My Alcohol Challenge

[TLK Valentine]

I'm sure, English professor, you noticed I did not capitalize "him" in that post?

I wonder why I did that, eh?

Because you don't consider any god You've created in Your own image to be God.

 

[Kylie]

I disagree.

As is your perogative. I, however, can find no rational reason for doing so. There are clues in the Bible that indicate that mere juice was not available.

I'm sure those who drank this beverage had their taste buds satisfied.

I don't think anyone would have even noticed it didn't contain alcohol -- (or cared if they did).

Yeah, why don't you try buying a round for everyone at a pub. They'll be expecting beer, but I'm sure they'll be perfectly happy if they get juice.

I'm not sure what this has to do with anything.

They drank it immediately, not six months later.

But since the grapes were harvested six months previously, the juice had been waiting around for six months before it was drunk.

But even if they did, how it could have stayed grape juice after six months and not fermented would be easy to explain.

Deuteronomy 29:5 And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.

And no one noticed this? No one made any comment? I suspect that you are speculating here with not a shred of evidence. And your speculation can take a hike.

 

[Strathos]

I'd believe Him.

But I would ask Him to show me in His word where I went wrong.

He points you to John 2: 1-11. Are you going to tell Him it was really grape juice?

 

[contango]

I'd believe Him.

But I would ask Him to show me in His word where I went wrong.

If you personally choose not to drink that's a perfectly valid decision, whether you don't like the taste or don't like the affect it has on you or just want to avoid the fate of Great Uncle Albert who spent all his money on beer and died penniless.

If you want to claim that drinking in any amount is sinful universally you need a lot more than the silly circular reasoning you're presenting here. What you're saying here is little more than "assume drinking is a sin, Jesus never sinned, therefore Jesus couldn't have turned water into wine so it must have been grape juice, and the reason Jesus did that was because drinking is a sin". It's easy to prove your assumptions and given a big enough circle in the reasoning some people might even overlook what you're doing.

If you have to bend and twist to make things mean what you want them to mean there's a good chance they mean something other than what you want them to mean.

 

[AV1611VET]

If you personally choose not to drink that's a perfectly valid decision, whether you don't like the taste or don't like the affect it has on you or just want to avoid the fate of Great Uncle Albert who spent all his money on beer and died penniless.

If you want to claim that drinking in any amount is sinful universally you need a lot more than the silly circular reasoning you're presenting here. What you're saying here is little more than "assume drinking is a sin, Jesus never sinned, therefore Jesus couldn't have turned water into wine so it must have been grape juice, and the reason Jesus did that was because drinking is a sin". It's easy to prove your assumptions and given a big enough circle in the reasoning some people might even overlook what you're doing.

If you have to bend and twist to make things mean what you want them to mean there's a good chance they mean something other than what you want them to mean.

And by the same token, if you want to use John 2 to justify recreational drinking, I say there's a problem somewhere.

 

[JustMeSee]

I'd believe Him.

But I would ask Him to show me in His word where I went wrong.

Perhaps he will tell you that it isn't His Word, but rather the writings of inspired imperfect humans with additional agendas.

If God tells you something in person, it is likely foolish to challenge him to derive His evidence from human writings.

Just my perspective.

 

[contango]

And by the same token, if you want to use John 2 to justify recreational drinking, I say there's a problem somewhere.

I figure that Scripture mandates some things (e.g. "Honor thy father and mother") and prohibits other things (e.g. "Thou shalt not commit adultery"). Anything neither mandated nor prohibited is for us to decide whether to do or not.

Of course there are some things that the Bible doesn't explicitly prohibit but we can figure out for ourselves - there's no verse that explicitly says "thou shalt not visit pornographic websites" but it's pretty clear from what Jesus said about adultery that such things are sinful even if web sites aren't explicitly mentioned.

So on that basis I don't need to find a verse to justify having a beer because I like the taste, any more than I need to find a verse to justify having a cup of coffee or a glass of Pepsi. If you want to claim it's universally prohibited you need to demonstrate why that is so, and to be honest your say-so that drinking is sinful is worthless unless you can demonstrate why it is sinful. If you can do it without the circular logic that seems to be going around in this thread that would be a bonus.

