Read 1 Corinthians 10:23-33
Intemperance is a sore peril. We cannot at once remove the temptation from the land, but we may put into the hearts and minds of young people such principles and such motives that they may be able to resist the temptation about them and keep themselves pure and safe, clean and unspotted. Our Lord’s prayer for His disciples was not that they should be taken out of the world, away from its evil, but that they should be kept from the evil.
The passage is a discussion of the question of personal liberty and duty to others — how far we may exercise our liberty, and where and how far we are required to by the law of love to deny ourselves practices or enjoyments for the sake of others. This question has an obvious bearing on the matter of strong drink. Some men claim that they have a right to use wines and other liquors so long as they do not use them to excess. They claim that no one has a right to interfere with their privilege in this regard, and that they are not required to think of the influence, which the exercise of their liberty may exert on others about them. Are they right in their contention? Or is there a higher law, which requires them to deny themselves if there is danger that the exercise of their liberty shall hurt others, lead them to put their lives in peril?
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