Scripture Somtimes Commends Wine (Eph. 5:18a)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/30/2019 5:06 PM

 

My Worship Time                                                   Focus: Scripture Sometimes Commends Wine

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Ephesians 5:18a

 

            Message of the verses:  “Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life” (NLT).

 

            Perhaps one may think that because of all we have learned about drunkenness that it forbids the drinking of wine.  Sometimes it even commends the drinking of wine.  In the Old Testament as seen in places like Exodus 29:40 and Numbers 15:5 we see that wine is actually a part of the sacrifices given to God.  Psalm 104:15 says “And wine which makes man’s heart glad, So that he may make his face glisten with oil, And food which sustains man’s heart.”  The author of Proverbs advised giving “strong drink to him who is perishing and wine to him whose life is bitter (Pr. 31:6).  Now in speaking of God’s gracious invitation to salvation, Isaiah declared, “Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money come, buy and eat.  Come; buy wine and milk without money and without cost” (Isa. 55:1).

 

            In 1 Timothy 5:23 Paul advised Timothy to drink a little wine to help his stomach problems.  We also know that Jesus made water into wine at the wedding in Cana as seen in John 2:6-10. 

 

            John MacArthur concludes this short section with the following comments:  “Like many other things, the kind of wine of which Scripture speaks (discussed below) has the potential either for evil or good.  I believe there was a time when the juice of the grape, like every other thing God created, was only good and did not have even the potential for evil.  Fermentation, a form of decay, likely was made possible by the corruption of nature at the Fall and actually began with the vast environmental change caused by the Flood and the accompanying removal of the vapor canopy over the earth that had protected it from direct sunlight.  It is not unreasonable to believe that in the millennial kingdom the process will again be reversed, when the curse is removed and nature is restored to its original state of perfect goodness.”

 

            I did mention a part of this in an earlier SD, and so that makes me happy that John MacArthur agrees with me on some things.

 

Scripture that goes along with Spiros Zodiates quotation from yesterday is from Proverbs 9:9 “Give instruction to a wise man and he will be yet wiser; teach a just man and he will increase in learning.”

 

6/30/2019 5:21 PM