CRN/Slice Discussion: Demon Brew
Issue: The use of alcohol, and Christians utilizing establishments that serve alcohol.
CRN/Slice Take: Last summer, Ken Silva made a great deal of sound and fury that Rob Bell’s “Everything is Spiritual” tour was not being held in church buildings, but in nightclubs and other establishments which served alcohol.
More recently, an outreach ministry (NOTE: Not the church, itself) of The Journey, an emerging church in St. Louis, has started meeting in the Schlafly Bottleworks on Wednesday nights, as a way of engaging people in the culture of their city. Predictably, Slice 2.0 does not approve.
Paul Walker sniffs:
Alcohol consumption issues aside, the real problem is a complete misunderstanding by the church in, “How does God convert the human soul?†If salvation of the lost depends on my fleshly efforts, then I’d better use any idea or method I can think up (even free beer night). But, if salvation is by grace and God’s Holy Spirit moving lost men to regeneration and repentance through hearing His precious Word, I’d better not waste time on beer ,pretzels and artsy chat, but rather, proclaiming the Word He commanded me to.
Bob Hyatt, who sits on our blogroll, is pastor of the Evergreen Community Church, a “pub church” in downtown Portland, Oregon. Over the past few years, he has received a great deal of grief from Ken, Ingrid and company for the mere location of his church.
On alcohol usage, itself, Slice 2.0 has remained silent, though disapproving in aside comments. Slice 1.0 was a bit more vocal on the subject, but… (you know that story). On a blog post we recently linked to, Anthony, who seems to be a supporter of the CRN/Slice viewpoints (though I fully admit that he may be an outlier on this, in the absence of other data), writes:
Why is it ok to drink alcohol now & then? Either it’s sin or it’s not. If it’s not sin drink all you want. You’re either hot or cold. Jesus will spit the lukewarm from His mouth. Rev.3:15 Tell me how drinking alcohol brings any glory to God & I will head straight to the nearest wet town & buy some!
My Take: I would divide this into two parts, one of which I suspect I will get some agreement on, and one of which I suspect will be a bit more contentive.
1) Meeting/Witnessing in establishments that serve alcohol:Â The old (and sometimes not quite dead enough) legalist in me wants to talk about avoiding even the appearance of impropriety, and to quote I Peter 2:11-12:
Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.
The problem with this is that most (if not all) people who would see this as an ‘appearance of impropriety’ are going to be immature or legalistic Christians. It is not the pagans that would accuse you of doing wrong just for meeting in such an establishment!
When asked why he robbed banks, Willie Sutton, the infamous bank robber said, “Because that’s where the money is.” Why would Christians who want to reach the lost people in this world want to go into places where the people of the world gather? The answer is rather evident.
All too often, we as Christians fall into the same trap as the rest of the world, thinking that certain places (like, say, church buildings) are “spiritual”, while other places (like, say, bars and stadiums) are “secular”. We then fall into the same trap by trying to compartmentalize other parts of our lives as “spiritual” or “secular”, when God makes no such distinction.Â
However, I think it is also important that this not be the only association/context in which Christians meet, and that in addition to witnessing to the lost that they be deeply rooted in a godly community. It is important that we can be relevant to the lives of the lost but that the company with which we identify in our hearts and minds, and with our tongues, is that of other believers.
Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.” (I Corinthians 15:33)
2) Use of Alcohol: Here’s where it gets a little tricky, because it is VERY contextual.
I think that most Christians, even those opposed to all forms of alcohol, would agree that the Bible does not forbid drinking of alcohol (which is actually condoned, in some references) but that drunkenness is a sin.
To answer Anthony’s question above - ”Tell me how drinking alcohol brings any glory to God” - I would answer that it brings glory to God in the same way that eating or drinking other food and drink brings glory to God. Who made it? Who gave you the ability to produce or buy it? For what purpose was food and drink made? To eat and to drink! In doing so, we glorify the God who produced and provided it!
Contrary to his claims, this has nothing to do with the admonition to the church of Laodicea, which the Slice crowd seems to consistently misapply.
In the US, if you’re under the age of 21, drinking alcoholic beverages - even in the privacy of your own home - is sinful, because it is in violation of governmental law
Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as the supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right. For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men. Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God. Show proper respect to everyone: Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king. (I Peter 2:13-17)
If you are 21 or older, it is much more of a judgement call, and it should be based on putting everyone else before you as prime consideration.
