“Don’t drink only water. You ought to drink a little wine for the sake of your stomach because you are sick so often.”
~ 1 Timothy 5:23
At first glance, one might think this scripture is encouraging us to drink alcoholic beverages, but I think it has a much deeper meaning:
God’s Word is often represented as “water” in the scriptures. For example, Ephesians 5:26 states: “So that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the Word.”
Similarly, “wine” represents the Holy Spirit. As illustrated in Acts 2 when God poured out the Holy Spirit on the multitudes, they were actually accused of being drunk: “But others in the crowd were mocking. ‘They’re drunk, that’s all, they said’” (Acts 2:13). While the people were not drunk with physical wine, they were “under the influence” of the Holy Spirit.
So if water is the Word and wine is the Spirit, what is Paul urging Timothy to do in the above scripture? I am convinced he’s showing Timothy how to correctly approach God’s Word and how to develop and mature in the faith in a healthy and wholesome way.
Although God’s amazing Word is like pure and undefiled water that cleanses our souls, sometimes people can twist the scriptures to suit their own selfish desires. When that happens, you can become “sick with sin.” This sickness can hinder our Christian walk and cause our hearts to harden towards our loving Father.
A proper remedy for this sickness and a good way to avoid it altogether is to include God’s Spirit with His Word. Notice Paul didn’t say to drink only water or only wine. He said to drink both. I believe the only way to extract life and Truth from the scriptures is by yielding to God’s Holy Spirit. As Jesus told Nicodemus in John 3:5: “The truth is, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.” Essentially, Jesus was telling Nicodemus that we can understand things on earth because we were born here. By the same token, we can understand the order of God’s Kingdom by being born of the Spirit.
The office of the Holy Spirit is to reveal and exalt the Person of Jesus Christ in the written Word. There is no way we can understand the true meaning of God’s Word without the help of our close friend, The Holy Spirit.
As you prepare to get a dose of God’s Word, be sure to ask the Holy Spirit to reveal the person of Jesus to you as you read the scriptures. Expect it! There’s nothing He loves more than to exalt and magnify our precious Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
