Whether you drink alcoholic beverages or not is not an issue of whether you’re going to be in heaven. Now, if I’m wrong, I feel sorry for those of you who are drinking alcoholic beverages. But I do not believe I’m wrong.
I believe the gospel is clear. We’re saved by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the fact that He arose from the dead. And I’m going to be in heaven because I believe in Him, regardless of whether I drink alcoholic beverages or not.
This is Hope for Today with David Hocking. Imagine a wedding in Cana, where the joy of celebration is threatened by a shortage of wine. In this culture and time, that was a problem.
Well, enter Jesus performing his very first miracle, turning water into wine. You know, this isn’t merely a display of divine power, it is that. It’s also a profound revelation of his glory and the inauguration of his public ministry.
This miracle transforms the mundane into the miraculous and unveils the depth of his mission, setting the stage for the fulfillment of his redemptive work.
We’ll get back into the passage in just a moment. Stay with us. First, though, I want to invite you to go to davidhocking.org to find out all about hope for today’s outreach to africa called Grace Bible Mission.
You got to see this. Log on to davidhocking.org. Scroll down a bit and you’ll see the link.
When you get there, you’ll be able to read about the 80 Bible churches we’ve launched through Grace Bible Mission, the seminary there, the Low Power FM radio station, and the Christian Medical Clinic. And we give God all the glory for his work through Grace Bible Mission. There’s photos there for you to look at and to see the smiling faces of the students and the workers.
I think you’ll enjoy taking a look. Again, Grace Bible Mission at davidhocking.org. Let’s turn back to the Gospel of John, Chapter 2, Verses 1 through 12.
And here’s David with Day 2 of his message, Water to Wine.
Lordship demands obedience. Whatever he says to you, do it. That could be the motto of our Christian life.
Whatever he says to me, I’m going to do it. What a testimony. Well, the third thing that was revealed.
First, we mentioned the marriage in Cana that revealed the strong commitment of our Lord to public weddings. Secondly, we noticed that the mother of Jesus revealed the simple confidence we should all have in the ability of Jesus Christ, her son, our Savior. Number three, the method of Jesus revealed the supernatural circumstances of this miracle.
This is no sleight of hand. This is no trick deal, as a lot of people accuse, who do not believe the Bible. Look at verse six carefully.
I bring before you two things that clearly show that Jesus was protecting the possibility of anyone misunderstanding the miraculous nature of what he did. One would be the size of the water pots he used. Verse six, they were water pots of what?
What does it say? They were made of what? Stone.
According to the manner of purification of the Jews, I have seen these ceremonial cleansing pots from ancient times that were used, and let me tell you something, I’ve moved even one that was empty. They’re very heavy. I got it on the side and was able to twist it, to turn it, so I could do it.
But if you put water in it, you’re not moving it. Twenty to thirty gallons, the Greek uses the term only in this text, nowhere else in the Bible, and it’s often translated measure, two or three measures. One of those measuring units is eight to nine gallons of water.
That’s why it says about twenty to thirty gallons in a lot of English texts. That’s exactly right. They vary in size, but they’re all approximately the same size.
Twenty or thirty gallons of water in a pot, no one person’s going to move. Jesus made sure by saying, fill it up to the brim. So everybody would know, especially the servants, that it was full and nobody’s going to move that pot.
Secondly, you have the servants involved in it. How clever, in a sense, in a godly, reverential sense, how clever of the Lord to do this. Neither he nor his disciples touched it.
Didn’t do anything. The servants did. It was Mary who said to the servants what she did in verse 5.
It’s the servants in verse 7 who filled them up to the brim. And in verse 8, it’s the servants who took some of the water out, presumably in a drawing cup, and took it to the master of the feast. And by the way, the Bible doesn’t say when the water was changed to the wine.
Was it changed to the wine in the water pots, on the way there, or after he tasted it in his mouth? I want to argue that it was in the water pots. Why?
Why mention their size if it wasn’t so? The point of the Bible mentioning the size of the water pots is that the entire thing changed to wine. An absolute miracle.
And the method of Jesus revealed the supernatural circumstances of this miracle. And I say, glory be to God, how about you? It happened, folks.
He who flung the worlds into existence had no problem changing water to wine. The Bible says in John 1, 17, the law came by Moses. The first miracle of Moses was changing water to blood.
The first miracle of Jesus Christ, because grace and truth came by Jesus Christ, was changing the water to wine. The water used in purification under the Old Testament law. Listen to me carefully.
