The Question of Alcohol: Is it wrong to drink?

Drunkenness is the main problem, not drinking itself.

No-nonsense Answer: Drunkenness = Wrong.
Drinking in Moderation = Fine, but it is a slippery slope.

The Excess is the sin. Too much food = gluttony.
Too much alcohol = drunkenness.

If someone says drinking is wrong, they directly contradict Paul who tells Timothy to “have a little wine with his water for his stomachs sake” (1 Timothy 5:32). To say it’s wrong to drink at all is to say Paul was wrong, which is to say the Bible has a verse that is wrong. And if one verse is wrong, where do we stop? The entire bible is wrong at that point.

Almost anything in excess is wrong.

Too much eating is called ‘gluttony’, and we know that gluttony is wrong. But when was the last time you heard  a sermon on the sin of gluttony?  You probably have never heard one. Because the same people who sit around condemning alcohol are the ones stuffing their faces with some sort of pie. These are the same people pushing the bathroom scale past three bills.

“Don’t those drunk fools have any self control?”
*Eats half pound brownie in one bite while using gut for a table*

There is a distinguishable line between eating and gluttony.
There is a distinguishable line between drinking and drunkenness.

The people who say alcohol is inherently sinful must also never take DayQuil  when they are sick. I bet these straight-edge, hardcore Christians just grind through their illness with no medicinal assistance.

You will struggle to find medicines that do not have alcohol substituents in their molecular composition.

For quick reference, any substance that ends in -ol is alcohol based.

Cholesterol. If you don’t take in a certain amount of alcohol, you will die, period. If you take in too much alcohol you will die. This rule of moderation applies to everything in life.

Too much water = death, no water = death.

So here is the basic idea: the chemicals that alter a state of mind and make you more likely to sin are themselves sinful. Unfortunately this applies to many more drinks than just alcohol. Take our favorite drink, coffee, for example. Coffee is well  documented to cause an increase in anxiety, which we are specifically told to avoid.

Caffeine makes us more likely to sin by being anxious. Therefore, caffeine is sin, if we are being intellectually honest in our arguments.

But many Christians only like to follow the Word when it fits their narrative.

“But…but caffeine can’t be wrong! Because I take that! I mean come on! It’s not like we are talking about crack cocaine here!”. These are involuntary attempts to justify our own chemical dependency.

Again, moderation is what we are looking at.

Caffeine in moderation = fine = No mental side effects.
Alcohol in moderation = fine = no mental side effects (debatable).

Logically, you can’t drink much before you start having the effects beat you down in the face. This is true for any substance. Have you ever had six cups of coffee in a row? If you have, you can’t argue that caffeine has no effects as you can’t even hold a piece of paper without shaking. Have you ever stuffed yourself so much on thanksgiving that your family had to roll you out the door? I’m sure you were well fit and mentally stable in that state.

Now for a point of clarity, I do not drink. I think it is unwise to drink because it creates a dependence on a substance to deal with depression.

Drunkenness also makes you more likely to engage in actions that your wiser self would never even think consider. It shuts off your body’s ability to burn fat, shuts off your good hormone production for testosterone. I’m not going to say it will damage your liver or kidneys, because plenty of substances can damage your liver besides alcohol. Too much sugar can damage your filtration organs.

Am I tempted to drink? Absolutely. I would love nothing more than to drown the world out by using alcohol. But I think it is important for the individual to experience the depth of whatever emotion he is feeling. That way the other side of peace can be that much more rewarding.

Common Quibble 1: What about Jesus and the wedding? Did He make Alcoholic wine?

Answer- no person still living today was at the Cana wedding, therefore how can anyone say definitively what the alcohol content of the wine Jesus made truly was?

Common Quibble 2: “Culturally, this wine would obviously have been diluted several times, like all wine”.

Answer: When was the last time our Lord and Savior tailored His actions to the culture at the time? The teachings of Christ flew in the face of culture, especially those regarding women and wives. Christians can do nothing but speculate about the Cana wedding and the alcohol content of the wine that Christ made.

Is it wrong to drink? I’m not convinced that it is.
Is it wise to drink? No.
Is it right to be drunk? No. Simple.