What does Tribe teach about new wineskins?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on new wineskins starts with a simple and honest tension: everyone wants new wine, but almost nobody wants to build a new wineskin to hold it. Brian has used Jesus' parable from Luke 5 and Matthew 9 as the foundation, explaining that new wine represents any new way God is moving, a fresh revelation or a new facet of his character, and that the wineskin is a person's capacity to receive and adapt to that movement. The parable is not abstract. Jesus himself acknowledges that we are creatures of habit, reaching for the old wine because it is familiar and it worked. The problem is not that the old was bad. The problem is that new wine requires new wineskins, and wineskins are not handed out for free. Something has to die before a new one can be made, specifically old mindsets, old patterns, and preconceived notions that have to be crucified rather than tidied up or shelved.
The warning that comes with this teaching is the part Brian has spent the most time on. Using John 8, where Jesus speaks not to obvious opponents but to people who already believed in him, Brian has shown what actually happens when someone refuses to let go of an old wineskin. The crowd in that chapter moves from asking reasonable questions to accusing Jesus of being demon-possessed to picking up stones, and Brian has pointed to that escalation as a picture of what an old wineskin does under pressure from new wine. It does not just resist. It breaks, and when it breaks, both the skin and the wine are lost. Brian puts it plainly: if you hold so tightly to old ways that there is no room in your heart for a new move of God in your life, you are in jeopardy of even losing the sweetness of what he did in the past.
The other side of the warning is the promise that makes the cost worth paying. The flesh cannot be cast out, only crucified, and anything not crucified will keep resurfacing. But crucifixion is not the end of the story. Brian says, "There is nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing that we can bring to the foot of the cross and crucify that we will not experience resurrection, abundant life on the other side." The invitation in this teaching is not to mourn what the old wineskin was. It is to trust that what comes after the dying is worth it.
Taught from Luke 5:33-39 · Matthew 9:14-17 · John 8:31-47 · 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 · Matthew 25
“If you hold so tightly to old ways that there is no room in your heart for a new move of God in your life, you are in jeopardy of even losing the sweetness of what he did in the past.”
From A Warning About New Wine
The passage taught · 2 Corinthians 10:4-5
4 for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God to the throwing down of strongholds,
5 throwing down imaginations and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ;
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- December 9, 2024 A Warning About New Wine Brian Hunter warns that clinging to old mindsets when God pours out something new risks losing both the old and the new. A sermon on John 8 and wineskins.
- December 8, 2024 Warnings About New Wine Jesus warns that clinging to old mindsets blocks what God is doing now. This sermon explores what it costs to receive something new from him.
- October 28, 2024 New Wineskins for Sale Brian Hunter reflects on Tribe's eight years, using Jesus' parable of new wine and wineskins to explore what the Holy Spirit has been building in this small Jackson Hole church.
- October 27, 2024 New Wineskins for Sale Brian Hunter reflects on Tribe Church's eight years, exploring Jesus's teaching on new wine and wineskins, and what it means to stay spiritually prepared in changing times.