God is always in the business of doing new things, and He wants all of His children to be part of it.

To become part of His moves, however, Christians should know that they have to do something to be included and not left out.

The Lord Jesus gave two illustrations from where we can learn how to step in line with God's new moves. Luke 5:36-38 records for us,

"Then He spoke a parable to them: '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 wineskins and be spilled, and the wineskins will be ruined. But new wine must be put into new wineskins, and both are preserved.'"

The Old Does Not Match the New

Although He used parables to drive His point, what the Lord Jesus meant was that old ways of thinking and expecting God to move will always miss the point of what God is actually doing. And Christ needed two illustrations to point that out. (We should also take note that this passage is found in Matthew and Mark)

First, He said that when the new cloth sewn into an old garment shrinks, it will surely bring some damage to the garment. Second, He said old wineskins will break when new wine is poured in. New wine should only be stored in old wineskins.

These illustrations both mean one thing: We can't carry the old into the new.

How to be a New Wineskin

Wineskins are containers where wine is stored. If we want to be a new wineskin for God's new wine, we need to cast off the old and embrace what God has in store for the future.

The Lord Jesus gave us some sort of warning about having the wrong attitude by being caught up and content with what God has already accomplished. In Luke 5:39, He says,

"And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, 'The old is better.'"

We are to guard ourselves from staying in the past successes that God gave us, because past success will always prevent us from seeing what God will do in the future. In fact, God never stops doing something new.

Do you want to be a new wineskin? Then learn to let go of the past, including the successes and failures. Don't put God in a box, thinking that He will do the same old thing. Our Creator is infinitely creative, and can do anything He wants to do – and we should expect Him to.

God said this in Isaiah 43:18-19, saying,

"Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, Now it shall spring forth; Shall you not know it?"