Turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Proverbs, Proverbs chapter 20, verse 1, one of a number of Proverbs that deal with alcohol, but Proverbs chapter 20, verse 1, hear the word of the Lord. Wine is a mocker and beer a browler. Whoever is led astray by them is not wise. What God has made good, we as sinful humanity always find ways to abuse. Alcohol and the Christian. What is the relationship? In more recent church history, the modern church, how Christians are to relate to alcohol has often been a contentious issue. And that might be a little bit of an understatement. There has often been opposition to alcohol. And in our own history as a nation, it led to a time when alcohol was made illegal during Prohibition earlier in the 1900s. And you can still find denominations that still find that as one purpose they seek after, still calling for it to again be made illegal. And in our smaller reform circles, it's also an issue we deal with. Many of you, I hope, remember Pastor Matthew Chiangi. He was a good friend of mine, a good friend of the congregation here as he studied at Westminster. And we discussed these issues because in the reformed church in Nigeria, the NKST, they very much frown on alcohol use. They seek to discourage it. And yet they're having an issue because one of the tribes that they're evangelizing, it's very much embedded in the culture. And so they've made exceptions for those in that tribe. But those of you who are familiar with the Reformed Church in Mexico or the Reformed Church in Korea. Both of those very much take hard stances or at least somewhat hard stances against alcohol. And I was familiar with the Reformed Presbyterian Church and they for a number of years, as they set a witness, they made all of their clergy, all of the pastors take an oath of abstinence of alcohol. So there's been quite a few different ways to approach it. But the question of the alcohol in a Christian, it's not just an issue for the church as a whole, right? It's an issue for each and every one of us. We must deal with it. We must deal with it in our lives. We make choices on how we relate to it. We seek to train our children on how they ought to deal with it. We come in contact with it with our co-workers, with our friends, with even our extended family. And it is definitely in the culture all around us. And so we ought to pay close attention to what God's Word tells us about alcohol, so that we may be wise. And so we are going to look at this proverb, this proverb dealing with it. And as with many proverbs, it's very short, very pithy. And so we need to unpack it, look at it closely. But also as we do that, we need to read it in light of the rest of the Bible. The rest of what the Bible teaches about alcohol. Because we can too easily make this proverb say something that it's not saying. And so we need to know what it is saying and what it's not saying. And as we go through, we'll look carefully at some of the various words and phrases used and discuss whether the NIV has the best translation for everything. But it's sometimes good for us to hear a new translation because we're familiar with what we've seen before. And so here's an elaborative translation, a little bit more filled out of what we'll go through, what this proverb is telling us. Wine is a pompous windbag. Beer is an unruly loudmouth. All who cannot walk straight because of them will not become wise. Now, as we start out, we first need to ask, wine and beer, that's what it mentions. Is this the wine and beer that we know of in our day? That's often a debated topic. What is it referring to? And for wine, yes it is. It was grape wine. It was the fermented juice of grapes. And if you take grapes, you squeeze them, you wait 40 days, it turns into wine. It's a natural process that occurs that's been a technology used throughout the history of man. It's only in our modern day that grape juice can stay as grape juice. With pasteurization, we now have the option between wine and grape juice. Otherwise, all grape juice naturally turns into wine. And so wine, it's the wine we know of. And it's around 10 to 12 percent alcohol content. And so it's familiar to what we have in our day. Now, the word translated as beer, it's a little more questionable. If you perhaps have the ESV translation, you'll notice that it translated it as strong drink. And that's how many translations have gone. I believe that translation is unhelpful because in the ancient times there really was nothing stronger than wine as far as alcohol content. All of the stronger alcohol we have nowadays is made by distilling, something we don't see or we don't have evidence for. And so most likely the word used there did refer to beer. Though we do find evidence that it might have been also a generic term. So if you think back, when a Coke meant not just a Coke, but any soda. And so when you say, I want a Coke, then they say, what soda do you, you know, what one do you want? Oh, I want Mountain Dew or Dr. Pepper, right? So also with beer, it referred to beer, but it could also be anything else alcoholic. But beer was the universal drink back in ancient times. Not every country could grow grapes like Israel. And so everybody