John Piper has reached peak-based on his latest post. He has garnered over 2 million views. Here’s the latest Piperian controversy:
“Can we reassess whether Sunday coffee-sipping in the sanctuary fits?” “Let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe.” Hebrews 12:28
That’s it! A call for reassessment with a Bible verse attached.
I only met Piper once and am trying to remember whether he was enjoying the benefits of the coffea plant or not. Still, the man is a ball of energy and one of the most productive humans who has managed to memorize a large portion of the New Testament and offer miles of literature to many on the doctrines of grace, missions, etc. In sum, Piper is a titan, and even when I don’t find him persuasive, I see him as an admirable father figure in our Reformed eco-system.
Now, back to our caffeinated discussion. I am certain there is a greater background to his comment for which he did not elaborate. Still, the reactions to his tweet were significant enough to garner attention from celebrities like Beth Moore, who encouraged Piper to join her new-found Anglican faith where there is much sitting and standing, sitting and standing, and no time for coffee-sipping.
Others chimed in, disregarding the grandfatherly Piper as legalistic, puritanesque, and scolding Calvinism for sucking all the joy away.
But I believe Piper is close to the truth. What he is addressing is not an antagonism toward coffee but the kind of worship where coffee could be sipped without interruption. He is addressing a certain passivity that allows you to see worship as an undemanding act.
Believe it or not, there are thousands of American churches discussing the virtue of church cafes. Here is a rationale for their side of the coffee aisle about why coffee is crucial to the Sunday experience
“The vast majority (82 percent) said that creating a pleasant atmosphere for parishioners was very important or critical. Additionally, encouraging young people to attend was a primary consideration for 93 percent. But — with a 100-percent response rate — the overwhelming motivation was to encourage fellowship and a sense of community.”
These congregations are highly motivated to bring people in, and the overwhelming sense of community is striking. These are good and noble things, but the idea behind it is to use coffee and all its lattes to provide a means to greater enjoyment. These flocks would all fall into some variation of Hillsong-style megachurches. That comes with a host of condemnatory espressos from me.
I am not expecting Piper to jump into sacramental concerns, but there is something deeper than the tweet itself, which he may have intended in the controversial statement. Again, two million views! People don’t want their coffees excoriated.
I suspect the idea he is fighting is an old war against the drivel of entertainment worship, a modern expression of the old seeker-sensitive model where the word and sacrament are the fellowship and that dark, black liquid.
Piper is a purist when it comes to these things, and as such, I try to read the best into such comments. It’s not that sipping coffee during a sermon is wrong, but that the culture where this is common offers a paradigm of ease and comfort where the afflicted is told to be a better version of his yesterday instead of repenting better than yesterday.
And, as I have written before, worship is hard. It’s hard to be sipping your Tall, Non-Fat Latte With Caramel Drizzle while singing “Crown him with many crowns!” and holding your squirmy two-year-old.
Again, we are assessing the drinking of coffee in the sanctuary, not the experience before or after. In my context, there is some validity to the concerns of America’s favorite Calvinist Arch-Bishop. And the fact that so many are overreacting to him is probably because they have not given him enough Calvinist credit.
