In this sermon, the preacher focuses on Proverbs chapter 23, specifically verses that warn against the dangers of alcohol and the deceptive pleasure of sin. He emphasizes the negative consequences of indulging in alcohol, comparing it to a serpent's bite and a viper's sting. The preacher also draws a parallel between Eve's temptation with the forbidden fruit and the allure of sin. However, he offers hope in the form of Jesus, who can save and redeem people from their sins. The sermon concludes with a reminder that Jesus offers a cure for bondage and the promise of eternal salvation.

Let's turn then to Proverbs chapter 23 towards the end. Proverbs 23 I'll go through some verses until the last one and I'll leave that for later. Proverbs 23 Verse 29, Proverbs 23 from verse 29 Who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has contentions? Who has complaints? Who has wounds without cause? Who has redness of eyes? Proverbs 23 verse 29 Those who linger long at the wine, those who go in search of mixed wine. Proverbs 23 Do not look on the wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup, when it swirls around smoothly. Proverbs 23 At the last it bites like a serpent and stings like a viper. Proverbs 23 Your eyes will see strange things and your heart will utter perverse things. Proverbs 23 And I'll leave verse 34 and 35 just typical of a person who is totally inebriated and who speaks the foolish things of a drunkard. Proverbs 24 Actually I'm not going to speak about alcohol today. Although this specifically is referring to the bondage to alcohol. But I'd like to broaden it out and look at some of the breadth of God's Word. Because when God puts something in His Word, it is a two-edged sword, it is multifaceted and it has many angles to it that is also totally true to the text. Proverbs 24 This person is in total bondage. Proverbs 24 We've started with verse 29. He has woe, he's got sorrows, he's got arguments, contentions, he gets into fights, he's a complainer, a murmurer, he even gets wounded. Proverbs 24 And it's visible on his face, in particular his eyes. Proverbs 24 Sin, when it bites, it bites in a way that the poison begins to destroy and wound and finally kills. Proverbs 24 This here of the bondage, the awful bondage to this type of sin, we are advised in verse 31, don't get near it. Because it says, do not look on the wine. Proverbs 24 If you have a weakness for some particular sin, and you want to get out of it, and I'll be referring to that in the latter part of the message. Proverbs 24 Here is an important tip from the word of God, don't look at it. Proverbs 24 Now it doesn't just mean look as in a glance that is inevitable, that happens by mistake. It says, do not look, do not gaze, do not gaze with desire and look at it from all those angles. And it says, you look at it when it sparkles in the cup, and you even swirl it around, and you admire the beauty of it, because you know the pleasure it's going to bring. Proverbs 24 Our corrupted forefathers began like that, they looked upon the forbidden fruit. Proverbs 24 And as Eve gazed upon that fruit, it had some sort of hypnotic effect that the serpent was able to work on, there was some connection. She gazed, and Lucifer worked. Proverbs 24 It might be that the rest of the sermon you don't even need, you just need to listen to the instruction in this verse 31, that's all. Proverbs 24 Stop gazing upon it. Proverbs 24 Admiring it, looking at its sparkle. Proverbs 24 At how smooth it is. Proverbs 24 By writing this God is saying that there is a deceptive pleasure in sin. Proverbs 24 There is a temporary pleasure in some things that the devil may offer you, but the emphasis is on the word temporary. Proverbs 24 Because in the very next verse God says be careful because in the next instant it bites like a snake. Proverbs 24 It could be that it's something that you're nursing in your heart, perhaps it's a grudge, perhaps it's a type of self pity, self sympathy, and you nurse it. And there are times when it actually feels nice to nurse your grudge. Proverbs 24 Maybe you're a driver and when that taxi driver overtakes you at, he's got 25 people in the car that's only meant to take 16, and he overtakes you by three centimeters and almost pushes you off the road. You have a thought which comes with a little bit of pleasure as you imagine what you'd like to do to that taxi driver. Proverbs 24 It's a relationship that's beginning to bud between you and somebody else. Proverbs 24 At the moment it sparkles. It's smooth. Proverbs 24 And you don't feel any bite or any venom, it's just pleasure all the way. Proverbs 24 Maybe you get a letter from that person with just two or three words like, I really like you. It's enough to send your emotions sky high. Proverbs 24 That's intoxication, that's drunkenness. Proverbs 24 