drank beer. Not everybody drank wine. Now, the beer that they had was a little different. It was slightly less alcoholic, probably. Probably only 2% to 3% versus our modern beers are more like 4% to 6%. But the biggest change is they didn't use hops. If you know how they make beer, hops is one ingredient and it gives it a distinctive taste. And without it, beer would be much sweeter than it is. And so we find reference to sweet beer in the ancient world. So, did they have alcohol? Yes, they had alcohol. Wine, like we know, beer, somewhat similar, pretty similar. Well, in Israel, where do we find it? Most every time we see a meal described, it includes wine. You think of Abraham, after he defeated the coalition of kings and saved his nephew Lot. Melchizedek comes and he brings a feast for him and it includes wine in there. Or Isaac, he tells Esau to go kill some game for him and bring it back and prepare it. And Jacob deceives him, but in that meal there's wine. And it was a normal provision for a journey. When you went out on a journey, you had your wineskins that you took with you. It was a normal part of preparations for the journey. Beer in the Old Testament isn't mentioned as much, as we said, but it was this normal drink we see elsewhere. And so most think it probably was a normal drink in Israel also. But it's not only used regularly, it's also described as a blessing, as a provision from God. We read in Deuteronomy 7 verse 13, as it describes the promised land, It says He will love you, bless you, multiply you. He will also increase the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, your grain, your wine, and your oil, the produces of the ground, the increase of your herds and the young of your flocks in the land that He swore to your fathers to give you. And also Psalm 104, verses 13 through 15, as again as it talks about God's provision. It says, he waters the mountains from his upper chambers. The earth is satisfied by the fruit of his work. He makes grass grow for the cattle and plants for man to cultivate, bringing forth food from the earth, wine that gladdens the heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread that sustains his heart. And even in the sacrificial system, right, of what Israel was supposed to bring, Wine was part of the daily offerings that they brought to the altar. And if we turn to the prophets and they look to the future, to God's restoration, it again plays into the imagery. So Isaiah 55, 1, Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come and eat. Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Or Amos 9.14, I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild ruined cities and inhabit them. They shall plant vineyards and drink their wine, and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit. So as we approach our text this morning, we must be perfectly clear that the Bible speaks of alcohol as good, as a provision, a gift from God. And yet, the Bible is also very clear that it can be abused. And it gives us great illustrations of that. The first mention of wine in the Old Testament is when Noah, after the flood, planted a vineyard and became drunk after he made it into wine. We read a little bit later how Lot's daughters, they used wine to get their father drunk so that they could go in and sleep with him. We know it was probably a problem in ancient Israel because Eli, in a time of turmoil during the judges, he sees Hannah come praying. Hannah praying devoutly for a son and he just suspects that she's drunk. So how many people came drunk to the tabernacle that he would think that? And the prophets, they inveigh against those who would abuse it. Isaiah 5 verse 11, Woe to those who rise early in the morning that they may run after beer, who tarry late into the evening as wine inflames them. Verse 22, woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and valiant men at mixing beer. And if we look in the Proverbs, we see not only the text we look at today, but we see other ones that tie the abuse of alcohol with poverty or they use it in parallel with prostitution, other things to run after. Or they talk about how it takes away understanding. And so those ruling should watch themselves, never judge with wine. And so we need to keep this in mind as we come to our text this morning. This portrayal of wine throughout the Old Testament, wine and beer, that it can be, it is a blessing, but a blessing that can be turned into a curse. And so as we read this text, we might be tempted right off to say, wine is a mocker, beer a browler. See, the one who's giving us this proverb, he's unmasking wine and beer for us. He's showing us their true character, what they're really like. But we've already seen the way the rest of the Bible speaks about this. So how are we to take the image that he has there? Well, we need to be careful. And as we approach a proverb, we need to treat it like a proverb. We too easily want to treat it like a law. A law comes to us and says, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. It makes that hard, fast line. But Proverbs, even though sometimes they sound to law like us, even though they're worded similarly like that, they aren't laws. They're