In this section, we will be discussing the phenomenon of people becoming “drunk” as they encounter the power of the Holy Spirit. As with all the phenomena discussed in this section, there are potentially three different types of manifestations that can occur in this area as well, i.e. people becoming “drunk” under the power of God, people pretending to be drunk under the power of God and people becoming drunk from a demonic power.
Daniel 8:27 “And I, Daniel, fainted and was sick for days; afterward I arose and went about the king's business. I was astonished by the vision, but no one understood it.”
Firstly we will discuss the biblical evidence of the genuine phenomenon of people becoming “drunk” as a result of encountering the power of the Holy Spirit. There is no scriptural evidence for what many call being “drunk in the Spirit”. There is however, scriptural evidence for people becoming physically weakened when they have an encounter with the Holy Spirit. The above passage is one of the scriptures that reveal to us the human body’s reaction to a powerful encounter with the supernatural. In this passage Daniel relates to us how he physically felt, when he experienced a powerful vision from the Lord. Firstly he describes how he feinted or fell to the ground, and He then goes on to describe how his body felt as a result of that encounter. The word translated “sick” can also be translated “weak”, and so Daniel was not sick as in being ill, but rather his body was so weakened by his encounter, that he had to be picked up and carried to his home and put to bed for a number of days afterwards. Eventually his body was sufficiently recovered, for him to be able to get up and continue with his normal daily functions. There are numerous believers that can attest to having had an experience similar to Daniel, albeit not to the same degree of being weakened for days after their encounters with the Holy Spirit. I personally have had encounters with the power of the Holy Spirit flowing through my body to the extent that after the encounter my body was physically weakened, and at the end of the meeting it was with difficulty that I was able to walk to my car and drive home. And so, I suppose that someone viewing my walk to my car in that weakened state could have assumed that I was slightly intoxicated.
Michael E.B. Maher
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