Will a Cup of Coffee Keep Me Out of Heaven?

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) are pretty well known for abstaining from the use of tobacco, alcohol, coffee, and tea. This practice stems from a health law commonly known today as “The Word of Wisdom”, a revelation received by the first prophet of the Church, Joseph Smith. This revelation contains both prohibitions of those substances, and encouragement to eat certain other foods, along with other health principles. It was published at a time when much less was known about the ill effects of tobacco in particular, and nutrition in general, than we know today.

Today there is little debate about the bad things tobacco does to the human body. However, people learning about the Church often find other parts of The Word of Wisdom as odd, or at least overly restrictive. Many would question whether occasional or recreational imbibing of alcohol, coffee, or tea really has any harmful effects.

While I strongly object to the use of alcohol in any amount (based in large measure upon the very destructive effects it had on my parents’ marriage), I understand the questioning one may have of any scientific basis for not partaking of these things in any amount. I guess for me, it has come down to more of a question of whether I believe the Lord has really advised us to not drink these things, for whatever reasons or purposes He may have. Like so many aspects of the gospel, one reaches a point where science and reason are insufficient to satisfy all inquiries. They have simply not advanced enough to prove all spiritual principles. That doesn’t in any way invalidate the principles, it just leaves us searching for another way to satisfy our questions, our spiritual longings to know more.

I would like to tell you a story that illustrates the point. This story is true, but names have been substituted out of respect for family members.

While serving in the capacity of a part-time missionary leader, Sister Carter caught me at church one day and mentioned that we (the part-time and full-time missionaries) should go visit Harold Brown. Harold was married to a member of the church, and had children who were members of the church, but he had never been baptized himself. He had been in poor health in the last few months, and had recently gotten out of the hospital. Sister Carter knew Harold and having recently visited him, felt that Harold might be receptive to the gospel message.

Before I could mention to the full-time missionaries that Harold would be a good person for us to call on, they had on their own already contacted him, just in the normal course of their work of calling on families of the church. While I wondered to myself if this wasn’t more than just coincidence, I encouraged them to continue visiting and to let me know if I could be of assistance. After just a few weeks of the missionaries telling me of their visits with Harold, which had seemed to be going very well, they then told me that they needed my help. They told me that Harold had just experienced a miracle in his life, and yet he had a problem with committing to live the commandments of the Word of Wisdom. They told me that he had an engineering background, and was extremely logical and calculating. Since I also had an engineering degree, the missionaries thought perhaps we could “speak the same language” and develop a rapport that could help break through the log jam they had recently encountered. We set a time for me to go with them to visit Harold.

When the appointed hour arrived, we knocked on Harold’s door, and were invited in by a gracious wife. Harold sat in an easy chair with his cane on the floor beside him. He apologized for not getting up, but he was not feeling well. We exchanged pleasantries, and I asked Harold to tell me a little about the experience (a true miracle) he had had while in the hospital.

Harold began by telling me that he has been agnostic all his life. He believed that the Church taught some fine principles, but he was never convinced that God existed. He had supported his children in things like missions and temple marriages and so on, but it was just never enough for him to be baptized, because he simply didn’t have the evidence he needed to know that the Church was true.

So, life was good for Harold and Bea Brown, but they never talked religion. He ruled his house, and made it clear that he was not to be pestered about things in which he did not believe. Then one day, Harold suffered a stroke. It left him with some impairments, including loss of memory and loss of function of some of his body. Slowly, his memory was returning, but it was far from what it had been. He was very weak, and suffered from a variety of ailments, which at one point put him back in the hospital. Harold suffered from an un-diagnosed condition which was causing him great physical pain--to the point that he began to want to die, so great was his suffering. However, death did not occur, but rather he just continued to be in pain to the point where he stayed heavily sedated constantly. Life had become miserable for Harold.