If you are personally convicted that you should not drink alcohol in a particular situation, and that to do so would be a sin, then by all means do not - because you would be sinning. Making a conscious decision to do something that you believe is sinful would be viewed by God as sin, as well, even if it is not defined as such in scripture [though the converse of this is NOT always true]. However, do not expect that every other Christian must come to the same conclusion as you.
With alcohol, there ARE some key dangers:
- Each person’s biochemistry is different, and what may not cause drunkenness in one person may push the one next to them completely over the edge of sobriety. So, it is difficult to know where the limit is, and with some people, the closer you are to the limit, the less likely your judgement skills will be able to acertain this.
- Enough studies have been conducted on alcoholics and their descendants to know that some people are incredibly succeptible to this horribly destructive disease. For people with this succeptibility, the ‘trigger level’ may be very low, and once crossed, it cannot be ‘uncrossed’, and that desire/temptation will burn like it never had before
- Driving an automobile with ANY amount of alcohol in your system is dangerous, and being in an accident that injures you or others - whether you are above or below the ‘legal limit’ - would be devastating to your witness.
In light of these dangers, I advise my own children that, when they turn 21, it would be best if they never decided to drink just for their own enjoyment, for the safety of themselves and the ones they love. We do cook with some alcohols (like an excellent Jack Daniels marinade my wife makes for chicken and beef), but we’ve made it clear that all of the alcoholic content is burned off in the cooking of the meat (though we’re very careful when we buy the liquor with which to make it, so as not to purchase it in a venue that might make someone else stumble).
However, they also have to recognize that there may be some times where it might be OK, particularly in the privacy of their home for a special occasion, or where it would be common courtesy to at least drink a toast or sample someone’s homemade wine/beer (i.e. where it would be a better witness for Christ to drink the alcoholic beverage than to make a show of abstention).
If there is a possibility that, by exercising your freedom in Christ to drink alcohol, you might lead someone else to stumble in their own walk, then it is incumbent upon you to die to your own wants and desires and to abstain from doing so. It is in this manner that I see many ‘emerging’ Christians (and myself, though not with alcohol, but with other freedoms) struggle. By all means we have freedom in Christ to drink - so long as we do not become drunk. However, when that freedom coincides with our own wants and desires, it is all too easy to demand the exercise of that freedom, even to the detriment of others who are weaker than we may be.
Is there a simple rule of thumb? I don’t think so, but there is a test I’ve become familiar with, which could be applied here - specifically if you believe that you are going to a bar to be a witness to others.Â
Are you willing to go to a pub and witness to others there - to just hang out - without drinking? Honestly. If someone else asked you this question just before you entered the pub, would you be offended? Honestly.Â
If you are willing to go to the pub and witness without drinking, then I would suggest doing exactly that. Only if you are specifically asked to join someone in a way that would require you to truly offend them and would shed a poor light on your witness should you exercise that freedom you have in Christ.
If you are NOT willing to go to the pub and witness without drinking, then I would suggest that the exercise of your freedom has become more important than the willingness to die to yourself and your desires and to love others as Christ loves them.
If someone else asked you this question before you entered the pub, and it would offend you, then I would also suggest that perhaps your motives and/or your pride are at work here, and that - once again - this is what you should do. I would suggest that we all consider the words of Paul:
“Everything is permissible”—but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible”—but not everything is constructive. Nobody should seek his own good, but the good of others.
Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, for, “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.”
If some unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. But if anyone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience’ sake— the other man’s conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another’s conscience? If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for?
So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God— even as I try to please everybody in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved. (I Corinthians 10:23-33)
Grace and Peace,
Chris
April 6th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Talk about that person setting things up with a dishonest question: Drinking bringing glory to God? “Tell me how and I’ll go out and drink a lot. etc. etc. etc. ”
Why does everything have to be taken to an extreme?
How does drinking milk bring Glory to God? Especially with studies showing that there is actually very little nutritional value in it for adults. Is that taking care of the temple of the Holy Spirit? Isn’t it wrong to run the risk of starting to be lactose intolerant, thus having your body function in an improper way, overworking your colon, maybe contributing to chronic conditions, inflammation, etc.?
The issue is drunkeness…not drinking.
Just cuz you might have come from a family that had no sense of proportion or were around a social group that didn’t doesn’t mean everyone is about to booze it up just because they’re having a vodka tonic before a big meal.
Relax.
People who get bent out of shape on this just act like anyone who disagrees with them wants everyone to drink.
That’s just silly.
Personally, I don’t want everyone to drink.
If you don’t like it. Don’t do it.
If you drink, just cuz you can. That’s stupid.