Jesus himself teaches in the Gospels about the new wine that he would bring, that was the gospel of grace in Jesus Christ. Is it not significant that he would take the water of purification used under the Old Testament law and change it into wine? Even in a symbolic gesture, he told people what he was going to do.
If any man be in Christ, he’s a new creation. Old things pass away and all things become new. A lot of us need to experience the new wine of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Fabulous illustration. When we look at John 2 and we examine what he did, we see that he safeguarded anybody accusing him of a little sleight of hand or trickery here. Number four as to what is revealed.
The master of the feast revealed the special content of the wine. Okay, all of you like a snort or two ever now and then, listen up. This and one other passage in the Bible are used by people constantly to argue that it’s okay to drink alcoholic beverages.
Now, let’s get something straight. Here, whether you drink alcoholic beverages or not is not an issue of whether you’re going to be in heaven. Everybody understand that?
Now, if I’m wrong, I feel sorry for those of you who are drinking alcoholic beverages. But I do not believe I’m wrong. I believe the gospel is clear.
We’re saved by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the fact that He arose from the dead. And I’m going to be in heaven because I believe in Him. And I’m going to be in heaven regardless of whether I drink alcoholic beverages or not.
Number two, drunkenness is always a sin in the Bible. There’s no exceptions. In the Old Testament and the New Testament, it is a sin to get drunk, intoxicated.
So don’t tell me the Bible wants you to get drunk.
You have no proof of that whatsoever. Number three, when we look at what the Master of the Feasts tasted, it says in verse 9, he tasted it and didn’t know where it came from. The servants did.
But he didn’t know. He calls the bridegroom and he said to him, every man at the beginning sets out what kind of wine. What does it say?
Good, best, what do you have in your translations? All those kinds of words. Every man at the beginning, he puts out the good stuff.
When the guests have well drunk, it doesn’t say they are drunk. It means when they’ve had several of those. By the way, the rabbis condemn drunkenness at weddings.
They are not drunk. It says after they have drunk a number of things. It doesn’t mean they are drunk.
Read the Bible carefully. But after you’ve had several glasses or cups of the wine, then you can bring out that which is inferior. But you kept the good wine until now, he said.
You reversed the order. All right, folks, here’s the issue. Is the good wine alcoholic?
Is it highly fermented or is it pure grape juice? That’s the issue. And that issue begins to affect a lot of things.
Well, I’m here to tell you that the following things are true about good wine. Number one, these things, regardless of your view, are true. That wine that is good wine is that which tastes delicious and is the taste of pure grape juice, according to ancient times.
I did not say it was pure grape juice, although that’s my view. I’m telling you that good wine in its taste, that’s why they call it good wine, tastes like good, pure grape juice. Remember the word for wine, oinos in Greek, refers to the grape before the juice comes out, refers to the juice that comes out of it when they drop it in a wine vat, and refers to the whole alcoholic processing all the way to the hard liquor stuff that should be thrown away and nobody tastes.
Oinos refers to all of it. So we have to decide which phase of the wine is under discussion here. All I can tell you is that good wine refers to the taste that is delicious of pure grape juice.
Good wine also is never mixed with any grains to make it more fermented and alcoholic. So I know that also. Whatever this good wine is, they haven’t put any grain into it to mix it and make it stronger.
Third, I also know that good or best wine is not old or highly fermented. As a matter of fact, did you know the Bible condemns highly fermented wine? Turn please to Proverbs chapter 20.
Proverbs chapter 20. Is everybody still having a good time? Amen?
I believe in total abstinence, and I do not believe the Bible commends drinking alcoholic beverages at all. You may disagree with me. God bless you.
We’re in the body of Christ, we’ll agree to disagree and still love each other. But I believe in total abstinence, and I believe it is impossible to prove that alcoholic beverages are the fermented wines of the Bible. First of all, in Proverbs 20 verse 1, it says, wine is a mocker, intoxicating drink arouses brawling, and whoever is led astray by it is not wise.
Now, I don’t want to call you stupid for drinking it, but the Bible does. Amen? Did you read that?
It says so. Now turn to chapter 23. In chapter 23 verse 29, is this ever vivid?
Please read it. It seems to me that there is an inconsistency in the body of Christ that we fool around with what we term as a legalistic question as to whether we should drink wine or not, when the fact is, we all know that alcohol is destroying our families and marriages in this country. God help us.
Now, if you don’t like what I’m saying, great. You go on your merry way, but people who care know what I’m talking about. And you want us to deal with people with broken homes and broken families and try to put them back together, and you tell me alcohol isn’t a problem?
