Well, hello everyone and welcome back. This is our daily devotional for December 2nd, 2025, and I am delighted to be with you. I hope that this finds you doing very, very well and having a very merry Christmas, Advent season time, whatever you want to call it. Again, lots and lots of things are going on at the church and we would love it if you would be a part of that fellowship with us. Like for instance, it's Tuesday. Tomorrow means, that means it's Wednesday, y'all. We've got a lot of things going on. The food is going to be fantastic, six o'clock. We eat from six to seven. Yeah, six, seven, right. We eat from six till seven, and then we'll have time together where we really dig into and conclude why our worship service looks like it does. We're also going to talk about preaching, why preaching is the way that it is. What's the rationale behind the chapter by chapter, verse by verse? You're going to have the opportunity to ask questions, that kind of stuff. So really, this is a who are we kind of night, and I'm really looking forward to it. So tomorrow night at 6, get there whenever you can. We eat from 6 until 7, and then we go next door. But also, we have a youth group that's going to be running, also our children's choir, because our children's Christmas pageant and our choir's cantata, I believe, is December 21st. It is the season to be busy. Mark those calendars, please. We would love to see you. Now, we're picking up today where we left off yesterday. Do you remember where we were? We were in Matthew chapter nine with Jesus calling Matthew. Spent a little bit of time talking about the fact that Out of those that Jesus calls, you got Simon the Zealot, and then you got Matthew the tax collector, two total opposite ends of the spectrum as it relates to politics. We also dealt with the Pharisees, and really for the first time, you see the Pharisees cropping up here. First time, but definitely not the last time because of, well, where we are today. Y'all, it's really fascinating, this dynamic that Jesus has running with the Pharisees. They are his chief critics. make no mistake about it, above anyone else. It's not that he had a particularly good relationship with the Sadducees, don't get me wrong. Like I talked about yesterday, the Sadducees, really their power revolved around the temple itself. Where Jesus is here, he's in Capernaum, he's in Galilee, in Galilee of the Gentiles. So he's away from the epicenter of the Sadducees' power, their influence, that kind of thing. He's out in the country. And y'all, like I said yesterday, it's the Sadducees that have control of the temple. It's the Pharisees that have control of the synagogue, which every Sabbath, Jesus was in the synagogue. He was teaching. He was preaching. He was around the synagogue throughout the week. And it's as good a time as Eden to tell you this. The synagogue was always the heart of any Jewish village, any Jewish settlement. I talked about this before, but I've got pictures I showed you pictures of the synagogue in Magdala, and it's on the Cardo Street. The Cardo Street during the time of the Roman Empire, it designed every single city in the Roman Empire. Its main street was the Cardo, and think Cardio, the heart, the heart of the city, but everything in Jewish society revolved around the synagogue, including all the stuff that we're reading about. Now, yeah, it's true that in some of these cases, Jesus is actually in somebody's house, but all of his preaching, his teaching, while he does that, well, as we saw in Matthew chapter five, he goes up on a mountainside. We know that he does this in a boat, but on a regular basis, we know it was Jesus's custom, it was his practice to be in the synagogue. As a side note, It ought to be your practice and my practice to be in church, but that's for a different daily devotional. Now, Jesus has run-ins with the Pharisees a lot more often for the very simple reason that there's a whole lot more Pharisees than Sadducees, number one. Number two, it's not really until Jesus gets to Jerusalem itself that he starts dealing with the Sadducees that are over the temple. Pharisees are over the synagogue. So, remember that. And also remember that while the Sadducees had the power They were kind of the lapdogs of the Roman government. The Pharisee was the everyday common man's leader. And remember we talked about they had a two-party system. I jokingly said I know that's hard for us to understand. A two-party system where you got a conservative side and a liberal side and the two don't get along. You know, not much has changed in 2,000 years. But where we're picking up today is after Jesus's interaction with the Pharisees, where we first start getting the real hints that, man, these people got a problem with Jesus. But also, Jesus got a problem with these people. As I said yesterday, he calls them all sorts of things. Brutivipers, whitewashed tombstones. How about the sons of hell looking to make more converts? When he interacts with them, he says, no, you're just doing what your daddy wants you to do. Your father's the devil. So, Jesus has a real issue with the Pharisees. A lot of that has to do with legalism. And pretty soon here, we'll talk a little bit more about that. But where we're picking up today is in Matthew chapter nine with what happens next. And it's in chapter nine, verse 14. But before we read anything, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our God and our Father, we pray that you would be with us now and that you would guide us in this time. We face a deficit. And that is the temptation to turn your word into all sorts of things that we ought not to turn it into. Just a collection of sayings, just a book from antiquity, amongst other things. But Father, we know that your word is the word of life. that it's living and active and sharper than any double-edged sword. That's what we learned in Hebrews. But Father, because of this, we can't approach this like anything else in life. We