 

[AV1611VET]

If God tells you something in person,

He did tell me something in Person, in Writing.

And He has told you the same thing in Person, in Writing.

... it is likely foolish to challenge him to derive His evidence from human writings.

That's why I don't rely on such things as Darwin's, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life; or its sequel, Mein Kampf (My Struggle).

 

[JustMeSee]

He did tell me something in Person, in Writing.

And He has told you the same thing in Person, in Writing.

That's why I don't rely on such things as Darwin's, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life; or its sequel, Mein Kampf (My Struggle).

I see your logic. I was foolish to question a god that IS a volume of translated writings. My god isn't so constrained.

 

[Queller]

Would that be Koine or Classical Greek?

Koine.

No, actually, I can't.

I would need to rely on an interpreter of tongues for that.

No actually, you wouldn't.

I gave you a link where you can see the original Greek. You can see which words are used in each verse.

We used to have a poster here named Hespera who once made the point that, in China, they wear shirts with American sayings on them, and we wear headbands with Chinese sayings on them.

She said some of the Chinese sayings ... if we really knew what they were saying ... we wouldn't be wearing them.

Satan is like that, and he gave us Strong's Concordance to muddy the waters.

But you must really hate Strong to claim (without evidence) that he was an agent of Satan.

Not to mention that you have given no reasoning (other than your opinion) that there is anything inaccurate about Strong's Concordance.

 

[Queller]

Why would I?

You think Satan would put his name on it?

The KJVO movement throws a monkey wrench into one of his best works.

Still no evidence or reasoning as to why you think Strong's is Satanically inspired and/or wrong.

By that logic I can claim that the King James Bible is Satanically inspired and wrong.

 

[Queller]

Satan owns the entire world and everything in it, doesn't need to put his name on anything. And there's only one way to get off his ledger of accounts.

Then by your logic Satan owns the King James Bible.

 

[Queller]

Simply wine was what people drank. Not like someone today would go out and have multiple drinks. They drank it at meals and like modern man would drink a glass of juice, milk or water during the day.

In those times its use was not strictly as a beverage for intoxication. This is what people confuse it with - that drinking alcohol today had the same connotation then.

And this is exactly why the Bible calls drunkenness a sin, not simply drinking wine. Too bad AV1611VET can't understand his Bible.

 

[Queller]

The answer to my OP is that I've tasted root beer before, yet I don't know what alcoholic beer tastes like.

In other words, it shows that "beer" can be both alcoholic and non-alcoholic.

No, in fact that is wrong. It shows that root beer is non-alcoholic, nothing more.

Suppose someone goes to a wedding feast and turns water into [root] beer, then years later, the default position on "beer" is an alcoholic drink.

People would swear that person turned water into alcohol.

No, because that that qualifier word "root" makes all the difference. Why do you think that root beer is call "root" beer instead of simply "beer"? For that matter, why do you think that drink such as O'doul's is specifically marketed as a "non-alcoholic beer"?

 

[Queller]

There's only one reason I can think of.

The default position for "wine" back then was unfermented.

Then how could anyone get drunk on wine?

 

[Queller]

I call it a "good point."

That's because you don't understand what constitutes a "good point".

 

[Queller]

I'd believe Him.

But I would ask Him to show me in His word where I went wrong.

And when He points to the exact same verses many people here have already pointed out, then what will you say?

 

[Queller]

I'd tell him to take a hike.

You would tell Jesus to take a hike? What kind of Christian are you?

 

[Queller]

I'm sure, English professor, you noticed I did not capitalize "him" in that post?

I wonder why I did that, eh?

Because you believe that if Jesus said something that you disagreed with, it would be evidence that He is not Jesus?

 

[AV1611VET]

But you must really hate Strong to claim (without evidence) that he was an agent of Satan.

Can't say as I know the man, let alone hate him.

Not to mention that you have given no reasoning (other than your opinion) that there is anything inaccurate about Strong's Concordance.

Actually I have.