God calls it a problem. In Proverbs 23, we read in verse 29, Who has woe? Who has sorrow?
Who has contentions or arguments? Who has complaints? Who has wounds without cause?
You don’t know why you’re abusive. Who has redness of eyes? Those who linger long at the wine, those who go in search of mixed wine.
Do not look on the wine when it is red. When it sparkles in the cup, when it swirls around smoothly. At the last, it bites like a serpent and stings like a viper.
Your eyes will see strange things. Your heart will utter perverse things. Yes, you’ll be like one who lies down in the midst of the sea, or like one who lies at the top of the mass, saying, they’ve struck me and I wasn’t hurt.
They’ve beaten me, but I didn’t feel it. When shall I awake that I may seek another drink? What a graphic description of an alcoholic.
My friends, God doesn’t want you to even look at wine that is mixed. And one thing we know about the good and best wine at the marriage of Cain of Galilee was not mixed at all. One other thing we know, rabbis insisted that at weddings as well as at Passover and all celebrations, wine, no matter what its stage, should always be mixed with three parts of water.
Three parts of water to wine at any stage could prevent any possibility of a fermentation problem, an alcoholic problem. Now whether you want to fight that or not, I don’t know, but don’t sit and argue they use straight wine. People say at communion services that we ought to have real wine, not grape juice.
And I refuse to do anything less. Well, you’re way off, way off, and I feel sorry for you. My dear friend, let me tell you something.
You ought not to have anything to do with alcoholic beverages in the name of compassion for the millions of people in this country that are being destroyed by it. God help us. And don’t use Jesus’ miracle to justify it.
Or Paul’s advice to Timothy when he said in 1 Timothy 5, 23, for your many stomachs and firmities, why don’t you take a little wine for your stomach’s sake? He is not referring to fermented wine. Every Jewish doctor knows, and so do other doctors here, that when you ferment, the alcoholic process goes on, the nutritional value of it is diminished.
Fermentation is a process of decay. What they still recommend in Israel for stomach problems is pure grape juice. It’s better for you because the nutritional value is still in the juice, and the fermentation hasn’t taken it out.
Friends, we need to use our head. The Bible gives us no sympathy, no encouragement for drinking alcoholic beverages. It warns us about them in Proverbs chapter 23 and others.
The master of the feast revealed the special content of good wine. Now here’s the punch line. I had to say all of that to get your attention in a way.
The punch line is that it was obviously a miracle to everybody who attended, because there’s no way they would have had enough time or enough hands available or enough quantity available to go out to the vineyards, get in the grapes, drop it on the vat, let the juice squeeze out in the pans, and pour enough in to fill 120 to 180 gallons of it. There is no way it would take you all week and lots of people working hard. Don’t you understand?
The reason it was best wine, it was good wine, and was pure grape juice is what astonished people and his disciples. They knew there could not have been a little exchange. It would have been impossible.
There’s no way it could have occurred. It had to be a miracle, and they knew it. Which brings me to the final thing that’s revealed in our story, and that is that the miracle of changing water to wine revealed the spiritual character of our Lord to his disciples.
They knew exactly what was taking place. In John 214, it says, 211 rather, it says, this beginning of signs, the word sign used 17 times in John, there’s a point behind the sign. John says in chapter 20, verse 30, many signs Jesus did, which are not recorded in this book, but the ones that are recorded, the ones that are written, he said, is to show that Jesus is the Messiah, the son of God, and in believing him, we’d have life through his name.
We read in verse 11, Jesus did this beginning of signs, his first miracle, in Cana of Galilee, insignificant spot, and manifested his glory. Look back at chapter 1, verse 14. The Bible calls Jesus the word of God, and the word that was God.
And in John 1, 14, it says, the word became flesh and dwelled among us, and we beheld his what? His glory. The glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
And now in chapter 2, verse 11, he manifested his glory. John said, we beheld it, we saw it, we were there. And here’s one of the first examples.
And it says his disciples believed in him. Look at verse 22. After he had risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this to them, and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had said.
Well, which is it? Did they become born again believers in John 2, 11, or was it after the resurrection? The night Jesus arose from the dead, Mark 16, 14 says, Jesus rebuked them for their hardness of heart and unbelief.
At the time of the cross, all the disciples forsook him and fled. When did the disciples become believers? Well, in the sense that we understand being born again and true believers, they were not saved until after the resurrection.
