... but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins. -- Mark 2:22

Jesus knew that his message was different. In a sense it was startlingly new. He knew that his life was drastically different from that of the orthodox rabbinic teacher. He also knew that it was difficult for his hearers to entertain such new truth. Therefore, he gave them a vivid illustration to show them how important it was to have an open and adventurous mind. Jesus tells the story about the wine and the wineskins. In those days the wine was stored in animal skins. Since new wine gave off gases and expanded, it was placed in new wineskins, because they were supple, soft, elastic, and capable of expanding with the pressure. Jesus said it would never be advisable to put the new wine into old wineskins, because they were dry an…