God's Word: Gambling And The Texas Lottery (21 Of 26) by Stan Coffey

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Issues of the 90's
Dr. Stan Coffey
Exodus 20:15 and 17

If you are looking for a verse that says "Thou shalt not gamble" you will look in vain. Neither will you find a verse that says, "Thou shalt not drive through a school zone at 110 miles per hour." This illustrates the fact that the Bible is not a book of minute rules but a book of principles. If it were a book of rules and laws we would have to have a freight train to carry such a book because there are so many situations that would have to be addressed. Secondly, the rules and laws that applied to the first century do not necessarily apply to ours. Thirdly, smart people can find loopholes in laws but they cannot find loopholes in principles which always apply. In this lesson we will look at some of those principles that apply to the subject of gambling.

Some people will say; "Well, life itself is a gamble. Business is a gamble, farming is a gamble." When we are talking about the subject of gambling we are not talking about these things at all. When you say life is a gamble you mean that it involves risk. All of life indeed is taking a risk when we go out of doors in the morning there is a certain risk involved. The Bible does not teach that we ought not to take risk. In Acts 15:26, Paul talked of certain men who had risked their lives for the name of Jesus Christ. We are not called to play it safe in life. In fact, in the parable of the talents, Jesus condemned the man who buried his treasure for playing it "safe." Some people say that playing the stock market is gambling. However even this is not the same as gambling we are addressing in this lesson. When you invest in the stock market that is exactly what you are doing - investing in a business or investing in many businesses. But there is a basic difference in betting on a horse race and in investing money in stock or planting a good crop. In gambling there is a winner and there m ...

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