must have you, Father. We must have the illumination of your Holy Spirit. If we're going to understand, if we're going to see, if we're going to know, And the Holy Spirit proceeds from you, not from us, so Father, please, please, by your Holy Spirit, work in our hearts and in our minds to not only see the truth of your word, but that we would be convicted to follow it. So please, work in us to that end, and we pray it all in Jesus' name, amen. All right, so Matthew chapter 9 beginning in verse 14. We've got a little interesting interlude here. Jesus, in this section, Jesus is going around and he's doing what John refers to as the signs. They're all signs pointing to the authenticity of who Jesus is. Wonders, miracles, that sort of thing. But we have kind of an interlude. where Jesus has a discussion. It says, verse 14, then John's disciples came and asked him. Time out, who's the John? Well, it doesn't give us specifically, but the idea we get is that this is John the baptizer's, I can't talk, John the baptizer's, or you can say John the Baptist, but John the baptizer's disciples. All right, and we know that he's got them. He's a prophet, he's doing his thing. They come to Jesus and they say, how is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast? interesting question that has been asked of Jesus here. And we start seeing a little bit of a divide, though it's not the same acrid level of accusation. You know, the Pharisees really, when they question Jesus, very rarely do they actually want to know the answer. When the Pharisees come after Jesus, they're usually trying to catch him in a trap, right? You got that whole thing like, hey, what's the greatest commandment? And the whole point of that is so Jesus will say, oh, you know, don't murder people. And the whole point is so they can say, oh, so you're saying it's okay to be a thief? Thanks, Jesus. Now, that's what the Pharisees do. And of course, Jesus' answer to them is perfect. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And the second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself. All of the law and the prophets are surmised in these two. Perfect answer, Jesus knows how to deal with them. But John's disciples are a little bit different. The idea that we get from them is that they come to him and they actually want to know. Big difference between them and the Pharisees themselves. And listen to what Jesus says. Now, even before I get to what Jesus says, realize here that this is referring to fasting not as a dietary practice, but as a matter of religious devotion. Do you remember Jesus saying anything about this before? Well, if you rewind to Matthew 6, which they weren't there for, Jesus talks about fasting. This is one of the reasons why we don't celebrate Lent and Ash Wednesday. John 6, verse 14, when you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show men they are fasting. Does that mean to disfigure your face? Tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face. That's why we don't do the ashes thing. We don't proclaim publicly that we're foregoing something because we're very religious. We're very, very spiritual. Jesus says, don't do that. Your father knows. Your father knows already, so you don't have to wear your religion on your sleeve. Not even that, it's a sign of how holy you are. Please, y'all, please. He calls people that do that hypocrites, and we don't want to be hypocrites. Well, listen to how Jesus answers them. Verse 15, Jesus answered, how can the guest of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them. Then they will fast. Interesting metaphor that Jesus uses here. The idea, let's break this down. They're saying, hey, how come your disciples don't fast like we do and like the Pharisees do? How come, explain that to me. And Jesus talks about this imagery, this idea of the bridegroom, and what's implied here when he talks about being with the bridegroom is the bridal feast. Have y'all ever been to a really, really, really good wedding? Not only have I been to some really, really, really good weddings, I've had the great honor. to actually do those wedding ceremonies, to preach, to do the hitching, if you will, tying the knot, that sort of thing. And y'all, I'm telling you, is there anything so great as going to a wedding, and it's a beautiful thing, and then you just have this marvelous, marvelous feast. And it's wonderful because the people that are there, for the most part, there's always, I'm sure there's always jealous ex-girlfriends, ex-boyfriends, perhaps, you know, that kind of, oh, I wish it would have worked out. I'm sure there's some of that. And then there's always, you know, family and not everybody's on the same page. I get that. But the grand majority of people at a really good wedding reception, I wish we'd call it a feast, they're there because they love the bride and the groom. They're there because they want to be with them on their special day. And you see this beautiful show of not only love for the bride and the groom, but almost like this, the whole idea of the wedding reception is we get to participate in this celebration of them coming together. That's the context of what Jesus talks about with how can the guest of the bride groom Okay, the context that he's talking about here, when you're the guest of the bridegroom, that means you're in this celebration that revolves around the wedding. And he says, how can they mourn while they're with the bridegroom? Could you imagine that? Going to a beautiful wedding and it's just, everything's right. And then you look over and it's time to eat. And the people are like, oh no, no, no, I'm in mourning here. Come on, y'all. So that's the paradigm that Jesus gives. And what's he describing there? Well, he's talking about the fact that he is God the Son taken on flesh, made his dwelling among them. He is with his disciples. And every moment that they have together is like a celebration. But then for the first time, Jesus alludes to