To a sister in Christ who objects to the use of wine at the Lord's Supper

Dear Sister in our Lord :

You tell me that you " have been opposed to the use of wine or strong drink since childhood." This does not settle the matter, does it? For you have created nothing and you cannot therefore fathom the needs of creation. God who created all things, knew best, and He created wine. In His word, regulating creation, He warns men that there is danger in wine and strong drink, yet He gives them a most honorable place among the offerings of His altar. See Exodus 29:37-42; Num. 6:17; 15:1-12; and chap. 28.

They must be holy things to be thus offered to the holy God upon His altar:they represented some aspect of the only perfect human life ever lived here-of our Lord Jesus Christ poured out in obedient service to God; even as the lamb offered on the altar represented His holy person. The " temperance " movement, which is largely responsible for the thoughts which you express, insults God the Creator. It practically accuses Him of creating bad things, such as wine, etc. On the principle that wine is the occasion of much sin (which no one questions) and that it must therefore be destroyed, we would also have to destroy money and women, for what are the crimes they have not occasioned ? Is there any gift of God that sinful man has not abused ? God's word warns us against the ill use of any of them, as well as of wine, but condemns none of them. 1 Tim. 4:4 says, " Every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving." Then in verse 6, "If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ"-a serious thing for Christ's ministers, is it not, if they fail to rebuke your principle ? See also Deut. 14:22-29, and learn how little God's thoughts agree with yours.

It is not that one contends for any selfish rights," for meat commendeth us not to God:for neither if we eat are we the better, neither if we eat not are we the worse" (1 Cor. 8:8). But God is being traduced, and" that among His own people! How could we pass this by ? From the Scriptures we have considered it is very evident that the sin is not in the material creation of whatever kind, but in man's will who makes abuse or ill use of every good thing.

You are opposed to wine, another to meat, another to marriage. God says they are all good, for He has created them all, and He will stand by all His creation, though woe be to him who abuses or misuses it. If you are against any part of it, you and He are face to face in the quarrel, and they who quarrel with God have not, and will not, come out victorious.

You quote Lev. 10:9 as a Scripture authority against the use of wine. Is this a righteous use of the word of God ? Is it not stated there that the restriction is to the priests "when they go into the tabernacle of the congregation ? "-lest their dulled, or exhilarated, senses should cause them to transgress before the Lord. In like manner would not Christians (the New Testament priests of God) who desire to exercise their Christian priesthood aright, guard against any excitement of spirit or surfeited appetite before prayer or ministry of the Word? But is this forbidding a right use of God's gifts ? Let us not use God's word in a different sense or purpose than that intended, nor make it say what we wish it to say. It will never bend to us; we must bow to it.
More than forty years ago, I met a case like yours in Ottawa, Canada. It was a brother who had been a drunkard before his conversion. He sat beside me at the Lord's supper. When the bread came, he partook of it. When the cup came, instead of partaking of it, he described a half-circle with it at arm's length, and so passed .it to me. It shocked me greatly. Calling upon him at his shop next day, I asked him the reason for his strange action. He told me he had been a drunkard, and that he feared the taste or even the smell of the wine would bring back his old love for drink. " What! " I exclaimed! Could you think, brother, that the blessed Saviour, who suffered the death of the cross to put away your sins, would ask you to do what would make you sin ? "

At the first glimpse of the insult he had been offering to the Lord, the dear man's eyes filled with tears, and, grasping my hand affectionately, he said, " Thank you, brother, for your faithfulness. I shall not again grieve the Lord as I have done."

One can only add that, were a case to be found where partaking of the cup of the Lord had carried one back to drunkenness, it would be very strong evidence that he had never really known the grace of God in his heart.

Turning to the scene when the Lord established His supper, how touching it is! How full of holy sorrow! In Mark 14:22-24, the Lord at the end of His last passover-supper with His disciples, takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, gives it to them and says, " Take, eat:this is My body. And He took the cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them and they all drank of it. And He said unto them, This is My blood of the new testament, which is shed for many." Had you been there with your present principle, you would have had to say, I know, Lord, that this cup represents Thy blood, by the shedding of which I am delivered from the everlasting hell into which my sins would sink me. You tell me to drink in remembrance of you in this proof of your wonderful love, but I cannot obey, for it is against my principles to drink wine. Does it not seem as if there must be something terribly wrong behind this ?-the pride of an insubordinate will ?

One feature of your letter adds to my fears:You seem to have made up your mind that the brethren who insist on the use of wine at the Lord's supper are in a low spiritual state. Those who refuse it, like yourself, are the spiritual ones. This, of course, will make it easy for you to see things as you wish to see them, and to hear what voice you wish to hear. There may be, as you complain, lack of good judgment in the choice of the wine to be used at the Lord's table, but even as to this, we do not come together to drink wine, but to remember our Lord in the institution of His supper with bread and wine according to His expressed desire. Alas, that any should dare to interfere with His institution. Let them restrict themselves as much as they like in their home life:refuse wine, meat, or anything they please, we will have nothing to say. It were doubtless better for many to be more abstemious in their eating and drinking. But to find fault with what the Lord Himself has put upon His own table for all His own is most serious indeed, and argues a state of mind which is an effectual barrier to spiritual progress. Under it, our gospel would become a gospel of the body, rather than a gospel of the soul-a Seventh-day Adventist gospel.

Consider well chapters 2 and 3 of Colossians ; they reach the root of all this; they say you are dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world and you are risen with Him-in another creation of course. " If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God." If we realize this heavenly place in which the grace of God has set us, we shall certainly not be taken up with questions about wine.

Trusting, dear sister, that you will heed the voice of word of God on this subject-a voice which seeks your welfare and that of the whole Church of God, I remain your servant in Christ our Lord,