Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-22
THE WEDDING WINE.
Temperance Lesson to Be Learned
From the Feast at Cana
THE BEST POLICY.
Drunkenness, Not Drinking, Is the Sin
Recognized by the Bible.
PURE LIQUOR IS OUR SALVATION
WRITTEN FOR THE p1spArcH.I


"And when they wanted wine, the mother
Of Jesus saith unto him, they have no
wine" Such piece of information.
whispered at wedding to Christian min
lister to-day, would probably bring re-
sponse of satisfaction. The Christian min
lister would be heartily glad that there was
scarcity of wine. He would rejoice to
have a wine famine fall upon the whole
country. To have no wine anywhere would
seem to him to be one of the essentials OF
the millennium.
1t is evident, however, that Jesus had no
thought of prohibition. The answer which
He gave to this appeal shows that He had no
wish to Danish wine out of Cana in Galilee.
Not only is it evident that Jesus was not .
preacher of prohibition, but it is quite as
plain that He was not Himself a practicer of
total abstinence. ''The Son of Man came
eating and drinking, and they say, Behold
man gluttonous and a wine bibber. -
Christ quotes this complaint not to criticize
it,but to show how impossible it is to please
everybody. He compares His own manner
of life with that of John the Baptist.
"John," He says, "came neither eating nor
drinking" Did they like that any better?
No; they say, "He hath devil" The
value of this for our present purpose lies in
the
Contrast Between Christ and John.
John was an ascetic. He kept out of the
world altogether. He had no part in the
life of his time except as stern preacher
oro CT fha ax,i1e af - Ee~aoioI1x ha ho-
longed to one of the numerous total ab-
stinence societies of his day. Jesus was in
full sympathy with everything that was
good in human life, lived in cities, rejoiced
in companionship, sat at mems tables, and
never Joined any of those associations which
e1acted pledge of total abstinence.
On the contrary, so far as the drinking of
wine was concerned, not only did He pro-
vide the wine for that festivity in Cana, not
only was He known and seen by the people
to drink wine, but He set the drinking of
wine as symbolic act in that sacrament
which summed up the blessed meaning of
His life. Ever since then, Christian peo-
pie, in the most sacred rite of religion, have
tasted wine. And this was real wine. 1t
was the fermented juice of the grape. 1t
was liquor with which it was possible to
become intoxicated; as people actually did
at Corinth. No other idea about it is sane
toned by scri plural scholarship.
Truth in the Right Religion.
My subject to-day is the Christian Doc
trine of Temperance. There is only one
good foundation for doctrine, and that is
the foundation of the actual truth. That is
the final test of the Christianity of any doc
trine; is it true? Nothing that is rot trpe
is Christian. It has sometimes been the
position of religious teachers that what
ever is desirable is true; that the real test
of doctrine is its influence over the peo-
pie. If it appears to promote sobriety and
quietness, if it promises to further the pur-
poses which the teachers have at heart,
then-it is true. That depends, however,
upon the essential meaning of reli zion. If
religion is a contrivance for keeping people
in orderly subjection, then whatever is de-
sirable is religion.
But if religion is an attempt to learn the
will of God and teach it, and to get the
commandments of God obeyed, and to meas
then the supreme Undesirable is falsehood.
Truth alone has place in right religion.
Example Of the Savior.
Accordingly, L set the example of Christ
at the beginning of all study of the doc
trine of temperance. The life of Christ Is
the revelation of the mind of God. After
all the centuries of moral progress, we still
go back to Him for the absolute ideal of
right living. Every reform that has ever
been proposed has prospered just in proper
tion as it voiced His spirit. He is still a
long way ahead of the wisest and the best.
To get His life realized in the hearts of men
is the supreme hope of the future. 1t has
been found invariably that His way of look
ing at things is the right way, and that every
other view which is broader than that, or
narrower than that, is wrong. This is the
testimony of experience.
A young man at a theological seminary
declared the other day that if he could be
assured that the wine at Cana was real wine
he would no longer be follower of Christ.
Between the judgment of Jesus Christ and
the Judgment of young man in theologi-
cal seminary it is not very difficult to
choose.
Established by Eighteen Centuries.
A good many people turned back and
walked no more with Him, differing from
Him in one way or another when He was
here. And great many people since have
refused to accept His example or His doc
trine, and have gone their own way, think
ing their own opinion wiser than His And
all these mistaken people have fallen into
inevitable confusion. Christ is the truth.
Eighteen Christian centuries prove that
sufficiently. The wisest man will do we'll
to think good while before he disagrees
with Jesus Christ. Jesus has been right
always He will be right always Only
those who stand with Him are right.
Now, we want to promote temperance.
All decent people are agreed in that. We
want to put down intemperance, and to
keep it down. We believe that drunken
ness is of the devil recognize the fear
full curse of it. We see plainly enough
that it is the mother of degradation and
crime, that it is the enemy of the home,
that it is the menace of manhood. We are
earnest for reform. But we want to be on
want to stand upon principle that has
truth under it.
Drinking as Sin.
1t may perhaps seem to US that some
other doctrine might be more desirable,
might be stronger, might have more
powerful influence over the people. If
had been set among the forbidden
things in the Ten Commandments, if it had
been lnveighed against in the Sermon on the
Mount, if it had been classed among the
deadly sins and threatened with everlasting
we might have been able to
scare more people out of it. But nothing
will ever permanently prevail in this world
except the truth. And truth in ethics,
truth about morality, truth about temper
ance, is to be discovered in the lite and
words of Jesus Christ.
And Jesus Christ, as we have seen, had
no desire for prohibition, did not practice
total abstinence, did not look on drinking
as sin. No plan of reformation which
represents drinking as sin, which teaches
total abstinence as the universal rule for
man, and tries to secure absolute .prohlbl-
ton. can possibly succeed There is no use
attempting it. It is against the right judg-
hent of intelligent people 1t is against