1 Timothy 5:23

‘Do not be a drinker of water any longer, but use a little wine for your stomach’s sake and your frequent infirmities.’

What appears here to be an abrupt change of subject is in fact probably the use of a vivid illustration comparable to that concerning the ox and the threshingfloor (1 Timothy 5:18), which he also did not feel that he needed to explain. (We might see Paul as saying, ‘Think about it. Do you really think that God is too concerned about the yips?’, in the same way as he said a similar thing about God not being over-concerned about oxen (1 Corinthians 9:9). It is not to say that God is not concerned about the oxen or the yips. It is because there are some things that are even more important). So he is saying, ‘remember your own experience with the water at Ephesus and recognise that you need also to drink of God-given wine when you make your decisions’. Both would be familiar with how Jesus had turned water into wine (John 2:1-10), indicating the new age of the Spirit.

So just as he had to learn to use discernment when drinking the impure Ephesian water, and to mix it with wine so as to prevent its harmful and unpleasant effects, so should he by the Spirit have regard to the impurities within men and cater for them in the best ways possible (which was why younger widows should be prevented from being ‘enrolled’). He may thus well be saying, in a way that he knew that Timothy would understand, ‘be careful what you are doing when you appoint people to God’s service, lest you finish up with the equivalent of a pain in your gut’. Or to put it another way, don’t just ‘drink water’ in an unthinking way when you make appointments, take steps to ensure that the worst will not happen by ‘drinking wine’ and only appointing worthy men. (It is hardly likely that the elders at Ephesus would not have already given similar advice to Timothy about the use of wine when they saw that he was suffering from the effects of the drinking water. Perhaps, however, he had asked Paul’s advice about it in which case Paul now gives it while also using it as a vivid illustration).

This is not to deny that Timothy might genuinely have had irritable bowel syndrome. But it is to suggest that Paul, in reminding him of the remedy for it in this case, humorously uses it to get over his main point. Discernment must be used, both in drinking water and in appointing people to the service of God, and that discernment comes through the Spirit. For at the back of the illustration may well have been what would be the well known story of Jesus turning water into wine (John 2:1-10), indicating the coming of the new age of the Spirit, combined with Isaiah 55:1-3, ‘come to the waters, --- buy wine and milk without money and without price’, which essentially pointed to the same.

The quality of the water is why wine is drunk in so many countries, not only as a pleasure, but out of necessity. It is because the water is almost undrinkable. It would have been much worse in Paul’s day, although stomach’s would have been more used to it. Ephesian water, however, appears to have been worse than most. But this suggestion that it is also intended to be an illustration is backed up by the examples that follow, for which the illustration is very apt.