Is it a Sin to Drink Alcohol? - The Men's Podcast

Is it a Sin to Drink Alcohol?

18th April 2024 • The Men's Podcast • PursueGOD

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Hey everyone, Pastor John here. Today we are starting a new series called, Is It a Sin? And we're looking at behaviors and habits that I would say most people in the church have historically looked upon them as sinful. As always, we want to know what does the Bible say about it, not just what tradition says. Are these habits, are these behaviors sinful? Are they always sinful? Are they sometimes sinful?

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And if they're sometimes sinful, what makes them that way sometimes, but not at other times? What's the difference? And today's topic is drinking alcohol. I think it's important for me to disclose that I'm a teetotaler. I've had one sip of alcohol my entire life. I was about eight years old. I was goofing around with a salt shaker at my grandpa's house and the lid came off and

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I ended up pouring, I don't know, probably a half a teaspoon of salt on my tongue. Of course, I was gagging and spitting and my grandpa gave me a sip of his beer to wash it off. And I'm not sure which tasted worse to me, the salt or the beer. That was probably one of the best things he could do to keep me from wanting to drink. Now, I have family members whose lives have been wrecked by alcohol.

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could definitely have an impact on my perspective on this topic. But I've worked really hard to try and allow scripture to speak for itself on this issue and not just lay my personal opinions on you. And I do know that this is an issue that can create divisiveness among the church. People have different opinions on it. Again, what I want to try and dig into today is what does God's Word say? So let's jump in.

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The first thing that I would say is that there is no place in Scripture that makes a blanket statement forbidding everyone from drinking alcohol. In fact, Solomon encouraged his readers to drink their wine with a happy heart. We read that in Ecclesiastes. Paul encouraged Timothy to drink a little wine for the sake of his stomach. And we know that Jesus drank wine.

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If no other time, if you would make the argument that he didn't other times, he did as he celebrated the Passover. So let's dig into some of those passages. Ecclesiastes 9.7 says, So go ahead, eat your food with joy and drink your wine with a happy heart for God approves of this. If you've read Ecclesiastes, you know that Solomon talks a lot about how life is meaningless.

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that he's pursued all of these things that he thought would make him happy and they don't. And one of the things that he decides, one of the conclusions he comes to is that we should be content in where God has placed us. And in the context of this verse, that's what Solomon is saying. He's saying, as you're living life wherever God has you, eat your food with joy, be thankful for it, be grateful, and drink your wine with a happy heart. For God appraises you.

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Another passage where we see someone encouraged to drink is in the New Testament. The Apostle Paul encourages Timothy to drink wine for the sake of his stomach. We see it in 1 Timothy 5 verse 23. Paul says, Don't drink only water. You ought to drink a little wine for the sake of your stomach because you are sick so often. I recognize that this is a medicinal purpose.

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Paul isn't telling Timothy to drink wine for social reasons or just for his enjoyment. He says you have stomach problems, you're sick often, so I want you to drink a little bit of wine. Obviously, in their culture, access to clean drinking water was an issue. Certainly there are more pathogens and more things in the water than in our time. And it's widely believed that the wine...

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in the New Testament, and Jesus' time, for example, was weaker than the wine that we have now. The Jewish people often diluted it with water, but it's still wine. I mean, there still was alcohol content in the wine, even though it wasn't as strong, and Paul is encouraging Timothy to drink wine. Another passage is in Isaiah 25-6.

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Isaiah writes, in Jerusalem, the Lord of Heaven's armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world. It will be a delicious banquet with clear, well-aged wine and choice meat. This is a passage where Isaiah is trying to give hope to the people. He wants them to look forward to a time when Jesus is going to make things right, when God is going to bless His people.

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this feast, this banquet with choice meat and well-aged wine. He's not going to use that as something to look forward to if it's sinful for everyone in every circumstance to drink wine. And then the last thing I'll point out about drinking wine, again, Jesus drank wine. If you want to argue that he only did it during the Passover meal, I think you'd have a hard time.

