Christians and Alcohol: Abstinence Is Not Righteousness

So far we have looked briefly at our context concerning alcohol, what is and what is not sin concerning alcohol, and the fact that Christians must consider their brothers and sisters higher than their right to drink alcohol.

In "Consuming, Drunkenness, and Abstinence as Sin" I mentioned that there is an instance where Mark Drisoll's scenario would be valid. To remind you of the situation, he was "studying the Scriptures for a sermon about Jesus' first miracle of turning water into wine, as reported in John's gospel, a miracle that Jesus performed when he was about my age. My Bible study convicted me of my sin of abstinence from alcohol. So in repentance I drank a hard cider over lunch with our worship pastor."

Alright, we already showed that not drinking alcohol at face-value is definitely not a sin. That notion is totally unfounded. But there is another dimension to consider: the dimension of self-righteousness.

[Jesus] also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

-Luke 18:9-14

There are some among us who abstain from alcohol and consider themselves righteous because of it. This is silly. And I do not want this to be a point you gloss over. If you exalt yourself, even in your own heart, because you abstain from alcohol, you are in sin.

Now, the proper response is not to go and drink a hard cider like Driscoll; that will absolve you of approximately nothing. Rather, the proper response would be to repent; ask God to lay your heart bare and uproot the self-righteousess that you may have concerning alcohol. If having a drink of alcohol will help remove this self-righteousness, so be it (just make sure to consider those around you as we have already talked about). But again, the act does not justify you; your heart before God is what is important here.

This is not a secondary issue when discussing alcohol. I think this is just as rampant as not considering a fellow believer before imbibing alcohol. Consider your heart. Like I asserted in "Reacting and Relating," "are you seeking to follow Christ at every turn or, like the rich young ruler, are you not quite willing to give up some things?" For some of us, the thing we might not be willing to give up may be our "right" to drink alcohol in certain circumstances; for others of us, it may be our self-righteousness in abstaining from it.

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Earlier in this series:
Christians and Alcohol: Prolegomena
Christians and Alcohol: In Context
Christians and Alcohol: Consuming, Drunkenness, and Abstinence as Sin
Christians and Alcohol: Reacting and Relating
Christians and Alcohol: The Corinthian Matrix

Christians and Alcohol: Sources So Far

Christians and Alcohol: Consuming, Drunkenness, and Abstinence as Sin

This post is almost unnecessary, but I don't want to take anything for granted in this discussion. So, before we press on we need to address what immediate individual sin is, or what implications drinking has on the Christian actually imbibing alcohol.

It has been said from time to time that simply consuming alcohol is a sin. This view is invalid according to Scripture as displayed by this syllogism:

1. The Bible states that Jesus was sinless.
2. Jesus drank alcohol.
3. Drinking alcohol is not a sin.

Of course this logic presupposes that the Bible is true, but keep in mind this discussion series is titled "Christians and Alcohol" and if an individual does not believe that Christ is without sin it is hardly possible for that individual to be a Christian.

It is also clear in Scripture that drunkenness is a sin.

The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

-Romans 13:12-14

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

-Galatians 5:19-21

So, consuming alcohol is not a sin, but consuming too much is considered a fleshy pursuit. These are simple biblical truths.

But what about abstaining from alcohol?

According to Mark Driscoll, he was "studying the Scriptures for a sermon about Jesus' first miracle of turning water into wine, as reported in John's gospel, a miracle that Jesus performed when he was about my age. My Bible study convicted me of my sin of abstinence from alcohol. So in repentance I drank a hard cider over lunch with our worship pastor."

There are situations where abstaining from alcohol is a sin (I will discuss this later; just hold on) and to be fair I do not know exactly how Driscoll means his abstinence was sinful. But at face-value, this statement is silly (I will discuss the deeper interpretation as well; just hold on). It is silly for this reason: wine was the primary drink in the ancient context in which Jesus lived.

