Your eyes shall behold strange women, and your heart shall utter perverse things.
Yea, you shall be as he that lies down in the midst of the sea, or as he that lies upon the top of a mast.
They have stricken me, shall you say, and I was not sick; they have beaten me, and I felt it not: when shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.
Drunkards do not produce godly fruit. They may write screenplays and great literature for the brave cities of men, but their thinking is twisted, nihilistic, depressed, and destructive. Most of the intellectuals of the last few centuries insisted that they could not have written the stuff they wrote without drinking copious amounts of alcohol in the process. This may be true, as their literature is a reflection of their lives. Most of these men lived in a way that was consistent with their writings, and then they ended their lives as Ernest Hemingway and Hunter S. Thompson did—by suicide.
The drunk gives up his family relationships for a strange woman, but he cannot feel what he is doing. With his judgment impaired while under the influence of alcohol, he runs his car over a cliff. After six months of recovery in the hospital, he emerges, only to return to the bottle. Drunkenness is a form of escape—like a sleep state—and herein lies the secret to its lure. By nature, men are running away from God. As they run, they must run from reality because reality is inescapably revelatory of God. Just as Adam and Eve hid from God in the garden, men will hide behind their drunken states, their fantasy novels, their electronic games, and an endless array of motion pictures. A man in this state doesn’t feel the pangs of guilt when he is under the influence of alcohol. Of course, he isn’t worshiping the true and living God in gratitude as he takes his fifteenth glass of booze, but he doesn’t have to worry about this violation of the first commandment because his drunkenness closes off his ears to the cries of his conscience. He cannot feel the emotional pain of losing his family relationships, the pangs of guilt, or the physical pain sustained by his accidents while under the influence of alcohol, so he has the best of all worlds! He can sin without guilt, hurt his body without suffering pain, and destroy his relationships without emotional repercussions. But one day he will awake to face reality as never before. The time will come when he will never be able to hide again from all the physical pain, emotional agony, and every imaginable spiritual torment. Unspeakably sad will be that day when he comes face to face with reality, and the most real experience of his life will occur when the Son of God says to him, “Depart from me, you cursed, you worker of iniquity.” As sure as God is real, as the Lord lives, and as He is ever true to His absolutely just character, He will judge that man “to his face” (Deut. 5). On that day there will be no more whiskey, no more heroin, and no more escape ramps from the highway of reality as that man is carried into the flames of eternal fire.
But there is a refuge to be found from such a miserable end! For those who have ears to hear, there is hope if they will face the reality of God and His holy justice, of their sin, of Christ and His bloody atonement, and the reality of God’s grace. Granted, these are serious realities. People have a hard time accepting the reality of their sin and guilt and the painful consequences. But the alternative is fearful, unmentionable, and not even worth considering. So let us understand the fact that we are sinners who live in a sinful, fallen world. Then, let us receive the only possible solution to this terrible dilemma—God’s salvation in His Son, Jesus Christ. Billions of others will try to escape these realities through alcohol and other opiates, and they will die in their sins. In this horrible predicament, how will we face these realities? Will we accept the only possible solution in this sin-cursed world? It is a solution that will repair family relationships, atone for our guilt, heal our diseases, and cure death with a resurrection. It is a grand solution! The brightest men of our generation solved their problems by intoxication and suicide, and these are not solutions at all. For us, the only possible remedy is God’s solution in the Lord Jesus Christ.
1. What happens to a drunk’s capacity to feel pain (both emotional and physical)?
2. Why do men want to escape into a dream-like state instead of facing reality?
3. Do you ever want to escape into the pretend worlds of novels, electronic games, motion pictures, or drunkenness? Instead of trying to escape reality, what should you do? How will you face the pain and effects of sin in this world?