instead depicting for us how actions lead to consequences, how the world often works. And an individual proverb will not tell us the whole story. We need to take it in light of everything else we know. We need to see it in light of a greater picture that we have. And a great example of that is in Proverbs 26. If you want to turn there. Proverbs 26, verses 4 and 5. There we find written, Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes. But which is it? Don't answer him or answer him. How are we to put this together? Well, as we think about it, as we reflect on it, not every fool is the same. Not every situation is the same. We need to know what can happen. That it is possible if we answer him according to his folly that we'll be like him. Or that if we don't answer him, then instead he'll think he's wise. And so we need to be discerning in a particular situation to know which it is. We need to know which of these will become true. What is this fool like? Is he one that I need to confront or should I not confront him? Because it won't do any good anyway. It will only harm me. And so that's the way Proverbs work. We bring them, we put them together. They go down deep into the way we look at and think about this world so that we can apply wisdom as we come to a situation. Another example would be Proverbs 10 verse 15. There it says, and you can turn over there, it gives us a truth about wealth. It says, the wealth of the rich is their fortified city, but poverty is the ruin of the poor. Now as we read that, it's very true in many contexts. Wealth is a blessing. Wealth can provide security in this world. It can be this fortified city. Poverty often exposes us, makes us weak. And yet this isn't all the book of Proverbs has to tell us about wealth. We find the abuse of wealth as we go through and look elsewhere in Proverbs. And so we need to put them all together. We need to see it in light of the whole teaching. So, as we come back to our text, Proverbs 20, wine is a mocker, beer a brawler. Why does the author here personify, right, make them as like they were persons? If it's not to show us what wine is always like, if it's not to show us what beer is always like, what is he doing? Well, here I think the second part of this verse helps us. Because in the second part, it's clear that we're talking about the person who's under the influence. The person who is abusing wine or abusing beer. The one who can't walk straight. And so, when it says wine is a mocker, beer is a brawler, It's talking about the person who abuses wine, who abuses beer, what they are like. What will they make you into if you do not use them wisely? And as we look at these terms, mocker. What does it mean to be a mocker? Well, it can be translated often scoffer or scorner. And maybe you noticed in Psalm 1 when we sang there, we're not to sit in scorner's seats. It's the same word. And it's used throughout the book of Proverbs in parallel with wicked men, with sinners, with fools. Proverbs 1.22, How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers, mockers, delight in their scoffing? And fools hate knowledge. Proverbs 21, 24, scoffer is the name of the arrogant, haughty man who acts with arrogant pride. And so mockers, scoffers, they don't take rebuke. They don't take correction. They're not teachable. They'll do what they want. And this is a pretty apt description of somebody who's been drinking too much. That you can't teach them much of anything. Not everybody acts this way, but many do. It takes away your common sense. It takes away any reason for you to listen to other people. As one country song says, it makes you feel ten feet tall and bulletproof. And so that's what it's portraying here. Wine, the abuse of wine, it will make you into this mocker. Or at least that's one way it affects people. What about a brawler? Well, we see brawl in there, fighting. It's not as common of a term. But where we do find it, it is often about something loud. Something unruly. A crowd can be this. Raging waters. And more closely in Proverbs, we find it about the adulterous woman. Proverbs 7, verse 11. She is loud and wayward. Her feet do not stay at home. Now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait. And also of woman folly. Proverbs 9, verse 13. The woman folly is loud. She is undisciplined and without knowledge. And so in both of these places, the real emphasis is on their being turbulent, unruly. They both lack discipline. They lack self-control. And thus, they're loud in, we could say, a variety of senses. And that fits with what we see of abusers of beer. They're often loud, unruly, turbulent. It's all about losing inhibition, throwing it off. Now, it's important to emphasize that the proverb isn't saying all who drink wine and beer are arrogant and loud. Instead, it's really characterizing those who abuse it. This is what can happen. This is what it can lead to. And as we mentioned, this is made, I would say, more clear in the second half of this verse. Those who are in a wrong relationship with their drink. Now, the second half there, in the NIV, it has, whoever is led astray by them is not wise. And I think the imagery is more powerful. This is a way to translate what we