Forget the wine. . .

Long before I became a Christian, I was married to an alcoholic. Since someone had to drive home, I decided that I would not drink. Besides, the only time I did, I remember not liking the feeling that I was out of control.

I soon found out that non-drinkers are targets. At parties, the host would ask what I’d like to drink, and when I asked for a soda or juice, sometimes they’d slip a little gin in it thinking I wouldn’t notice. I’d go for lunch with a group of friends, and the pressure to have a drink with them was insane. For me, it became a game. What lengths would they go to in their efforts!

My mother drank a little wine at Christmas time. My father didn’t drink at all. He had a brother who was addicted, and that was enough to keep him from touching the stuff. Why I picked and married a drinker, I don’t know.

The Bible does not forbid drinking, but does tell God’s people to avoid drunkenness. Most people don’t know that the wine of those days came in various strengths and the everyday stuff was well-watered down and much safer than the usual water supply, but “strong drink” had the same effect on people as it does today.

Another little-known bit about wine is that drunken orgies were common during many pagan worship ceremonies. These were supposed to induce an ecstatic communion with the gods being worshiped. The New Testament calls that wine “the cup of demons.” So for the people of faith, getting drunk had a double stigma. They were not to be controlled by booze or identify themselves with pagan worship.

In Ephesians 5, Paul writes to the Christians in that city telling them to make the most of their time on earth, walking in wisdom. He says, “Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is, and do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit . . . .”

Dissipation refers to over-indulgence in sensual pleasures. Some Bible versions use debauchery, meaning the same thing. In other words, any so-called worship induced by wine was sensual, sinful indulgence.

Christian worship is not anything like that. Paul goes on to describe it. “. . . be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.”

When I read this, I think, worship is gracious, joyful people who love God and one another with thankful hearts and a deep willingness to serve each other’s needs. This is what we should be like when we gather together in worship—yet I’m well aware that doing it requires being filled with the Spirit.

The passage continues. It says “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord . . . . Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her . . . . Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right . . . . And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.”

God intends that spirit-filled living goes beyond worship to permeate daily family life. Marriage and raising children is a holy sacrament with deeply spiritual significance. However, obeying this requires being filled with the Spirit.

Paul doesn’t stop there. He goes on to address bondservants, the equivalent of employees today, and says, “ . . . be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ . . . doing the will of God from the heart.”

When I hear people talk about their work and their attitude toward their boss, I know that obedience to this command also requires being filled with the Spirit.

Paul adds one more; the employers also need Him. He tells them “And you, masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that our own Master also is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.”

Spirit-filled living seems a lot easier in church. When I’m with others who believe, our sense of God and our worship is mutually supported. We encourage one another by having a like-minded attitude and a unified purpose in being there.

But the Bible is clear; if I am going to please God, then I must be filled with the Spirit—not just in church, but in ordinary, everyday situations, like when my husband asks me to run an errand when I’m busy, or when someone in my family mocks my faith, or when I edit someone’s book, or serve on a committee, or am in charge of a group effort. Wine certainly won’t give me what I need.

Family life, work, all relationships and activities can be challenging. Maybe the reason so many people are “driven to drink” by their personal challenges is that they have no idea of the alternative offered by Jesus Christ.