(This is good to note before I go further: the wine in John's gospel and in the rest of the New Testament was approximately 3 parts water, 1 part wine. The average individual would have to consume 22 glasses of wine to get drunk. Bladders tend to fill up before you get to that 22nd glass. Hard cider contains a much larger amount of alcohol than ancient wine.)

Wine in the ancient context was the drink of choice for the whole of the population. It is clear that it was a cultural norm. Our observations from the previous post shows us that our culture does not view alcohol in the same way that Jesus' culture viewed it. This ancient wine, if you want to call the diluted mixture that, was as much a staple of culture as wearing sandals. But Driscoll doesn't think that walking around in biker-boots or barefoot is a sin. Abstinence from alcohol in this sense is definitely not a sin.

There are intangibles at work here. This discussion is only a small piece of the pie. Remember the reaction and relation I discussed at the end of the last post? That is where we are going next.

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Earlier in this series:

Christians and Alcohol: Prolegomena

Christians and Alcohol: In Context

The Mirth of Christ

GK Chesterton concludes his book, Orthodoxy, with an accurate observation of the life of Christ.

"Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth."

I see two things in Scripture which makes this true. There are others, but for the sake of brevity I will limit it to two.

Firstly, Isaiah prophesied about the sorrow and grief that the Messiah would endure.

He was despised and rejected by men;
    a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces
    he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

-Isaiah 53:3

The chapter continues,

Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him;
    he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
    he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
    the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.
Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied;
    by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant,
    make many to be accounted righteous,
    and he shall bear their iniquities.

-Isaiah 53:10, 11

Jesus knew that He was to be crushed by His Father, this caused Him deep sorrow, but out of His affliction He knew His Father's purposes would be accomplished which leads to the second observation.

While on Earth, the joy that Christ knew was not immediate, but to come.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

-Hebrews 12:1-2 (emphasis added)

Jesus knew that doing the will of His Father would bring Him great joy, although His Earthly mission was one of sorrow and grief.

Unfortunately, some have disagreed with Chesterton saying that Jesus was a funny guy, trying to turn his teachings into jokes. I do not think that Chesterton would say that Jesus did not laugh or crack a joke from time to time, but his true joy, the mirth that Chesterton referred to, was not yet realized during Christ's time on Earth.

It is also irreverent and somewhat disgusting to take Jesus' teachings and use them as a justification for crude humor. A perfect example comes in the book, Vintage Jesus. In it Mark Driscoll says,

"Jesus' humor was often biting and harsh, particularly when directed at the Pharisees. For example, he called them a bag of snakes, said that their moms had shagged the Devil, and mocked them for tithing out of their spice racks."

Driscoll made it clear at the 2008 Desiring God Conference that he directly disagrees with Chesterton in this particular instance, but, as much as I appreciate Driscoll's leadership and ministry, I must side with Chesterton for three reasons.

1. Jesus, in the same verse where He calls the Pharisees a "bag of snakes" concludes with, "For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks" (Matthew 12:34). A heart filled with the Spirit of Christ (as Christ's heart obviously was) would not make a joke out of the Pharisees by saying "that their moms had shagged the Devil."
2. Jesus does say to the Pharisees that they do the will of their father who is the Devil (John 8:39-47), but only because if God was their Father they would not be seeking to kill him. They are of their father the Devil because they want to kill Jesus, not because their mother's had sexual relations with the Devil. When Jesus speaks about God our Father he does not mean that our mother's had sexual relations with God. This passage, therefore, does not translate into a crude joke.
3. The apostle Paul says in Ephesians 4:29, "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear." Jesus is the example of this and He adhered to it perfectly. Yes, He did say that the Pharisee's father was the Devil, but He did not say "that their moms had shagged the Devil." That is corrupting or unwholesome talk.

Again, this all is not to say that Jesus was above jokes. He was a man who laughed and I am sure had fun. But His full potential for joy was not realized until after He was crushed. He knew that joy was coming, but the sorrow and grief were great leading up to it. This is why Chesterton felt like Christ's mirth was restrained on Earth and why I do as well.

