is God asking you to linger on His countercultural truth?

Day 3: The Danger of Defending Fences Instead of Faith

Humanity builds guardrails around God’s cliffs until the barriers become the focus. The Pharisees’ 1,500 Sabbath rules obscured the day’s healing purpose. When protecting the fence replaces cultivating the field, we mistake control for covenant. True obedience follows the heartbeat behind the commandment. [03:09:24]

"This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men." (Matthew 15:8-9, ESV)

Reflection: What well-intended “fence” in your spiritual practice has become a wall against grace? How can you recenter on God’s original design?

Day 4: Childhood Folders vs. Kingdom File Cabinets

Mental schemas formed by trauma, tradition, or tribe often override Scripture’s radical narrative. Peter’s fishing expertise nearly rejected Christ’s fish miracle. Spiritual breakthroughs come when we trade “this is how we’ve always done it” for “Lord, at Your word I’ll try again.” [03:14:46]

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." (2 Corinthians 5:17, ESV)

Reflection: What childhood lens distorts your view of God’s character? Where is He inviting you to refile experiences under “mercy” instead of “fear”?

Day 5: Second Chances and Unseen Accidents

Every heartbeat testifies to divine intervention we’ll never fully comprehend. The car crash avoided, the diagnosis diverted, the addiction interrupted—675,000 daily mercies pulse through veins. Gratitude flourishes when we recognize our lives as collages of holy near-misses. [02:11:11]

"Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit." (Psalm 103:2-4, ESV)

Reflection: What unseen rescue from this week deserves your awe? How will you live differently knowing angels intercepted disasters on your behalf?

Sermon Summary

Luke 5 sets Jesus right in front of religious people who had plenty of Bible, plenty of rules, and still missed the Truth standing in their face. The Pharisees come with a question about fasting, but the text shows a deeper problem. Jesus is not rejecting fasting. Jesus is saying that the bridegroom is present, and fasting for what is absent makes no sense when the One longed for is already in the room.

The algorithm picture exposes how people get locked inside what they already believe. The phone keeps feeding the same outrage, the same bias, the same little world, and the human heart has always worked that way. Confirmation bias did not start with technology. The Pharisees had their own feed, and Jesus kept showing up in it doing everything that made them mad.

The Pharisees were not cartoon villains. The Pharisees began as sincere people trying to keep Israel from exile, idolatry, and disobedience. Their fence around the law started as protection, but the fence became confused with the word of God itself. Tradition, practice, and policy became easier to defend than the living voice of God.

Jesus presses the issue with the images of cloth and wine. No one tears up a new garment to patch an old one. No one pours new wine into old wineskins. New wine expands, stretches, moves, ferments, and changes the container from the inside. The Holy Spirit works like that, and old, rigid thinking cannot hold what God is trying to pour out.

The text asks the hard question, “You want the wine, but can you hold it?” The danger is not lack of information. The Pharisees had prophecy, doctrine, commentary, and Bible knowledge. The danger is a heart so set, so offended, so committed to being right, that truth feels like a threat instead of deliverance.

The old wineskin names a mindset that refuses to be stretched. Trials, relationships, repentance, and the Spirit’s conviction expose whether the truth merely sits in the head or actually has the person. Jesus is looking for people willing to rethink what they think they know, like Peter going back into deep water after an empty night. The Spirit still comes after hard hearts, still breaks strongholds, still calls for surrender, and still asks whether the life can hold the new wine.

Key Takeaways

1. New wine needs flexible skins [03:25:19] The image of new wine is not about religious excitement for a moment. The Holy Spirit expands, stretches, and changes whatever receives Him. A rigid soul may admire the wine, sing about the wine, and ask for the wine, while still resisting the very movement that makes the wine new. [205:19]
2. Knowledge can still miss Jesus [03:10:09] The Pharisees had prophecy, Scripture, and serious religious discipline, yet Jesus stood before them as an offense. Bible knowledge becomes dangerous when it trains the mind to win arguments but not to yield. Truth does not merely ask for agreement; truth asks what must die if Christ is actually right. [190:09]
3. Tradition can become the fence [03:06:23] The Pharisees built fences to protect obedience, but the fence eventually sounded like God’s own command. That same drift happens whenever policy, preference, or church habit carries more emotional weight than Scripture. A sincere beginning can become spiritual bondage when protection replaces communion with God. [186:23]
4. The heart has an algorithm [02:57:16] Social media only exposes what the fallen mind already does. The heart searches for what confirms its old folders and rejects what threatens its settled world. The Spirit interrupts that feed, not to shame the soul, but to break the loop that keeps a person offended, stuck, and unchanged. [177:16]
5. The Spirit still breaks strongholds [03:47:38] The call to baptism and surrender rests on the mercy of a God who keeps coming after resistant people. The Spirit does not merely inform the mind; He breaks yokes, softens hard places, and creates courage where fear had been ruling. The need is not worthiness, but neediness before God.

