weird title i know. but i wanted to send a note out related to the above topic. i addressed this at a recent leadership meeting but i wanted to send it out to the larger audience here.

there is some bad theology out there concerning christians and alcohol. for many years the teaching of some conservative branches of the church has been that if you are a christian, you will not drink. the problem with that view is that it is not found in the Bible nor in church history. it may have been a well-meaning prohibition to stand apart from the world and treat as dangerous a dangerous substance, but there are significant problems that arise when we treat anything that God has made as inherently evil.

Alcohol in the Bible
In John 2 Jesus is at a wedding and turns the water in ceremonial water jugs into wine! a lot of wine and a lot of very good wine! there is no evidence that it was “weak” wine as some have proposed, but actually that it was strong, intoxicating wine prepared for a wedding feast of joy and celebration. the interpretation is fairly natural and straight forward. if Jesus made wine for a party, it can’t be that wine is inherently bad. in fact it would seem that it is indeed good! looking back on the 7 days of creation we see that everything that God created was good, very good. so it must be that grapes and the process to ferment them into strong drink and other forms of alcohol alike are not inherently bad. it is the trajectory or what we do with them that can be bad.
for too long that some denominations have forbade the drinking of alcohol so that it has become sin. it has been such taboo that actually the adverse reaction has been achieved. some surveys have been taken that show the denominations with the most conservative views on alcohol actually have the greatest rate of alcoholism while those with more moderate views of drinking responsibly have fewer instances of alcoholism. moreover, what has happened is that there are very few examples in the church of people publicly living out the drinking of wine in moderation. therefore, when college students come of age i think it can be difficult to figure out what to do with your new found freedom. where do you turn for models?
Ephesians 5:15-21 also talks about alcohol. it is the passage that many use to encourage abstaining. but there is more going on here than just telling us not to get drunk. first of all, the command is to not “get drunk” but it does NOT say to “not drink”. but a wider application can also be made of this passage to go beyond getting drunk. the command to not get drunk on wine is preceded by the much broader command to lives as “wise, making the best use of time”. if you are around cornerstone or greek life you will hear us often talk about having an impact in others’ lives. we exist here not to be a “fellowship” but to be a movement that seizes the day. it is a theme that can separate us from several other campus ministries. in that light we encourage you to make decisions that will affect the kingdom, not just your own personal connection with god. this is also what ephesians 5 encourages. right after the portion warning against drunkenness, we are told that it is “debauchery” which means a waste of time contrasted with the previous “making the best use of time.” Furthermore it says “instead (or but) be filled with the spirit”. the contrast again is the important thing. “drunkenness on wine” is the specific issue addressed here. but it could say “don’t be controlled by greed, but instead be filled with the spirit”. or don’t gossip… or don’t cheat… or many other things. the issue is who is in control. is the holy spirit in control or is it someone or something else? the danger of wine is that it leads to drunkenness which leads us out of control and ultimately the holy spirit also loses control of our lives and we waste our time.

Living out freedom
what i am concerned about for those of you that are of age is that a newfound freedom in Christ can become a newfound freedom to quench the spirit of god in your life. it is for freedom that christ set us free indeed (Galatians 5:1). the old conservatism was an error i believe quite strongly. it is a testimony to non-believers that we handle alcohol responsibly and don’t abuse it. the early church’s celebrations always incorporate alcohol. the great theologians of the past talk often of alcohol. but we must be careful because all that was created good can be used for evil and in the case of alcohol there are greater consequences to its abuse than some other things. wine is a mocker! (proverbs 20:1)
we are free but we exercise wisdom and constraint as those trying to please god. everything is permissible but not all is beneficial. (1 Corinthians 10:23) as christians you must consider appearances as much as actions. be careful to not even give the appearance of evil (1 Thessalonians 5:22) is Paul’s command. no we can’t be responsible for all people’s judgements of us. people will think what they want to even if we maintain the utmost scrutiny of our lives. but there are certainly wise measures to which we must focus our attention upon. there are freedoms that we give up in order for the power of the gospel to be protected. (romans 9:3) we are all leaders and leaders always make sacrifices for the sake of the cause. (philippians 1:21)
i like beer! i am a bit of a connoisseur of drinks in general…coffee for sure- i am from seattle you know. but seattle is also a beer place. there perhaps is some evolutionary advance in the design of us seattleites palates to where we like quality in our drinks. so anyways, all that aside, i enjoy drinking a beer with friends and have no problem with that. but there are a couple of practical thoughts that i think through in an effort to be wise. i am not giving these as rules for you, but simply things to discuss with your friends.
environment: i won’t go out on franklin street on friday or saturday night. it is not a good place for me to be seen. if i am out at 12 with a beer in my hand no one knows if its my first or my 5th. no, i am not totally responsible for others’ opinions but i might not be giving them much of an option. what else would i be doing at topo at 12 on thursday? furthermore, it is not very healthy for me to be in those environments. the atmosphere is pretty hard on the eyes and the soul if you ask me. i like seeing friends out, but if it costs me my heart and mind, it is not worth it. i can see people at a local place down the street if i invite them.
accountability: in college, as me and my friends turned 21, we wanted to be accountable to one-another. we set up and understanding of how many drinks we were going to have if we went out. if we saw each other going back to the bar after our agreed limit, we said something to one another. we cared about each other and cared about the appearances we gave off.
21st birthdays: these can be special days. especially if you have not drunk much before, they can be dangerous days too. if you care about a person and care about the people who look up to that same person, why would you want to see them get wasted and contribute to that? it really concerns me if we think that it is somehow ok to get others drunk when it is their birthdays but not other times. like that is some sort of special day that god doesn’t see or care about. what is the model we set pouring drinks down a christian’s throat for all to see…or not see?

