SERMON NOTES:
Galatians 5:19-21, “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are [these]; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness (loose living), Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance (contention), emulations (jealousies), wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings (or partying), and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told [you] in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Human beings being human beings and the flesh being the flesh always wants to justify sin by diluting down its nature and danger, making it innocuous, harmless and acceptable. That applies as much to drunkenness as it does to any other sin that exists.
Many use popular worldly phrases to paper over the evil of being drunk like “getting a buzz” or “being tipsy” so as to put a veneer of respectability on their rebellion.
Having a buzz or getting tipsy from drinking is a classic sign that you are drunk. It is physically affecting your body and judgment.
Many justify their own drunkenness by conveniently defining drunkenness as someone being completely out of their mind or legless. While this definitely describes a very drunk person, drunkenness covers the general physical effects associated with the consummation of alcohol.
It is a medical fact: the consumption of alcohol affects your speech, movement, vision, judgment and appearance. It alters your normal natural mental functions and behavior starting with the 1st drink.
The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines being drunk as:
1: having the faculties impaired by alcohol
2: having a level of alcohol in the blood that exceeds a maximum prescribed by law
When alcohol is consumed, it hits the bloodstream quickly and reaches the brain within five minutes.
Alcohol lowers one’s inhibitions and encourages a person to excesses that they wouldn’t normally do when they are sober.
What we call DUI (or Driving under the influence) in America is
DIC in the United Kingdom – drunk in charge of a vehicle. It is the same thing.
The law deems once you get to 2 drinks most people are considered unsafe to drive a car. As we heard the last time: with recent advanced research, that figure is being brought down throughout the world to 1 drink.
One week after I spoke the last time on this subject a significant report was published by Canadian health officials that overhauled their guidelines for alcohol consumption, warning that no amount is healthy and recommending that people reduce drinking as much as possible.
The report states: “Research shows that no amount or kind of alcohol is good for your health,” It continues: “It doesn’t matter what kind of alcohol it is — wine, beer, cider or spirits. Drinking alcohol, even a small amount, is damaging to everyone, regardless of age, sex, gender, ethnicity, tolerance for alcohol or lifestyle. That’s why if you drink, it’s better to drink less.”
Gautam Mehta, an associate professor in hepatology at University College London, was involved in a study comparing drinkers doing dry January, who had previously been drinking about 20 units a week, with a control group who didn’t give it up. “The changes were quite marked,” he says, describing how people’s blood pressure reduced by approximately the same amount as you would expect had they taken blood pressure medication. Their risk of diabetes went down by about a quarter, and they lost weight. “We also saw changes in growth factors that are connected with cancer. You can’t reduce your cancer risk hugely in a month, but the proteins that are linked to cancer fell by about 70%, a huge reduction. That was the most numerically striking finding.”
Mehta concluded: it is “absolutely reasonable” to conclude that “the safest amounts of alcohol to drink is zero. There’s no absolute safe level of consumption – the data is good on that.”
In 2016, 3 million deaths, or 5.3 percent of all global deaths (7.7 percent for men and 2.6 percent for women), were attributable to alcohol consumption.
The European Union recently revealed that alcohol is directly responsible for some 60 diseases and major health problems. These include various types of cancers, heart attacks, strokes, chronic liver diseases, lung diseases fetal alcohol syndrome, brain damage, mental illnesses, Dementia and ultimately early death.
Medical evidence proves: when you drink this poison, you are defiling your own body.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17
16. Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?
17. If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.
In the 1930’s the Brewers Association said, “We must not rest content until we get the taste of alcohol into the mouths of every young man and woman in this country.”
Talk about a vision! Talk about a toxic vision.
I think: few informed onlookers would deny that they have extremely successful in their dream.
Alcohol is a curse among our young.
Excessive alcohol use contributes to the premature death of over 1700 college students a year.
The average college student spends $900 a year on alcohol and $450 a year on books!
• 1 in 5 high school girls report binge drinking. The figure is much larger among boys.
• 84 percent of college students drink alcohol.
• According to a 2019 health survey, an estimated 414,000 adolescents ages 12 to 17 in the United States had Alcohol Use Disorder. This number includes 163,000 males and 251,000 females.
• Each year an estimated 599,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 are unintentionally injured under the influence of alcohol.