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Youtube Chapters

[00:00] - Welcome
[96:44] - Thanksgiving and Church Announcements
[98:06] - Supporting the School Mission
[99:00] - Facility Needs and Giving Appeal
[106:40] - Baby Dedication for Ziana
[114:55] - Holy, Holy, Holy and Praise
[130:53] - Prayer for Second Chances
[137:31] - Tithe and Offering Appeal
[144:02] - Introduction of Doctor Myron Edmonds
[167:54] - Luke 5 and New Wineskins
[171:51] - The Algorithm and the Feed
[184:46] - Pharisees, Rules, and Sincerity
[192:38] - Schema and Confirmation Bias
[205:19] - New Wine and Old Wineskins
[214:44] - Invitation to Receive New Wine

Bible Study Guide

Bible Reading

Luke 5:33-39
“And they said to him, ‘The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.’ And Jesus said to them, ‘Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.’ He also told them a parable: ‘No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment. If he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, “The old is good.”’” [02:47:54]

John 1:11
“He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.” [03:12:13]

Acts 2:13
“But others mocking said, ‘They are filled with new wine.’”

Hosea 4:6
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.” [03:20:41]

Observation questions

In Luke 5:33-39, what two images does Jesus use after the question about fasting, and what happens when new things are forced into old ones? [03:25:19]
What does Jesus say about fasting while the bridegroom is present, and what does He say will happen when the bridegroom is taken away?
What kinds of people and actions in Luke 5 seemed to trouble the Pharisees so much—especially in the way Jesus dealt with sinners, rules, and forgiveness? [03:03:19]
What are some examples of how a person’s “feed” keeps showing them more of what they already pause on, like, or agree with? [02:57:16]

Interpretation questions

Jesus does not reject fasting, but He does say fasting makes no sense when the bridegroom is present. What does that reveal about who Jesus is and what the Pharisees were failing to see? [03:24:12]
The Pharisees started with a sincere desire to protect obedience. How can sincere efforts to guard God’s commands slowly turn into traditions that compete with God’s voice? [03:06:23]
Jesus says new wine must go into fresh wineskins. If the new wine points to the Holy Spirit, what does a “fresh wineskin” look like in a real person’s life? [03:25:57]
People can have Bible knowledge and still miss Jesus. What is the difference between having truth in the mind and being changed by the truth in the heart? [03:29:38]

Application questions

The heart often looks for what already feels familiar and safe. Where is that tendency strongest right now—in politics, church habits, relationships, or personal convictions—and how might that be making it harder to hear God clearly? [03:01:03]
Tradition, policy, and preference can become more precious than Scripture. Is there any church habit, family pattern, or personal opinion that has started to feel untouchable, even though it may not actually carry the weight of God’s Word? [03:07:31]
New wine stretches the container from the inside. What situation in life right now feels like stretching—trial, correction, conflict, repentance, or change—and what might God be trying to form through it? [03:29:11]
Truth often feels threatening because it may cost something. When God exposes something in the heart, is the first response usually surrender, defensiveness, delay, or argument? What might that response be revealing? [03:18:26]
Peter went back into deep water after an empty night. Where might Jesus be asking for a second act of trust after disappointment, fatigue, or failure? [03:33:37]
It is possible to enjoy church, agree with preaching, and still resist real change. Where has spiritual life become routine—showing up, hearing the Word, going home—without much fresh surrender or movement? [03:34:46]
Jesus still comes after hard hearts, and the Spirit still breaks strongholds. What would it look like this week to become more flexible before God instead of just trying to appear correct before people? [03:47:38]

Sermon Clips

84s

#FlexibleFaith

“Here's the danger. Wineskins is not about a type of holy person. You know what we don't you know what Jesus is trying to tell you? He's saying, I need a kind of mindset that is flexible, that can be stretched. You you know what stretches us more than anything? Trials, relationships, battling our own stuff. We we need we need to come to a day where the amens and the shouts are not about other people. Get them, pastor. Teach pastor. Fix those folks out there that don't believe what we believe. We got the truth. Ah. But does the truth have you? Does it have you to the place that you are as progressive and that you are constantly changing and that your thinking is different? If you think the same way that you thought last year, twenty five years ago, it is evidence that the wine of Jesus is not working in your life.”

65s

#TransformedByJesus

“And so now that the wine is here, and I gotta ask you a question today. I don't know about you, and it may sound weird for folks who don't drink, I think. Jesus is intimating that you ought to want the wine. The scripture says that when the holy spirit fell on those apostles, what did they say about them? They said, it seems like they're drunk. It seems like they have had new wine. see all throughout scripture that the symbolism of wine represents the presence of Jesus in your life. And can I just tell y'all something? When Jesus comes in your life, you don't think the same. You don't stay the same. You don't always believe the same. You ought to be growing. You ought to be expanding so that when truth comes, you don't miss it.”