Those emotions are to be reserved for between you and your spouse, your future wife or your future husband only. Proverbs 24 I read yesterday that there are 13 year old girls, perhaps even younger, who are now regularly taking the morning after pill because they are sleeping around, either being sexually abused or willingly going to these discos and being used by older men. And it's easy, they just go to the local clinic, it's free, or they go and buy one at the chemist if they are afraid of going to the clinic. The morning after pill and it's over and done with. Proverbs 24 But the word of God says it stings and it wounds. Proverbs 24 Whatever it is that intoxicates you, that has that feeling that sends you on a high, that is the thing that has the potential to destroy you if it isn't doing so already. Proverbs 24 Some of the effects are immediate. Proverbs 24 Because we started the first verse about the red eyes and the, in other words, the bubblous and the wounds and the fighting and things that he forgets about the next day, but he gets into arguments and you know what a drunkard is like. Proverbs 24 Some things in verse 32 if you have a look at it. Proverbs 24 Some things don't happen instantly. It says at the last it bites like a serpent, it stings like a viper, which may imply that it happens afterwards, but it might also imply that your final condition is one of destruction. Proverbs 24 Maybe you have a sneak peek at a pornographic film. Proverbs 24 Or you're a voyeur, a peeping tom and you look through that keyhole and it sits there and at the last it bites like a serpent. Proverbs 24 Because eventually it's not just the mixed wine that causes you in verse 33 to see strange things, it's also the venom of the serpent, Lucifer. Proverbs 24 It says your eyes will see strange things and your heart will utter perverse things, delirium tremens they call it, I think medically. My father was an alcoholic and knowing him and knowing other people, sometimes the alcohol would have such an effect on the brain that they would see monsters or insects the size of cars and they would see things that were not nice, that were demonic, terrible, fearful. Proverbs 24 If you are intoxicated by a grudge. Proverbs 24 Verse 33 will also be true of you, your eyes will see strange things. Proverbs 23 And your heart will utter perverse things. Proverbs 23 If you have a suspicion about somebody that they have done something wrong against you, and maybe they did, maybe it's true, but whatever it is, a grudge is sinful and who does it hurt most? It hurts the grudge bearer, you. Proverbs 24 And your eyes will see strange things. Proverbs 24 You will see things that you are certain are happening. Proverbs 24 Now, Solomon is telling us that obviously these things are untrue, but your eyes will see them anyway, even though it's an illusion. It's nevertheless the result of your intoxication. Proverbs 24 Like when a boy first tells a girl, maybe she's only 13, 14, and he tells her, you are definitely the prettiest girl in the whole school. Proverbs 24 And the thing that grabs me about you is your lips, they just, I just don't know how to explain it, they are just marvelous. Proverbs 24 And when you smile, I feel like I'm in heaven. Proverbs 24 Well, your eyes will see strange things. So what happens very commonly to whoever hears this, whether it's from the boy's side or the girl's side? Proverbs 24 Is that they will look at themselves in a new way. Proverbs 24 And as they look at themselves in the mirror, they say, indeed, my nose is just, I don't know, God, thank you. I thank you that I'm not like the others. Proverbs 24 You practice your smile this way, that way, a closed lip smile, a full open smile, slightly dip to the left, dip to the right, and you practice on it. And your eyes will see strange things. Proverbs 24 Maybe you saw a film where the main actor impresses the girl when he can lift his left eyebrow. Proverbs 24 While he smiles with the right side of his mouth. Proverbs 24 And if you're drunk with infatuation, you're drunk, and your eyes will see strange things. Proverbs 24 And he will tell you, that person who you're infatuated with, he'll tell you or she'll tell you things that keep on fluttering you, to intoxicate you more. Proverbs 24 And you actually begin to believe him. Even though you play coy, and you say, oh no, you're just pulling my leg, I'm not the prettiest, you know it, and you know that I've got some pimples, oh, you're just acting. But inside your heart, you're deeply touched and stirred, and as you behold yourself in the mirror again, your eyes behold strange things, which you didn't notice before. Proverbs 24 Your eyes will see strange things. Proverbs 24 You're in a room of people who are talking, and there's a sudden hush, and you know exactly in your heart, in your