The New Wine:

Fiction

It stuck with her all these years, the melodramatic picturesque setting of the audience. The way the people looked at the stage with great expectations, the way they turned their heads sideways as they watched the play, and how they studied the unassuming looks of the characters. The way the old lady with the hat clapped her hands, and just how the well-built young men cheered, of which, by the way, some of them spoke to her after it was over. The way the people loved Shakespeare. The way they loved her.

Lucille was her name. She was always Juliet, and Maximus usually played Romeo. They played their roles really well, and no one dared contest with them in the entire village. The play was her pride. In this place she became someone else, a different person altogether. Oh, the joy of that! Instead of the poor church-rat she really was, she became the rich young woman who was in love with Romeo, the handsome man from a family her own despised. She always got lost in the moment.

But in a few days, BROADWAY would be coming to town. A new theatre had just been completed, more beautiful, exciting, and unfortunately more daunting. A new look, and new faces. She was completely afraid...afraid of what might happen to this place. She did not want to part with the old. Inside her, she knew people would stop coming here. And that the regulars would become strangers. She had the opportunity to audition, but she did not want to take it. She was afraid, really afraid. Afraid of the what the future held. Afraid of the new wine.

* * *

Have you ever been afraid of the "new"? Afraid to take hold of the unfamiliar? Afraid that what you have right now might be better than what you think you could have tomorrow? I know I have! I remember when I started attending my current church. I saw how people let go of themselves and go crazy for God, and inside my heart I called them lunatics. Come on now, what was all the noise about? What was this charade and hullabaloo? Like they couldn't keep quiet and listen in solitude. Every little tune from the piano made someone shout or leap for joy. Every sound of prayer made someone tear up. Couldn't they just do things like normal people? God was a quiet spirit, so what was all the noise about?

But the newness in my path was for a reason. Though some times we can pray in the quietness of our spirits, there are other times we may need to shout for help. There are other times when some thing like a word touches our hearts and we tear up. There are sometimes when we need to stand up and start jumping. It was a new wave of worship, and I just wasn't used to that!

This writing is not about "worship" though, this is just about letting God take over your life. Christianity is not a tradition, neither is it a religion. It is about the freedom to follow wherever God's spirit leads you. The freedom to part with the old and take in the new. Today, technology has reached a new high...with twitter, facebook, blogger, wordpress, linkedin, and so much more. People are using these social networks for the wrong reasons, but I totally believe there's something deeper than just social networking. There are lives to be taken for God, there is the new wine tapping on old doors...new ways for miracles to happen...new ways for God to visit you.

You might be the one who's stuck in the old, you feel something in your heart tearing apart, but you're still there trying to hold the pieces together. How about you do this? Let the old garments be torn apart, and put on a new you. Don't tell yourself, "this is just the way I am, I can't change." Change is not too far from you...it is only seconds away...closer than you even think.

DRINK IN THE NEW WINE...& POUR OUT THE OLD...Let God do what He's been trying to do with you...let Him in...He's knocking...

"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. And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, ‘The old is better.’” Luke 5: 37-39

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