If you really enjoy wine with your meal, etc.
then enjoy in moderation and with a sensitivity to the TRULY weaker brother–i.e. not around alcoholics–or to avoid unneccesary, un-Christlike attacks from legalists who seem unable to help themselves.
(Funny how alcoholics and legalists get to be in the same boat on this one. Ironic, ain’t it? Sorry. That was snarky.)
I think Mark Driscoll actually got this one right.
http://perlaetus.blogspot.com/2007/03/who-wouldve-thunk.html
“Appearance of Impropriety”?
What about believing all things, hoping all things, etc?
Believing the best?
Is it improper to drink ever?
It’s only going to appear improper to those who want it to be improper in every circumstance.
Thus it’s always bad in certain people’s eyes because they know they can’t justify it scripturally, so they do these contortions about “testimony”, blah, blah, blah, ad nauseum.
I don’t know a single person who came to Jesus because certain people get angry about alcohol consumption.
I don’t understand why this is such a deal breaker for people.
Especially being a pastor where every church I have been in has people who are so overweight that their doctors have told them they have the same problems as if they abused cigarettes and alcohol their whole lives. Too bad…their angry hypocrites that didn’t even get to have any fun while they destroyed their bodies with their “acceptable, christian vice”.
I’d be upset too. (That’s some sarcasm there again.)
I’ve always gotten beat up by people who only “HEAR” about my having a glass of wine and then get told I have to defer to them. They aren’t the “weaker brother”. They have a strong extra-biblical conviction. In such a situation, “defer” really means “let someone control”.
I don’t believe THAT is loving. I think it’s hateful to let someone be controlling and mean spirited. How does that help their discipleship and REAL witness?
http://perlaetus.blogspot.com/2007/03/no-transformation-necessary.html
We need to show a little more respect and love and believing the best on this stuff. It’s not the “main thing” and it’s just more of the distraction from the real issues.
To end, here’s a little story attributed to D.L. Moody and Billy Sunday:
D.L. Moody confronted Billy Sunday about smoking cigars. (Smoking! Gasp! From a fundy evangelist!!!)
Moody:
When are you going to stop smoking those things, Billy?
Sunday:
About the time you lose some weight, Dwight.
Grab that log, brothers and sisters! Grab that log and pull!
You’ll be better able to see the numbers on the scale.
April 6th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
Are we not yet weary of the alcohol mind games? It would be disingenuous to say the Scripture forbids it and similarly disingenuous to say in our culture of abuse it probably would be better to abstain willfully.
But to Pastor Walker’s comments, it will always intrigue me when staunch Calvinists spend their time criticzing what may or may not be fleshly efforts to ellicit decisions for Christ. Why do they care, these are only non elect people trying to get through the day, leave them alone. And if they mistakenly think they are saved, and if they mistakenly feel joy and peace, and if they mistakenly think they are going to heaven - so what? What is the mindset here, to inform the non elect that they really are not saved neither can they be? The non elect can never realize they are non elect and the elect will only respond to the truth so relax, it will all work out.
And I will never understand how a Calvinistic blog can spend such an obscene amount of time criticizing and critiquing what the non elect people do. They are dead and God hasn’t chosen them so let them have a little fun before they are cast into hell, why deny them that?
But if messages matter in the scheme of eternity and if people who could have been saved can be deceived and lose their souls, well, that puts a different light upon it. But many of these watchmen do not believe that, so who cares if the non elect have church nightly in a strip club, they are incapable of anything else. And to get all bothered about meeting in a place that serves alcohol, wow, straining at a non elect gnat!
April 6th, 2007 at 1:36 pm
D.L Moody had his own cigar’s. Now, if you admit to smoking a cigar, Moody won’t let you in their school. Seems funny to me. Personally, this is the silliest of silly discussions.
April 6th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
I’m pretty much a teetotaler myelf, as I grew up in a Christian house where my parents never had alcohol around. Now being a campus pastor at a school where binge drinking is a huge deal, I just can’t find a good excuse to drink. I don’t really care if other Christians do or not, I just don’t want to myself. I have friend who order a beer at dinner, and I’m completely fine with it.
That being said, I think some of the contributiors at CRN could stand to have a few, you know, just to take the edge off.
April 6th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
Tolkien, Lewis, Calvin, Luther, and Spurgeon all drank alcohol. Grape juice wasn’t even invented until 1869 (for the purpose of a non-alcoholic communion wine). So, for the last 2 thousand years, Christians have been drinking.
