BOLD Ministry

Alistair Petrie’s Transformed! is one of those special books that you have got to reread on a regular basis because of the cornerstone content it holds.

He addresses ten principles for sustaining genuine revival in our society.

He wastes NO TIME getting to the heart of the matter and by page 16 which actually is page 3 of his book, he states: “God can penetrate every part of life and society…”

In simple terms: there are no systems, organizations or cultures that God is incapable of affecting: that includes the world economy.

So going back to the subject of Petrie’s book, revival, we have got to shake the dust off the word to rediscover that revival is NOT JUST A RELIGIOUS EVENT, but actually is the recovery of the functionality of any sustainable system from dysfunction or disease.

If you want to revive your business, what you do stop doing is just as important as what you start doing or redoing. Selah.

The Church today has a part to play in the economic disaster today. This is the third catastrophic calamity to hit our church and the world in less than ten years. The first two being the attack of 911 cost our country alone -- the price tag approaches $2 trillion [according to the Institute for Analysis of Global Security] and Hurricane Katrina.

These three events are reconfiguring the global economy away from a grid comprised of national economic segments into one which is integrated one-world system.

This new model will force Christians either to reconsider the implementation of the Great Commission or see the relevance of the gospel reduced to doctrine and dogma. According to one of BOLD's original organizers and former New York investment banker from the 80’s & 90’s, Skip Naglevoort, the platforms of media and global finance will emerge to be “the Roman Roads” upon which we carry the good news of Christ.

This new world is going to require us to revisit what it means to walk out our faith in the marketplace. We must be willing to explore all aspects of the way that faith in Christ is communicated. Jesus tells us that you can’t put new wine into old wineskins. I think that we presume that we hear what is written but the fact that there is a scarcity of new wine in our lives is a crushing indictment that we don't understand what Christ is actually saying.

The models of old evangelism (old-time religion) and new evangelism just won’t mix; and that is scripture saying that! This doesn’t have to be a bad thing which creates competing denominational camps and factions.

What typically happens is that when a model is no longer working, the old guard digs in its heels and works twice as hard doing the things that worked back then. Their anthem proudly holds on and says, “We always did it this way, and if it was good enough then, it’ll be good enough now.”

Look at what Jesus said in Luke 5:33-39
[33] They said to him, "John's disciples often fast and pray [old wineskin], and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking [new wineskin]."

[34] Jesus answered, "Can you make the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? [35] But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast."

[36] He told them this parable: "No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. [37] And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. [38] No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins.
[39] And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, 'The old is better.' "
In other words, we all get used to the wine we grew up on. My father loves Italian wine; as a matter of fact he won’t even keep a bottle of Californian wine in his house. Does that make him wrong? No, just as long as he understands that wine can be grown in other places! [He’s starting to admit that it does.]

There are still two more significant points I would like to make about this wineskin concept:
#1. We are not in charge of the wineskins the way that executives are in charge of business models; wineskins correspond to the vintage of grapes and the season in which they are grown.
#2. Every growing season has its own distinctive taste and which will require its own wineskins to hold it, according to Jesus.

Now take a closer ‘spiritual look’ at the wineskin concept. What are wineskins made from? They are ‘bags’ made from the skin of a goat.

The goat symbol has two meanings 1. goats represent practical wisdom; 2. goats also came to symbolize evil and the term "scape-goat" becoming a common expression for someone bearing blame for others. (See Leviticus 26:20-22 – and take a look at why goat mentality is so different: they not only eat anything, including garbage, but are so so self-willed that they are incredibly difficult to handle.)

Here is the rub: I believe that you will agree with me that with every new growing season comes a new vintage. This ‘new wine’ cannot be placed into the old wineskins but rather must be placed into fresh wineskins of goats freshly slaughtered.

A goat in scripture represents that which carries the sin of the people away from them. So the metaphor follows: that with each new season and new vintage of grapes, will come a season in which the goats and sin-carrying habits and activities will be slain.

The new wine requires a fresh repentance. Each new area of repentance will require a vengeance or judgment against anything in our lives, families, businesses and churches that exults itself above the knowledge of God must be eliminated. The new wine can only be carried with the fresh and new repentances of our lives.