45s

#EmptyToReceive

“he said, y'all know this. If it's already been filled with old wine, you don't empty the old wine and put in new stuff. Because if you put new wine that has not expanded, that has not experienced fermentation, that has not experienced the transformation process, what's it gonna do to the old way? It's gonna destroy it. He said, so so here's what I'm really telling y'all. The reason why you can't receive me, the new wine, is because you're old in your thinking.”

55s

#TruthOverNarrative

“That that what what I'm talking about is not truth per se, but I'm talking about our relationship to it and our natural response to something that is really true. And I'm not talking about true in terms of teachings. I'm talking about true when the holy ghost is coming after you, when the holy ghost is trying to speak to you, when the Holy Ghost is getting in your business, getting in your kitchen, getting in your marriage, getting in your mind, getting in your entertainment, getting in your decisions, getting in your come on and talk to me in here. What we have a tendency to do is we see truth as a threat, and we will filter truth out if it doesn't fit our narrative.”

45s

#DontMissTheMiracle

“So he's reading your mind and telling you something you know you didn't say out loud, but you are still so hard hearted toward who he is that even when do y'all see what's happening? The conviction of the spirit of God is revealing him as God. He he tells a man that's been lame to get up and walk, and then he asks you what is easier, to tell the man to get up and walk or to say his sins are forgiven. You don't rejoice that he's walking. You don't rejoice that a miracle is happening. You don't rejoice that the power of God has showed up. You are so steeped in your offense that you've missed the truth in your face.”

36s

#RulesVsCommandments

“So the Pharisees said, let's play it safe. So whereas God says, don't go over this cliff, the Pharisee says, let's build a fence about a 100 yards away from the cliff, full of rules and regulations. Watch this. Watch this word y'all. To protect us from disobeying. And y'all know what happened. As a result of it, what became a good idea of protection actually got confused with God's actual commands.”

47s

#RulesOverWord

“Issues and fights over women and fights over what people are wearing and fights over these things and styles of music, and everybody has a feed of what confirms what they think is right. And here's what I've noticed most of the time, pastor, many times what we are arguing about is so far away from what God actually intended that we will defend our rules more than we will stand firm on the word of God.”

45s

#TraditionTrap

“Now can we pause and just talk for a minute? How many of y'all know that when you it doesn't matter what denomination it is. That's what I found. It doesn't matter what it is. But the human nature's tendency is to always create more rules and to come up with more regulations and to come up with more inhibition. We we we just come up with as much as we possibly can. And by the time we look back at it, we're realizing, hold on. This is not even the word of God. Many of us get more upset about tradition and practice and policy than we do about what the word of God actually says.”

84s

#MentalFolders

“They're regular church folk. They could quote the entire Old Testament by memory. And if they made a mistake, they could correct themselves. They they created commentaries on commentaries on commentaries on the scriptures. And yet, I'm telling y'all, we gotta get this. And yet, when the Messiah came, We're in trouble. And they call it schema. What is this, pastor? See, your brain is basically a file cabinet. And from childhood, it's been building folders. How marriage works, how church works, how God works, and you never see the world What you see is through your folders. We don't even see reality. We see reality and make an interpretation.”

56s

#OpenToChange

“Scrolling on your phone, and the algorithm is just confirming what you believe and the holy spirit trying to jump in. Are you ready to receive the outpouring of the Holy Ghost? No. Are you ready? It's not because he doesn't want to. The issue he's saying is is, are you open to receiving new wine? Can you hold the wine? Can you hold it? Or will it destroy you? Because you are resistant to change.”

79s

#GoDeeper

“And so, for example, look I'm gonna take my seat, but but notice something. Right in the text, we see the kind of mindsets that are open to Jesus. Peter. Jesus said to him, he said, look. I know y'all tried to catch fish all night. Watch this. He said, and I know you're a fisherman. He said, but I made fish. And I know it makes sense that after you tried all night, it didn't work. He said, do something else. Go back out there again. But because I'm on the boat this time, in broad daylight, go deeper and you're catch something. The scripture says that he caught so much fish that the nets began to break. Are y'all are y'all hearing me here? The the are you noticing the kind of and what did he say? He said, Lord, I feel so unworthy even to be in your presence. But see, that's the kind of mindset you have to have in these last days. I'm willing to rethink what I think I know in order to receive something new from God.”

49s

#WouldJesusRecognizeChurch

“And then Jesus makes it worse. And that's what I like about Jesus. He ain't studying none of y'all. He don't care if you're offended. He gonna do what he does. But shouldn't it bother us today that the ministry of Jesus has always been rejected by the church? I'll tell you, if Jesus came back literally physically right now, I'm talking about before the second coming, and watch how we do church and how we live our life, he would be confused as to why we call this even church. Like, I I I this this don't look like what I started.”