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Arguing that from scripture nowhere in scripture does it say that that was the only time Jesus drank wine But even if that was your argument, he still drank wine In fact, we drank wine with his disciples at the Passover meal during the Last Supper He said that once he drank the wine that he wouldn't drink from the vine again Until he drank it anew in the kingdom of heaven So there's a point where Jesus is going to drink wine again in the kingdom of heaven

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We know that Jesus is absolutely perfect, absolutely sinless. So it would be extremely difficult, I would say impossible to argue from scripture that every time every person drinks wine or other alcohol, it is a sin. So again, you can't make this blanket statement that it's always sinful to drink alcohol. However, there are clearly situations where drinking

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is sinful. And I want to go through a couple that are black and white, that is just clearly a sin, and then I want to talk about some areas where it might be sin and we need to be led by the Holy Spirit. So let's talk about the black and white ones. Drunkenness. Drunkenness is clearly a sin. The Bible is not at all ambiguous about it. In addition to its prohibition in Scripture, we also see the consequences of drunkenness.

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can be absolutely brutal. So the first passage we're gonna cover today that deals with drunkenness is Proverbs 23 verses 20 and 21. Do not carouse with drunkards or feast with glutton's, for they are on their way to poverty and too much sleep close them in rags. We're told not to even associate with drunkards in this passage. You know, the writer of Proverbs is trying to give wisdom to his audience and he's saying,

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Not only should you not become a drunkard, but you really shouldn't even spend a lot of your time with drunkards or feast with glutton's. Why? Because one of the consequences of drunkenness is a financial impact. You're on your way to poverty. But I would say it's not just limited to literal poverty. I think it leads to poverty in relationships.

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If you look at individuals who struggle with alcoholism, who struggle with drunkenness on a regular basis, there's so much collateral damage that we see in the relationships that they have with those around them. Proverbs 20 verse 1 is another one. It says, wine produces mockers, alcohol leads to brawls. Those led astray by drink cannot be wise.

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It says, those led astray by drink cannot be wise. Again, it doesn't say that those who ever have a drink cannot be wise, but if you're being led astray by drink, you are not wise. If you're being led astray by alcohol, it leads to sin. Paul addresses it in 1 Corinthians chapter six, 1 Corinthians six, verses nine through 10. Now, this is a scary passage to me.

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This isn't the podcast where we're going to break down exactly what he's saying, but the warning here is clear. Paul says, don't you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the kingdom of God? Don't fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin or who worship idols or commit adultery or are male prostitutes or practice homosexuality or are thieves or greedy people or drunkards or are abusive or cheat people.

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None of these will inherit the kingdom of God. Drunkenness is clearly a sin. The consequences of drunkenness can be absolutely brutal. We see that throughout scripture, but we also see it in our lives. I mean, again, even in my own family, I've seen how alcoholism and drunkenness has destroyed relationships, how it has led to bad decisions, how it has led to...

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to poverty in many ways. But think of some of the examples we see in scripture. One of the ones that jumps out to me is Lot. So if you know the story of Lot after he leaves Sodom and Gomorrah, he and his daughters are living in a cave and his daughters say, let's get our father drunk and sleep with him or we won't have kids because there's no other men around here. And he gets so drunk.

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that on separate nights, he sleeps with his two daughters. They both get pregnant from their dad. I don't know how drunk you have to be to not know what's going on in that situation. And I'm not even saying that for those of you who drink and do get drunk from time to time that you get that drunk, but that's not the point. Drunkenness is a sin and drunkenness leads to some brutal consequences. Another one that I think of is when Noah

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After the flood is done, Noah gets so drunk that he passes out and his son comes in and sees him naked. And there's a whole cultural context of him going out and kind of making fun of his dad, and then his other son comes in and covers him. But that led to broken relationships. The consequences of his drunkenness and then how his son responded to that had a ripple effect.

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that lasted for generations. Another example is Jacob marrying Leah instead of Rachel. Now, I do understand that it's possible that Jacob wasn't drunk, that he was just completely deceived. The bride in those times was veiled during the ceremony, and scripture says that it was at dark when Leah and Jacob finally laid together.

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But it also says that Laban prepared a great feast. Certainly wine would have been present. There's nothing in scripture that says Jacob abstained from drinking, so it would have been customary for him to drink at the wedding feast. And even though it was dark, I just have to think if he was fully sober, if he was in his right mind, that he would know that the woman that he was about to sleep with wasn't the woman he'd been working seven years for to marry.

