v.18 – “Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, ‘Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?”

Old Testament Reasons for Fasting

1. Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur (Lev. 23:26-32)

2. To mourn national tragedies (Zech. 7:3-4)

3. To ask for protection (Ez. 8:21-23)

4. To ask for provision (Neh. 1:4)

5. Self-imposed fasts for personal reasons (2 Sam. 12:16; Jonah 3)

v.19 – “And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.”

v.20 – “The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day.”

Matt. 28:20

1 Cor. 6:19

We don’t need to fast for the Day of Atonement (Heb. 10:14)

We don’t need to fast for provision (Phil. 4:19)

We don’t need to fast for protection (2 Thess. 3:3)

We don’t need to fast to express guilt of sin (1 Jn. 1:19)

We don’t need to fast to enhance our prayer (Heb. 7:25)

vs.21-22 – “No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. 22 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.”

a. Parable #1: A new patch and old garments

b. Parables #2: New wine and old wineskins

2 Cor. 5:17

Gal. 2:20