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From The First Baptist Church in America pulpit

Providence, Rhode Island – October 19, 2008

“Patches and Wineskins”(Matthew 9:16-17)

Dr. Dan Ivins, preaching

There’s a story about a rich Texan, who bought 10 ranches and consolidated them into one big spread. Naming it was a challenge: “It's the Circle Q, Rambling Brook, Double Bar, Broken Stone, Crooked Creek, Golden Horseshoe, Lazy X, Bent Arrow, Sleepy T, Triple O Ranch.” “Wow,” somebody said, “I bet you have a lot of cattle!” “Nope,” said the Texan. “Why not?” “Not many survive the branding.”

Language requires designations. But it can become a weapon. Pidgeonholing an opponent serves a purpose. In sports its “bulletin-board material.” In politics, it’s nasty. In church, well, it’s even nastier. It’s not much different from judging a church by the numbers. It’s hard to avoid the branding. Nobody’s been branded like Jesus. He refused to oversimplify, like using colors, red or blue. But he was enough of a wordsmith to blend opposites: the old and the new. It’s a lifelong challenge for us to learn to synthesize these into the ever-evolving framework of our days and nights.

Matthew's gospel about patches and wineskins speaks to that with common-sense wisdom. Jesus spoke in terms his listeners understood. Too poor to buy new clothes, they didn’t need to ask him what he meant. No seamstress would sew a new patch on worn-out clothes. The new patch must first be shrunk to fit, else it would tear apart. Nor could his audience afford new china. When new wine is poured into an old skin, it ferments before it settles down. If the container has no elasticity, it’s gonna burst. Then you’ve got a mess, and the ruptured skin will no longer hold the wine. With these simple models, Jesus cites two common outlooks on life. It’s always a struggle to find a way to fit them together or neither will be any good. Refusing to adapt results in polarization, not progress.

Extremism is at the root of most of a lot of problems today. In politics, it leads to gridlock. In education it lends itself to sophistication. In religion it shows up as exclusion. In nationalism, it becomes war. The economics of Wall St. greed, well it’s a convoluted mess. But these two realities are always with us: the new is constantly being birthed from the old. Finding the proper blend can be exasperating. How do we get the new to respect the old and the old to accommodate the new? Boy if we could wave a magic wand and pull that one off, wouldn’t the world be a better place? Nature seems to have developed an in-built resistance between them, like oil and water. When two entities are in conflict, one of them got to blink. Jesus’ point in both stories is, the one who can is the one who must. Things break down when the one who can, won’t.
In the first example, he put the burden to change on the patch. The new must adapt to the old because it’s the only one that can. The faded Levi’s can't shrink any more than they've already shrunk. But a new patch still has the capacity to be altered, to fit that which cannot change. People with fewer miles on them have more flexibility than the restraints that come as the miles pile up. Jesus’ common sense says they’re the ones who can adjust. But in his illustration of a wineskin, the onus to change is on the old vessel that’s grown brittle. It can be softened by dampening until it becomes malleable.

But not with new wine. It’s just coming to life. It can’t stop bubbling. New wine, like old clothes, has no control over itself. In this case, it’s the new that can’t change. The one that can is the one that must. Both need each other and for the relationship to work, the old receptacle must be softened to oblige the bubbling enthusiasm, lest it be lost. If neither changes--everybody’s worse than before. But only one has to change to save each, because there’s good in both.

Jesus offers a word to the wise for today’s deeply polarized society. At our worst we label each another. Being a preacher it comes with the territory. And I’ve been branded in various and sundry ways all across this country. But the only one that counts is God’s brand. Every place is something different. Here I’ve become #36. And that’s one I’ll claim. A proud son of the south, that too. “Dan the Baptist.” I’m sure there are others I haven’t heard yet but doesn’t it show how hard we are to classify? Depending upon history, habits, region, it changes from time to time. But it’s hard to avoid the branding.

Unless it’s a harmless nickame or a funny term of endearment underlying our naming others has no good purpose. Human beings are far too complex to fit the downsizing. I’ve lived long enough to identify with the older generation. But still able to hold out hope that there’s hope yet for a new generation. I look around and see young people who lack the capacity to see any good in the old. And refuse to adjust to anything that inconveniences them. And others my age, who look askance at anything new. That gets us nowhere. Where are the middle-of-the-roaders Jesus advocated with the possibility of a ministry between the generations? Wouldn't it be great to somehow hold together the new patches and old garments in our society? To conserve the best of each, because there’s good in both? In the stream of life, the new is constantly emerging from the old. And it can create lots of friction and the blame game when things don’t go right. That only leads to the further Balkanization of America.

