His Blood Is the True Drink: On the Christian Use of Alcohol
Every Sunday we come to the Table and hear these words:
“The outer ring is grape juice; the inner rings are wine. His blood is the true drink. Let us serve you.”
We mean it. What we believe about wine is on display in miniature every Sunday. In short, wine is an option, and so is grape juice.
I thank God that in the ten years of Cities Church, we have not fought over wine and juice. Rather, we come together at the Lord’s Table each Sunday and lift our red thimbles in unity and share together in a foretaste of the age to come.
As promised, I want to follow up here on the sermon from last Sunday on the wedding feast at Cana. Famously, of course, Jesus turns water into wine (not vice versa). Which prompts some to ask, “Hey, what about wine today?” Clearly Jesus and his disciples weren’t prohibitionists like we had in this country a century ago. But how do we as Christians approach the consumption of alcohol today?
On Sunday, I wanted to emphasize that the point of John 2:1–12 isn’t our own drinking or abstaining. That’s downstream. The point in the Old Testament prophecies about wine, and the point in John 2, is the glory of Jesus. As the long-awaited Christ, he brings such blessing and joy and celebration, that wine, among other pointers, signifies the riches and abundance of his goodness and glory for his people.
John 2 doesn’t tell us specifically how Christians should approach wine today, but the positive vision of wine raises the question, and provides an opportunity for some brief biblical perspective. I’ll share three brief theses here, and send you to chapter 7 in my book Workers for Your Joy (free PDF available) if you’d like to ponder it more.
1. God made wine.
God made grapes, and fermentation, and made it so that humans might make and enjoy wine. Wine is first a good gift from God, for our joy, when enjoyed properly. At its best, it anticipates the final celebration that is to come (Isaiah 25:6–8; 55:1; Amos 9:13–14; Joel 3:18).
2. Wine can be misused.
As a good and potent gift, wine is perilous to treat lightly or improperly. Wine teaches us that in this age you can have too much of a good thing. For this reason, the Bible includes passages that teach the goodness and lawfulness of wine, and about three times as many passages that warn of its misuse.
3. Christians will choose differently.
Very practically, in the church, in this age — when Messiah has come, yet indwelling sin remains — we do well to give each other space on our various preferences and convictions. To paraphrase Romans 14:3,
Let not the one who [chooses to drink in moderation] despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who [drinks].
In Christ, you are free to choose not to drink. There can be much wisdom in that. And as you refrain, let your abstinence create anticipation for the enjoyment of the wedding feast to come. And note: you are not free to pass judgment on those who partake appropriately, nor are you free to manipulate others in Jesus’s name to make the same choice you do.
And in Christ, you are free to enjoy God’s good gift. And let your careful partaking in moderation create anticipation for the full enjoyment of the wedding feast to come. And note: you are not free to mishandle God’s good gift by letting your partaking become an opportunity for the flesh (Galatians 5:13) or a failure of love for others (Romans 14:21).
What’s Most Admirable
What’s clear for us as Christians is that this church age, between Jesus’s first coming and second, is to be characterized by a holy restraint, whether the personal choice of full abstention or moderation.
And for those who do choose to partake, we will need wisdom to navigate moments of moderation and others of abstention. The mature Christian doesn’t always say “Yes” to alcohol. And we all look forward, in the age to come, to when we will enjoy fully without sin or curse.
What’s most admirable on both sides is (1) those who choose to abstain, and are not legalistic or self-righteous about it; and (2) those who choose to partake, at times (not always), and in moderation, without being self-righteous about it.
Mind That Pendulum
For me, I am not a teetotaler, but I am sympathetic with those who choose to pass on alcohol in this life, in anticipation of the feast to come.
In my lifetime, and in moving from South Carolina to Minnesota, I have observed a pendulum swing among some Christians. For decades, an unbiblical prohibitionism may have continued to hold sway in some Christian circles. But today that seems to be less of a danger. In fact, we may be in fresh need of Christians who will not fall victim to the new temptations of alcohol’s popularity. A prophet may be so bold as to pronounce, “Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink” (Isaiah 5:22).
My prayer for us at Cities Church is that we would be stable and mature enough in the faith to not only know well our freedoms in Christ but even more: to stand ready, in love, to forgo our rights at times in looking proactively to the good of others.
But again, don’t miss the meaning we saw Sunday in John 2: wine is a sign. It’s not the main point. It signals the joy Jesus brings, and the blood that Jesus shed when his “hour” came, when he drained the cup of our curse to the bottom for the sins of his people.
Whatever your instincts and upbringing on this issue, let’s remember together in Jesus, “His blood is the true drink.”
