I suppose it all depends on the person. Some people drink in social settings to impress folk. You will notice them at business functions where alcohol is served holding their glasses with a posture for all to see. Almost like if they could they would put a neon sign pointing at the glass so everyone would know they were 'drinking'.
Others drink because they feel more masculine when they get 'lit' as it's sometimes called in Missouri. A can or bottle of 'courage' it has been called. Courage to confront or fight or both.
Most sin starts out in a way that is different than what sustains it. I have known many alcoholics personally having grown up around it almost 24/7/365. They started out drinking in the military or to impress a friend, etc. Some did it because their father did it and they wanted to be like him; same with smoking.
I personally believe that folk often drink to satisfy their appetite for rebellion itself. It intensifies all of the characteristics of the flesh; like the flesh with a turbo charger.
(Proverbs 23:29) Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? who hath babbling? who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes?
(Proverbs 23:30) They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek mixed wine.
(Proverbs 23:31) Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it giveth his colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright.
(Proverbs 23:32) At the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.
(Proverbs 23:33) Thine eyes shall behold strange women, and thine heart shall utter perverse things.
(Proverbs 23:34) Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down in the midst of the sea, or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast.
(Proverbs 23:35) They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not sick; they have beaten me, and I felt it not: when shall I awake? I will seek it yet again.
Clearly alcohol effects a persons judgment. Generally it makes them more confident. I have known of men to say they could drive better drunk than sober- just as they nearly side swiped a parked car. I have known of men to hand a waitress a $50 bill after just having gotten paid to pay for a few drinks and then say, "Keep the change." How many children have gone without because their fathers tarried long at the wine? How many hard feelings are scarred upon their hearts and minds from harsh words spoken in drunkenness?
At last in some strange way it takes hold of people. They never dreamed they would be drinking 7 days a week and slipping alcohol in their thermos and taking it to work; drinking on break, drunk on the job. Sin always takes a person father than they wanted to go. I have asked grown men that were alcoholics; "What was the attraction?" I have never gotten a clear answer. Yet, I have seen men that had set alcohol before their eyes in such a way that they could not do anything without a drink- no matter how enjoyable.
Perhaps we could lay some of the blame on the propaganda commercials that used to tell the people, "It doesn't get any better than this" or "The high life" etc." I have yet to see the camera pan to the man laying drunk behind the bar in his own excrement or the Indians of some reservations that may well be tonight so drunk that they literally fill the floors of liquor stores passed out with people stepping over them. In such bondage to alcohol that to see deliverance would be almost in step with Legions salvation.
There is nothing like the fear of a child that knows his father is drunk and angry. There is nothing like the suffering of young girls that suffered at the hands of their drunken fathers. If you have not guessed by now I don't have too good of attitude towards drinking. I recall once a skinny and sickly man on the streets as we were conducting a street service late into the night day after day walking continually drunk without ever changing clothes. Some street ministers asked to pray for him and he agreed. As he approached where we were I reached to get the anointing oil to pray. From the corner of his eye the man saw that oil and began to backpedal as if he had seen a ghost. There is no doubt in my mind that the man was under the influence of demonic spirits. He needed set free, but when he [i]saw[/i] his deliverance coming- he chose the alcohol.
I have been at the bedside of two different men that died of liver failure as a result of alcoholism. There is nothing relaxing about having 3-5 gallons of water on the belly and needing to be 'tapped' to drain it off. Men that looked to be 10 months pregnant with stretch marks 10 inches long. Their belly buttons unfolded like a protruding fist. At last they could not even hold ice chips in their mouths without vomiting them back up. A horrible death it is. Whatever reason or pleasure one may find in drinking I would hope to take heed to a few of these anecdotes of these personal factual experiences.
