Hornswoggled: Captured In His Love

  I don’t know or Do I

  In all the years of listening to the Lord speak, and all the times that He held my deepest attention, it took a long time to realize that Jesus’ words were all in parables. Yes, that language that many knew, but not everyone spoke in, the language of symbols and allegories. For many times He would speak to us and the multitudes, with this mysterious language, and all listened intently, and maybe even occasionally understood, but for the most part we didn’t, at least at this time in our lives. I now know, this many years later, that to grasp the deepest of value from the many parables that Jesus spoke, one had to go beyond the surface of the sheep, the vine in the vineyard, the blindness, the halt, the marriage, and even the little children to comprehend, much less apprehend the truest of meaning. The art and gift of the parables go far beyond the surface values of the subject, because they spoke about the meanings of what they represented. But back then, I pretended my way through it, but understood little; never-the-less it was printed on and in my heart; I would always remember.

  Knowing our thoughts, and the confusion I think most of us had, Jesus again began teaching in parables.

  “No one puts a piece from a new garment on an old one; otherwise the new makes a tear, and also the piece that was taken out of the new does not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; or else the new wine will burst the wineskin and be spilled, and the wineskin will be ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins, and both are preserved And no one having drank old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, ’the old is better.’” Luke 5:37

  Let’s look at this and see if we can make anything of it. If the parable is truly about wine, and new and old bottles that it’s put in, then we get this small lesson of how to make wine without it spoiling. And if this is all we can ever decipher from it, then why did God waste our time placing it in the mouth of Him that proclaims His true eternal Word; but it isn’t. A life-changing meaning is attached to each and every parable, once it’s understood, but back then, I didn’t understand.

  Vineyards are always in the ancient language of parables representing schools, or a school-of-thought, therefore grapes that grow on the vine are the product, or fruit of the school-of-thought, and turned into wine, the final product and purpose. Wineskins or bottles are the vessel in which the final product is to be placed in; us. Not just people, but those that think on a higher level of thinking, but not to those that maintain their lower level of thinking.

  Remember that John the Baptist came preparing a way for the Lord, and called us into repentance, which is to say: a changed way of thinking, this is exactly what repentance means. So we either continue thinking through our carnal, sensual mind, or we allow Spirit to transform us into a new wineskin, a new vessel to receive this new Way, Truth, and Life that Jesus is talking about in this parable. This is a completely different way of thinking.

  The same thing is equated when speaking of the rent garment. To embed or sew a new piece of material onto an old garment, will in the first place be a waste of the new, and in the second it will never match. The new patch is stronger, so different, that it will make the old garment rip up anyway, and much quicker. Again we, that is our way of thinking, are either on the earth level, the sensual minded; or on the heaven level, the things of Spirit. The parables therefore is given that those of us that are satisfied where we are, will never understand the higher levels of God and His word, but those of us that yearn for a deeper walk, a meaningful relationship with the Father will open themselves to allow the Spirit to renovate us within. Man can’t figure this out on his own, nor will studying give him an understanding, but we can open our man within to receive the teachings of the Holy Spirit. We can allow Him to completely change our way of thinking; repent.

  “And no one, having drank the old wine, immediately desires the new.” Barring none; all of us have drank the old wine, the old school of thought, and has readily accepted it as being true and right. Therefore, when Jesus came with this new wine; the barriers of the carnal way of thinking had to be broken. So He spoke in parables. Giving those that are still attached to this world, and what it pretends to offer, even those still involved in the laws of Moses, a means to continue to understand only though their flesh. But those that seek a much deeper value in life, become, by God, a new creature, a new creation, a new wine vessel ready to receive His new wine. We are not reformed into a new wine skin, but though the transformation of God within each; are created.