mind, your heart feels it, your emotions confirm it, and you can see it with the eyes of your mind, that they've been talking about you again. Proverbs 24 The problem when you see a delusion, and when your eyes see strange things, is that it looks real to you. Proverbs 24 It seems true. The problem is, you've got mixed wine in you, and it's mixed with the venom of the viper as well. Proverbs 24 And so you begin to behave the way you see things. Alright, they don't like me, then I'll do the very thing which they are guilty of. If they don't like me to be with them, then I'll be like that, I won't be with them. Proverbs 24 They don't like smiling when they say hello, even though I like to greet, then I'm not only, will I not smile, but I'm not going to greet as well. Proverbs 24 And your eyes and your heart begin to see perverse things. Proverbs 24 You begin to imagine that so and so is doing this thing, and in your mind's eye it's true, because you've seen it. In your intoxicated state, your bitterness, this viper, this luciferian venom, has such an effect upon you, that it looks true, at least to you it does. Proverbs 24 Notice the text, this man is an injured man. He's in bondage as well. But look at the last part of the last verse in this chapter. Where he says, when shall I awake that I may seek another drink? Proverbs 24 It would seem, at least in my translation, that even in his intoxicated sleep, in his babalas, he's thinking about when can I wake up properly to get the next bottle or the next glass as a, what do they call it, a rechmaker, just to get me straight. Because some people, they can even go to work, even if they're drunk, they can even be on drugs, they can live a semi-normal life, but eventually, of course, it says, like we've referred to in verse 32, at the last, it bites like a serpent, so that eventually it will totally destroy. Proverbs 24 You can imagine what his head feels like when he wakes up in the morning. I once had a severe babalas after red wine, and I can tell you, there's nothing like it. It is the worst experience. And there was a red vomit next to my bed. It was terrible. It was awful. And I woke up feeling like I should, I would feel better in a coffin. Proverbs 24 40 years ago. Proverbs 24 They can't let it go because it will not let them go. To you young people, I plead with you. Don't go and try it out. Don't say, one day I want to stand up on the pulpit and I want to give a really impressive testimony. Proverbs 24 I need to be able to tell them how I got drunk. About the discos that I went to, about the girls that I slept with or whatever. No, don't even think of it, because you are injuring yourself and you have no guarantee that God will give you repentance. Proverbs 24 Think of that next time the wine is red and it sparkles in the cup. Consider that it might be your last and that you may not wake up again. So here is a man or here is a woman and sometimes here is even a girl or a boy. They are barely 12 or 13 years old. We are not sure of the statistics but there are boys and girls dying on the streets of Durban and Joburg and Cape Town because they are sniffing glue. Mostly glue connected to repairing shoes. Some sniff petrol because it is so cheap, although when it is heading towards 10 Rand a litre they might think again. But they are destroyed and often are dead before they are 20. Because they get so intoxicated and their brains are so ruined that they don't feel like eating or drinking. We go out to schools, our choir and other co-workers, every morning for the last three weeks and I think there are still some days ahead, visiting and addressing maybe 2,000, 3,000, sometimes 4,000 children in one morning. It might be 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 schools in a day. I was remarking when we were at a practice session and arranging for the next days, going out in the transport, that I see a thing that is awful to me in the faces of these children as they stand, they don't have chairs for assembly, as they stand listening to us singing and preaching, that the faces of these children are no longer the faces of children. I see the faces of heaviness and depression. I see these little children of 11, 12, 13 years old who have lost the joy of childhood. And as we've got to know more about the circumstances of these children, we understand why. Many of these little girls are being sexually abused by their uncles and brothers from the extended family and whatever, who are unemployed at home and they grow up from the age of 3, 4, they are being sexually abused and they come to school and they have a burden on their shoulders like a mountain and they are being crushed under its weight. The faces of boys who should be, even though they are not Christians, but at least have the look of a Christian. The look of a