Bible Text

Luke 5:27-39 (ESV)

²⁷ After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, “Follow me.”  ²⁸ And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.

²⁹ And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them. ³⁰ And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” ³¹ And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. ³² I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”

³³ And they said to him, “The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.” ³⁴ And Jesus said to them, “Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? ³⁵ The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.” ³⁶ He also told them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment. If he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. ³⁷ And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. ³⁸ But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. ³⁹ And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, ‘The old is good.’”

Reflection Questions

Luke 5:27-28  

• Describe Levi’s response to Jesus’ calling.   
• What did Levi leave behind in order to follow Jesus?  
• What are the things I am struggling to leave behind to follow Jesus?

Luke 5:31-32  

• Whom does Jesus say needs a doctor?
• How do I react to the assertion that I am “sick” or that there is something not right about me?  

Luke 5:36-39

“Those who like old wine do not try the new, for their minds are already made up: ‘The old is good.’ So Jesus expects many not to respond to his new way. They are comfortable with life and piety as it is. Jesus’ remark is both a description and a warning. John the Baptist came to tell the people that a new era of change was coming, but Jesus knows that some do not want change.”[1]

• Why does the new wine need to be poured into a new wineskin?
• What do the new wine and new wineskins symbolize?  
• Are there some ways in which I have been resisting God because I don’t like to come out of my set “old ways”?

[1] Darryll L. Bock, Luke, NIV Application Commentary Series, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1996) 170-171.