Winebibbers and Gluttons 

I am a pastor.  I am also a chef.  As someone who appreciates good food, I have to admit that I also appreciate a good glass of wine.  As a student of the bible I have no issue with moderate alcohol use, but as a pastor I encounter the full gamut of attitudes on this issue, from insisting that God commands abstinence, to a lack of concern about it altogether.  In the last couple of decades I’ve noticed a definite shift among church members who, at least in my contexts, appear to not be nearly so concerned about the issue.  More and more church members, including leaders and pastors, are feeling free to enjoy “adult beverages.”  Yet there are lingering questions in the minds of many as to what this means for the Christian, and a host of dysfunctions and self-destructive behaviors continue to coincide with alcohol consumption.  Perhaps what bothers me the most is the lack of discourse on this subject.  It appears to be still “in the shadows”, with pastors no longer preaching the evils of demon rum, but nor do they appear to address the issue biblically in order to help their people get a clear set of guidelines on this issue.  For my part, I’m never good with the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on any issue of faith and life, always preferring to have open, legitimate, biblical, and grace-filled discussions on all such things with my fellow believers as we work through this thing called a biblical worldview together. 

To that end, my first question is always:  What is the over-all biblical witness on this issue?

Old Testament

Alcohol consumption has been part and parcel of the human experience since the beginning of recorded history, including the ancient texts of the Old Testament.  In regards to the Old Testament law, there are no prohibitions on consuming alcohol. Quite the contrary, wine, in particular, is symbolic of God’s blessings and included as one of the required sacrifices his people are to bring to him as their first-fruits.  This would militate against the notion that alcohol in itself is sinful, or “unholy”, since the Old Testament sacrificial system was designed by God to ensure holiness.  To conclude that abstinence was somehow a lifestyle that is more “holy” would require assuming that God is inconsistent with himself and doesn’t understand his own notions of holiness. 

The Psalms continue to present wine as a symbol of God’s provision and blessing for his people:

He makes grass grow for the cattle,
       and plants for man to cultivate—
       bringing forth food from the earth:
 ¹⁵ wine that gladdens the heart of man,
       oil to make his face shine,
       and bread that sustains his heart. (Ps. 104)

At the same time, there are narratives, such as Noah after the flood, which illustrate the dangers of overindulgence, although they are not specifically designed to teach that lesson per se’. 

In regards to actual Old Testament instruction on this issue, Proverbs may come closest. As a primer for Israeli youngsters to help them avoid some of the traps of life, the writer(s) of Proverbs make sure to warn them of the perils of misusing alcohol.  Just one example: 

¹Wine is a mocker, strong drink a brawler,
         And whoever is intoxicated by it is not wise. (Prov. 20:31)

At the same time, the proverbs recommend that we:

Give beer to those who are perishing,
       wine to those who are in anguish; (31:6)

Rules of biblical interpretation for various genres affirm that the proverbs are good advice, not laws.  But good advice inspired by the Holy Spirit and in the canon of Scripture is what I would consider to be really good advice.   Proverbs 23, in particular, warns of the kind of drinking that intoxicates you and then causes you to crave another drink when you wake up.  Overall, the advice appears to avoid prohibition, but advise moderation, similar to what we can glean anecdotally from the law and Old Testament narratives. 

The Old Testament prophets continue along these same lines, assuming the cultural and ritual use of alcohol, but critiquing its misuse.  Isaiah is exemplary on this, using the misuse of alcohol as one of the aspects of a culture gone sour:

But see, there is joy and revelry,
       slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep,
       eating of meat and drinking of wine!
       "Let us eat and drink," you say,
       "for tomorrow we die!" (22:13)

He also includes his own proverbs:

Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine
       and champions at mixing drinks, (5:22)

At the same time, he affirms the intimate connection between the gift of wine and God’s blessings, looking ahead to times of restoration and fulfillment:

On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
       a feast of rich food for all peoples,
       a banquet of aged wine—
       the best of meats and the finest of wines. (25:6)

Taken together, the sum of the Old Testament witness on this issue presumes a place for moderate alcohol consumption among God’s people, both culturally and ritually and in the Eschaton.  At the same time, it offers instructions descriptively and prescriptively for temperance and avoiding drunkenness, especially of the sort that leads to bad choices or is exemplary of a life lived deliberately out of God’s design. 

