ALCOHOL USE AND ABUSE
DR. JIM DIXON
JOHN 2:1-11 & LUKE 7:31-35
JANUARY 29, 1995
His name was Alfred “Al” Beatty, but people just called him Al. They also called him other names. Some people called Al a drunk and some people called him a bum because Al was an alcoholic. For 20 years, he lived in San Francisco’s skid row area. He would sometimes take odd jobs, but most of the time he depended on contributions from others and he would kind of rummage around in trash cans looking for something to eat. Mostly what he looked for was something alcoholic to drink. People kind of liked Al, and from time to time they gave him the price of a drink. But in 1959, they found Al besides an old beat-up building in a San Francisco slum. Al was dead. There was an empty wine bottle at his side. Cirrhosis of the liver, that’s what the autopsy showed. And for most people, it was just one more hopeless derelict gone from the earth.
But you see, Al’s life had not always been hopeless. There were a few people who looked back and researched Al’s past, and they were amazed to find that Al at one time was in the old Army Air Corps in Kelly Field in Texas. He’d been an officer and a pilot, and he had graduated first in his class, the most likely to succeed. There were many other people in Al’s class who went on to become United States congressmen and senators. Some went on to become heads of great financial corporate conglomerates. But what happened to Al? Al became the victim of alcoholism. And of course, tragically Al is not alone because in the world today and in the world of the past, there are and there have been millions of people afflicted with alcoholism. Tragically, from Alexander the Great to John Wilkes Booth, from President Andrew Johnson to King Edward VIII of England, alcohol has ruined many a life.
We’re told that 20 million Americans are afflicted with alcoholism today, and over 50% of the traffic fatalities on America’s highways are in some way related to alcohol abuse. With this tragic situation, we might well ask why it was that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, created abundant and even excessive wine at a marriage in Cana of Galilee 2,000 years ago. Why did He create wine at all? The biblical message concerning wine is actually quite simple. Some people try to make it complex. Biblically, wine is not evil in and of itself. It is not a sin to drink in moderation. There are even some passages in the Bible where wine is spoken of as a gift of God, passages such as the 108th Psalm. But all through the Bible we are warned and cautioned again and again about the abuse of alcohol. We are warned regarding the abuse of alcoholic beverages. And in the Bible drunkenness is called sin.
If anyone has a tendency to drink to excess, they would be better off not to drink at all. 10 to 20% of the people in this world, we are told by scientists, have chemical predispositions towards alcoholism. They should not drink at all. Even those Christians who do choose to drink in moderation are cautioned in the Bible that they should not drink in those circumstances where they might cause someone else to stumble. You see, what our Lord Jesus Christ created in Cana of Galilee almost 2,000 years ago was not wine in moderation. He created 120 to 180 gallons of wine, six stone jars, each jar containing 20 to 30 gallons. He transformed them by the power that was in Him to wine, 180 gallons of wine. Why did He do that?
Most theologians are agreed that He wasn’t simply trying to keep the party going. In fact, most theologians are agreed, most biblical scholars are agreed, that this miracle at Cana of Galilee had very little to do with wine, and it had very little to do with a party. This miracle had a deeper meaning, and our Lord Jesus Christ had a deeper purpose. Those who have eyes to see and ears to hear are meant to understand this meaning and purpose. You see, in the passage of scripture, in the gospel of John, this miracle is called a sign from the Greek word “semeion,” and refers to that which points to a deeper truth, which points to a deeper reality.
Jesus Christ had a deeper truth He was pointing to when He performed this miracle, and it’s all bound up with the symbolism of wine in the Bible and in biblical times. Because you see, in biblical times in the Greek culture, in the Roman culture and in the Hebrew culture, wine was a symbol of life. It was a symbol of joy and it was a symbol of life. At the beginning of His ministry, in His first miracle, as Christ transformed 180 gallons of water to wine, He was showing that He is indeed the source of abundant life. We cannot understand the meaning of this miracle unless we understand that. Now, with this concept of wine as symbolizing life, I have three simple teachings this morning, three short teachings, and the first teaching is this: apart from Jesus Christ, the wine will run out.
If you do not belong to Jesus Christ, if you do not have Him as your Lord and Savior of life, then eventually in your life, the wine will run out. Life will cease, joy will cease. There’s a cartoon that I kind of like. I saw it on the newspaper a few weeks ago. It’s kind of embarrassing to admit that I like this, but it shows a man who’s on an airplane and he’s about to jump out and he’s never jumped before. His friend is with him giving him instructions and his friend says, “Now when you jump, it’s really simple, you pull the right cord and the parachute will open. However, if it doesn’t open, you pull the left cord and then the parachute will open and you’ll just go gently to the ground and my wife will be there to pick you up.”