58s

#HolySpiritExpands

“I don't have time, but y'all should know that in those days, they didn't use glasses. Where they put wine was in killed animals, goats, lambs. They cut the head off, tie down the legs, remove the skin I mean, remove the hair, and leave the skin. And watch this. When it was freshly cut, when it had just been killed was the right time to fill it with new wine. Now now now I know what you're asking me. You're saying, pastor, what is he saying? He's saying the new wine represents the holy spirit, and the holy spirit is the truth. The holy spirit, when he comes in, just like fermentation, he expands. He moves. He stretches. He changes, and he works from the inside”

66s

#EchoChamberCulture

“The reality is, brothers and sisters, is it's becoming more and more difficult in the world that we're living in to know what is truth and what is not true. No matter what aisle you're on politically, no matter how you were raised, most of us are governed by beliefs we already have, and the whole point of this society and this matrix we're living in is to keep us locked in how we already think. And so the algorithm didn't invent anything. What it did is it put technology and and and systems behind a way of moving that humans have had since the beginning of time. So we only, watch this, to agree with what we already agree with.”

92s

#FilteredAgreement

“And so your schema your schema is in trouble, and it creates confirmation bias. So watch this. Your mind doesn't treat information equally. What agrees with your folder is what you focus on. So even what I'm preaching right now, psychologically, what we're doing is we're looking for agreement. What's he gonna say that fits what I like to hear? What is he gonna say that agrees? And so you will hear amens. And the amens normally are when you say something come on somebody. Ain't nobody saying amen when you step on toes. Pastor, you know this. You preach for years. And normally when somebody says, that was a good sermon. Normally, what they are saying is, I agreed with everything you said. The problem with that is your agreement is seen through a filter, and your filter is wrong most of the time.”

79s

#BlindToProphecy

“And so their mindset was very simple. They said, we've got to build a fence around the commandments. And so specifically, the Sabbath alone, they created 39 additional categories for how to keep the Sabbath. And in those 39 categories, it ended up being another 1,500 rules. so here comes Jesus following none of them. And he's getting popular, and he's going viral, and people are following him, and they're scrolling on their phones getting outraged, looking at Jesus going against everything they taught. Now here's what's crazy. They knew the word. They knew the prophecies. They knew according to the the books of Isaiah and all the messiah chronic prophecies that the Messiah would come from Bethlehem. Now this ought to disturb you. That that he would be reared in Nazareth. The scripture literally gives detailed prophecy about Jesus to the extent. We know this from the twenty three hundred day prophecy of actually when Jesus would be crucified.”

54s

#NewWineOldSkins

“They they have no need to fast for something because the something is with them. Now there will come a time where I'll be gone and they will fast. But we ain't fasting right now. He says, but let me take it deeper for you, and watch this y'all. Here it is. He said, you all agree with this, but it it does it even make sense to take some new clothes, cut it up, and patch it on some old? And in their minds, they're shaking their heads like, you know, that makes sense. Nobody does that. He's going somewhere, though. He says and here's the word right here. He says and and furthermore, would it make sense to take new wine, somebody shout new wine New and put it in an old wineskin.”

33s

#AngerForProfit

“I'm probably gonna get in trouble today. We watch channels that tell us we are already right, and we stay mad at things we've got no plans to change. So the phone didn't make us this way. It just found a way and figured out how to make money off of it. And I see this right in the text today.”

58s

#RulesBornFromFear

“Can I can I break it down real quick? Can I give you a little Pharisees one zero one? Can I tell you about alright? So how did the pharisees even come about? The pharisees were a group of laymen. They were not pastors. They were a group of of regular folk who decided after the history of Israel constantly going into exile because of idolatry and disobedience, they came up and says, we're not going back into exile anymore. We are not going to disobey the law of God anymore. We don't wanna be found against God anymore. So with a genuine passion, with a sincerity just to do God's will, they said, so let's figure out a way to keep us from disobeying God's law and following his commandments.”

68s

#MoreLikeThePharisees

“The scripture says that we see Jesus constantly breaking religious and traditional rules that the church had set up. Now I wanna pause here and say this y'all, because a lot of us look at Pharisees in a very negative way because when we preach or talk about Pharisees, we always talk about them from a negative perspective. So for example, if I ask any of you out there, how many of you all are down with the Pharisees? Not many of you would raise your hands. Nobody wants to be called a Pharisee. Nobody wants to be associated with Pharisees because how many know this to be true? We know that the Pharisees were responsible for killing Jesus. Right? Amen, everybody? But but what what what I wanna show y'all today is that the Pharisees were not even bad people. were just like us. We have more in common, help me, Holy Ghost, with the Pharisees than we have in common with Jesus and the disciples.”

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