• Each year an estimated 97,000 students between the ages of 18 and 24 are victims of alcohol related sexual assault or date rape.
• Binge drinking results in about 23,000 deaths in women and girls each year.
Alcohol is a factor in the deaths of thousands of people younger than age 21 in the United States each year. This includes:
• 1,092 from motor vehicle crashes
• 1,000 from homicides
• 208 from alcohol overdose, falls, burns, and drowning
• 596 from suicides
The consumption of alcohol leads to sexual immortality – loss of purity, unwanted pregnancies, abortion, sexual abuse, rapes, and venereal diseases.
• Alcohol and immorality are inseparable. Where there is drink and drunkenness there will be adultery, fornication, flirting, and perversion.
• Alcohol is associated with the sins of the flesh / especially the sin of lust.
Proverbs 23:29-35: “Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? who hath babbling? who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes? They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine. Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it giveth his colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. At the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder. Thine eyes shall behold strange women, and thine heart shall utter perverse things. Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down in the midst of the sea, or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast. They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not sick; they have beaten me, and I felt it not: when shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.”
As they say in Ireland: “when the drink is in, the wit is out.” Also, the man takes the drink – then the drink takes the man – then the man takes a life.
Hosea 4:11: “Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart.”
Reuters: More than one in four U.S. teen girls is infected with at least one sexually transmitted disease, and the rate is highest among blacks, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Tuesday.
An estimated 3.2 million U.S. girls ages 14 and 19 — about 26 percent of that age group — have a sexually transmitted infection …
The CDC said the rate of STD infection among U.S. teen girls might be higher than the study indicates because it did not look at syphilis, gonorrhea or HIV infection, but said these generally are uncommon in girls this age.”
Is the alcohol trade good or evil? Does it carry the blessing of God or the curse of God?
The curse of God is on the alcohol trade. It is the devil’s domain and it is governed by the spirit of antichrist.
Why would any genuine Christian want to support such an industry in any way by their attendance or financial support?
But the skeptic says: “there is no harm in 1 drink.”
• Why does society have extremely stringent laws against the consumption of drink if it is harmless?
• Why does society forbid anyone under the age of 21 from consuming any alcohol if it is harmless?
• Why does society have strict rules restricting our young from public bars if they are harmless?
• Why would you or I want in any way to condone it or give anyone around us any encouragement to consume it?
Alcohol is deceiving!
• People use it to lift their moods but fail to understand it gives them a long-term downer. In fact, medical research shows that one day of heavy drinking can impair abstract thinking for up to 30 days.
• People use it to quench their thirst; little do they realize alcohol actually causes dehydration.
• People use alcohol to causes you to drop your natural inhibitions but it also causes you to drop your natural guard to act sensibly, wisely and normally.
Proverbs 20:1 “Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.”
Where does deception come from?
Genesis 3:1 says Satan is “more subtil than any beast of the field.” In Genesis 3:13 he’s identified as ‘a beguiler’. In Revelation 20:3 he is exposed as ‘a deceiver’.
Bars
What is the purpose of bars?
To sell as much alcohol to as many people as they can and get people addicted to their product so that they will be a regular customer. The more people that get hooked on alcohol the more money they make.
But as we have already learned in Habakkuk 2:15: “Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink, that puttest thy bottle to him, and makest him drunken also.”
When you buy alcohol for others you participate in their sin. You become an accessory to the crime. You never know whether that drink that you are buying for someone could put them over the edge.
The alcohol trade and bar industry practicing on a large-scale something that God hates.
On a day-to-day basis it is their aim to see people get intoxicated. The more alcohol they buy the more money is made.
In your opinion: what type of atmosphere and behavior characterizes most bars? Are they godly or worldly?
The results produced by bars are damaging and destructive to the individual, the family and to society.
Do you accept this environment produce sinful impulses, profane language, ungodly music and immoral and disorderly behavior?
Most people in a bar are normally tipsy or intoxicated or they are there for the expressed purpose of getting tipsy or intoxicated. If they are sober and want to remain sober they have to sit and observe the rest make a fool of themselves with their carnal behavior and foolish language.
As Michael Brown says: “in the bar, everyone is right, when everyone is wrong.”
I have 2 questions for the supping saints: why do you feel so comfortable in a booze house? And why do drunks feel so comfortable around you in the booze house?