Well, in the second picture in the cartoon, the man has jumped and he’s flying through the air and he’s pulled the right cord and the parachute hasn’t opened, but strangely, he has a relatively calm expression on his face. In the third picture in this cartoon, he’s pulled the left cord, and of course he’s flying through the air, and he’s pulled the left cord and again the chute didn’t open. But again, strangely, he has kind of a calm expression on his face. Then in the fourth picture, the fourth and final picture in this cartoon, the man is flying through the air at what looks like about warp 10. He has, amazingly enough, kind of a calm but perplexed expression on his face. You can tell he is contemplating something and his thoughts are kind of capsulized there. He’s thinking to himself, “He lied about the right cord. He lied about the left cord. I wonder if his wife’s really going to be there to pick me up?”
Now what that man is going to need to pick him up is a spatula. And it is an amazing thought, mildly humorous at best, to envision someone just flying to their death and not seemingly aware of it. Yet, you see tragically there are millions of people in the world, billions of people just like that. They’re just racing towards death and they don’t even seem to be aware of it. It doesn’t even seem to bother them that one day life will cease. Whatever measure of joy, no matter how fleeting they have in this world, it will cease apart from Jesus Christ. Now of course, there are some people in this world who, though they yet live, still have little joy. Some people who so tragically despair of life that they take their life. Two such people were Charles and Carolina Hovenden. I read their story recently.
Charles had MS and he suffered for 20 years with that. His body becoming increasingly paralyzed, and his wife Carolina had cancer and she was restricted to a wheelchair. As the years went by, their grief grew. Finally, they just despaired of life itself. The wine ran out and they took their lives. Authorities found them with their hands holding each other in death. There are, of course, other people like that in this world who have taken their own life when it seemed to them as though the wine had run out. Some people who didn’t really have any physical problems or physical sufferings, but people who had perhaps emotional sufferings or relational social problems.
One such person is named Joe Barnes, who took his life just recently in New York State. He jumped into a river, but Joe didn’t know how to swim. He did it on purpose. He wanted to die. He left a suicide note and the New York Times published that note in the newspaper. He said, “My name is Joe Barnes. I have no accomplishments, no friends, no relatives. I have no hope.” There are people like that in the world. You see, the wine just ran out. There are some people who seemingly have everything going for them, and yet there is no joy and there is no life.
One such person was named Robert Young. Now you’ve all heard of Robert Young the actor, but this was Robert Young the railroad tycoon. He was chairman of the board of the New York Central Railroad. According to Time Magazine, he was one of the most powerful men in the whole railroad industry. According to Time Magazine, this man Robert Young had everything this world has to offer. He had wealth and he had power, and he had glittering friends, including the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. He had palatial homes in Newport and in the Palm Desert and in many other parts of the world. Yet, something was wrong because when Robert Young turned 60 years of age, he took his own life. No one knows why. Perhaps he just didn’t want to grow older or maybe his power was waning. But the wine ran out.
We’re told by the World Health Organization that in the decade of the 1970’s, 50 million people in this world attempted suicide, 50 million people. In the last 20 years more than 1,500 books have been written on the subject of suicide because you see, for millions of people, the wine just runs out. The tragic truth is that for millions and perhaps billions of additional people who would never attempt suicide, there is still an absence of joy and of life itself. But there is a message of hope in the Bible. A message of sure hope. Our second teaching this morning is this: Jesus Christ is the winemaker. He is the source of life abundant, and He is the source of joy. And He has said, “I have come that you might have life and that you might have it abundantly.”
There were six stone jars, each jar containing 20 to 30 gallons. The Bible tells us that these stone jars had been set aside. They were used for Jewish ceremonial washings. They had been set aside for the Jewish rights of purification. These six stone jars represented the old covenant, the Old Testament law, and the number six in Hebrew symbolism was the number of imperfection. So perhaps, perhaps they represented the imperfections of the old covenant and the Old Testament law. But you see, Jesus Christ took what was imperfect and He made it wonderful. He transformed that water into wine, abundant wine, symbolic of the new covenant, which He had come to offer. A new covenant that is the very source of life and the source of joy. He offers that to each and every one of us who are here today. He alone offers victory over death, meaning and purpose and joy in the midst of life.
