Drunk In The Spirit

“They must have had good reason to say they were drunk….”

The day of Pentecost came and brought with it the advent of the Spirit of God being given to everyone who believes. The initial sign of this was a fulfillment of Isaiah 28:11, i.e. foreign lips and strange tongues. At this, many Jews belittled the event by saying that these were drunk. Most charismatics today will say that they must have had good reason to say this, implying that these saints must have been falling all over themselves, laughing like fools and slurring their words and such like. They argue that there is nothing about other languages being spoken that gives the impression of drunkenness, which is true. However, is it right to assume that these same men who murdered Jesus and mocked Him frequently (not all Pharisees were of this spirit, but the majority were) had on this day any good reason to say the things they said? It is said that they (the apostles and others gathered together) must have been acting drunk, i.e. slurring words, laughing, stumbling around and just acting plain weird and out of place. Apparently the strength of this argument is that foreign languages being spoken are not a good enough reason to call someone drunk. It’s sounds good for a second, but I would like to apply this logic to other previous instances where this same group of Jews gave other descriptions of something Jesus did or of what He was about as God and see how it holds up.
What I intend to show is that not only was there no reason to believe that these disciples were acting drunk and foolish, but that this was the Jews normal way of belittling what was of Christ’s doing in their day. If there was good reason to believe that these disciples were falling, laughing and acting insane, then they must have had good reason to assume that:

(1) “He is demon possessed and raving mad.” John 10:20. Using the same logic that is applied to Acts 2, we have to be fair and say that these same Jews must have had good reason to say this as well. Jesus must have walked around screaming and cutting himself with rocks and breaking chains, running around naked and doing other things like foaming at the mouth, jumping into fire and water, etc. Surely there is nothing obviously demonic about preaching repentance and healing the sick and rebuking double standards! There must have been more activity than just these.

(2) “Aren’t we right in saying that you are a Samaritan and demon possessed?” John 8:48. He must have had some Canaanite facial features, or maybe he still worshiped in the wrong locations…dang ‘ol high places! It must have been the Canaanite gods that he had in his house growing up as a kid that made people say this. Once again, there must have been good reason, right? Wasn’t there some obviously Canaanitish feature or lifestyle quality that made this a reasonable statement? I mean, all he did was tell them in the previous verse that those who belong to God will hear what He has to say and that these Jews couldn’t hear Jesus because they didn’t belong to God. Of course, ten verses later He calls Himself “I am”. Oh boy, now we know He’s nuts!

(3) “You are demon possessed. Who is trying to kill you?” John 7:20. Once again, we ought to assume that He must have been acting like a madman, making up conspiracy theories about hit men and what not. He must have been making this up out of His head, no less a demon possessed head by virtue of these same Jews having obvious good reason for this accusation, just like they had good reason for the accusation of drunkenness on the day of Pentecost. Right?

(4) “For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine and you say, ‘He has a demon’. The son of man has come eating and drinking and you say, ‘Behold, a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” Luke 7:33-34.

Are you starting to see my point yet? These Jews/Pharisees had misjudged the one who Jesus said was the greatest man ever born at that point in history. Did John really act demon possessed? Was there real reason to call this accusation out, or was it not even meant to be an accurate assesment but rather a slur? What about Jesus? Did he walk around town with wine on his breath, stumbling through town and sort of “packing on the pounds” as a result of his eating binges? It is clear that these remarks were nothing more than slander in the face of obvious reality. Jesus gave no legitimate reason for the accusations of drunkenness or demon possession. He was sound in His speech and perfect in holiness. John the Baptist was the greatest man born of woman, according to Jesus and equally gave no good reason for the accusations leveled against him.

So, if these accusations are false, unfounded and slanderous, why then do we assume that these Jews were suddenly justified in the accusation of drunkenness on the part of the disciples on the day of Pentecost? Isn’t it obvious that they were simply continuing in the same frame of mind that slandered John and Jesus? Isn’t it equally obvious that we’re making a poor excuse to engage in stupidity at the expense of Christ’s reputation?

