One of the derogatory labels given to our church by at least a few Christians outside of our church is that we’re the “boozer” church. I’ve also heard a less inflammatory observation, but from the same section of bleachers, that we have mostly orthodox doctrine but an overemphasis on alcohol.

Forget for a moment the fact that classifying “wine as an alcoholic beverage…makes about as much sense as classifying cheese as a salted food” (Robert Capon, The Supper of the Lamb, Location 1245). Let’s give the benefit of the concern? Are we too focused on fermented drinks?

Maybe. We should willing to put on those shoes and walk a mile to see if alcoholism is a problem for us. It’s a good exercise. Lives have been destroyed by the sin of drunkenness; drunkards earn their damnation, let alone the temporal damages visible in the ditches behind them.

There are a few questions down this road.

Is alcoholism a one-off sin, or does it usually show up in a tangle of sins? Getting drunk is a choice, no matter how strong the physical dependence/addiction or cultivated habit. Drunkenness is a sin of letting some other substance take over; it’s filled with stupor not the Spirit (as contrasted in Ephesians 5:18). And yet this sin almost always starts by a desire to forget some other sin, maybe not even yours but seen by you. That said, a guilty conscience thirsts for cover. Strong drink blurs strong memories, at least for a while. Drinking wine because we’re fully forgiven of all our sins by faith in Christ isn’t the same as drinking to forget.

Are there any other problems/sins that are as ruinous, perhaps equally or even more so, but that masquerade as virtuous? More to the contrast, can a teetotaler sin, in his/her teetotaling attitude? I’d say yes, and I’d say that the spiritual superiority complex (aka, pride) is only the single-barrel sin. The cask strength sin is fear. Even though international bitterness units and the highest level of tannins can’t separate us from the love of God, Christians too often fear the things of earth that God called good.

Is love of alcohol our problem? Do we have too much of a focus on fermented drinks? For now, I don’t think so. I think, to the degree that it’s representative, we do not yet have enough fermented living (whether or not that means imbibing fermented drinks themselves). And if I was trying to describe just part of what distinguishes us, it would be that our doctrine leads not just to understanding truth, but to pursuing embodied goodness. In fact I’m good with someone saying that we’re “focused on alcohol” in so far as the better way to say it is that we’re focused on the embodied joys of faith in obedient feasting.

In light of our faith, why wouldn’t we be? Is Jesus Christ God in flesh? Did Jesus live without sin, and die for our sins, the just for the unjust, so that we might receive the righteousness of God? Have we been baptized into Christ, buried by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life? Did He come to give us life, and life abundant? Is our faith futile? Are we still in our sins? Do we have an eternal inheritance reserved for us in heaven? Is Jesus Lord, and has He said, “all are yours, and you are Christ’s”? Can anything separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord?

Is the earth the Lord’s and the fulness thereof? Then partake of His gifts with thankfulness and eat and drink to the glory of God!

There are only so many options:

• We are still in our sins and have no reason to feast.
• We are still in our sins and all we have is a feast.
• We are delivered from our sins and yet refuse to feast.
• We are delivered from our sins and why not feast?!

A feast is a larger than usual meal shared with others—family and friends, for sake of celebrating something. It’s a time of joy, laughter, stories, and strengthening, via the food itself and the fellowship. It’s not for everyday, but some can be scheduled. There were obligatory feasts in the Old Testament, to commemorate the Passover, to thank God for the harvest. Feasting is a receiving and a rejoicing in the good things God has given. It sees God as the source of our gladness and strength.

You cause the grass to grow for the livestock
and plants for man to cultivate,
that he may bring forth food from the earth
and wine to gladden the heart of man,
oil to make his face shine
and bread to strengthen man’s heart.
(Psalm 104:14–15 ESV)

Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD,
who walks in his ways!
You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands;
you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you.
(Psalm 128:1–2 ESV)

Feasting done right is for strength not suppression of the truth.

Happy are you, O land, when your king is the son
of the nobility,
and your princes feast at the proper time,
for strength, and not for drunkenness!
(Ecclesiastes 10:17 ESV)

Feasting belongs with a life of truth and thanks, as Paul writes in 1 Timothy 4.

Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer. (1 Timothy 4:1-5 ESV)

Jonathan has taught on this passage, and spoken about feasting a number of times before. I’m trying to add a side dish to the table, not steal his main protein.