New Testament

The gospels are the story of Jesus Christ, God’s messiah, who came to usher in the kingdom of God and establish the church, the final form of God’s people prior to his second coming.  There is very little ethical instruction on this issue in the gospels, although Jesus does warn us against drunkenness in a time when we are meant to be alert and about kingdom business prior to his second coming:

³⁴"Be on guard, so that your hearts will not be weighted down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of life, and that day will not come on you suddenly like a trap; (Luke 21:34)

The connection between dissipation, a deliberate licentious lifestyle, and drunkenness is a common theme in the New Testament, as we shall see.  Outside of that, the issue does come up in various narratives in the gospels. The first miracle of Jesus, turning water into wine, is a well-known example.  This is not intended to be an instruction one way or the other regarding drinking, but an enacted parable in which Jesus used the water reserved for ritual cleansing and transformed it into the wine of celebration: a way of declaring that the kingdom which the prophets had looked forward to had arrived with the coming of Christ, and the Old Testament system of cleansing was about to be replaced.  At the same time, he doesn’t bother to use his status as the ultimate prophet to critique the fact that at this time in the gathering the guests had probably had “too much to drink.” But we cannot presume to read into that any specific lessons other than that which the miracle was intended to convey. 

Jesus does not provide us an example of abstinence from drinking.  Very few people of his time would have affirmed that as valid, other than those such as John the Baptist who had taken the Nazirite vow.  One of the accusations leveled against Jesus, in fact, was that he was too eager to indulge, especially with those who would have been considered sinners by the religious culture:

¹⁸For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, 'He has a demon.' ¹⁹The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and "sinners." ' But wisdom is proved right by her actions."  (Matt. 11:18,19)

It would take an extreme exegetical stretch to assume that when Jesus was eating and drinking with these people in ways that allowed his critics to accuse him of being a drunkard, that he was not eating what they ate or drinking what they drank.  The primary lesson here was also not about drinking per se’, but about the fact that Jesus had come to call these people to join the kingdom and was perfectly willing to go where they were and involve himself in relationship with them in order to accomplish his missional purpose for their lives.  In spite of the accusations of his critics we do not, of course, have any record of over-indulgence or drunkenness on the part of Christ.

Finally, the Lord’s supper was the ultimate symbol of God’s provision and blessing for his people through his Messiah as he transformed the Passover feast; utilizing the symbol of the wine to present himself as the final Passover lamb, come to complete God’s plan to redeem and bless his people. 

Overall the gospels appear to continue to affirm the trajectory of the Old Testament on this issue.  They offer us teaching by example, or inference from silence on the subject, offering us no support for either abstinence or overindulgence. 

The most specific ethical instruction comes to us from the epistles, that part of the canon where the characteristics of the New Covenant which the Messiah had established are worked out in the lives of individuals and the church through the apostolic letters. 

In his letter to Corinth, Paul offers a harsh critique of their gatherings:

When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper you eat, ²¹for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk. ²²Don't you have homes to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you for this? Certainly not!  (1 Cor. 11:20-22)

At Corinth as, no doubt, the other house churches of the time, drinking was clearly a part of the love feast-- the way in which they celebrated the Lord’s supper.  Paul doesn’t critique the fact that they were getting drunk, having no comment on that fact other than asking whether they had homes to do that in.  His problem was with the fact that the poor people were forced to wait for their food while the rich people over-indulged.  “Eating and drinking without recognizing the body of the Lord” then is probably not a reference to whether or not you have been saved by your faith in Christ.  Rather, it is more likely a comment regarding Christ’s body, the church, as a mutual care-giving society filled with people who put other’s needs above their own.  Not allowing those who have nothing to have an equal part in the love feast was a basic abdication of the nature of the new People of God which Christ the Passover lamb had come to establish. 