If you were in the bar sharing the truth the way they did in this Book you wouldn’t last 15 minutes. They would throw you out because they are in there to enjoy their sin and you would be annoying their happiness. Excuse the pun: but they would bar you for life.
Charles H. Spurgeon once said: “A man is known by the company he shuns as well as by the company he keeps.”
2 Corinthians 6:14-18 declares, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.”
The old saying is true: Birds of a feather flock together. Godly people love to be around godly people. Carnal people love to be around carnal people. Christians love the things of God; sinners love the things of this world.
Ironically, it is pastors today that are the ones now telling Christians what the world was telling them 30 years ago: there is no harm in a drink. They are pointing people down a very dark path.
What message does it send out to the young godly that are increasingly aware of the fact that alcohol is damaging to one’s health? What message does that send out when we are partaking of that same alcohol? What example is that to our kids? We are telling those around us that this is a legitimate lifestyle. This is wholesome. This is recommended.
1 Corinthians 5:11-13
11. now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat.
12. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within?
13. But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
What about the evil servant in Matt 24:48-51 that Jesus talked about?
He started to compromise saying “in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming.”
Do you know what he started to do?
He started “to eat and drink with the drunken (or the intoxicated)” he got into the bar scene. It nowhere says he was drunk, he simply ate and drank with them.
Jesus said:
50 The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of,
51 And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Because of his compromise on alcohol, this man ended up damned and doomed for all eternity.
Why would Jesus condemn a man for doing something He supposedly did?
The scary thing today is instead of the Church getting further and further away from this increasingly messed up world, the Church is trying to embrace it today through compromise.
I have even heard some compromised professing Christians give the impression today that Jesus went round the bar scene or party scene befriending the sinners whilst they were performing their debauchery. That is not true.
There was a publican who got saved called Levi who Jesus visited in Mark 2:14-15. It says, “as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the receipt of custom, and said unto him, Follow me. And he arose and followed him. And it came to pass, that, as Jesus sat at meat in his house, many publicans and sinners sat also together with Jesus and his disciples: for there were many, and they followed him.”
This was not a visit to the local bar to experience ungodly fellowship in an ungodly atmosphere, as carnal “Christians” do today, it was Christ operating in His mission to save souls. Publicans here described tax collectors.
It was because the unsaved were continually drawn to Christ that the religious reacted in Mark 2:16-17: “And when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with publicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners? When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”
This same story is repeated in Matthew 9:9-13, Luke 5:27-32 and 15:1-2.
This wasn’t a bar room. There is no evidence here of partying or drunkenness. This has absolutely nothing to do with social drinking.
Conclusion
Romans 14:21 says: “It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy brother (1) stumbleth, or (2) is offended, or (3) is made weak.”
Here is wise heavenly advice on how believers should approach alcohol in our day. It is such a scourge on society, there is so many within the church that have been rescued from a depraved life in alcohol, that it would be folly for a godly person to go in any way in that direction.
1 Corinthians 8:10-13 says: “For if any man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the idol’s temple, shall not the conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things which are offered to idols; And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? But when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ. Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.”
What Paul is saying is, if someone sees you in a worldly place cause a weaker brother to stumble. If it does then the blood is on your hands. You are responsible for his sin. The reality is: the Christian life is not about you but about Christ and others.
Alcohol ultimately leads men to hell!
Galatians 5:19-21, “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are [these]; Adultery, fornication (porneia), uncleanness, lasciviousness (loose living), Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance (contention), emulations (jealousies), wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings (or partying), and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told [you] in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 confirms (NKJV):
“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.”
There is a true story told of a Police Officer in London in the 1940’s that left its mark upon him. He was on duty patrolling down a street in London one night, when a gentleman approached him looking for a public house called ‘The gates of hell’. Knowing that it was on the same road he was patrolling, he gave him directions to the pub. The only notable landmark he knew between where he was and the pub was Calvary Baptist Church. He then proceeded to instruct him. Keep going the way you are going, sir. You will see Calvary ahead. Bypass Calvary and you’ll arrive at the ‘The gates of hell’. For everyone that rejects Christ in this life, the same directions apply.
Is alcohol a blessing or a curse to society?
I put it to you: on the grounds of this Word and on the grounds of the glaring evidence all around us, alcohol is a curse upon society that is damming millions to hell.