They didn’t receive the Spirit until after. But did they believe that he was the son of God and the Messiah here? Yes, absolutely.
You see, they didn’t understand everything. They didn’t know about the death and resurrection. And later when Jesus revealed it to them, they tried to stop him.
They wanted a Messiah to set up his kingdom and overthrow Rome. But they believed here by seeing the miracle that he was the one, and his disciples believed in him at this moment. They didn’t know everything as we know today.
They didn’t have all the information we have in the New Testament, but they saw his glory, and they believed in him. I wonder if we believe in him as they did. Do you believe by just reading the story of the water changed to wine, that he is the Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world?
Do you believe that only God could perform that kind of a miracle in front of those people? All those witnesses there that would see it, no doubt about it, he manifested his glory that he’s something other than anything we’ve ever seen. What a miracle was done that day.
And my friend, he who changed the water to wine could change you and turn your life upside down. You’re going one way, away from God, the way you want to go, and God’s power can turn you around and turn you straight towards the Lord. The Bible says if you’re in Christ, you’re a new creation.
Old things pass away and all things become new. We all need to be changed. From darkness to light, from death into life, we need to be changed by the one who can change water into wine.
That’s Bible Teacher and author David Hocking, and you’re listening to Hope for Today. We’ll have more from David in just a moment to close out today’s time with what will no doubt be, for many, a life-changing time of prayer. So stay with us.
First, though, Matt and I want to tell you about a great book by David. Matt?
As believers, it is imperative that we do not let the world rob us of our joy.
There’s so much in our world today, Matt, that is right there in our face. And if we aren’t careful, we can let it rob us of our joy. This is where your dad’s book Principles of Joy comes in.
Yeah, and this is four principles of joy. They’re detailed and discussed as revealed to Paul’s letter to the Church of Philippi.
Yeah, and the book Principles of Joy is a study of Philippians. Matt, the philosophy of our lives must be centered in Jesus Christ. The pattern of our lives must be conformed to Christ.
And the purpose of your life must be changed by Jesus Christ. And the peace of your life must be controlled by Jesus Christ.
Absolutely. That’s four principles in this book by your dad that take us through the book of Philippians. Now, in today’s world, do you think we need more joy in our lives?
Yes.
And can we exhaust that joy?
The joy that we can only get from the Holy Spirit. The joy that only comes from knowing Jesus Christ.
Knowing Jesus Christ and growing in Christ.
Yes, the joy that only comes from the Lord and growing in the Lord.
Get this book and study through Paul’s epistle to the Philippians. Principles of Joy is the title of the book. We have this, again, our featured offer for the month of September, and it’s just $15.
When you call us at 1-800-75-BIBLE, or in Canada, call the Canadian number. Yes, it’s much, much cheaper for the shipping. It’s 1-888-75-BIBLE.
Of course, you can order online as well at davidhocking.org. Oh, and I want to remind you that you can also get David’s sermon notes on our current series in the Gospel of John for just $10. Sermon notes for every message in the series as a package, just $10.
And when you purchase these notes, you’re not just enhancing your study time in God’s Word as you listen to the program, you’re directly supporting the radio ministry of Hope for Today. Your purchase helps us stay on the air, continuing to spread biblical truth and offer free resources like the ones you hear about on the program. So grab your copy, again, the Gospel of John sermon notes, dig into the Gospel of John, and know that you’re making a real difference.
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Well, here’s David to close out our time in prayer.
Father, you know how many people in this audience have a personal relationship with your Son, Jesus Christ, and have come to believe that He is everything He claimed. God, I pray for those in our audience that are not sure. They don’t know if they died now, they’d be in heaven.
Or if Jesus would come back, they’d be ready to meet Him. God, I pray that you would open up their hearts by the Holy Spirit to the Lord Jesus Christ, and they put their faith and trust in Him who died for our sins and rose again, that we might live forever. God help them to turn to you before it’s too late, we pray, in Jesus’ name.
Amen. Amen. And friend, if you’d like to know that when you pass from these earthly bonds, that you’ll be with Jesus Christ in heaven for eternity, well let us send you a couple of free resources to help you find out how to have that assurance in your heart.
The first is a booklet by David called What is Christianity? And the second is a free Bible study by mail. Both are completely free to new believers and those who don’t yet know the Lord, but want to know more.
Get yours by calling 800-75-Bible. In Canada, call 888-75-Bible. Bible by the numbers 24253.
Next time, more on the Gospel of John. Join us then right here on Hope for Today.