Conclusion
is alcohol wrong? no! i will never have a blanket prohibition to alcohol in our leadership agreement for those over 21. is what we do with alcohol wrong….many times it is, yes! should we be concerned about how we exercise freedom, yes! should there be times i abstain when given the choice, yes! should we talk about it amongst ourselves, yes! should you talk about it with under aged students, yes! should we be known for living in the world but not of the world, yes! (romans 12:1-2) but should we feel guilty for enjoying the good gifts of god? no! (btw- no beer that has a commercial on TV is a good gift from god, but rather a poor tasting imitation from the pit!)

I welcome any thoughts, feedback, disagreement or questions! miles

I hope many of you have been getting a feel for the book of Romans at the weekly meeting this semester.  It is a challenging book to teach in the setting of the weekly meeting and there has been necessarily a lot left out, but we have tried to hit on the main points.  Certainly i have not communicated everything clearly or perfectly by any means, but i am hoping some of the themes have been brought out and that our hearts will be impacted by God’s Word.

I wanted to write a short blog post related to some questions and statements that i have been getting regarding the Romans series.  I will list the responses now and respond to each of them briefly:

-Miles, it sounds like a lot of gloom and doom, God is first of all loving and not an angry God!
-What about forgiveness?  What about when a Christian sins?  How does God view our sin and forgiveness?

First- gloom and doom- i have said many times that especially with a book like Romans, it is hard to teach it in a weekly meeting setting in general due to time restraints and furthered by the fact that i don’t teach it every week in a row.  The nature of Romans is that it is a letter and meant to be read as a letter in its entirety.  In fact the early church members did not each own a copy so the letter would be read orally.  In this way, the listeners heard the ebbs and flows of the letter in their intended form and were able to see the whole rather than isolating the individual pieces.  This is a great advantage in learning Paul’s emphases in Romans because you can hear the arguments raised and answered as the letter goes on.

So, as i have repeatedly said, the letter starts with Paul giving us a quick taste of ‘The Gospel’ in the first part of chapter 1.  Then for two chapters, he takes an excursus.  He realizes that unless people understand how bad off they are without Jesus, they will never really value Jesus offer of justification by faith and peace with God.  Furthermore, Paul was trained in the rhetorical style of preaching of the Rabbis of the time period.  Their practice was to say things over and over in slightly different ways to communicate the full weight of an argument.  Paul follows suit. In chapter 1:18-chapter 3:20 he argues over and over for our unrighteousness before a righteous God.  He is defending God’s complete righteousness simultaneously his complete justice in our condemnation before Him.

For 2-3 weeks i talked through these chapters.  Each week i tried to explain our state before a righteous God in order that we would more fully understand our great need of grace.  At the same time, each week though i tried, all be it perhaps ineffectively, to show us that there is hope to come, but that that hope was more fully explained later on in the letter.  So i understand some who might see a negative flavor to the first messages i have given through romans, really you should have seen a negative flavor.  But hopefully you keyed into the hope that was explained looking forward to the one who could rescue us from our predicament.

On the statement that God is ‘first of all loving’.  Quite honestly, that is a perversion of Biblical teaching.  The truth is that God is not first loving and 2nd anything….  He is always 100% all of his characteristics.  For us this would be impossible.  For instance, if we were to be 100% loving towards others, it would obviously diminish our love for ourselves.  But for God, he is 100% loving towards us as he is 100% loving of himself as he is 100% holy as he is 100% full of wrath towards evil; all of which form the definition of his righteousness.  He is the perfection of all goodness, even when it seems that his characteristics can contradict, he is all of them in the fullness of possibility.