cheerful boy, even if he's got a mischievous look, but all of that is just the look of grief and of heaviness upon these children. Please remember us in prayer as we go out to minister. This is a special time. We're using these few weeks before they start with the semester tests so that we can address the assemblies and it's a time which we can use, especially at the beginning of the year. Remember them in prayer. For many of them, it is their conversion experience and they never forget it for the rest of their lives. This is a special time. We're using these few weeks before they start with the semester tests so that we can address the assemblies and it's a time which we can use, especially at the beginning of the year. Remember them in prayer. Some of these little girls come to school with a baby on their back. And they offload their baby at some friend, some arrangement that they have just before they go into the school gate, and they offload it onto some neighbor or some relative. They leave the baby. Lunch break, they come out to breastfeed their baby. Often they have to leave school because they must take the child to the clinic. It's sick. Misery and woe. Many of these children have no parents. They're dead because of AIDS. That's why more than ever before, the gospel we preach is of utmost importance. And that's why all of us, not just full-time co-workers, we are all called to bring the gospel to the uttermost parts of the world to teach them what Jesus has taught us. Now the problem with bondage is that even when you know you're bound and you're getting wounded, you still want more of the thing that wounds you. I'm sure there are many here in our midst who can stand up and say, I was like that at one time. I hankered. I longed for the very thing that I knew was wounding me and others. Maybe it's a quiet little emotional affair. Nothing physical that's going on. And it's silent. You've never spoken a word. But it's something that's happening in your heart and your mind and your emotions. Well, at least start with what we've heard here in Proverbs. Stop looking at the wine when it sparkles in the cup. Now let's go to the New Testament. Because should we be left in this condition, Matthew chapter 1? And I'm just going to keep you for a few more minutes and then close. I've tried to portray to you what is very clearly portrayed already, but just with other examples in Proverbs 23, the person who is in bondage and cannot set himself free. Matthew chapter 1 verse 21. While the angel was telling Joseph what to do about this holy conception in Mary. He said, and she shall bring forth a son and thou shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. We hear this verse often, don't we? This is one of the foundational verses. This is a hinge verse. This is a pillar verse. This is the very basis of the word of the gospel. If we stayed with the man in Proverbs 23, we would have to cry out, who shall set this man free? But God had already made plans from eternity. The cure was busy happening and here it was. Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. If you find yourself in an impossible bondage, you try to throw it away, but it seems like it doesn't want to throw you away. Here is the ultimate hope and the offer of the cure. He will save. He will rescue. He will redeem. He will save his people from their unique individual sins. Regarding sin in general, he will save his people from the curse of sin. But he also says he must save his people from their sins. In Hebrews 10 it says, Jesus has perfected forever those who are being sanctified. But I'll look at that another time. Here we are told that he'll save his people. So firstly you have to belong to him. If you're in bondage, get back to God. Your eyes are seeing perverse things, are they? You're dreaming strange and weird and perverse things? And yet the first thing when you wake up is to reach out for the cup of whatever it is, bitterness, infatuation, alcohol, drugs, a grudge, whatever. To be intoxicated again. Humble yourself before almighty God and confess your sins just as they are. You don't have to polish them up for God. God doesn't need to be impressed. But if you truly confess and turn away from your sin, you shall find mercy. Because Jesus will save his people from their sins. Maybe you have made that decision, you have turned to Christ with all your heart as far as you know. Then take this verse literally and go before God humbly but boldly. And say, oh God, here's what you say, but here is this intoxicating pride. And you may have to eat humble pie. God may require you to say sorry to somebody that you really didn't want to say sorry to. It may mean the exposing of something so filthy, so perverse, that you're ashamed and you blush even at the thought of having to mention it to God. And maybe some