Monday, May 15, 2023

Common Sense & Scripture Applied to the "Wine" of Cana's Marriage Feast

"Now as to the wine that Jesus made for the guests at the marriage feast in Cana. 
It is true that the word has no qualifying adjective in the narrative of that event; but the circumstances unmistakably indicate its character.   
 --In the first place, let us remember that only good things come from
the hand
of the Lord. He sends blessing, not a curse; and we have just read that the blessing is in the
wine that is found in the cluster. --On the other hand, we are told that they who drink the wine "when it giveth his color in the cup, when it moveth itself aright," that is, when it is fermented, have woe, sorrow, contentions, and wounds without cause, and that such wine at the last "biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder." Prov. 23:29-32
--It takes away a man's senses, so that he is like one "that lieth down in the midst of the sea, or as he that lieth upon the top of the mast." Verse 34
 
Q: Can anybody charge the Lord with preparing such a drink for
men? 
 
Q: Who that reverences the Savior can for a moment entertain the thought that He would deliberately manufacture, and order to be given to the guests at a marriage feast, such wine as would tend to take away their senses, inflame all their passions, and set them in an uproar, and possibly cause them to fight?  
Still further: 
--If it were true that on this occasion Jesus made fermented wine, it would furnish a most unnatural exception to God's work; for never in nature has such a thing as fermented wine been known. 
 
*On the contrary, God takes the utmost pains to prevent the wine that He makes from fermenting. 
Let us study the case for as moment.  
Examine a cluster of grapes. See how firm the skin is upon each
grape, and how closely it is fastened to the stem. The skin of the grape, like that of other fruits, is its protection against decay or fermentation. As long as the skin remains unbroken, fermentation cannot possibly take place. 
Each grape is, in fact, a small bottle of unfermented wine, 
hermetically sealed so as to preserve it from fermentation. 
Q: Can you not now see clearly that the first state of wine, as the Lord makes it,is always unfermented? 
--And not only so, but that unless man interferes, and changes the Lord's plan for the grape, the wine will always remain unfermented? God never makes fermented wine; that is always a product of the curse." 
E.J. Waggoner