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So if you're not familiar with that story, Jacob wanted to marry the younger daughter, Rachel. But Laban was deceitful and tricked Jacob and instead gave him his older daughter, Leah. And so Jacob marries her, Jacob sleeps with her, and it wasn't until the morning that he recognized that he had been deceived and that it was Leah that he had married and not Rachel. So again, it's not just the fact that drunkenness is sinful.

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That should be reason enough for us to abstain from getting drunk. But the consequences, guys, are terrible. It's just like every other boundary in our lives. God's rules against drunkenness aren't just because he doesn't want you to have fun. It's not just because he's a killjoy. It is because he knows what's best for us. His boundaries are for our protection. His boundaries are for our safety.

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Another time when it would be sinful to drink is when it's against man's law. So for example, if you're underage, if there are age requirements in the culture where you live or in the nation where you live, the state where you live, there are laws on the books that say you have to be a certain age to drink, if you drink before then, that's sin. We're told to obey the authorities that God has established unless those authorities are asking us to do something that is against His law.

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And they're not asking us to do that when it comes to drinking laws. Now you may not think the laws are right. You may not think they make sense. And I might even agree with you on that. I confess. I think it's silly that you can vote at 18, but you can't have a drink at 18. That makes no sense at all to me. You can go serve your country. You can die for your country here in the United States at 18, but you can't have a drink. So I don't get the laws. I'm not saying that I think they're wise.

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But again, that's not the issue. If we only obeyed the laws that we agreed with, that would lead to chaos. The same thing if you have open container laws. So even if you're not drunk, even if you're not drinking to the point that it affects your driving, if you have open container laws in your state, then it would be a sin to drink while you're driving. So those are times that I think it's very black and white that it is sin.

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I also think it's sinful if it becomes a crutch for you. So even if you stop short of getting drunk, if you have to have a drink to make it through the day, or if alcohol is your go-to when dealing with stress or frustration, that's sinful. So 1 Corinthians 6, 12, Paul says, you say I am allowed to do anything, but not everything is good for you. And even though I am allowed to do anything,

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I must not become a slave to anything. Now, alcohol isn't unique here. I understand that. Coffee, you could become a slave to coffee. My advice is Dr. Pepper and Mountain Dew. I love soda and there are times when I'll go 30 days without drinking it and it's hard, but I do it because I wanna make sure I'm not a slave to it. I wanna make sure I'm not addicted to it. So I'm not singling out alcohol here.

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But that is the topic of today's conversation. So we're told not to be a slave to anything. So if you feel like you literally can't get through the day without having a drink, even if you don't drink to the point of drunkenness, then that means you're a slave to it. And that means it's sinful. That means you need to work on giving it up, not necessarily giving it up completely, but making sure that it doesn't control you.

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You know, self-control is one of the fruits of the Spirit, so anything in our life that we don't have control over is going to be sinful for us. Also, this issue of alcohol being your go-to to get through a hard day, to deal with stress or frustration. Psalm 91, 1-4 says, Those who live in the shelter of the Most High will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty. This I declare about the Lord. He alone is my refuge.

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my place of safety. He is my God and I will trust him. For he will rescue you from every trap and protect you from deadly disease. He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings. His faithful promises are your armor and protection. God is the one who needs to be my refuge. God is the one that I need to go to to help get me through a tough day.

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to help get me through stress. Now, look, alcohol isn't the only way that people cope with stress or with a hard day. Some people use exercise. Some people use entertainment to just kind of block it. In fact, one of the other pastors I was talking to as we were discussing this topic said, well, hey, sometimes I'll watch a ball game to kind of help unwind. And he said, is that sinful? Well, I'm not saying that

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having a drink of alcohol to help unwind is sinful. What I am saying is if that's your primary go-to, if that's the thing you look to first, then yes, that's sinful. And yes, watching a ball game could be sinful in that case. If I had a tough day at work and I'm like, man, the only way I'm gonna be able to unwind and settle down is if I sit down and watch this game.

