I am rather proud of belonging to Dundee. It is a great city which is full of character and stories. One of its proudest moments was when the good citizens of this city threw out that carpetbagger, Winston Churchill, as their MP and replaced him with a Christian Socialist Teetotaler! What surprises people in this country is not that there was such a thing as a Christian socialist, but rather that a Teetotaler got elected in Dundee – where the ‘demon drink’ was a serious social problem. On reflection that is probably why ‘Neddie’ Scrymgeour was elected. The abuse of alcohol remains a serious social problem in our society so let us reflect upon it from a Christian perspective.

Alcohol is a curse. As anyone who has ever stood at the deathbed of a loved one dying from cirrhosis of the liver will tell you. It is responsible for more misery in Scotland than any other single factor. 80% of emergency admissions in some hospitals at the weekends are due to alcohol abuse. On a visit to Inverness prison I was told that 70% of the prison population have committed crimes under the influence of alcohol. It is responsible for numerous deaths on the road, it is a significant factor in much homelessness and who can quantify the misery that comes from alcohol abuse in the home? Walk in a town center in Scotland on a Friday night and you run the risk of being accosted by a group of juveniles who think that there ability to consume copious quantities of alcohol somehow turns them into Supermen who have a fantastic sense of humour and the right to abuse/molest and even assault you.

As a minister I am only too aware of the devastation caused by alcohol abuse behind closed doors – whether it is the teenager with their Alco pops (surely the most cynical piece of manipulative commercialism that our capitalists have managed to come up with) or the bored and lonely housewife who seeks her solace in drinking alone. When you observe people you know, having their personality changed as they over imbibe, turning from reasonable sweet tempered people into irrational, angry and abusive morons, it is almost enough to make one sign up immediately to the Temperance League.

And yet….Alcohol is a blessing. It helps people relax and gives them pleasure. It is hard to beat a glass of Beaujolais with one’s steak, or a pint of Hoegarden after a thirsty summers walk. And what better way to celebrate the New Year than with a taste of 18 year old Glen Morangie? Alcohol is also very useful medicinally – whether it is ”taking a little wine for the sake of one’s stomach’ , or Granny’s favourite ‘toddy’ cure for a sore throat. If you examine the hospital records of the early 19th century in Dundee you can see that ale, beer and whisky were staple parts of the diet issued to all patients – almost certainly because it was far cleaner than the water.

So blessing or curse? Surely given the amount of harm that alcohol does in our society, the argument is straightforward. One can find pleasure in drinks that are non-alcoholic and one does not need to drink alcohol in order to be healed. I recall one elderly elder informing a man who had just preached teetotalism in Brora that he had to take a ‘wee dram’ on doctor’s orders! But surely one can give up alcohol, no matter how pleasurable it is, when we see the devastation that is has wrought on our society. Would that not be the Christian thing to do?

This argument is so strong and overwhelming that for over a century it has largely been the evangelical position within Britain that believers should stay away from the ‘demon drink’. This is such a deeply ingrained belief that if you even mention that you have had a pint then you run the risk of being excommunicated – at least in the minds of some people. Yours truly once wrote an article in which he mentioned drinking a pint of Carlsberg. This was enough to have the FP magazine writing a pompous and solemn piece on how the Free Church is worldly (didn’t it just break their hearts as they wrote that!). More seriously there are those who were genuinely and deeply concerned about any mention of alcohol in anything other than a condemnatory way. One can understand and even to a certain extent sympathise with this. I too am desperate to avoid the harm that the abuse of alcohol causes. Let me also say that as far as I can recall I have never been drunk. In my non-Christian days this had nothing to do with being obedient to the Bible – it was more a kind of logical and rebellious thing. I just did not see the point in paying a fortune on drink in order to lose one’s mind. I remember a friend going to a dance, getting drunk, getting into a fight and having his ‘head kicked in’. He made a complete fool of himself, was battered black and blue and yet the next day was still able to boast about ‘what a magic night it was – I don’t remember a thing’! What’s the point!

However I have real difficulty with those who are so strongly opposed to drink that they have no problem in equating it with ungodliness and sin. No matter how strong the case may appear to be in ‘worldly terms’ – the Christian has to think about things differently. From a Biblical perspective. We must ask “What does the Lord say?”. And we only know what the Lord says in terms of what he has revealed to us – the Scriptures. We ought to begin there and only then consider how to apply them to the society and culture we live in.