One thing I’d point out from this paragraph is that those who reject are more likely to be the problem than those who receive. Paul told the weaker brothers in Romans that they could not eat and still honor God by abstaining with thanks (Romans 14:6). And actually, fasting is an assumed tactic of spiritual discipline in Scripture. But insincerity in rejection is the target, and its cousin ingratitude.

What drives abstinence and prohibition is not always demons, but it is often more defense, not offense. It’s fear, not faith. It’s defining righteous by what we avoid rather than by good works done.

Too many pastors have told their flocks not to feast (except figuratively on sermons, maybe also theology books). Pastors fear losing control (as if control was actually possible). They may not be devoted to the teachings of demons, but fear and manipulation are more demon type tactics than means of the Spirit.

You can’t easily manipulate feasting people. Joy is strong. The joy of the Lord is our strength. Mr. Joystrong is the guy who gets up and fights attackers because he has great joy in what needs defending. Mr. Joystrong is a considerable man, and considerable men don’t bother with controlling men.

“May your men wear their weight with pride, secure in the knowledge that they have at last become considerable.” (Capon, The Supper of the Lamb, Location 2461)

Feasting isn’t about eating and drinking as much as you can; it’s not a contest of portions. Note again that thanksgiving and prayer season the meal if it’s to be a feast. Like waiting, feasting is a heart posture, but also like waiting, it’s more, not less.

True feasting fights envy; Judas fussed about any extra expenses, and so do the woke and complaining egalitarian Karens in our culture. Feasting fights pride, isolation, pretense. Feasting fights idolatry, especially in materialism and consumerism, because God gets the thanks, the stuff isn’t god. Feasting fights laziness, there’s too much Pre-op and Post-op work to ignore. Feasting fights false/demonic/dualistic teaching. Feasting fights fear, especially pietism, which is works based righteousness. Feasting by faith strengthens faith.

Of course you can overindulge; gluttons and/or drunks are sinners. You can eat/drink too much out of boredom, or to distract yourself from pain and other problems. You can do it to be selfish, worldly. But none of those belong with truly considerable men.

How does advent help us? Waiting isn’t just a December thing, and feasting isn’t only for a four or five week window from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day. But there are more parties with more fudge and more cookies. And, good. Our remembrance of the incarnation is that Jesus took on flesh, not to destroy it. The reception encouraged in 1 Timothy 4:4 depends on 1 Timothy 3:16, God was “manifested in the flesh.” He came to destroy sin and death, which are the real enemies, not food and wine, not meat and sweets.

And we are headed toward the Supper of the Lamb as seen by the apostle John in Revelation 19, to the feast Isaiah saw in Isaiah 25.

Conclusion

Feasting opposes fretting. A good feast is not grabbing the neck of the event and strangling the strings tighter and tighter.

Better is a dinner of Costco Dino-nuggets with love than a plate of organically fed duck tongue with strife (see Proverbs 15:17). Feasting that increases affections that inform our obligations is a great delight, feasting that is an obligation for affection flips over the table’s purpose.

King Lune gave wisdom that is not fictional:

“For this is what it means to be a king: to be first in every desperate attack and last in every desperate retreat, and when there’s hunger in the land (as must be now and then in bad years) to wear finer clothes and laugh louder over a scantier meal than any man in your land.”

Let us be considerable men, considerable fathers, with considerable presence. If you picture considerable people, you do not picture them holding a goblet of grape juice in one hand with a half slice of Wonder Bread with the crust trimmed off in the other.

René Girard once wrote, “Few people want to be saints nowadays, but everyone is trying to lose weight.”

The two aren’t mutually exclusive, sure. But what if it would increase your godliness for you to eat more? Is it a sign of greater godliness that you won’t eat or drink? It really might be. But don’t be deceived by simplistic, superficial satisfactions.

Self-control over calorie counting that does not include patience and joy and love (which belong with the same fruit of the Spirit) is a lesser self-control, the Kraft cheese single of self-control.

Guy Fieri employs “the Hunch.” Lean in, over the table, elbows above hands. Embodied posture. Afraid of looking silly? At some point, that sort of fear is what keeps us from confessing the glory of Christ. Let men their feasts employ.

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Charge

May you become even more considerable fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, for generations. May you never be content with following (advent/holiday) traditions without also committing to shared joy with your people through bread and wine around a table (or Christmas tree) of love.

Benediction:

[May you be] strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. (Colossians 1:11–12 ESV)