A couple of weeks ago, Linda Bausserman and I paid a visit to our First Baptist saints down in Newport, living at the Baptist Home. When we went to Barbara Staples’ place, most of the time was spent catching her up on “what's going on at the church.” I came away impressed, that church, even from a distance is still a part of her life. I have an appreciation for our older saints, for we wouldn’t have a church without them. But as time goes on, they aren’t always gonna be around. So I am encouraged when we can celebrate the younger people coming into our church. One can only wonder what church will be like when fewer people that care about “what’s going on in church?” are no longer on the scene. Because for church to have a future, it has to accommodate those who’s experience is not the same as those who precede us.

To counteract the changes, and the unpredictability of life, I sense a national longing for a life where there’s nothing left to be afraid of. Of course that’s impossible. Fear of change causes us to pull inward and try to sharpen people's minds by narrowing them. Fear of change causes us to look to the Bible to close a discussion. But it’s the nature of the scriptures to open a discussion. The biblical image of God is one who would bruise our egos but mend our hearts; who provides minimum protection but maximum support. In scary times, you want to be protected, who cares about support? The Book of God when taken seriously, is bound to arouse official discontent because it’s a signpost, not a hitching post. That's why the beauty of loving is much better than the purity of dogma.

One thing that stands out to me, is the assumption of agreement. Agreement is good. Disagreement is bad. God help us if we have to agree all the time. We’re Baptists! Heck I don’t even agree with my Libby...sometimes. I don’t like to do that too much, because she’s got a good track record at being right. So how about less blaming, more listening?  Jesus’ parables are not based on agreement, but on mutual concern. Patches, considerate of the cloth it’s attached to, so it doesn’t defeat its purpose. Wine, contained by flexible skins, to allow for expansion. They have to work together to work at all.

St. Paul wrote to the church in Thessalonica, “Hold fast to what is good!” He didn't say, “Let go of everything.” Nor did he say, “Don't open yourself to anything else.” “Hold fast to what is good!” Some of the good is old. And some of the good is new. Jesus had a balanced outlook, seeing value in new patches and old wineskins. Can we in the church learn to conserve the best of both? In his “You’ve heard it said by those of old time...but I say unto you,” sayings from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus valued the old scriptures of his religious heritage. But he would formulate something more up to date. “The old timers say, `An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'” “But I say, `Love your enemies and do good to those who persecute you.'” That way folks get to keep their eyes and their teeth! Jesus “held fast to what is good,” by introducing a newer, second mile ethic which made the old better.

Elton Trueblood was a popular Quaker ethicist, who had a lot to say about branding. “It is a mistake to suppose that we must choose between being liberals and conservatives, because every healthy personality is something of both. Everyone who is open and spiritually alive is a liberal, ready to receive truth from any quarter, welcoming evidence without the bondage of prejudice. Similarly, people who think with any care are conservative, partly because they are unwilling to waste whatever has proved itself in the experience of history and the most recent emphasis is not automatically the most wise.”  Winston Churchill, with his irascible humor said “If you’re not liberal when you’re young, you don’t have a heart. And if you’re not conservative when you’re old, you don’t have a brain!” Granted that doesn’t fit everybody, but both Trueblood and Churchill are balanced rather than extreme.

Our outlook on life is important, because if what we think is right and wrong divides the human family further, then there’s something wrong with what we think is right. “A house divided against itself cannot stand!” Truth is between us, not in any one of us.  St. Peter’s conflicted world view became apparent in a rooftop vision at Jaffa. His religious approach had a bad habit of separating life and people into clean or unclean; good or bad; in or out. But God said to Pete: “Don’t call anything unclean that He’s declared clean.” The big fisherman became a bigger man when he widened his horizons. So let's not narrow ours! When he awoke from his dream Peter got it right, “Truly I perceive that God shows no partiality.”

Christians are like the spokes on a wheel: the closer we get to the center, the closer we are to each other. And the farther we get from the center, the more polarized we become. I think the more we avoid the branding, the better church we’ll have.

Prayer: (10/19/08) Gracious Father, In Jesus you gave us a piece of new cloth, and because our stature is limited by heights already achieved, we keep trying to patch it onto our old garments. You offer us new wine, and we keep trying to pour it into brittle skins, spilling your grace more than we share it. Even as our own structure is being renewed, we thank you for the ability to do that. But our prayer is for something more substantial: freshness, new wineskins that accommodate a wider outlook; new garments, a new vision; a renewed hope for healing for all who are finding life too much; for those consigned to live on the ragged edge of poverty; for too many others for whom your name is only a word on a coin, who’ve never experienced your grace, who’ve paid way too much at the altar of success and long to recover a soul lost along the way. We would remember those who are expected to be what they are not, and for those who feel left out, who are ill, and all who need to be encouraged. May this worship stimulate our minds, that in hope, things can be made new. Our spirits, that with faith, things can be improved. Our hearts, that because there is love, we can be made one. May this hour of worship remind us of your love for us that we may live above the need for praise or the fear of criticism. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.