Wake Up, Look Up

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hello everyone thanks for listening to

wake up lookup a podcast where we

connect events happening in real time to

the Gospel of Jesus Christ I'm Zach

wrock and in today's episode we're

asking the question is gambling good now

this is prompted by two things one is

you know here on wake up lookup if

you've been listening for a while that I

am an opponent of gambling uh and that

I've used I've actually used this

platform a couple of times to talk about

the damaging effects that gambling has

on individuals and on society but the

second thing that prompted this is the

economist ran an opinion piece recently

arguing that gambling has actually been

good that it should be celebrated not

feared and so I thought it would be good

to take a look at their arguments and to

evaluate those arguments from a Biblical

perspective uh their their main points

were three three reasons why gambling is

good one is it makes money over the next

decade Americans will spend about $630

billion on gambling the concern of

course is if you make that illegal here

in the United States that money goes

elsewhere to overseas or offshore

gambling outfits it doesn't get recycled

into the American economy they also

argue that technology makes it so that

you don't have to go to Cy places to G

gamble so you don't have to go to the

bookie and the bar or even the casino

you can stay home and be relatively safe

and Gamble from your phone and the third

argument is that increasingly Sports

gambling at least on the Internet is

appealing to a higher income clientele

44% of people who engage in online

Sports gambling make at least $100,000 a

year so these are people who have the

money uh do those arguments hold water

well I think the answer to that is no

let me walk through them really quickly

saying that the gambling generates

revenue does not comment on its morality

or immorality there are a lot of things

that generate Revenue that we would

argue shouldn't be legal U drugs for

example generate tons of Revenue but no

one's saying hey we should legalize

heroin because after all we could make a

lot of tax money off of it at least I

hope there not there are other things

like prostitution or child pornography

that could generate lots of Revenue but

most of us believe that those things

would lead to societal degradation the

economy matters it just doesn't always

matter the most and it certainly isn't

the Arbiter over what is right and wrong

good or bad for us the argument that you

don't have to go to the bar in the

bookie sounds a lot like to me like the

argument legalizing abortion the

argument was well people are going to

have abortions they're just going to

have them in back alleys don't we want

to move women into their doctor's office

for that to happen again it doesn't

comment on whether it's right or wrong

but actually gambling moving into the

home is not a net positive because

having to sit in your living room ask

yourself do I really want to go to the

bookie in the bar do I really want to

drive into the casino means there's a

natural obstacle you'd have to overcome

gambling on our smartphones makes it so

that you don't even have to get off the

couch to blow your entire savings

account and by the way that's what the

gambling companies want I'll I'll

comment on that in just a second as for

the argument that overwhelmingly people

are betting on sports and they have the

disposable income listen I'm not a math

wizard but I will say this if 44% of

people doing sports gambling make at

least $100,000 guess what that means 56%

of people Sports gambling make less than

$100,000 because all the data out there

says you show me a community where

gambling is flourishing and I will show

you a community where overwhelmingly it

is the poor and marginalized doing the

gambling those least able to afford the

hit that they're inevitably going to

take those arguments are nonsense and

they're what happens when you do away

with the concept of God and have only

yourself to Jud to judge whether or not

what you already wanted to do is moral

or not the truth is that the Bible tells

us that we are each of us stewards of

the resources that God has given us and

gambling is poor stewardship it is not

financially wise ask yourself this

when's the last time you went into a

casino and you found that they were

pulling up Furniture to sell it because

people were winning so much they

couldn't afford it anymore the truth is

they didn't build Las Vegas by losing

they built it by taking money from you

and the same is true of all these online

platforms who are making money hand over

fist because they know eventually you

will lose gamblers lose that's how they

make the money that they make in the

gambling industry the Bible affirms hard

work it affirms sound financial

management generosity wisdom saving

investing taking care of your family

through those means being dependent on

God and not on quote unquote chance now

in the end it is far more likely that

the person in our churches who is

gambling is a person who will ruin their

family financially whose addiction to

compulsive gambling will lead them to

other places like alcohol or drugs or

pornography because the same compulsive

Behavior the same craving of the

dopamine hit has to go somewhere

churches are not full of people that are

flourishing through gambling they're

full of people who thought they would

and instead are finding ruin gambling

isn't new and neither are the biblical

commands against mismanaging the money

God trusted with you listen be wary of

those who will give you thin moral

arguments to make yourself feel better

remember the Bible tells us if we will

confess sin God is faithful and just to

forgive us but if we pretend sin isn't

sin and we have bigger problems than

gambling hey thanks so much for watching

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