have there, but there's another way to translate it that gets at this imagery better. That it's not just straying error, but the term can also be for one to lose their ability to walk straight, to stagger, to stumble. And thus, it really is, again, an image of somebody who's drunk, who's stumbling around, who can't stay on the straight line. And we see that elsewhere. Isaiah 28 uses it that way. And these also stagger from wine and reel from beer. Priests and prophets stagger from beer and are befuddled by wine. They reel from beer. They stagger when seeing visions. They stumble when rendering decisions. But it's at least interesting to note, in the book of Proverbs, this staggering, this stumbling, this not being able to walk straight, it isn't always a bad thing. There's one thing that should make you stagger, that should make you stumble. It's your wife, not the adulteress. Proverbs 5 says that. Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth. A lovely deer, a graceful doe, let her breasts fill you at all times with delight. Stagger always because of her love. Why should you stagger, my son, because of a forbidden woman and embrace the bosom of an adulteress? But this staggering, it's really used, I would say, doubly here in this image. It's not only the physical staggering that drunkenness can bring, but it also is that image of staggering in the ethical life. Not walking as you should in your life before God. We get this double play involved, physical and ethical stumblings. And so the focus here is, it's not just on drunkenness, but it's really on that effect as it takes away your abilities, as it puts you under its power. Your wife is supposed to knock you off your feet. but not your wine. And so the proverb concludes that if you are thus controlled by wine, by beer, you will not become wise. This is again where I think another translation does a little better than the NIV. The NIV has whoever is led astray by them is not wise. Another translation says, He who is muddled by them will not grow wise. It's looking to something in the future. This proverb, it's not just focusing on whether staggering around in drunkenness is wise. I think we can agree that it's not. But it's really focusing on something more serious. It's how this as a lifestyle removes your ability to become wise. Being under the control of wine and beer removes your ability to gain wisdom. And thus, the focus of this proverb isn't just on one night. One night of folly, one night of drunkenness. Oh, we could say it falls within it. But it's really focusing on a life that is controlled by alcohol. Someone who is controlled by alcohol, they are really staggering all the time. Not just when they're intoxicated. It's not just when you're really drunk that it affects you. It affects all of their life. It destroys their life. Peace. By peace. And if you struggle with alcohol, you know that. You know what I'm talking about. That your dependence on this grows more and more. That every bit of your life begins to be affected by it. It controls you. It destroys you bit by bit. It affects your family. Affects your work. Affects your friends. Everybody knows when mom or dad have been drinking or when their friend or classmate or co-worker has been under the influence. But I would argue that it's not even those who get drunk all the time that there are other ways to abuse alcohol. It can control our moods. Do we need it to get through the day? Do you use it to get away from responsibilities? Do you use it to escape from reality? Is it stealing your time? Is it stealing your talents? Those that belong to God. And so, as we come to this verse, if you are struggling with alcohol, this proverb comes as a rebuke. This proverb calls you to see what you're doing. To look at it. To call sin, sin. To recognize that you're taking a good thing of God and abusing it. But it calls you not to then go and fix yourself. This is God's Word. Part of His Bible. It calls you to turn in repentance and faith. To return, repent and believe, but also seek help. Jesus came to save sinners. Sinners like the mocker. Sinners like the brawler. He came to save sinners like you and me. He came that we might have forgiveness from this. To make us right with God. He also came to transform us through His Spirit. That His Spirit might work in us so that each and every day we are more and more conformed to His law, to what is wise. And so you're called to repent, to believe, and to seek help. God has given us a church, a body, in which we can turn to each other in our weakness, in our failings. Speak to your friends. Speak to the elders. Speak to the pastors. Turn to them so that we can help. So that we can strengthen one another in our weakness. You might think you're too deep. Your sin's too much to overcome. But Jesus says no. He doesn't say, come to me those who are partially clean. Come to me those who have made a good start. It's come. All. All sinners come. And change won't be easy. It never is. It takes a lifetime. And we don't finish it in this lifetime. But to turn, to repent, to believe, to look for help and call out for help, it doesn't show weakness. It shows wisdom to do that. But there's many of you out there, I'm