The Bible is actually quite surprising in its statements about alcohol. Take a concordance and look up every reference to alcoholic drink. It can be quite enlightening. On the one hand there are some strong warnings about the abuse of alcohol. Just read some of the warnings in the book of Proverbs. On the other there is positive praise for it. The Psalmist praises the Lord for giving us wine that makes the heart of a man glad (Ps 104 v.15). It is used by Melchizedek to honour Abraham. In the New Testament, whilst we are specifically warned about the sin of drunkenness and the inappropriateness of elders being given to too much wine, we are also told that it is good to take a little wine for ones stomachs sake, that Jesus turned water into the best quality wine and that the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is to be celebrated with wine. It will not do to argue that Jesus was talking about new wine which was unfermented. In fact the process of fermentation sets in rapidly and indeed the expression ‘new wine’ suggests not non-alcoholic, but rather particularly potent wine. In summary the bibles teaching is that alcohol is a gift of God which like all gifts can be used or abused.

So how do we apply all this?

Firstly no-one has the right to say that alcohol is a curse. It is a gift of the Lord and we must never call any gift of the Lord a curse. Indeed we are to give thanks to God for it. At one Highland funeral the visiting minister was at the post funeral wake where, as was customary, drams were being handed out. “You’ll give thanks for the whisky”, said the old elder, as he stood glass in hand. “I will not”, said the somewhat surprised minister. “Well’” said the elder as he reached for the ministers glass, “If you cannot give thanks for it then you should not have it!”

Secondly we must not adopt a position based on personal experience and observation and then do our utmost to get out of what the Scriptures actually say on this. The pseudo-scholarship that is employed by some who really want to tell us that Jesus turned water into grape juice because he could not have turned it into something ‘evil’ – just will not wash. Those who are convinced that they will not take alcohol should not seek to impose their views on others as though they had specific divine warrant. They do not. Drunkenness is a sin. So is condemning what the Lord has given.

Thirdly it is quite clear that there are those who abuse this gift. This is a sin and must be taught against and dealt with. There are those who are alcoholics (whether from genetic or environmental reasons) and they have to stay away from alcohol. There are also those who will want to stay away from drink – they may have had previous bad experiences, they may object to giving their money to those who produce it and they simply may not like it. There is Christian freedom here. No-one is compelled to drink.

Then we must teach our people how to use this good gift from the Lord. We must teach them how to give thanks for it. I am not sure that the Scots have got it right here. Our macho drinkers and our teetotalers tend to have the same unbiblical view of alcohol – that it exists only for people to get ‘smashed’. This tends to lead to extreme positions and stances being taken, which end up not being helpful to the vast majority of people. Surely we need to teach out people how to handle drink? Can we not demonstrate by example that it is possible to enjoy a glass of wine without having to drink the whole bottle? Can we not show that you do not need to go to a ‘spit and sawdust’ drinking den in order to enjoy a social drink with friends? Our sister church in Haren has a youth room which is a bar – complete with stools, alcoholic drinks, lights and a sign – “Reformed café – maximum two beers”. Is that horrifying to you? Is it wrong? Why? Surely the ‘continental’ attitude to drink is much better than the pseudo puritanical one that has too often prevailed in British (and American) evangelical culture? Is it not ironic that we have a far greater drinking problem in Britain than on the continent?

One final thought. Let me say that this is no new doctrine I am espousing. Apart from it being biblical, it was also the position of our forefathers. It was not until the second half of the 19th century that the temperance movement took hold in the evangelical church in Scotland. For example the Kirk Session of St Peter’s refused the use of the Church to the emerging temperance movement because they regarded it as unbiblical. I have a letter from McCheyne thanking his mother for the box of ‘good things’ (referring to a crate of wine) but asking her not to send any more and especially whisky – “as I do not like it, though I have to drink many a dram when visiting”!

It is amazing how one can be accused of being ‘modern’ for upholding a traditional position. I recall getting a rather irate letter from a woman in Lochcarron when she read something I had written which mentioned enjoying GlenMorangie. ‘The Godly Lachlan Mackenzie would have been appalled” she wrote. I did not have the heart to tell her that the ‘Godly Lachlan Mackenzie’ had an (illegal) still in his manse. (It certainly adds a new perspective to Rev. Mackenzie’s nick name ‘The Happy Man’!).

Let us encourage a responsible and biblical attitude to alcohol. Let us seek to root out its abuse and help those who are victims of that. Let us also seek to give thanks to the Lord who created all things richly for us to enjoy. And for those who are inclined to be censorious in this matter please remember that Jesus was accused of being a ‘wine bibber’. Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.

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