Free beer

How many of you read the title of the post and your first reaction was to be like "where?" Ya, free beer is one of those great things in life. Free booze in general. The monetary value of the free beer that you get is always completely out of proportion to the immense enjoyment derived from drinking beer that was free. They should do a study on that. Free food is almost as good, but somehow less satisfying, although more useful. Now what if I were to tell you that there will be free booze in God's future kingdom? You wouldn't believe me. But would you believe scripture?

A false promise, probably the Devil's work

The prophet Isaiah declares: "On this mountain the lord of hosts will provide for all peoples a feast of rich food and choice wines, juicy, rich food and pure, choice wines." That's right, scripture promises us free booze and delicious food. Sweet. I should clarify, however, that the "mountain" here refers to Mt. Zion, which symbolizes the heavenly Jerusalem. As Hebrews 12:22 tells us, this is not the literal Mt. Zion where the earthly city of Jerusalem is located. This is the heavenly Jerusalem. That is, God's town. When God runs the world, God's righteousness, peace, and booze will flow like rivers. All hunger, sickness, and injustice will be over, as will all need for beer runs.

The heavenly Jerusalem also appears in the book of Revelation. The reign of God will happen in the future. It is something awesome to look forward to. The world may seem like a tough place now. Life is hard, but there is free booze waiting at the end of it. Imagine what it would be like to work hard all day knowing that at the end you get free ice cold beer. Sounds great. In the same way, we can work for God- work for justice and beauty and love in this world- knowing that after all of our hard work God will have a buffet and an open bar ready. What an encouraging promise.

Jesus buffet, the open bar is off-camera

My recent tour of the Sam Adams brewery was analogous to this too. You go through the whole tour just waiting for the free beer. That's really the best part. But the tour itself is really valuable. You learn a lot about how the beer is made and about the history of the company. Then when you get the free beer it is the fulfillment of the tour experience. In a similar way, our time here on earth before God's reign is very valuable. We should not just sit idly, twiddling our thumbs and waiting for the kingdom of God. We should explore the world God put us in, we should love it and learn about it and cherish it and make the most of it knowing that God will affirm and complete all of our efforts in the end.

Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "why are you talking about beer when the scripture clearly says wine?" Well you know what, I just like beer. I am just choosing not to interpret the "wine" part literally. There's a famous book called "I Hope they Serve Beer in Hell." Well scripture promises that God's kingdom delivers wine, at least, and probably beer. So if it's booze you want you're better off on the Christian side.

Label for my beer company if I had one

This week's drink is wine-based in honor of the literal interpretation of Isaiah.

Wine Spritzer

Ingredients: frozen raspberry or blackberry, sweet white wine, lemon-lime soda

Microwave berry for 10 seconds, just enough to slightly thaw it. Place berry in bottom of wine glass and gently mash it so some of the juice is released but it is not total mush. Fill glass with half cold white wine and half Sprite or other lemon-lime soda. As the berry continues to melt the drink will receive infusions of fruit juice and will also stay cold. Enjoy this.

It's easy to make but you will have to buy the ingredients yourself, at least until the reign of God.