brother in Christ. But if you've chosen Christ because he's chosen you, then go all the way with him. So you take that sin by the scruff of its neck and say, you will bow to this promise. Jesus will save me from my sin. Now I close with my last text in Romans chapter 6. And we read from just 12, 13 and 14. I'm sure you're very familiar with the fact that Paul says, what shall we continue to sin since we have received grace? No, by no means. And he explains how we have died with Christ, we've been buried with Christ, we have been resurrected with him. This is all part of the fulfillment of Matthew chapter 1, of Jesus saving his people from their sins. Go and read those verses again before verse 12, but I'm going to read just from verse 12. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. Now listen to verse 14 carefully. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace. In the olden days when a woman would faint when it's very hot at some public meeting or whatever it was, they would produce, when she was lying on the floor, smelling salts under her nose. And apparently that was meant to help and should get up. Now even if that might be a bit of a quack thing, maybe it's true, whatever, but here is a cure that is the ultimate smelling salts. For it says through Jesus, for sin shall not have dominion over you. Do you hear that? You who are still in Proverbs 23. You who wake up morning after morning saying, when will I awake properly so that I can get my next glass full. If you've truly repented and come to this Jesus, he has promised sin shall not have dominion over you. I enjoy swimming in the sea. And I notice, it's quite an interesting sight to behold, but very many black Africans come and they come with bottles or scoops. Now they're dead scared of these giant waves, but they are desperate to get the salt water. And sometimes there are two or three of them and the one is the cheerleader or the one who spurs, the one who is going to take the risk and watches out that the next wave isn't coming to smash him or take him away. And they run in and out, in and out until they filled their gallon thing or a five litre old Aquila bottle or some sort of container. And once I've got that bottle or scoop of salt water, I'm going to put it in my mouth and I'm going to drink it. What do you call a scoop? Once they've got it full enough, they then take a bit of beach sand and put it inside. Because they must prove back at home that this is the real thing. This isn't just water with salt added to it, this is sea water, it's the real Makoi. And I'm given to understand that they send it back home to their relative or they use it themselves to drink. And they drink the whole lot. They drink so much of it that they feel nauseous. And they drink more. And if they still don't vomit, they put their finger in their mouth and they make sure that they really vomit and vomit and regurgitate that all the uncleanness comes out. And then they feel good. For a while. Because after some time they need another cleansing ceremony. So you go to the beaches and you see people filling bottles with water, you now understand why they're doing it. It is based on a false, a quack, fringe medical understanding. And of course you feel better after you vomited, it's only natural. But it certainly does not cleanse you. The blood of Jesus only has the power to cleanse and save. And you don't have to risk your life being drowned at the sea. Maybe it's a poor example, but I hope that if there are unclean things in you, that this which you've heard from the word makes you feel so nauseous that you need to regurgitate and get it out. In a certain sense, confession of sin is to vomit the unclean thing which is disturbing your whole system. And Jesus promises that if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive and to cleanse. That means to release you from your Proverbs 23 bondage. And then you can stand on the ground of this in Romans 6 with confidence and with a new boldness. Sin shall not have dominion over me anymore. It doesn't mean that there will never be an accident. Doesn't mean that there will not be weaknesses and struggles. But you will no longer be under the dominion of the viper, of the serpent, of the venom. But you will be under the dominion of him who has come to save. I'll leave it there. Could I ask uncle Ernie Engelbrecht to close for us? Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we thank you for your word to us. We thank you for having made it so plain to us. And we thank you for the hope that you came to save us from our sins. Grant us grace that we may be those that hear your word and do it. We pray that as we go out here that the birds of the air won't come and take away the good seed. But that that seed will bring forth good fruit. That your name may be glorified. Amen.