There’s a man who is known to all of you. He is one quarter Cherokee Indian. He is internationally perhaps the most famous folk and country singer in the world. He hit the big time in 1956 when he released a song called “I Walk the Line.” He has set attendance records from Nashville, Tennessee, to London’s Palladium. In his rise to power, however, he found in his rise to prominence that he discovered more than fame and fortune. He also discovered suffering, emptiness, and tragedy. As the years passed, he had more and more gold records, but he also had more and more emptiness, more and more despair. Somehow, the world just didn’t seem to have the answer. He was first arrested in 1965, and incredibly, they found more than 1,000 pills in his pockets. You see, he had to take pep pills in order to get up for concerts anymore, and he had become addicted to amphetamines, tragically addicted, and his body was beginning to waste away. He had dwindled from 200 pounds to 140 pounds, and his soul and spirit were dying, and he was thinking of taking his life. The wine had run out.
But then one day on the 8th of May in the year 1971, he went into a little church in his hometown. A minister was speaking. At the conclusion of the sermon, the minister gave an invitation for anyone to come forward who would like to receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. So it was that at that time and in that place, Johnny Cash got out of the pew and he went down to the wooden altar rail and he said, “Lord Jesus Christ come into my heart.” He gave his life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. He met the winemaker. That was 16 years ago. Johnny Cash has continued to have problems from time to time, but he testifies that his life has never been the same since that time, because whenever the wine seems to be running low he knows where to go. Whenever there’s an absence of life or joy or perhaps some sense of failure, some despair, he knows where to go. He goes to the feet of the Son of God, the foot of the cross, and he presents his life anew to Jesus Christ, the winemaker.
Very few of you have ever heard of Jacob DeShazer. Jacob DeShazer was an American military man in World War II. He flew among Jimmy Doolittle’s Raiders over Japan in World War II, and his plane was shot down. As his plane was shot down, Jacob DeShazer bailed out of the plane, parachuted to the earth, and there he was picked up at the Japanese. He was thrown into a prison camp. Life was miserable in that prison camp. Jacob DeShazer was an atheist. He didn’t believe God even existed. He didn’t want to have anything to do with God. But in that prison camp, he began for the first time in his life to truly despair.
The weeks passed, the months passed, the years passed, and he began to fall into a deeper and deeper depression and a deeper and deeper sense of hopelessness. Life had no meaning, and the wine was running out. He didn’t even know where to look for hope. But of course, he’d heard of a Bible. He’d never read the Bible. There was no Bible in the prison camp. But he decided to ask one of the Japanese guards one day if he could get him a Bible. The guard just laughed. But a few weeks later, the guard came back and Jacob DeShazer does not understand how or why, but this guard gave him a Bible. He said, “I’ll let you have this Bible for three weeks and then I want it back.” So Jacob DeShazer began to read the Bible, and during that three week period, a miracle happened. He was transformed from water to wine, bitter water to sweet wine. He met the winemaker and he gave his heart and life to Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. At the conclusion of World War II, he was released from that prison camp. In 1948, he returned to Japan with his new wife and a little infant child. He returned to Japan as a missionary, his life transformed by the power of Christ.
Perhaps you don’t know Christ today. Perhaps your life is nothing but water. You’ve never had that sense of passing from death to life, and you don’t have the confidence of eternal life, and you don’t know you’re going to heaven. If that’s true, then God has a message for you. There’s one source of eternal life, one source of purpose in this life, and that source is in His Son, Jesus Christ. Perhaps you’re already a Christian, but you still have times when you feel like the wine is running out. Maybe you’re in the midst of some sense of despondency, some measure of despondency, and you want help. Jesus Christ wants you to know that He’s the winemaker.
You might be in a marriage where you don’t love your wife like once you did, or maybe you don’t love your husband like once you did, and you feel like the wine is run out and it’s all over. But Jesus Christ wants you to know that He’s able to turn the water of your marriage into wine. I’ve seen him do it countless times, and the lives of men and women who are willing to trust their marriage to Him and give their marriage to Him and say, “Lord Jesus, work a miracle here. We commit ourselves anew to each other and to you.” Because He’s the winemaker and He can rekindle that love. You might be in the midst of some other kind of suffering. It might be financial, could be health-related, medical, could be relational. But in any case, you see, Jesus wants you to know He’s the winemaker.
I’m sure the children of Israel felt like the wine had run out when they came to the Red Sea. I have to believe that that woman who was hemorrhaging horribly with blood, who reached out her hand in a crowded street in Israel and touched the hem of the garment of the Son of God, surely she was thinking the wine was running out. The little man who climbed a sycamore tree in Jericho, the wine must have been running out. He just wanted a glimpse of the Son of God. Mary and Martha, at the tomb of their brother Lazarus. But you see, because they turned to Jesus Christ, they found their water turned to wine. He’s the winemaker.