April 6th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Phil says “That being said, I think some of the contributiors at CRN could stand to have a few, you know, just to take the edge off.”
A classic.
April 6th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Matt,
Be careful, the next thing you know, you’ll be saying stuff like “Paul didn’t read the KJV”…
April 6th, 2007 at 3:26 pm
Mike Corely had a radio show about Luther in which his guest said it was ok that Luther drank because he was “a product of his times.” Couldn’t every emerging/emergent Christ follower just say the same thing?
The guest also justified Luther’s comments about the Jews with the same argument, that he was “a product of his times.” I think Luther was a great man, but even great men screw up big time, which I think Luther did here. No one is perfect, only Christ.
April 6th, 2007 at 3:45 pm
anti-semitic pogroms aren’t even in the same realm of consideration as having a drink.
It’s not even in the same realm as getting drunk–and that IS a sin.
April 6th, 2007 at 3:52 pm
One thing to realize is that no one cares who drinks or not except the extreme fundamentalists. I don’t know a single non-Christian that cares one way or another if I drink or not. I go out with a huge group of moms from our neighborhood, and I have a drink or I don’t have a drink–NONE OF THEM CARE! It is odd that the unsaved world are more accepting and understanding of people’s different choices and quirks than Christians. Don’t get me wrong…I am definitely not a “tolerance” advocate. But God DID make us all different with different tastes, likes, dislikes, stlyes, etc. So it only makes sense that we might be “called” to behave different from one another, all, of course, within the confines of God’s law.
Also, RIck, you crack me up!! Thanks for the great humor! LMBO with the whole “elect” thing…but also very to the point!
April 7th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
Excellent post Chris L.
April 9th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
[...] Erica on CRN/Slice Discussion: Demon Brew [...]
April 27th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
I’ve got no problem with people who want to drink a little alcohol now and then. Although I don’t drink myself.
I’ve got no problem with a church or ministry who meets in a pub (or other “unacceptable” location).
But if we say we are going to meet in a pub so we can reach the unsaved (and that’s a good thing), but we do it at time when the establishment is not usually open or serving patrons - what have we gained??? It seems for the argument to work, we need to have church in the pub during happy hour. How one does that — I don’t know. But to completely meet that goal, that’s what we would need to do.
Again, no issue with Bob from Evergreen. His blog is in my RSS feeds. I wish him all the best reaching the unsaved in his community. But I wonder how we are really doing in reaching the unsaved by meeting for church in pub at 10am Sunday morning when the “regulars” aren’t even there.
April 27th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Bill,
thanks for your comments. Two things.
1. Who or when did God determine what was acceptable and unacceptable space to hold church in? Martin Luther often held meetings in German pubs and wineries.
2. “But I wonder how we are really doing in reaching the unsaved by meeting for church in pub at 10am Sunday morning when the “regulars†aren’t even there.”
Do they meet at 10am? If they do.. lame
Our church meets in a nightclub (the bars are closed) at 7pm. It seems to attract the same crowd.
May 31st, 2007 at 4:49 pm
[...] I won’t take up much space here, since we responded to their tired legalism back in April, and since we tackled the subject of alcohol a second time - TWICE - when Ken went ballistic over Mars Hill (Seattle) Church’s use of the word ‘cervesa’ in a celebration flier, other than to say that Ingrid’s new article is a perfect example of how little she understands what a ‘church’ is. [...]
July 23rd, 2007 at 10:46 am
“The problem with this is that most (if not all) people who would see this as an ‘appearance of impropriety’ are going to be immature or legalistic Christians. It is not the pagans that would accuse you of doing wrong just for meeting in such an establishment!”
Actually, I work with several “pagans” that make it a point to notice things exactly like this. They drink, but Christians are not supposed to in their minds. I’m not defending them, I’m just saying that’s how they think. Consequently, they–on numerous occasions–have made comments like: “that’s why I don’t go to church, etc.” Believe it or not, some are watching and they do make accusations.
July 23rd, 2007 at 1:26 pm
Keith,
Ironically you have proved the point even more. Christians have set up such false pretenses for what it means to be a follower of Christ, that the world mocks at us and laughts at us when we don’t meet the falsly high standards we have set We are being held up to such a high standard that isn’t even biblical. How do you think “Pagans” got the idea that “Christians are not supposed to in their minds”?
I dream of the day when “pagans” do not know us primarily by our stance against alcohol or gays. What would happen if a “pagan” said to you “why do you not love like the other Christians” rather than saying “I don’t go to church because you drink and Christians aren’t supposed to”