In one of Miss Read's charming books about Thrush Green the formidable Nellie Piggott always ensured that her mashed potatoes were fluffy by beating in an egg. This seemed a very simple way of transforming potatoes and so I tried it. The result was highly satisfactory; it worked superbly. Ever since my discovery I have been urging ladies of my acquaintance to do the same. They don't. I ask them, "Have you tried it yet?" The invariable response is, "No, but I am going to." How can this reluctance to experiment be explained? Perhaps, my elderly lady friends and their families have developed a taste for mashed potatoes the way they are!

Jesus recognised that an acquired taste was a powerful obstacle to change. "A drinker," he says, "who has got used to old wine will have no taste for the new." The fresh new wine in Jesus' day was reckoned to be superior to a mature vintage but, nevertheless, the acquired taste cried out, "The old is better." The Pharisees had acquired a taste for their religion; its legalism, formalism and complexity. It was intellectually stimulating in an arid sort of way and it conferred power and status upon its experts. They had neither taste for the new teaching of Christ nor the lifestyle he encouraged. They criticised the freedom Jesus and his disciples enjoyed. Their old wine was best!

The acquired taste remains an enormous hindrance to Christianity. It is the main reason why conversions from older age groups are less common than from amongst the young. As a man ages he acquires a taste for life as he leads it. He is familiar with his Sunday routine, comfortable with it, and reluctant to change. Sunday morning on the golf course does seem preferable to sitting in the pew of a cold church listening to a dull sermon. The old wine is best!

However Christians should not be complacent - they have acquired tastes too. A small group of elderly Christians meeting week after week in their chapel and going through the same unvarying from of service are reluctant for any change. They may even resent the arrival of fresh faces - they are some how disturbing. The old, closed, cosy, safe, club atmosphere is best. I know, because that is how I felt when the attendance at the prayer meeting during our last pastor's ministry increased from 15 to 25. For some reason I was vaguely resentful.

Numerous initiatives by well-meaning, enthusiastic, workers have been scotched by the chilling words, "We have always done it this way." I can remember speaking up in a large committee against requiring fellow Christians whose work was to be discussed to leave. I felt this was most unbrotherly. The reaction of the Chairman of the committee was, "This is how we conduct our affairs and we are not going to change because of you." The old wine is best!

The tyranny of taste has even worse consequences. It explains the persistence of error in the church. Many practices and beliefs of the corrupt, medieval, Roman church have survived into reformed denominations. I am sure that the popularity of some of these, such as infant baptism, is due to sentiment or acquired taste. I attended a christening in an Anglican church whilst on holiday in Wiltshire. It was a very happy, pretty, touching ceromony. I can well understand why Anglicans are loath to abandon it. The old wine is best! Even some of the most reformed groups are not altogether free from taint. The pagan doctrine of hell, which somehow found its way into the medieval church, with its everlasting, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual anguish is retained on scant Scriptural authority because preachers and, indeed, congregations, have developed a taste, even a smell, for it.

It is enormously difficult to get across an unusual or different interpretation of a familiar Scripture to the majority of Christians. Take, by way of example, Matthew's account of Jesus' confrontation with Peter over payment of the temple tax. See Mt17vs24to25. Jesus finishes reprimanding Peter with these words: "But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours." It is highly likely from what we know of Jesus' willingness to upset the religious establishment and his indignation at Peter's desperate eagerness to secure the good opinion of the temple officials that this is an ironical statement. Probably most conservative evangelicals are unhappy with such an interpretation. They prefer to believe the miracle occurred. Why? This is what they were taught in Sunday school. They can remember from childhood the picture of the incident in their illustrated Bibles. It is a vivid, satisfying, picture - such a large fish - with the gleam of silver in its gaping mouth. Preachers that they have admired and trusted always treated the account as another instance of Christ's amazing miraculous powers. So Christians have acquired a taste for the traditional approach to the story and they reject a different way of looking at it. The old wine is best!

It is wrong to dismiss any exposition of Scripture on grounds of taste alone. Not everything we learned as children is true. Not all the beliefs of our parents were correct. Old and respected pastors are fallible. It is not reasonable to say, "What was good enough for my parents is good enough for me." Christians should accept the interpretation of Scripture that makes the most sense and best harmonises with the rest of Biblical revelation. In the example given, those who take Jesus' words literally must conclude that he did not wish to give offence to the religious establishment. Yet this was precisely Peter's motive in the first place for telling the tax collectors that Jesus paid his two drachmas. This motive clearly annoyed Jesus. The literalist position fails to explain why Jesus hardly lets Peter close the door before telling him, sharply, that genuine children of God give from love and not under duress. Instead it introduces an inconsistency into the story.

Not only do Christians refuse to change their mind over what is more a matter of taste than of conviction but they can get extremely hostile towards those who offend their taste. It is pathetic when hackles rise and tempers flare over matters of taste. Bitter rows occur in churches over what version of the Bible and what hymn book to use, the appropriate form of service, the dress of the minister and even the mode of addressing God in prayer. I have known Christians to get belligerent when the congregation say the Lord's Prayer as part of public worship.

Not all changes are for the best. Not all unusual or original interpretations of the Bible are correct. We need to possess the spirit of adventure and discernment. The Pharisees lacked both. They never tried the new wine of Christ's ministry. It was new; his teaching on the Sabbath, diet, ceremonial washings, divorce, wealth and forgiveness was more than they could stomach. Jewish Christian always had a tendency to revert to Judaism. They loved the old wine. Today the Jews still claim, "The old wine is best." We know it is as sour as vinegar compared to the sparkling, gospel, vintage of grace.

INDEX.