The Tails of Ales

by Aaron

The young guy who oversees our youth ministry, James, was married last Friday night. As part of his wedding ceremony the men of Element did something ancient and made it modern: we made beer.

Today the issue of alcohol has become very volatile in the church. We are told that alcohol is a sin and that any consumption of it is against God's will. People quote verses such as Ephesians 5:18 which says 'don't get drunk on wine' (not realizing that the verse is more about the Spirit of God than wine). It seems anything people fear, or has been used wrongly, Christians want to do away with.

How has alcohol been abused? Here are some statistics:

  • 100,000 U.S. deaths are caused by alcohol consumption each year. Alcohol has become the #3 cause of preventable mortality.
  • 37% of rapes involve alcohol use by the offender
  • Fetal alcohol syndrome is the #1 cause of mental retardation in the western world.
  • Youth who drink alcohol are 50 times more likely to use cocaine than those who never drink alcohol.
  • Traffic crashes are the greatest single cause of death for persons aged 6–33. About 45% of these fatalities are alcohol-related
  • Alcohol kills 6½ times more youth than all other illicit drugs combined.


Do these stats make us run from God's original intent for alcohol or should we be about redeeming what God has called good? We live in a world that is sick and doesn’t know how to deal with anything GOOD that God has given. Food has become gluttony, Sexuality has become lust and pornography, money has become arrogance and pride, and alcohol has become drunkenness.

But Element is a church that longs be about God's business of REDEEMING culture and looking at life through a scriptural lens and not a cultural one. The simple truth is EVERYTHING GOD HAS MADE HAS BEEN GIVEN TO US AS A GIFT.

Over the next few weeks we will research what this means in regard to alcohol.