The real question becomes that of discerning what is the nature of our ethical obligations in the new era of grace, without the law.  In this case, of course, there is no governing law in the Old Testament that we need be concerned about.  However, Paul does mention drunkenness in the context of his systematic theology, the book of Romans, in which he addresses fairly precisely the interaction between grace and ethical living:

 ⁸Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. ⁹The commandments, "Do not commit adultery," "Do not murder," "Do not steal," "Do not covet," and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: "Love your neighbor as yourself." ¹⁰Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

 ¹¹And do this, understanding the present time. The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed.

 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. ¹³Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. ¹⁴Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature. (Romans 13)

In this passage in Romans we find that the Old Testament law has been replaced by the “law of love,” precisely what Jesus affirmed for the religious rulers: 

Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' ³⁸This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' ⁴⁰All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.".  (Matt. 22:37-40)

At the same time, here is one of Paul’s so-called “sin lists.” In juxtaposing the law of love with this list, Paul reminds his readers of a key component of life in the New Covenant:  liberty is not license.  Drunkenness, specifically, is put together here with orgies, or “carousing”: “a nocturnal and riotous procession of half drunken and frolicsome fellows who after supper parade through the streets with torches and music in honour of Bacchus or some other deity, and sing and play before houses of male and female friends; hence used generally of feasts and drinking parties that are protracted till late at night and indulge in revelry.” Clearly not appropriate behavior. 

This is the kind of drunkenness of the sort which other passages in the epistles warn us about:

²¹envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal. 5:21)

³For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousing, drinking parties and abominable idolatries. (1 Peter 4:3)

Just because the “do nots” in the law are summed up as “love your neighbor as yourself”, does not mean we live life without personal moral boundaries.  Love is the fulfillment of the law, but there are still things we deliberately shy away from, including any kind of drunkenness that would qualify as part of a lifestyle involving things like sexual immorality or a life that is characterized by indulging our old sinful natures. 

One of the most well known specific prohibitions comes from Paul in Ephesians:

Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit (5:18)

Here Paul also confirms that the prohibition is in regards to the kind of drunkenness that leads to debauchery, “an abandoned, dissolute life.”  This makes a lot of sense, since he is using drunkenness as a lifestyle to compare to being filled with the Spirit, using a present tense construction that speaks of an ongoing activity.  Allowing the Spirit daily to guide us is by its very nature antithetical to allowing ourselves to be controlled by anything other than God.  This is a specific instruction that hearkens back to the promise of the Old Testament prophets:

I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. ²⁶ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.  (Ez. 36:25-27)

Here is the joy and the challenge of life in the New Covenant.  We live not under law, but by the Spirit who guides our choices.  A deliberate lifestyle of self-indulgence disallows that kind of guidance and compromises our relationship to God, as does being controlled by substances.  

Paul’s exhortation to Timothy to drink some wine for health reasons is also, of course, well known to those who would question the legitimacy of requiring abstinence.  It is interesting to note that this is in the context of instructing Timothy to “not share in the sins of others” and to “keep himself pure.”  (1 Timothy 5:22-24)  This squares with modern nutritional science which understands moderate alcohol use to be beneficial, and over-indulgence to be dangerous.  Sounds familiar.

The other issue which Paul brings up in regards to outright prohibition, is the impact “laws” have on our attitudes and actions. 

 ⁷What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, "Do not covet." ⁸But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead. ⁹Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. ¹⁰I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. (Romans 7:7-9)

There are many (including myself) who would offer America’s ill-fated experiment with prohibition as an example of precisely this principle, believing it to be partly responsible for the dysfunctional cultural attitude we have toward alcohol that results in its abuse and misuse.  I know of foreign students who grow up drinking responsibly in the home who roundly criticize the kind of binge drinking they see when they come to America’s college campuses.  Often-times the assumption is that the prohibition up to the age of 21 led to over-indulgence and misuse when it became available.  I don’t pretend to offer an opinion as to what the appropriate legal drinking age should be (if any), but I would certainly offer it as an example of the principle, “When the commandment came, sin sprang to life”.  Paul re-iterates just how little use prohibition has on keeping us from bad choices in his letter to Colosse:

