If you listen to the sermon, spare yourself this entire blog post. I'm just recapping what he says.
Three stances in The Church:
Prohibitionists teach that all alcohol is a sin no matter what.
"Wow, right? But, that is a stupid position that you can’t argue for Biblically. I’ll give you some verses. Psalm 104:14-15, down at the bottom of your notes there. “God makes the grass grow for the cattle, plants for man to cultivate, bringing forth food from the earth, and wine that gladdens the heart of man.” Who makes wine? Who created wine? God. And why did he make it? To gladden the heart of man. Does it still work that way? It does." Did Jesus consume alcohol? Yes. Did he ever get drunk? No. He never sinned. He was blameless. Mr. Driscoll goes into a lot more detail... please listen to it or read it.
Mark then made the second stance, 'Abstentionist position that says, “Alcohol consumption is not a sin, but because so many people abuse it, we should never drink alcohol.”' and of course, i loved his response to this one...
"The abstentionist says, “Well, we should just get rid of things that cause us to stumble.” My question is this. Is there anything on planet earth that someone has not used to sin against God with? Everything has been used to sin against God. Martin Luther said, “You know, there’s stars in the sky and certain astrologers worship them. If it’s causing them to stumble, then we gotta find a way to take them down.” This position sounds good, but what it ends up doing is abstaining everything. You ever been in a church that said, “Well, we’ll abstain from this because people are stumbling. Oh, look, they’re still stumbling. We’ll abstain from this too.”? And next thing you know, right, you’re in a suit and tie. Your wife’s got a doily on her head. You’ve set the drum kit on fire. You’re reading the King James Bible. And you’re just praying that Jesus comes back ‘cause you’re so sick of being in church." hahaha! With this one he also makes the point that we just keep making all of these rules on top of rules on top of rules. And when Jesus came he did not break any rules in the bible, but he did break the rules of the pharisees or the religious teachers.
The third stance in The Church is that of the 'moderationist position that says that alcohol consumption is not a sin, but that some people can drink and some people can’t.' A weak person cannot and a strong person can. a weak person cannot make a rule to take away the strong person's freedom in which Christ has given us. and a strong person needs to be humbled by the weak person and love them by respecting their weakness and not drinking in front of them. a weak person isn't just an alcoholic, a weak person is someone whose conscience does not allow them to drink. and that is good and should be respected. "Romans 14:1, “Accept him whose faith is weak.” In light of our discussion, people who do not drink, are they weak or strong? They’re weak. People who cannot drink with a clear conscience are weak." He gives this analogy, "Is it a sin to be weak? No, it’s not a sin to be weak, but a lot of people who don’t drink think they’re really strong. “Look how strong I am. I don’t drink.” Well, no, you’re weak. It’s not a sin, though, to be weak. Are some of you physically weak? Right? You just about die carrying your groceries. You’re weak. Okay, I’m sorry about that, but it’s not a sin. Okay, it’s not a sin to be weak." For this point he used a beautiful scenario that I love so much. One of my most dearest friends, Amy, does not drink alcohol because of her job and her heart is so beautiful on this subject. I wish she would give a sermon about it. So here is the scenario, "Let’s say there are two couples. One drinks; one doesn’t. They sit down for dinner together and they’re Christians. One couple has a glass of wine and the other couple says, “Sorry, we don’t drink.” The one couple then says, “I’m sorry. Am I gonna cause you to stumble? Are you a recovering alcoholic? Is there a problem here?” “No, it’s just a conscience issue. I don’t drink.” “Okay, do you mind if we drink?” “No, we don’t mind if you drink.” Is it okay for one couple to have a glass of wine with their meal and the other couple to not have a glass of wine with their meal, and they both sit at the table and love each other? That’s beautiful, isn’t it? Your conscience, my conscience, we both belong to the Lord, we love each other. I don’t cause you to stumble. I don’t make you drink. You don’t cause me to stumble. You don’t take away my freedom in Christ. Mutually beneficial."
Really I'm posting all of this so that I can have a quick link on my archives to this sermon since it seems to be such a hot topic in the American church. Anyway, If you actually read through all of that, you probably have a lot of time on your hands and should go listen to this sermon right now. you wasted your time reading this blog post.
I must say, I am NOT a fan of Mark Driscoll (I tend to think he is misogynistic and I do not like much of his theology) however, I like (parts of ) what he says here. Thanks for sharing! It reminded me that I can find truth anywhere (a Rob Bell-ism) even from the mouth of a pastor that I can't stand. Lol!
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