Good Morning; February 26, 2010
This headline caught my eye on Google News this morning, “The little-told story of how the U.S. Government poisoned alcohol during Prohibition with deadly consequences.” The article goes on to assert that during the 13 years of Prohibition, ending in 1933, some 10,000 people died from alcohol tainted with chemicals required by Federal law. The law was intended to make industrial alcohol non-palatable and less a target for bootleggers who would steal it and turn it into liquor to sell on the streets.
Prohibition is a perfect example of how “the law” will not save us or protect us. The article states the following,
“But people continued to drink—and in large quantities. Alcoholism rates soared during the 1920s;
insurance companies charted the increase at more than 300 more percent. Speakeasies promptly opened
for business. By the decade's end, some 30,000 existed in New York City alone. Street gangs grew into
bootlegging empires built on smuggling, stealing, and manufacturing illegal alcohol. The country's defiant
response to the new laws shocked those who sincerely (and naively) believed that the amendment would
usher in a new era of upright behavior.”
It surprises me that the religious community, especially the Christian community, would rally behind Prohibition laws as a solution. Christians, of all people, should know their Bibles which states clearly how laws cannot and will not save us. Paul, our greatest Christian witness in the Bible, in his letter to the believers at Rome proclaims again and again how the “Law” cannot save us. How right Paul is. In Romans 7:24, Paul laments, “Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” How can we ever be free from those things that entice us into destructive ways of living? Paul shouts the answer in the next verse, Romans 7:25, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
The religious community and the government tried to legislate and scare people into living right, and it failed miserably. God freed us and loved us into new life. When Jesus said he came to “Fulfill the law” he meant he would accomplish what the law failed to do, change people’s lives.
Let us embrace the freedom Christ offers, freedom from the negative forces of darkness and sin.
Pastor Gary