“Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved” (Matthew 9:17 ESV).

Every day is new wine and our minds are wineskins. The human brain is one of God’s greatest creations. It’s where he put his image in us. It’s where he creates our faith in Jesus. It’s where we regret our failures and understand our potential to do his will. It’s where we rise up to meet all the challenges we face in life. It’s where we accept who we are and aspire to become what we can be.

Unfortunately, we have the ability to turn a perfectly flexible mind into an old wineskin. If we don’t continue to educate ourselves, if we fail to expand our horizons, if we never explore the universe near and far, if we don’t try to fathom what’s going on in other people’s minds, we can become neurologically incapable of expanding our own. The pathways in our brains become so narrow and rigid that when new wine comes at us, we have no capacity to contain it. It blows our minds. We habitually resist anything new. But this is our time of grace. God preserves us by renewing our minds and giving us the mind of Christ.