Did you know that apparently millions of people stop drinking in the new year for a month? They call it “Dry January.” It’s become an annual challenge to abstain from alcohol either for health reasons or to reassess drinking patterns.
Tom Holland, the actor most famous for playing Spiderman, did Dry January in 2022. After reflecting on how much he was struggling without booze in that first month, it really scared him. So he stayed dry in February, which was no easier. He said: “So then again I was starting to panic, thinking…I have a bit of an alcohol thing.” So he extended his abstinence to March, & started to feel a little better, though still struggling. He decided to go to June 1st. He remarked, “…By the time I’d done 6 months sober, I really started feeling the benefits. I started sleeping better, I was handling stressful situations better, my relationship…with my family was better.” So he kept going. When he made it one year, he said, “I was done….I’m never going to drink again because this is the best version of myself.”
I’ve never been a drinker, & I have cautioned others against drinking from the perspective of biblical wisdom & warnings. While Scripture doesn’t forbid drinking, it does condemn drunkenness. It’s a spiritual & moral danger to lose self-control. I wrote about this a couple of years ago, but since then experts have begun radically rethinking alcohol. Since the 1980s we’ve been told that light & moderate drinking was good for us–that wine was good for our hearts. But reports have debunked those claims. More than poor science, it’s myth. Drinking can actually be harmful to your health.
The Apostle Paul did encourage his young minister friend, Timothy: “No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments” (1 Tim. 5:23). By adding a little wine to the water, perhaps this would medically aid in digestion, or help destroy harmful bacteria prevalent back then. Regardless, we have better treatments for such health issues today.
In the opening days of this year, the U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, released a report finding deep links between alcohol & multiple fatal cancers. Florida neurosurgeon, Dr. Brett Osborn, comments that we’ve always known alcohol is a toxin. This is not some new discovery–it’s a compilation of data over several decades. All of this has raised questions about whether those who have issued health guidelines have been ignoring or downplaying the risks. Guess who’s been funding much of the research into the so-called benefits of drinking? Yep, the alcohol industry.
In September, the American Association for Cancer Research reported that adults under 50 years old have been developing cancers at increasingly higher rates, & that alcohol may be a factor driving the trend. The previous month a large British study found that light & moderate drinkers didn’t benefit from a reduction in heart disease in comparison with occasional drinkers. More than that, they even experienced more cancer deaths than occasional drinkers. In other words, there’s no health benefit to drinking any amount.
Last July, Dr. Tim Stockwell, a Canadian expert on alcohol & longevity, revealed that consuming one drink per day over a lifetime cuts 2 ½ months off a person’s life. Those who drink heavily (about 5 drinks per day) shave off about 2 years. This doctor used to support moderate drinking until a fellow scientist showed him major flaws in the medical research. When he led a meta-analysis of more than 107 studies published over the past 4 decades, he saw that no amount of alcohol improves health, but could increase the risk of death of any cause.
The Surgeon General calls drinking the 3rd leading preventable cause of cancer, which means 5% of cancer deaths can be attributed to alcohol. He states: “Consuming any type of alcohol – beer, wine, or spirits – increases the risk for at least seven types of cancer, including cancers of the breast for women, colorectum, esophagus, liver, mouth, throat, and voice box (larynx).” That’s why he wants a cancer warning label. Ireland already passed legislation to put health warnings on booze labels beginning in 2026–the first nation to do so.
He also says it’s a gateway to neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s. A 2022 study shows that alcohol causes brain degeneration. If you’re middle-aged or older, going from 1 to 2 drinks per day was associated with changes in the brain equivalent to aging 2 years. Even 1 glass of wine per night is enough to destroy white & gray matter in your brain.
We’ve become increasingly more aware of the poor health caused by our American sedentary lifestyles & diets high in processed foods, seed oils, syrups & sugars. It seems we’re being told everything in our foods is causing cancer or some other condition. So, granted, a beer or glass of wine now & then may not be as bad as the cumulative effect of all those other things.
I’m no doctor, but I am a theologian, & it seems wise to steward our bodies well by avoiding foods & beverages that significantly harm them (1 Cor. 6:19-20, 10:31, 3 John 1:2). My pastoral role is to help you examine your reasoning for your behaviors & give you information to make an informed decision. I don’t know if a warning label will dissuade anyone from drinking because a person still has to want to control themselves (Gal. 5:22-23, 2 Tim. 1:7). So why not see how long you can go without drinking, & how it affects you? You may not go cold turkey, or stop altogether, but maybe you’ll start to reduce your alcohol consumption & even taper off. You may just find that abstinence is good for you–body, mind & soul (1 Thess. 5:23, Rom. 12:1-2).