Drinking

Did you hear the one about: A pastor loved a little wine, but served a parish that didn’t easily support alcohol consumption, certainly by one of its clergy. A couple who knew and appreciated his palate brought a bottle of home brewed blackberrry wine to a private dinner with the pastor. They said they would gladly give him another bottle if he would put his thanks in the newsletter. In the next newsletter there was a note: “The pastor wishes to thank Mr and Mrs. Smith for the gift of fruit and the spirit in which it was given”.

What you might expect me to say about drinking: Look at the disaster of alcoholism and drunk driving and liver disease and the deaths and disastrous decisions made from excessive drinking on campuses and see how destructive it is to have the alcohol option so pervasive and available in this society. As the United Methodist Book of Resoutions quotes from John Wesley’s mother: “… whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off the relish of spiritual things … that thing is sin to you…”

But that isn’t the whole story, is it? Many many people are capable of drinking a drop of wine for their health (just like Paul tells Timothy to do in the Bible (I Timothy 5:23). Most people are capable of taking a glass of wine or a beer to relax. It really is true that some foods go better with a wine!

Now I get in trouble: Many people have the power to drink to a little “buzz” a couple of times a year and not drive or become fools or violent at all. A bit of drinking, to what we would call that buzz, was done by the Jews at festivals under God’s guidance, as seen in passages like Deuteronomy 16:12-14 or Ecclesiastes 9:7. The passage where Jesus makes the water into wine is more striking to me because it is clear that Jesus was at a party with people who were drinking more than I am prone to do ever (it is in John chapter 2).

Some of you know that I attend a 12 step meeting of one kind or another, over 30 years after I used chemicals to excess. But I can drink a glass of wine with no problems at all. I just find the 12 step process to be useful to me.

I would want to put it this way: if you can drink with meals or after mowing a lawn to relax a wee bit, good for you. If you can drink a bit more twice a year and not need to drink the same every weekend, good for you. I hope you smile for joy!

And yes, I have willingly let my kids taste wine at restaurant meals. Me. A pastor, no less!

But don’t lie to youreslf. You are an example to someone at those meals out who might not be as capable as you. So the context is a big big deal. And a lot of the alcohol industry makes its living from excess and abuse. The Bible and most holy books are more critical of drinking for these reasons than they are ever permissive about it. I am quite willing to vote for more and more restrictions on the use and availability of alcohol, and feel no love for events sponsored by beer companies.

Well, I hope your merriment is richer than a drink could ever make you. And that you have much of it. Remember, Jesus said “I came that your joy would be full”.