Gambling Is a Sin

T

o be quickly rich without any labor, this is the dream of all sinners. That is the foundation of gambling.

Gambling – definition: To play a game for money or property; to bet, to take a chance, to risk on an uncertain outcome; to expose yourself to danger and to proceed in the face of it.

The attraction of gambling is entertainment and the love of money. Both are very addictive strongholds of Satan. The victims are people who are lazy, covetous, foolish and ambitious at the same time. That combination is deadly. Gambling is a scheme to escape labor, but in reality, gambling is an evil spirit that kills and destroys.

Recently a young lady approached me and said “Tabby I really need your prayers. I have a gambling problem. And I need to stop before this makes me crazy. I have taken loans from everywhere. I even went back home and sold a cow. I have debts surrounding me right, left and center as we speak because I take loans so as to gamble. I am working but I am working to pay off my debts and at times I go hungry almost coming to a place where my house is about to be closed.” “In the last two weeks I have gambled over ksh. 200,000 ($ 2,000),” she said as she sent me screen shorts of her betting schedule.

Again not many days after as a sister in Christ and I exchanged pleasantries and got to ask how the family was doing. “They are all fine” she said excited to fill me up on the new addition in the family. Which lead me to asking about the man of the home since she did not speak about him. I could see her long pause as she breathed heavily before answering me. “He is fine with his betting.” I immediately discerned a problem as she continued “do you know that he put a bet to our only family car and lost it?”

Is it a sin to gamble? If you are looking for a "Thus saith the Lord: Thou shalt not gamble," you won't find it anywhere.

Does that automatically put gambling into the realm of adiaphora, or indifferent matters? Not at all. Gambling is a sin, full stop.

A Sin? Are you Serious? Why Would Anyone Believe that in this Enlightened Age?

If you study the Word of God and His ways you can deduce that gambling is a sin and it is to be rejected as a practice to make money. Gambling violates God’s law because of the following:

1.   The foundation and the attraction of it is the love of money, which is evil.

‘Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income’ (Ecclesiastes 5:10)

2.   Gambling encourages laziness and covetousness in the same time. The Bible says that we should work and be good stewards of the income we make. We are to offer our gifts to God, then use the remaining to take care of the family. Any surplus we are to invest or to save for emergencies in the future.

‘Lazy hands make a man poor but diligent hands bring wealth’ (Proverbs 10:4)

‘You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife…’ (Exodus 20:17)

3.   Gambling may be entertaining but it is addictive. All addictions are sins because they master the person who becomes a slave.

‘A man is a slave to whatever has mastered him’ (2 Peter 2:19)

4.   Gambling gives false hope to people and builds false imaginations. God is to be our only hope. Our future is joyful because God, in Christ will change our sorrow into glory. Any other hope of riches and fame outside Christ is false and criminal.

‘The hopes of the wicked come to nothing…when a wicked man dies, his hope perishes; all he expected from his power come to nothing’ (Proverbs 10:28; 11:7)

‘May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit (Romans 15:13)

5.   Gambling does not give glory to God but to the ‘luck or fortune’ of men. There are things in this world that may not be bad in themselves, but they are not beneficial to the kingdom of God and to our testimony as believers.

‘Everything is permissible for me but not everything is beneficial…but I will not be mastered by anything…but not everything is constructive…’ (1 Corinthians 6:12; 10:23)

That means that gambling does no good to me or to others. Its hope of success is a deception that will only destroy life and family.

6.   Man was created in the image of God. But gambling makes a man to be a fool.

‘Like a partridge that hatches eggs it did not lay is the man who gains riches by unjust means. When his life is gone, they will desert him and in the end he proves to be a fool’ (Jeremiah 17:11)

Gambling is a demonic spirit that is wrecking homes and marriages. The business is wicked and it attracts all type of men and women alike but especially the poor who believe in the get rich quick schemes. 

80-90% of the winning numbers go to the patron. The chance to win there is minimal but the attraction to make money without work is very high. Even the few that win, statistics say that they will lose all their money in maximum two years and they are back to gamble again, ready to sell even their soul to Satan.

Gambling is the entertainment of the devil and it is to be rejected, in Jesus name! What is the church doing about it? Watch out for part 2.