Last week, I wrote about the Jurassic Park Principle of Christian freedom. You can read that post here. After writing that, I saw a question floating around about whether it is okay, or wise, to have alcohol at church events. So, with a nod to that previous post, let me have a stab at my particular answer.

Two basic principles

The two relevant principles are pretty basic. On the one hand, we have Christian liberty. On the other hand, there are times whereby – out of love and for the sake of the gospel – we will not take up our liberty for the sake of others. These two principles combine to make the Jurassic Park Principle: (1) you have liberty; (2) love trumps liberty; therefore, (3) just because you can doesn’t mean that you should. Out of love, we should sometimes set aside our liberty.

A matter of sin?

So, what do we do when it comes to serving alcohol at church events? There is absolutely nothing in scripture that would lead me to conclude drinking alcohol is wrong or sinful. The biblical witness is that wine is a good gift from God and it is impossible to avoid the fact that not only did Jesus drink himself (making it evidently not sinful), but he even made a load of wine for other people to drink at a wedding. There is no command against drinking alcohol, Jesus’ example makes it clear it is not sinful to enjoy and several comments in scripture insist it is a good gift from God that can and should be enjoyed.

There is similarly nothing that would lead me to the view that alcohol would be wrong in essence in church. After all, we can’t avoid the fact that Jesus used wine when he instituted the Lord’s Supper and Paul seems clear enough that wine is used when the church gathers. If it isn’t wrong to have wine, and it is instituted as something involved in Christian worship (and various Jewish religious festivals before it), you are hard pressed to find a material difference between using alcohol in church in communion and it’s use in every other context in church. I can only conclude we are absolutely free to have alcohol at whatever church events we might want to do so. This cannot be a matter of sin. It is a matter of liberty.

Contextual considerations

If the issue isn’t a matter of sin – we are free to have alcohol at church events if we want – we nevertheless have to reckon with whether it is always appropriate. Specifically, will it do more to help or harm our gospel effort or ministry?

There are two contextual considerations to bear in mind when answering the question. First, there is what we’re trying to do. Second, there is who we’re trying to include.

There may be occasions we might host in which alcohol might be attractive and helpful to what we’re doing. Other occasions it might be actively detrimental. To take an obvious example, it’s hard to do an evangelistic wine tasting event that doesn’t include wine. To take a similarly obvious example, it would be difficult to host an addictions group whilst handing around glasses of wine. Sometimes, what you are trying to do will make it obvious.

Other times, who we are trying to attract will influence matters. If I am trying to hold an open event that is hoping to attract as wide a cross-section of people as possible, the chances are serving alcohol is going to unnecessarily limit who might elect to come. It may cause problems for muslims, those with addiction issues and even a fair few Christians. By contrast, specifically aiming to reach other kinds of people might make it less problematic. Many middle class people could hardly imagine a Christmas event without mulled wine.

Both what you’re aiming to do and who you are aiming (and think you are likely) to reach are going to influence your decision.

Wise considerations

We are then left with a series of wider matters of wisdom to think through. Let me briefly outline some of them.

Widest reach: I suspect the average church wants to reach the widest cross-section of people they can. Whilst there may be some room for specific contextual decisions, if we want the most possible people to come to most things we run, we have to reckon with the fact that alcohol will necessarily turn many off whereas its absence is likely not to have the same effect for others.

Necessity: There aren’t many events or programmes that we might run for which an absence of alcohol would cause a specific problem. There is nothing intrinsic to Christmas, for example, that necessitates wine. There is nothing intrinsic to almost any outreach we might do that necessitates wine. If it isn’t necessary, given the wider potential to limit who would engage as a result, is it worth it?

In our context

Taking all that into account, let me explain how I would view it in our particular context. Do bear in mind, this is quite context specific for us. Our context is socially deprived, high-population Muslim and working class, including those from complex backgrounds.

We run relatively few ‘attractional events’. I will return to that shortly for the few we do. However, the vast majority of what we do involves long-term relationships through regular ongoing programmes. It is things like English Classes, drop-ins for those with complex issues, food clubs, interfaith dialogue groups and the like. Almost none of these things would be enhanced by the presence of alcohol. Pretty much all of them would be damaged by the presence of alcohol. I couldn’t imagine running any of them with it available.

The handful of attractional events we run would equally not be helped by the presence of alcohol. Our biggest and most effective is our Light Party on Halloween. This brings a good number of Muslims to us; often people we have ongoing links with. The presence of alcohol would serve only to alienate large parts of our neighbourhood. It would make very little sense. Muslims would be directly turned off and many who suffer from addictions – but are trying their level best not to be enslaved by them again – would either be badly damaged or swerve us entirely. Even those who might only have one drink at the church would be encouraged to then head home and drink to excess later. For us, it simply isn’t helpful.

There is a case for showcasing the freedom of the gospel we have. I think this is particularly true in muslim-majority areas like ours, but a good argument for it elsewhere too. However, I think this is best done in other ways. I do not believe showcasing my freedom and liberty in such a way as it will keep people away and stop them encountering the gospel is a good idea! My view is there are plenty of ways to engage with people in the pub or to share a drink in a home where that is welcomed, and to exhibit our freedom in Christ in that broader sense, without specifically flaunting it during events that would be actively shunned if we were to do it.

For the most part, then, I would reckon in our context that it is inappropriate to have alcohol at church events. I reserve a small space for the possibility that something, particularly that is a limited guest-list for a specific set of people, might be well enhanced by the presence of alcohol. But I am yet to find the actual occassion (in our context) where that is the case. It isn’t missed in any of the places we might countenance it at all, it would limit the breadth of who we usually get along and it would be actively damaging to most of what we do.

Your church will be different to mine. I recognise that we have Christian liberty here. You are free to wisely disagree. But I suspect that, for the majority of churches, much of what I have written here would be true for them too.