²⁰Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: ²¹"Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"? ²²These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. ²³Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. (Col. 2:20-23)

I was asked recently why it was that so many churches took a prohibitionist position on this issue, and not being able to come up with a biblical construct I wondered about that myself.  As it turns out, this is a uniquely 20^th century American phenomenon, coming not from the puritans as I had previously supposed (they had no big problem with this, taking great pains that they were able to brew a drinkable beer in the New World in particular), but from the temperance movement of the early 20^th century, which for all intents and purposes actually became the abstinence movement.  Although this torch was clearly carried from many a pulpit, the biblical basis was sketchy indeed.  At one point there were some in the movement who even went to the pains of hiring someone to re-write the bible in order to remove all references to wine.

Without any Old Testament prohibition or any explicit or implicit New Testament teaching regarding abstaining from alcohol, the logical conclusion would be that the Christian has freedom in this area, particularly given the example of Christ.  I assume, of course, that we are not talking about the kind of drunken lifestyle which is clearly out of step with a functional relationship to God. 

The one caveat which I have heard mentioned repeatedly on this issue in regards to Christian freedom has to do with the “stumbling block principle.”  This comes primarily from Paul’s 1^st letter to Corinth:

 ⁹Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. ¹⁰For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? ¹¹So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. ¹²When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. ¹³Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.  (1 Cor. 8:9-13)

In their classic text “How to Read the Bible for all its Worth”, Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart use this text in particular as an example of how to apply a proper hermeneutic (application) to the epistles.  They note that we simply do not have any comparable situation in our culture, since we’re not having to deal with the issue of food having been sacrificed to idols.   Therefore, we must discern the principles underlying the instruction and apply them appropriately.  They argue from the larger context that to Paul, things such as food and drink or anything that is cultural rather than inherently moral (including Christian cultures such as wine and non/wine cultures) are a matter of indifference.  They also note that in this passage, what is under discussion is not simply what might offend somebody, but what would literally destroy somebody’s faith.  At the risk of sounding really “out to lunch” on this, I would go so far as to say that given the fact that the issue here is people being willing to come to faith in Christ and fellowship with his people, the stumbling block principle could often-times be applied in reverse to how it is normally used.  For many who are considering the faith, if they were to see Christians as legalistically prohibitionist on this issue, that would be more of a stumbling block than if they were to come to dinner and be offered a glass of wine.  Whatever else you may be able to say about this it is clear to me, at least, that Jesus himself would not have fared well if the usual way of thinking of the stumbling block principle would have been applied to his activities.     

The issue, of course, is no longer (or at least more seldom) about seeing drinking in and of itself as sinful, and therefore a “stumbling block” to an appropriate relationship to God.  What is normally at stake is people who have a problem with drinking.  Shouldn’t we see ourselves as responsible in some way if by the exercise of our freedom they somehow see their own bad choices to continue to purse something they have a problem with as having been validated?  Actually, one of the primary characteristics of life in the New Covenant era is that we bear responsibility for our own choices.  The Prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel look ahead to the time in which we now live:

The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous man will be credited to him, and the wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him.  (Ez. 18:20)

"In those days people will no longer say,
       'The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
       and the children's teeth are set on edge.'
 Instead, everyone will die for his own sin; whoever eats sour grapes—his own teeth will be set on edge. (Jer. 31:29,30)

In my view, we don’t need any biblical justification at all for abstaining from alcohol when we’re with someone who clearly has a problem, if we think that it would contribute to self destructive behavior on their part.  That doesn’t require a proof text—just simple common courtesy and Christian charity. 