So, God is specifically NOT ‘first’ loving and ’2nd’ full of wrath.  He is both at once and that is specifically why we need the cross so much.  The cross is the time and place where perfect love and perfect wrath meet in one cataclysmic display.  It is the hope of the world because God does not reduce his righteousness to give us righteousness, he is both just and the justifier.  He maintains his perfection and offers us that same perfection as a covering for our unrighteousness described in chapters 1-3.  Thanks be to God that he is so perfect and so right which by the way is the real point of the book to the Romans.  God’s righteousness, not our righteousness.

2nd- Where is the message of forgiveness in Romans?  Well, it is all over the place!  We can only have peace with God because he forgives our sins.  Without the forgiveness of sin, we could not be made righteous and come into fellowship with God.  Justification by faith of Romans 5:1 is that God pays the penalty by substituting his son’s death on the cross for the penalty that we deserve.  He thus counts us righteous and qualifies us to come into relationship with him.  This substitution that he makes is in very nature the forgiveness of our sins.  He forgives past, present and future sins in his son Jesus.  Once we repent and trust his work on the cross as payment for what we deserve, we have peace with God and the sin is done away with.

But what about when Christians still sin?  What happens, how does God view that?  What about the really bad sin?  One of the bad sins we tend to think of is ‘sexual immorality’- let’s take that as an example and see how God deals with it.  I think one reason that we see sexual immorality mentioned so many times in the bible is that it was (and is) a very prominent issue in the culture.  it is a tangible expression of our rebellion against God’s design for humanity and his marriage (bridegroom and we the bride) to us.  It is not necessarily that it is any worse than another sin in some sense, all sin is simply rebellion against God’s character.  Therefore, compared to an infinitely holy God, any falling short of him puts us in infinite danger.  Martin Luther said that when we break any of the 10 commandments we always break the first one.  We put other things in place of God which is idolatry and is the root of all sin.  So in that sense all sin is the same, it is idolatrous worship which God hates in any form seemingly small or big. On the other hand it seems that there are differences in degrees of consequences to our sins in this life.  there is a more real and tangible pain caused in our lives from sexual sin as compared to telling small lies.

For a Christian, sin no longer separates them from God, the relationship with Him is secure, held by Him.  Eph 1: 3-14  But there are still consequences.  Sin has consequences which can be discipline from God to correct and move us towards holiness.  Consequences can actually be God’s grace to us to cause us to turn towards him.  Hebrews says it well that perhaps if were are no consequences, it would be that God is not truly loving. I personally discipline my children for their health and benefit.  I get angry with them at times even.  But my love never waivers….my feeling of love may even waiver, but ultimately the love i have for them never changes.

“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
6 For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.”
7 It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. 11 For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
Hebrews 12: 6-11

That all being said, the Bible teaches us that God does not harbor a grudge against us if we are Christians. His son has dealt with our sin and he sees us covered over by his son’s perfection. Nor does he carry out anger in a malicious sense.  Again, we are totally forgiven at the moment of salvation, past, present and future sin.  One of the areas of growth in our lives is to experience God’s forgiveness in a real sense.  Not to just believe mentally, but to feel it in the sense of rejecting feelings of guilt and inadequacy.  Ultimately those feelings lead us to further rebellion rather than back to the arms of a savior who has done the work for our release from the bondage of sin.  If i say ‘don’t sin because God will give you consequences’, or i say ‘don’t sin because your father loves you intensely and wants what’s best for you’- the 2nd ‘freedom’ motivation actually moves us towards holiness, but the 1st ‘fear’ motivation leads us to a vicious downward cycle.

Hopefully those thoughts are helpful to some of you.  Please email and ask any questions that you have and i would even be more than willing to meet if you are struggling with any of the teaching from Romans.  Blessings, Miles

When we encounter the Gospel…’peace with God’…Jesus, we are changed in a supernatural way. Yes, this is change is external, but more importantly it is internal. It is change that we cannot just conjure up on our own. It takes God himself to radically alter our hearts and minds. Look at the list below and reflect on ‘non-Gospel change’, ‘true Gospel change’, and which your life most resembles…

Peace with God: You can sleep at night.
Piece of God: You lay awake wondering if your piece is big enough.

Peace with God: Gives you great security so you give life to others.
Piece of God: Leaves you insecure so you are so needy that you suck the life out of others.

Peace with God: Will lead you to make Jesus’ name great while you are at UNC.
Piece of God: Leads you to an addiction of making your name great while at UNC.

Peace with God: Leads to rest.
Piece of God: Leads to great stress.

Peace with God: Leads to loving others.
Piece of God: Leads to looking for others to love you even in your showing love to them.

Peace with God: Leads you to look at your future with open hands.
Piece of God: Leads you to approach the next four years with desperation looking for academic success to give you life.

Romans 5:1 “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”