Well, lastly, thirdly, and finally, we have this message from this miracle. You have a part to play. Apart from Christ, the wine runs out. Jesus Christ is the winemaker, but you have a part to play. You see, this miracle was not wrought apart from the faith of Mary who brought the problem to the Son of God, her own Son in the flesh. This miracle was not wrought apart from her faith as she said to the servants, “Whatever He tells you to do, do it.” It was not wrought apart from the obedience of the servants. You have a part to play in every miracle God would do in your life.
You see, if you’re not a Christian, if you’ve never had your water turned to wine and you’ve never received eternal life, then the part that is yours is that part called faith. You must invite Jesus Christ to become the Lord and Savior of your life and commit your life to Him. Even if you are a Christian, but you’re in the midst of some circumstances that seem so depressing, some circumstances that seem so overwhelming, even if you’re a Christian, but you’re in the midst of some form of despair, God wants you to know that if by His Son you would change your water to wine, perhaps you need a change of attitude for the power of Christ to be released in your life.
Here’s a story. It’s a true story. With this we’ll close. The story of a woman named Mary Menefee. During World War II, she accompanied her husband, who was a military officer, to a small military base on the edge of a California desert. Mary Menefee didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to go because she knew it wouldn’t be much fun, and her husband had told her that. But she went out of duty and she accompanied her husband. She thought that it wasn’t going to be a very good time. She was wrong. It was an absolutely horrible time. She lived in a little shack there on the edge of the desert. The accommodations at the base were meager, to say the least, and it was so hot, 115 degrees in the shade. Day after day after day, no change. And the wind was everywhere, just blowing over the desert, sand, constantly in her hair. There was sand in their food and sand over everything. The days were long and the days were boring. She had no neighbors except for some Indians on a nearby Indian reservation, and they didn’t know English.
As the time went by, somehow she grew to just begrudge her husband who had taken her there. She knew he couldn’t help it, he was in the military, but still somehow she was angry at him. As the days went by, it seemed as though the wine just went out of her marriage. She wrote her mother and she said, “Mom, I’ve had enough. I’m leaving my husband.” Her mother wrote her back and told her that she loved her and said, “If you’d just be open to hear me for a little bit, I’d like to remind you of a couple of things. I’d like to remind you of the vow you made to your husband when first you were married. Even more importantly, I’d like to remind you of the vow you made to Jesus Christ when you were in junior high school at a camp when you asked Him to come into your life and be your Lord and Savior.”
Mary Menefee thought about that. She prayed about that and she committed her life to her marriage and to her Lord again. She resolved that she would stay. She prayed about it. She said, “Lord, but I hate it here.” She said, “Change my water into wine. I’m so miserable. The joy of my life has run out.” And it was as though the Lord spoke to her, and one verse of the Bible came alive for her. That verse of the Bible is that verse that says, “Give thanks in all circumstances for this as the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” It was as though Jesus Christ was saying to her, “If you’ll obey that verse, if you’ll seek to the best of your ability to give thanks in all circumstances, I will change your water into wine.”
So, she began to do that. She began to make friends with some of the Indians. She took classes from the Indians in weaving and pottery. She began to study their culture and their history, and she grew to love them. She began to share Jesus Christ with them. Then, she began to study the desert, and a whole transformation took place. She had viewed the desert as a barren, desolate, miserable place, but suddenly it became a vast expanse of beauty, beauty unique in this world. She began to study the yucca Joshua trees. She found shells in the desert from a long, long time ago when the desert had been an ocean floor. Mary Menefee actually wrote a book about the wonders of the desert.
You see, her life had been transformed from water to wine. How did that happen? What changed? The desert didn’t change. Her husband didn’t change. The military didn’t change. Mary Menefee changed by the power of Christ who changes water to wine. But you see, she had a part to play. She had to resolve that she would indeed seek to give thanks in all circumstances. So sometimes the wine runs out. Jesus Christ is the winemaker. If you’re not a Christian, there’s only one source of life abundant and life eternal, and that source is Jesus Christ. He invites you to receive Him today as Lord and Savior of life. If you are a Christian, He would challenge you anew to an attitude that reflects His will, giving thanks in all circumstances. If you do, He says, “I’ll change your water into wine.” Let’s close with a word of prayer.