Wine is my specialty. When used in moderation I can make the heart rejoice and put the heart in a merry mood. (Psalm 104:15; Esther 1:10) I can be used for medicinal purposes, as the apostle Paul advised Timothy. Or be used as an antiseptic. (1 Timothy 5:23; Luke 10:34) In modern times I am used to build up the blood of anemic ones.

The details for grape and wine production figured in the mosaics of the Egyptian dynasties as far back as 3,500 years ago. During the time of Homer, wine was a regular commodity among the Greeks. Pliny, a part resident of Rome, described 91 varieties of my grape descendants and listed 50 different kinds of wine. There are many more today.

Today, when I have reached a sugar content of from 20-23.5 percent sugar, I am picked, crushed, stems are removed, I am pumped into stainless steel tanks, cultured yeast is added for fermentation and eventually my grape sugar is converted to alcohol and CO₂ gas. Then the use of centrifuge or filters removes yeast cells and other solids, and I stand as a newly fermented wine. I am analyzed and checked with constant care until I reach maturity, when I am bottled and ready for release.

But it was not always so. In the early history of man, especially in the regions recorded in the Bible, I reached my maturity and sweetness during August and September. I was then gathered and placed in limestone vats where men, barefoot and singing as they worked, crushed me gently so that my stems and seeds would not be broken down and very little of the tannic acid in my skins would be released.​—Isaiah 16:10; Jeremiah 25:30; 48:33.

Whereas you humans have a tendency to deteriorate with age, I improve. In Bible days, for the aging period I was placed in jars or skin bottles made from the hides of sheep, goats or oxen. Left undisturbed while fermentation took place and the dregs fell to the bottom, I reached my zenith in flavor.

Jesus mentioned this process as an example that the truth of Christianity was too powerful and energetic to be retained by the old system of Judaism, when he stated: “Neither do people put new wine into old wineskins; but if they do, then the wineskins burst and the wine spills out and the wineskins are ruined. But people put new wine into new wineskins, and both things are preserved.” (Matthew 9:17) You see, as my new wine ferments, it generates carbon dioxide gas that can cause the new skin bottles to expand. Old, dry skin bottles would burst under the pressure.

I have long graced the tables not only of common man but especially of kings. Melchizedek, king of Salem, set before Abraham “bread and wine.” (Genesis 14:18) The Pharaohs, served wine by their official cupbearers, enjoyed the fruitage of their many vineyards. (Genesis 40:21) King Ahasuerus, in the days of Mordecai and Esther, had royal wine at his disposal in great quantity. (Esther 1:7) And King Belshazzar enjoyed his wine at the feast of his 1,000 grandees.​—Daniel 5:1.

I was included as a commodity in trade between nations, even as I am today. (Nehemiah 13:15; Ezekiel 27:18; Hosea 14:7) King Solomon provided 20,000 baths​—approximately 116,200 gallons, or 440,000 liters—​of wine, in part payment to Hiram the king of Tyre for building materials and craftsmen in preparation of the temple building. I was used as a tithing contribution for the support of the priests and the Levites. (Deuteronomy 18:3, 4; 2 Chronicles 31:4, 5) I was offered up to Jehovah in sacrificial worship.​—Exodus 29:38, 40; Numbers 15:5, 7, 10.

Are you impressed? But there is more. I became involved in the first miracle performed by Christ Jesus when he turned water into wine at a wedding feast. (John 2:2-10) And I gained further prominence when Christ Jesus on the last night spent with his apostles used wine in symbol of the blood he was about to shed.