Driscoll, Nightline, and Sex

If you read this blog, you probably read several Mark-Driscoll-loving blogs, so this video will no doubt be spamming your feed-reader. It's Drisoll on the latest episode of Nightline.

I only have one question after watching the video: when did the mainstream, semi-liberal media, who broadcast soft-porn soap-operas in prime time, begin to care about what churches--or Mark Driscoll--are saying about sex?

The Manliest Man

The manliness of a man is often determined by the amount of pain that man has endured.

By that standard, Jesus Christ is the manliest man ever.

Unfortunately, we have been pumped full of "the drag-queen Jesus images that portray him with long, flowing, feathered hair, perfect teeth, and soft-skin, draped in a comfortable dress accessorized by matching open-toed sandals and handbag" as Mark Driscoll puts it (Vintage Jesus, pg 31). That Jesus would run from pain.

However, the real Jesus was willing endured the full effects of the wrath of God--the most painful pain know to man--for each individual in history that the Father gave to Him. A dose of this pain is unbearable for any individual and is enough to kill an individual for eternity, but Jesus endured it for many and it could not hold Him for 72 hours.

That's manly.

Shoot the Wolves

At the Desiring God Conference National Conference this weekend Mark Driscoll delivered a talk entitled How Sharp the Edge? Christ, Controversy, and Cutting Words. I encourage you to take a look, listen, or read.

Driscoll included five contexts and what kind of words should be used in each.

1. Feed the sheep
2. Rebuke the swine
3. Shoot the wolves
4. Bark at the dogs
5. Pray for the shepherds

Death By Love

Mark Driscoll has a new book coming out on September 30, titled Death By Love. And the Re:Lit people have put together a trailer for it.

If you are interested, you can pre-order the book on the Crossway website. And of course you can become a fan on Facebook.

Desiring God Conference

I am beyond excited for this year's Desiring God Conference. What really jumped out at me in reading the preliminary material for the conference was the theme: The Power of Words and the Wonder of God. And further, the description of Mark Driscoll's talk is particularly intriguing. Here is how John Piper describes it:

Mark Driscoll, pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, has agreed to tackle the knotty issue of tough and tender words, words in controversy, words in confrontation, words like Jesus and Paul used when they called people vipers and said, “If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed” (1 Cor. 16:22).

Fitting.

Rebekah and I are planning on attending. I pray that every Christian would consider going to this conference. I went last year and was greatly encouraged and edified by the teaching and testimonies of God's faithful servants. And if you cannot make it, you can always listen to the sessions at the website of Desiring God.

I trust that it "will be mind-sharpening, heart-humbling, mouth-seasoning, backbone-strengthening, and Christ-acclaiming."

American Idolatry: What Others Are Saying

In light of yesterday's post regarding American Idolatry, watch Mark Driscoll in this video:



In addition, Tom Stellar writes concerning 1 John 5:21:

"What, then, is idolatry? Idolatry is valuing any thing or any person more than the one true God. An idol is any thing or any person that takes center stage in our affections. God is a jealous God. He deserves center stage in our lives. Anything that usurps that place becomes an idol, whether it be a spouse, a child, a humanitarian project, or pornography, or drugs, or power over the poor, or religion. An idol is a god-substitute. Archeology limits idols to stone statues; biblical theology teaches that idols are any things that take the place of God in our lives. When understood this way, we can realize that idolatry is not ancient history but is alive and flourishing in America as we rush toward the twenty-first century.

"So John's closing command 'Little children, keep yourselves from idols' has as much relevance for our day as for any generation since creation."

Too Much Culture

Ever wonder what would happen if the culture had a larger impact on a church than Scripture? Well, it happened in a big way at Mars Hill Bible Church. Jeff Robinson posted his findings at theresurgence.com in an article entitled Engaged by the Culture: Michigan Megachurch Goes Egalitarian.

Mark Driscoll addresses the danger of cultural issues permeating Biblical Principles in this video. Check it out.