something. He says at the end of verse 15, the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them. Then they will fast. So if Jesus is talking about this celebration as what's going on right there in his earthly ministry, obviously what he's talking about when the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, he's talking about what's coming when he's crucified, when he's resurrected, and when he ascends back into heaven. and then he's talking about the Christian life. And then he says, and then, then it's going to be time for fasting. But y'all, also Jesus points to what fasting is here. that fasting is an act of spiritual dedication. And we shouldn't read Matthew 9 without taking into account what Jesus said in Matthew 6 about when you fast, that the whole point of this is to draw closer to God, not to wear your religion on your sleeve. And to that end, verse 16, he continues. He says, no one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear worse. The idea that you get there, right, if you take a patch that's brand new, never been washed or anything, y'all know it contracts over time. He's saying, hey, if you sew a patch onto a garment that has not yet shrunk, Then when it does shrink, it's just going to pull away from everything else. Then he continues, neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out, and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved. Now, what he's talking about here, it's a very complicated thing, because at first glance, it's like, what in the world is Jesus even talking about here? Well, y'all, what it comes down to, that Jesus is really and truly focusing on here, is faith. and what faith actually does, and the old way versus the new way, the fact that the Savior is there, the Messiah has finally come. And what he's saying here is, what I believe he's ultimately pointing to here is, hey listen, all the old ceremonies, all the old ways, all the old paradigms that you, disciples of John, he doesn't flat out say to him, you ought to be my disciples, not John's disciples. We don't know the whole paradigm that's going on, and indeed, Jesus would be justified in saying that. Remember what John the Baptist said about Jesus. He said, hey, one's coming after me, who I'm not even worthy to untie his shoes. Then Jesus shows up and he says, behold, the Lamb of God. His disciples, John's disciples, should have left John and started following Jesus. Remember John the Baptizer even said, I must decrease so that he may increase. But all of that being said, What Jesus is talking about here is genuine faith put into action. Hey, you can't take new, vibrant faith and try to regulate it with the old ways. What Jesus is talking about here with new wineskins versus old wineskins, with unshrunk cloth being put as a patch on, what he's really getting at here is the idea of genuine devotion. and how genuine devotion must be cultivated and preserved. And we're not talking about feelings here. We're talking about faith. We're talking about faith really being put into action. That's why some of the movements that you hear out there, like I know of one movement that exists in the Visible Church, it's called the New Wineskins Movement. That is churches that are breaking out of their denominational affiliation because their denominations have become apostate for the most part. Or their denominations are refusing to move forward in faith, and so they're considering themselves to be new wineskins. It's like, guys, we gotta go. We can't stay hitched to this, we can't hitch our wagon to this dead horse over here. We're new wineskins. The Lord is working amongst us. And that's ultimately what he's pointing to with his own disciples, that what the Lord has given them is a real and genuine faith. And that real and genuine faith must be cultivated. It must be preserved, but it must be fed so that it grows and grows and grows. And he says to that end, that's why they're not fasting. because they're with me, because they're learning from me. They're celebrating with me. They're rejoicing over the kingdom of God being at hand. So we're not going to dump this new wine into old wineskins. It'll just blow up everything. We're not going to sew this new patch that isn't shrunk onto an old garment. It's just going to pull itself away. Instead, we're going to put the new wine into new wineskins. What does this practically mean for you and me? I think what practically this means for you and me, at least this is my devotional emphasis for today, is that yet again, we're given the opportunity to examine our faith. Is your faith genuine? Is it real? And if you're wondering, well, how do I know? Well, does it do anything? Does your faith lead you to trust in the face of darkness? Does your faith lead you to act, to do something? If not, then you probably have old wine and old wine skins, and you need a refreshing wind from the Holy Spirit to blow inside you, through you. So if your faith is not really resulting anything, let me encourage you. Take the time to ask God today, to renew your faith, to renew, as David prayed, renew a right spirit within me, restore to me the joy of my salvation. And ultimately that's what Jesus is getting at here. His disciples have joy because they're with him. You and I should be the same. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you for this time that you've given to us, and we pray that you would work in our hearts, that we would examine our faith, if it's genuine, what it does, why we do what we do, and give us the courage to admit when we need refreshing. Father, I know that I do. I believe that all of us do. So please, work in us to that end. And we pray it all in Jesus' name, amen. Well, I'd like to thank you all for being a part of this time. Lord willing, we'll be back tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. Make plans to be with us tomorrow night, too. But until then, have a great Tuesday or whatever day it happens to be. Take care.