It was at this point that one of Harold’s daughters came to visit him in the hospital, and she discussed religion with him. She talked about the reality of God and His great healing power. After she left, Harold pondered what she had said. He had never prayed before, but felt there wasn’t much to lose at this point. Harold told me that he said a prayer, and asked God to show him a sign, if in fact He really existed. Harold was specific; he wanted a nurse to come in and turn off a light that was over his bed; if this happened, he would take this as a sign that God existed, and heard his prayer.

It happened. Within just a few minutes, a nurse came in and turned out Harold’s light. And then, if that weren’t enough, Harold awoke the next morning with no pain. Totally, one-hundred percent, Harold’s pain was gone. A great miracle had just occurred, and Harold knew that God had heard and answered his prayer. He was released from the hospital, not without infirmities, but without the pain that was previously causing him to wish for death. Because of this miracle, Harold was willing--even anxious--to learn about the Church and the gospel of Jesus Christ, with a perspective he had never had before.

It was just at this time that the missionaries knocked at Harold’s door, seemingly by chance, adding even more evidence to the possibility that the Lord’s hand was in what was happening to Harold.

So, as the missionaries began teaching the precepts of the gospel, what they taught sounded good, even though Harold wasn’t making any commitments. He was listening to the Book of Mormon on audiotape, and he was certainly thinking deeply about the things he was being taught. However, as the days and weeks passed, he began to question whether it was possible for the nurse to have turned out his light just by a coincidence. He wasn’t sure, but he told himself that while the probability of this being coincidence was small, it still could have just happened without intervention from God. He still had no explanation, though, for the relief from his pain.

The discussion then came to the Word of Wisdom. The missionaries taught that the Lord had commanded us to abstain from taking harmful substances into our bodies, including alcohol, tobacco, coffee, tea, and so on. When the missionaries asked Harold if he would commit to abstaining from these harmful substances, he refused to commit himself, without really any good reason. And so, this was the point at which I had been invited to participate, with a standoff between Harold and the missionaries, neither knowing just where to go from there.

Harold and I seemed to be at ease with each other. We communicated very well, not so much because of engineering backgrounds, but frankly, I just liked him and I think he liked me. So, I bluntly asked him what the problem was. He told me that he drank coffee only once or twice a year, so giving it up was not a problem for him. In fact, it was no big deal. But no youngster or anyone else was going to tell him what he could and couldn’t do. Harold was full of pride and independence; he was his own man. It could be that he would never touch coffee again, he said, but he just hadn’t made up his mind, and certainly wasn’t going to commit to the missionaries to never drink it again.

We talked for some time about this and other subjects. There seemed to be no other obstacles or objections for Harold, other than that infrequent cup of coffee. While I made several attempts at analyzing the situation with Harold, I couldn’t relieve the requirement to commit to living this principle of the gospel. We talked about how it was God’s commandment, not man’s, and how the commitment he had to make was to God and himself, not to a missionary. We talked about how other commandments would probably be much harder for him to live than this one, and yet he was willing to commit to those. I bore my personal testimony on the subject, and made several return visits to see if Harold had a change of heart. I am sad to say that not only did Harold never change his mind, I in fact began to see a regression in his spirituality. He became rather certain that the nurse turning off his light that night in the hospital was just a coincidence, and his remission from his painful condition could, too, have just been something that happened to him as it has happened to others, without any spiritual significance.

Today, Bea goes to church by herself, while Harold sits at home in his easy chair, again suffering from his infirmities, with no faith in the salvation available to him through the grace and power of Jesus Christ. My perspective is that in this case, a cup of coffee is preventing Harold from receiving the saving ordinances of the gospel. Until he has a change of heart and accepts all the commandements in their entirety, failure to live this one "small" commandment prevents Harold from being baptized for a remission of his sins. And because "no unclean thing" can enter into the kingdom of heaven, Harold will not enjoy being with his family eternally, in the presence of the Lord. Oh, what a terrible price to pay, just to be able to drink an occasional cup of coffee.