Finally, I would offer a broad eschatological perspective on this subject as well.  Jesus said,

I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father's kingdom."  (Matt. 26:29)

Here we confront what scholars call the “now and not yet” of the kingdom of God.  We noted earlier Isaiah’s prophecy regarding the ultimate experience of God’s people on mount Zion:

On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
       a feast of rich food for all peoples,
       a banquet of aged wine—
       the best of meats and the finest of wines. (25:6)

We also know that the kingdom of God was ushered in by the coming of the Messiah, as noted (among other places) when Christ read from the 61^st chapter of the scroll of Isaiah in Nazareth and declared that prophecy of the coming day of the Lord to be fulfilled.  Peter affirmed this in his sermon at Pentecost when he quoted from the prophet Joel, and regarding the mountain of God in particular we note from the writer of Hebrews:

²²But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, (Heb. 12:22)

The New Testament witness is very clear that all of the characteristics of life in the kingdom are meant to be our present experience, even though they have yet to be fully realized when Christ comes again to finally destroy all sources of sin and renew the heavens and the earth for our eternal post-resurrection existence.  I just have to say that when I drink just the right Cabernet with a perfectly prepared cut of beef, I always think of what early Christians, up to and through even the puritan era, have thought: that this is truly a gift from God.  And I celebrate life in the kingdom. 

So: what would I conclude from all of this if someone were to ask me to prepare actual guidelines on this issue for believers in a local body of Christ?

First of all, regardless of my own biblical thinking on this as outlined, I am perfectly aware that there will be some who think otherwise.  I see this as one of those non-essential doctrinal “gray areas” about which I hope that practicing Christians would be able to come to different conclusions.  My principle on these issues is that of Augustine:

Unity in the essentials, diversity in the non-essentials, and love in all things.

I would certainly hope that godly Christians who have differing viewpoints on this issue, or come from different cultural backgrounds, would be able to worship and fellowship together in harmony and tolerance of each other’s positions.  It seems to me that a believer who was a social drinker should be able to go to dinner with one who abstained and they would both be able to enjoy their time together without judging the other for having a different opinion on this subject.    

Obviously, I do not affirm that abstention from alcohol is or should be any kind of requirement for pursuing a right relationship with God or his people.  Like the biblical authors, however, I thoroughly deny the legitimacy of drunkenness as a lifestyle, as defined previously. 

Two cultural distinctions that we live with which the biblical authors did not have to contend with bear consideration.

First of all, we now travel in large death machines at high rates of speed (cars and trucks), and any kind of impairment from alcohol puts ourselves and others at risk of injury or death if we get behind the wheel.  The authors of Scripture appear to be singularly unconcerned with the fact that alcohol can temporarily impair your cognitive function, preferring instead to soundly critique a deliberately licentious lifestyle characterized by drunkenness.  However, we cannot construct an argument from silence to validate it, either.  I can’t recommend it nor can I think of a reason to do so.  In our situation, in particular, if we get behind the wheel without full use of our abilities, we put ourselves and others at risk of injury or death and this is clearly inconsistent with a Christian approach. 

The other issue is that we now live in a society that takes a therapeutic rather than a shame based approach to this issue, preferring to see the chronic misuse of alcohol as a disease to be treated rather than a bad moral choice for the community to condemn.  Rarely was the abuse of alcohol a problem in early America when the first public offense landed you in the stocks in the public square.  Whether that approach is right or wrong is neither here nor there.  The fact is that our context is very different, and if we see a brother or a sister who struggles with this, we must be willing to see ourselves as part of the “therapeutic community.”  What this means will require discernment and open communication between all parties.  I would hope that honest and open discussion would lead to mutual understanding as to how we can best help each other along the paths of our spiritual journeys. 

For believers who are social drinkers, I believe that strong consideration should be given to fasting from alcohol consumption on a regular basis.  It simply must be admitted that there is a potential for alcohol to get a hold on us and lead us to a place where we don’t want to go.  Given that, regularly abstaining for long enough periods of time to ensure that we are not travelling down that road could hardly have a significant downside.  Quite the contrary, fasting of this nature can be a helpful spiritual discipline, especially when married to a time when you determine to particularly focus on developing your intimate relationship to God through prayer, solitude, meditation, and devotion to the Word.  The 40 days of lent is a traditional time for some Christians for this kind of discipline, and although it probably wouldn’t be helpful to see that as a legalistic requirement (for reasons noted above), that basic approach could perhaps be a guide of sorts. 

So far, that’s my take on this one,  given my own experience and understanding of the word of God and what it means to pursue a relationship to Him and be effective in his kingdom ministry and mission.  L’Chaim.