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That's sinful because that means I'm not making the Lord my refuge. I'm not making God my place of safety. I'm going to something else first. So I need to go to God first. I need to come before Him in prayer. I need to ask Him to help me put the day in perspective. I need to ask Him to remind me that, hey, everything that is happening is part of His purpose and His plan, and He's not surprised by it. He's not...

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He's not in shock by anything that happened in my day. Now, if after I've done that, I wanna sit and have a drink and relax, again, I don't think that's sinful. I think we have seen from the very beginning of this conversation that there are certainly times when we can have a drink, when we can have a drink of alcohol and it's not sinful. But if I'm going to alcohol to be the thing that kind of delivers me from the day,

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or to be the thing that helps me process or get through my day and I'm not going to God first, then I would submit that's sinful. At the very least, guys, I would submit that it's not wise. In fact, that's a good transition into kind of the last part of our conversation today, and that is situations where drinking alcohol might be sinful. I think you need to really...

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really listen to the Holy Spirit in some of these next situations and circumstances we're going to talk about because it might be sinful, but at the very least, it's probably unwise. And really, as we grow in Christ, as we grow in maturity, we're not just simply trying to avoid sin, we're trying to live with wisdom. You know, we're trying to please God in the way that we live. When we have a full circle pursuit of God, we want to live in a way that honors Him.

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And so let me give some areas where I think you should strongly consider if drinking is sinful for you or at the bare minimum if it's unwise. And so the first one is if you just have a tendency towards addictive behavior. Some of us are just more prone to get sucked into things that are addictive. And so I think you need to ask yourself an honest question, do I have a tendency towards addictive behavior?

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And if the answer is yes, then I think at the bare minimum, it would be unwise for you to drink alcohol. I guess I can't say for sure that it would be sinful, but I think it would be unwise. And the Bible talks a lot about us pursuing wisdom. A second area is if your spouse prefers that you don't drink. So maybe your spouse has had issues in their family where they've seen alcohol just devastate lives.

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They've seen drunkenness devastate lives. They've seen addiction devastate lives. And they come to you and they would just say, I know you can drink, but I would just prefer if you not drink. Men in particular, I think this is where we're called to love our wives like Christ loved the church and he gave himself up for her. So if it's really heavy on your wife's heart that you drink, you should be willing to give that up for her. And you might say, man, you know, pastor John, what?

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All my buddies do it, all my friends drink, and I'm not sinning in these other ways that you've talked about. Why would I give that up? Because that's what we're called to do. We're called to live like Christ lived for the church. We're called to give up ourselves, literally sacrifice ourselves like He sacrificed Himself for the church. So if your spouse prefers that you don't drink, I think it's sinful if you continue to drink.

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Another area I'd ask you to consider is, are you struggling financially or are you in massive amounts of debt? If you're struggling financially, look, alcohol is expensive. And so if you're spending that money and you can't be generous to God's kingdom, you can't be generous to others, you can't meet your financial obligations and yet you're spending money on alcohol, I think that's sinful. And again, at the bare minimum, I think it's unwise.

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Alcohol isn't unique in that. I think you could put a lot of other things, you could fill in the blank with a lot of other issues if you're struggling financially and you're going out to eat four or five times a week. I think that'd be sinful. If you're struggling financially and you're smoking, I think that would be sinful. So again, I'm not trying to single out alcohol. I'm not saying that's the only way that it would be sin, but I am saying spending that money

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on alcohol on a consistent basis if you're struggling financially is not wise and likely sinful. I also want to talk just about being above reproach. Specifically, elders and overseers in 1 Timothy chapter 3 verse 2 are called to be above reproach. But I think there's application here for all believers. I really do. So I'm not saying that if you're going to drink, you should drink in secret.

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I'm not saying that you should try to hide it. I don't think that's the right approach either. But I am saying you should be wise and you should be careful about the image you project if you're a Christian and if you do choose to drink. Are you taking selfies all the time where you've got a beer or a drink in your hand? So someone who doesn't know you and someone who doesn't know that you never get drunk, someone who doesn't know that you do this with self-control.

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Is that what they would think based on the images that you're putting out there in social media? If half of the posts that you put on Instagram or Facebook or whatever social media platform you use, you're drinking, don't you think people would assume that you drink a lot? Don't you think they might even assume that you have a drinking problem? And you might want to argue, I'm not supposed to live my life for them. Well, no, you're not supposed to live your life for them.

