Who Wants A Glass?

Ex. I remember when I started school for the first time. I couldn’t wait to go to school. I remember thinking- I am going to get to have homework and everything! It’s going to be great! So I went to school and everything was cool, but pretty soon school wasn’t all that I thought it was cracked up to be. Then I heard about middle school. In middle school you get to have 7 different classes. You get to change classes and you’re your own locker and walk around the halls and no one tells you what to do! WOW, that’s what I want, Then I got to middle school, no one told me that I was going to have homework for all those classes, and that my locker had a combination lock That I was going to have to figure out and that 7th and 8th graders didn’t think to highly of 6th graders. But hey, middle school is nothing. When you get to high school that’s when it will be really great. But then the 9th grade is 6th grade all over again. What I really need is a car! If I had a car then things would be great. But in order to get a car what I really need is a job. When I get a job then things will be great. Now I have this car this job but you know when things will really be great, when I graduate. Then when you graduate, college is really where it’s at. Or getting a real job, that’s where it’s at. You know when I am going to be happy, when I get married or have kids, that’s when it will be great. When these kids grow up and move out of the house, that’s when it will be good. Hey retirement is where it’s at. When you retire that when you really start living! Ok I’m ready to start living now and that’s when you die! Isn’t life good?

Everything we have in the natural world only satisfies us temporarily. Ex when you eat so much food and you vow never to eat like that again. (At least not today) But what usually happens? We eat like that again. Why because it only sustains us for a little while. Eventually we are hungry again. The same thing happens with things we drink, natural drink. We fill ourselves up but soon we are thirsty again.

One day Jesus ran into a woman who was drawing water out of a well and check out what He told her: John 4:13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, :14 but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

That should be everyone’s request. “Jesus, please fill me up so that I don’t have to keep looking to natural things for temporary fulfillment. Fill me up in such a way that I will never thirst again! That’s what I want to talk to you about today. Being fill with a new drink that will satisfy you forever.

When the juice that flows from a crushed grape is mixed with yeast, a sweeter and it’s allowed to settle, a biochemical process occurs called fermentation. The result is an intoxicating drink known the world over called wine. I want to talk to you about wine. I know some of you have had some experience with wine already. I’m sure there are some of you here that can teach me a thing or two about the drink. But I don’t want to talk about the kind of wine that slurs your speech or impairs your judgment. I don’t want to talk about the kind of wine that leaves you hung over and empty inside. I want to talk about a new kind of wine a new kind of wine that when you drink it will quench your thirst forever. Now who wants a glass of that? Now the Bible is not shy when it talks about wine.

Eph. 5:18 Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. The Bible says that we should be filled with something that is better than wine. What’s better that wine, THE SPIRIT! Wine in the Bible is very symbolic. There is an astounding reference that Jesus made about wine that I want you to look at today: Now this is the famous last supper that Jesus had with His disciple on the night that He was to be betrayed. They were are all sitting around a table and participating in the Feast of the Passover. Jesus picks up a glass of wine an look at what He says: Luke 22:20 In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. What an amazing reference Jesus makes here. He says this cup of wine, is like his blood being poured out. And this spilled blood is part of a new covenant. What is this new covenant? Well a covenant is a legally binding contract between two parties. Jesus said a NEW covenant. So if there is a NEW covenant there must be an old one right? Yes, The Old or Mosaic Covenant was a covenant that God made with Israel on Mount Sinai. Remember the Ten Commandments? Well there weren’t just ten, there were more like 610. The old covenant was a system of laws, codes, rituals and observances. God held His people strictly accountable to these laws. When ever the people failed to live up to this standard it was a violation that could only be cleared up by offering a sacrifice. The reality was that it was impossible to completely live without some type of violation, so that meant everyone was quilt under the law. That’s why the Old Testament is filled with scarifies and talks some much about sacrifices. And that is exactly what purpose of the old covenant was. To show man that he is guilty before God and in need of a Savior! This is actually what divides the Bible into two parts. OT-, which means old covenant or God’s old plan and NT- or new covenant or God New plan. The OT is filled with sacrifices but the NT only speaks about one sacrifice. John TB said when He saw Jesus “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!” The old covenant, (the Law) was never intended to save people. Its purpose was to increase sin and guilt. Its purpose was to show man how sinful he is. It’s purpose was to show us that we needed something to save us from this problem of sin. Listen to Hebrews: Heb. 10:1 The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming — not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, (by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year), make perfect those who draw near to worship. 2 If it could, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. 3 But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins, 4 because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. 5 Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; 6 with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased. 7 Then I said, ‘Here I am — it is written about me in the scroll — I have come to do your will, O God.’” /// 11 Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12 But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. Who is “this Priest” who offered one sacrifice and then sat down at the right hand of God?