Text: Brother Lu
During a period of time when I was working in Papua New Guinea, there were often problems with the large trucks that picked up and dropped off workers in our project department.
We had just fixed the engine and the brakes were broken again. The brakes were repaired, but there was another problem with the steering wheel.
Therefore, this made the project management personnel extremely headache, and everyone unanimously complained that this second-hand car was really unreliable.
It reminds me of my father's tricycle in the past. At that time, my parents used that car when they went out to the market, and it was very important to my parents.
However, as the age of the tricycle increases, the tricycle often breaks down.
The tire is broken, just repaired the tire and the exhaust pipe is broken again. The exhaust pipe was repaired, however, shortly after it was opened, there was another problem with the engine.
As we all know, the importance of the engine to the car is self-evident, if even the engine is broken, then the value of the car is not much. So, my father decided to buy a new car, and since the new car was bought, our frequent major repairs and minor repairs have finally disappeared.
Dear friends, in life, I believe you have also encountered this situation, the same thing is repaired twice in three days, but it always cannot return to the normal state of use.
For example, washing machines, televisions, air conditioners, etc., when their important parts are broken, you only repair them for a while, but it doesn't take long for them to break down again. So, you repair it over and over again, and the money for this repair adds up to enough to buy a new one.
Why would I want to share such a real-life case?
Because I would like to explain this sentence to you:
No one puts new cloth on old garments, because the strip that is mended spoils the garment, and it is even more torn. Nor did anyone put new wine in old wineskins, for if they did, the wineskins would be torn open, and the wine would leak out, and even the skinskins would be broken. but put the new wine in a new leather bag, and both things will be preserved.
Just like the example we gave earlier.
If you have a classic car, yesterday you found that the lever was broken, so you went to the repair shop and replaced the lever, but not long after, the driveshaft broke again, so you replaced the driveshaft again. After a while, the flexibilizer breaks down again, so you replace the flexibilizer again.
However, you replace parts one after another, and you never get the feeling of driving normally.
Moreover, the more frequent the repairs, the more frequent the problems of the car, which is to use the new cloth to repair the old clothes, and the new cloth will tear the old clothes. It's like putting new wine in an old leather bag, and finally the old leather bag cracks open and the new wine leaks out.
We often make the mistake of mending old clothes with new cloth and putting new wine in old leather bags.
For example, in the late Qing Dynasty, the Qing Dynasty decided to reform, but it was unwilling to abolish the old feudal system, so the empty form of reform did not change substantially.
In the end, the new cloth did not mend the old clothes, and the Qing Dynasty was lost by the new cloth.
So in order to change substantially, then the core thing needs to change. If the core thing does not change, but only the external form, then no matter how you fix it, you can't fix a classic car.
In Noah's time, everyone except Noah's family was bad. At that time, all the thoughts of the people every day were evil.
In such an age, how can you mend the evil of human nature? Can you, like Confucius, take the Analects to save this era of moral decay?
Like Sodom, Lot who went into Sodom was like a new cloth, and their family was like a new cloth on old clothes, so what was the end? Lot could not influence Sodom, but instead Sodom broke the Lot's family.
Therefore, in order to purify the morality of human beings, when the repair is not good, the master can only choose to abandon them and replace them again.
So in Noah's time, the great flood came, and only Noah's family was left from then on. In the time of Sodom, the fire of brimstone came, and the fire consumed the people of the city.
In Jeremiah's day, the King of kings hated an idolatrous people. So he told Jeremiah that he would tear it down and build it.
This means that the old self needs to die before the new life can be restored. For it is not possible to mend old clothes by mending.
Therefore, friends, we cannot mend old clothes with new cloth and new wine with old leather bags.
If a person's foundation is not changed, no matter how much you cultivate, it will not be possible to repair the corrupt human nature. For a person to have a fundamental change, the old self can only be resurrected when the old self dies.