I’ve given 4 good examples of this kind of inaccurate judgment on the part of these particular Jews, but I feel more can be explored and needs to be, if for no other reason than to show the overwhelming evidence that supports the fact that these Jews were not making an assessment on the Day of Pentecost that came from solid, logical and weighty outward evidence but rather from the same hate inspired cynicism that caused them to speak out against Jesus’ whole ministry. Observe:

(5) “This fellow (Jesus) is blaspheming!” Matthew 9:3. This was in response to Jesus having just told a man that his sins were forgiven. We know full well that Jesus had authority on earth to forgive sin and that this was not a fair judgment call, nor was it based on or given in the Spirit of Truth. In this same chapter in verse 34 they claimed,
(6) “It is by the prince of demons the he drives out demons.” Once again, is this a fair call? Was there some outwardly obvious sign that Jesus was calling on Satan to drive away demons? Did he sit cross-legged with his thumbs touching his index fingers in a circle, chanting some mysterious incantation and then saying, “Be gone by authority of Ba’al Zebul”? No? Well then, can we assume that there is anything obviously demonic about just simply driving out demons with a word? No? Then what reason did they have to assume this? None. It was hate inspired as was the criticism of the advent of the Holy Spirit’s fall on man on the day of Pentecost.

(7) “Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” Mark 3:20-21. Wow! Now we have his own flesh and blood saying things about him. If anyone was able to make an accurate judgment call on Jesus, surely it would have been his own blood relatives who grew up with him. No doubt they could testify to his “messiah complex” that he had all growing up. Yes, these must have had an insight that no one else could have had. He must have been out of his mind! Who knows you better than your own kin? They must have been totally justified to assess him as insane and needing correction. Yes, these loving and kind hearted family members got together to do an “intervention” for Jesus.
Now, all of this is facetious of course. They were wrong, totally, and Jesus publicly put them in their place upon learning of their demand that he remove himself from where he was and come back home and be sensible. I know his family were not members of the Pharisees, but I use this as an example to show that even those closest to him and (in an earthly sense) most qualified to assess him were still horribly wrong. They looked on the outward sense of things and came to the wrong conclusions, just like the Jews came to the wrong conclusion on the day of Pentecost. Jesus gave no real sign that he lost his mind. He didn’t drool down his beard like King David; he didn’t scribble nonsense in the dirt or any other thing that was a real outward indication of insanity. The only time He ever wrote in the dirt was in the story of the woman caught in adultery, and we don’t know what He wrote, but we know that they dropped their stones and left one by one. Oddly enough, this was an occurrence involving Jesus that brought sobriety, the antithesis of drunkenness.

Are we using unequal weights and measures (Proverbs 20:10, 23; Leviticus 19:36) in our justification of dubious activities that feel good to us or have given some sense of blessing and a “touch”? Have we grown too close to an activity to objectively examine it without prejudice? It seems to me that there is a double standard in place here, namely that we only come to trust the slander of the Pharisees as being justified on the day of Pentecost, but not on any other day. How dare we be so unjust in the handling of the word! Has it now become a self serving device for our convenience, and have we now become as the lawyers of this age who manipulate “law” to find loopholes just to win a case regardless of what is right and just?

If we abuse this text in this way, what other texts of scripture are we abusing for equally self serving ends? We ought to examine ourselves to see what other areas of corruption may have snuck in through the poorly exegeted Acts 2:15 backdoor. If we’re capable of it here, then let’s be suspicious of ourselves and as Paul said, examine ourselves to see if we are in the Faith.

One quick noteworthy thing to remember: the Jews who belittled the believers were the ones living in the land who did not speak the native languages of those sojourners who came from far away lands. These locals were the same individuals who sneered at John the Baptist, Jesus and ultimately the apostles and other disciples on this Holy Day of Pentecost. It was easier for “outsiders” to come and look in to what was happening on this day and to come to the right conclusion. Sometimes it’s good to listen to an “outsider”. We can provide an analysis that isn’t biased toward holding onto sacred traditions that we’ve come to love and ideas about the Holy Spirit that we don’t want altered.
Which group of Jews do you find yourself in: the ones who can’t look past their own bias toward what/whom they think Jesus is, or the ones whose understanding isn’t colored by popular social opinion and can ask the objective questions such as, “What does this thing mean for us?” Are you able to, for just a moment, step away from all the recent hooplah surrounding Jesus and look inside the Word to find out “what these things mean”? I suggest using a bible study search engine (www.blueletterbible.org is great) and looking up the words drunk, drunkard, drunkenness and drunken. Look at the context of these words and ask yourself, “Is drunkenness that is sent from God a blessing or a curse?” Neither New nor Old Testaments ever once mention drunkenness as something to be sought from God nor is it put in any kind of favorable light, be it of a physical or spiritual kind.

I think these are valid questions to ask ourselves and others. We need not be afraid to look into this. Would it really be so bad if we found out we were wrong and God is near to bring what is true in place of the false? Wouldn’t God’s version of reality be better than what we have held on to? I pray that we not be found in the same predicament as our Israelite forbears found in Isa. 44:20—“He feeds on ashes; a deceived heart has turned him aside. And he cannot deliver himself, nor say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”

mark jr.

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