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between the sacred and the common. To Aaron and his surviving sons
was given the warning: “Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor
thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation,
lest ye die: it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations:
and that ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between
unclean and clean; and that ye may teach the children of Israel all the
statutes which the Lord hath spoken.” The use of spirituous liquors
has the effect to weaken the body, confuse the mind, and debase the
morals. It prevents men from realizing the sacredness of holy things or
the binding force of God’s requirements. All who occupied positions
of sacred responsibility were to be men of strict temperance, that their
minds might be clear to discriminate between right and wrong, that
they might possess firmness of principle, and wisdom to administer
justice and to show mercy.
The same obligation rests upon every follower of Christ. The
apostle Peter declares, “Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood,
an holy nation, a peculiar people.”
1 Peter 2:9
. We are required by
God to preserve every power in the best possible condition, that we
may render acceptable service to our Creator. When intoxicants are
used, the same effects will follow as in the case of those priests of
Israel. The conscience will lose its sensibility to sin, and a process of
hardening to iniquity will most certainly take place, till the common
and the sacred will lose all difference of significance. How can we
then meet the standard of the divine requirements?” “Know ye not
that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which
ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a
price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are
Gods.”
1 Corinthians 6:19, 20
. “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink,
or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.”
1 Corinthians 10:31
.
To the church of Christ in all ages is addressed the solemn and fearful
warning, “If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy;
for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.”
1 Corinthians
3:17
.
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