You Decide 2008: Mars Hill Candidates

Rob Bell
Mars Hill Bible Church
Grandville, Michigan

Bell is the founder of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Michigan. He is also a well know author, speaker and developed the widespread NOOMA video epidemic. He has been coined the "next Billy Graham" by the Chicago Sun Times and cracked the top 10 of TheChurchReport.com's "Top 50 Most Influential Christians in America." Bell obtained an undergraduate degree from Wheaton college, and upon realizing that he had the ability to teach, enrolled in Fuller Theological Seminary and graduated with a Masters in Divinity.

Bell's theology tastes a lot like little open theism as indicated by Greg Gilbert's review of the latest NOOMA video. The Mars Hill homepage states their theology like this: "When we begin to describe what we believe about God, we discover that he's been writing a story of hope and redemption for all the world, and we have a role to play in this story." In response, I prefer to agree with Scripture which portrays God as an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent being that doesn't require my help "writing" a story. The story is written. And it's about God and His glory.

These stances are not surprising in the least. Bell has been wishy-washy at best when it comes to the authority of Scripture and Sola Scriptura. He also calls into question the virgin birth of Christ in his book Velvet Elvis. Immediately this seems harmless enough, but when one takes a closer look one sees the tremendous impact and follies of this poorly thought out hypothetical. If Christ were the Son of a man, not conceived of the Holy Spirit, he would have been born into sin therefore making a perfect life impossible and ultimately left Christ's death ineffective and unable to justify anyone or anything. This does not bode well for redemption. At least he is consistent. If he questions the authority of Scripture then by all means question the virgin birth. And in a theology where the virgin birth is irrelevant it is probably true that God does need us to help out in "writing a story of hope and redemption for all the world."


Mark Driscoll
Mars Hill Chruch
Seattle, Washington

Driscoll is the co-founder of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Washington. He also co-founded the Acts 29 Network and is a major contributor to the missonal resource website, The Resurgence. He graduated from Washington State with a degree in communications and is continuing his education at Western Seminary in Portland. Driscoll has been characterized as a new kind of fundamentalist and a maverick. Personally, he refers to himself as a "charismatic Calvinist." He received criticism in 2006 from friend and mentor John Piper. Joshua Harris recounts this in his blog: "As if he (Piper) were speaking to Mark, he said (and I paraphrase), 'A pastor cannot be clever and show Christ as glorious. Mark Driscoll, you’re clever. You have an amazing ability to turn a phrase and make statements that draw people back week after week. But it’s dangerous. So many pastors will see you and try to imitate you and then try to watch all the movies and TV shows so they can try to be like you.' In essence, Piper was bringing correction to certain aspects of Driscoll’s style and delivery, while stating that they agreed on the most important issues of doctrine."

Driscoll's theology is essentially Reformed. He has called himself a 4 1/2 point Calvinist. Very early in his career Driscoll associated himself with the emergent movement; however, he has become a major voice against the camp which is inhabited by influential evangelical thinkers like Brian McLaren, Doug Pagitt, Tony Jones, and, his Michigan Mars Hill friend, Rob Bell.

What separates Driscoll from Bell? First, the authority of Scripture. Bell wavers while Driscoll is unwavering. Scripture is uncompromised at Mars Hill Seattle through exegetical preaching while Bell shows us that he is not so sure in Velvet Elvis. Secondly, Jesus. Driscoll emphasizes Christ as risen Lord, ruling over all of creation, sovereign and unchangeable, perfect in life, glorified in death, and in his resurrection reigning from His seat at the Father's right hand. Bell emphasizes Jesus and his life on earth and the mission that He had. According to Bell, Jesus came to spread love and invoke a redemptive process by jump starting efforts to bring His kingdom to earth.

Both of these gentlemen have "effective" ministries; both have an impact in their communities and are doing wonderful things in their respective cities. Both of these men are my brothers in Christ. However, are both men preaching Christ and him crucified? That's an important question to ask and the question I will leave you with.