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but you are an ambassador for Jesus Christ. You are an ambassador for the gospel. We are supposed to reflect Jesus in the way that we live. Now again, I'm not saying that you go so far as to act like you don't drink. I don't think you should be deceitful in that. If you have a drink from time to time and someone asks you what your stance on alcohol is, I think you should tell them, I have a drink from time to time. I think you should say, I am in control of it.

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I don't get drunk, I don't use it as a crutch to get through the day, but I do have a drink from time to time. I think you can certainly be honest about that. But in that situation, in that context, you get a chance to explain how you're doing it in a way that isn't sinful. But when you're just blasting pictures of your time at the bar week after week after week, that's not really a context where you get a chance to talk through that.

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you know, take an honest look. If you're doing that week after week after week, maybe you don't have as much control over it as you think you do. If you're the type of individual that even just one drink you notice will take away some of your inhibitions, I would say again, at the least, it's unwise to drink and probably sinful. The Bible talks a lot about self-control. We mentioned earlier that self-control is one of the fruits of the Spirit. So if you're putting

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where your decision-making ability becomes impaired, where you just find yourself doing things that you wouldn't do without that alcohol, that's a dangerous position to be in. That's not wise and likely sinful. You know, we're told in the New Testament to be of sober mind. Now, it's not specifically talking about alcohol there. I don't believe it is. But anytime we put ourselves in a position where

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we don't have all of our faculties or where we're making decisions on a basis that we normally wouldn't, that's not a good situation for us to be in. Another situation where it's gonna be sinful to drink is if you're causing a brother to stumble. So if you're in a situation where you're out with a friend or you're having someone over for dinner and you know that alcohol is a vice for them.

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Even if they're not an alcoholic, but even if you just know that drinking alcohol for them will lead to bad decision-making For them it will lead to drunkenness Then it would be sinful to drink in front of them It'd be sinful to tempt them in that way You might want to push back on that again and say why I just I feel like I'm living my life for everyone else Well, we don't live our lives for everyone else so to speak

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there is freedom in Christ, but Paul said, hey, to the Jews I became a Jew, to the Greeks I became a Greek. I became everything to everyone so I could win as many as possible. We don't need to have these self-centered lives where everything is all about us. And if that's giving up alcohol in the presence of a friend that you know struggles with that, then that's something we're called to do. I want to land the plane here by just saying we should be spirit-led.

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in this issue with whether or not to drink alcohol. James 1.5 says that any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God who gives generously without finding fault. This is something that I would definitely encourage you to seek God on to pray about. That for some of us, any alcohol would be sinful for some of the reasons we've talked about, but for others, as long as it's

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with self-control as long as they're not causing someone else to stumble, as long as our spouse isn't affected by it, you know, all these different things we've talked about, it certainly is okay to have a drink from time to time. But I just think we need to be wise about it. I think we need to recognize that it can lead down a path that has a lot of negative consequences if we're not very careful. So we should approach it that way. We should be, we should be humble about it.

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not becoming prideful and thinking that, oh, I, you know, none of those bad things could ever happen to me. I've got it under control. I think we should recognize that we need to treat it with respect. We need to be careful about it. You know, in some sense, it's a little bit like sex, you know, sex in God's plan between one man and one woman and the bonds of marriage committed is amazing, but it's so dangerous outside of that.

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And I think alcohol is similar, that if you choose to consume alcohol, as long as you do it within the boundaries that God has given us, it can bring enjoyment, it can be great, but we have to be very, very careful because it's very dangerous any time we choose to use it outside the boundaries that God has given us. This would be a great conversation to have with your sons if you've got a son and they're probably getting tempted even earlier than you think to drink.

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on why it would be sinful to drink if they're underage, period. That's black and white. That would be a sin. But then how to help them think biblically about it moving forward. You can find discussion questions at PursueGod.org to continue the conversation with your sons, with your small group, with your men's group. And I hope you come back and join us on the next episode where we're going to tackle the question, is smoking tobacco or marijuana, is it a sin? Thanks for joining us.