sure, who have not had a struggle with alcohol. And so you might be saying, so what? What's the application here for me? Well, I'll remind you, the book of Proverbs, it's very much said as a father telling his son. And the father's not telling the son this because he was a drunk. He's telling this so that he won't become a drunk. So that he'll know how to properly use alcohol, but know how it can be abused and keep that ever before him. It's not written just to addicts. It's written for you and me. It was written for every Israelite and in one particular climactic way, it was written also for a special Israelite, our Lord Jesus Christ. He came into this world. He read God's Word. The Bible says he grew in wisdom. And so we see in his life, he came eating and drinking. He changed water into wine. He shared the cup of blessing with his disciples. And yet, he was never controlled by them. Instead, he always submitted to every word that came from the mouth of God. And so this comes to us as Christians, as those who are redeemed, as those who have been bought by the blood of Christ, but those who are called to be like Christ, to follow His example, to know that we're being conformed to His image. And so in this life, as we go along, as we seek out of thankfulness, out of gratitude to serve and obey our God, we ignore this warning at our own peril. The proverb, it tells us of this ever-present danger that confronts us as we are still sinful creatures, still sinful people, as we still have that cling to us. We need to know about this as we think of our relationship between alcohol and the Christian. And we must not distort this warning. It's not saying that the dangers are so great that everybody should avoid it. That's found nowhere here or in any other text in the Old Testament. But it is calling on each and every individual to examine themselves in every situation so that he who drinks, drinks for the Lord and he who abstains, abstains for the Lord. And as we come to it, sometimes we'd like it to be law. That would be easier. Thou shalt only drink one beer. Then we can check it off and we know whether we've done it or not. But most of life doesn't work that way. I told my son I was going to use him as an example. We need law when we're young. And often we as parents, right, we're the ones that put that on there. And so I know my son Caleb, he would probably play video games from dawn until dusk or until his eyes fell out, whichever came first. He doesn't have that restraint, right? So I have, as a parent, that's my responsibility. I'm forming him in that. I set the times. I set when he can do it and how long he can do it. But as he grows, I need to teach him how it is to manage time, to know how to do that, because he'll be on his own someday. And I'm on my own. Nobody tells me how many hours I can play video games. Right? Well, maybe my wife. But, right, we need to set those limits. We need to discern that. We need to know what are our boundaries? What are our weaknesses? Where do we struggle? Where do we sometimes fail? And we do that with so many things. Video games, TV, desserts, everything else in our life. Right? That's part of being human. And so, we know that alcohol is good. The Bible teaches that. But yet, we know it can be abused. How do we negotiate our path? And that is where we learn, we grow in our wisdom. But we keep the warning before us as we constantly check ourselves, look at ourselves. And maybe we need help. And so, we call friends to hold us accountable in this or that. so that we don't abuse it. We know that this word comes to us from our Father who loves us. Our Father who wants us to live full, happy lives, to avoid the miseries that can come about as we turn blessings into curses. And I think one other thing that's such a stern warning as this, that we find here in Proverbs, that it should cause us to be very thoughtful, even as we enjoy or use alcohol, that we're very thoughtful in how we do it, in how it can be perceived, how the jokes we say, or other ways we talk about it, how they might be distorted. And as you look through Proverbs, Probably the thing that alcohol is most compared to, has a parallel with, is sexual sins. And I think most of the time we are very thoughtful about that. We don't put ourselves in situations where it might be misinterpreted. We watch what we do. We watch what we say, the purity of our language. We don't say crude jokes to make light of those sins. And I think we need to often think of alcohol in those same ways. That we need to be careful with our language. To not give any the impression of looseness. To not help, to not have a brother or sister who's weaker, who struggles with that. To not treat them as weaker. To not chide one another and cause each other to sin. And so, as we think of alcohol and the Christian, we come to this as Christians. Come to this as those who claim Jesus Christ as our Savior. Jesus Christ, who it says is our wisdom in the New Testament. And we pray that we will be wise as he is, as we approach each and every thing that encounters us in this life. This life full of so many good things. So many good things. But so many things that can be abused and distorted by sin.