Many moons ago (actually several decades), as a lad I was at campmeeting, and with nothing better to do, I went into the bookstore. On the shelf was a thin book attempting to address various âhotâ topics including lotteries.
The author (I forget his name) argued in favour of the official SDA position (no surprise - he was on church payroll) and then addressed some of the objections.
One objection to the gambling prohibition was âbut I only buy lottery tickets with my spare moneyâ. The authorâs response was âwhen the âworkâ remains unfinished, does any believer really have any spare money?â This utter nonsense didnât set off alarm bells in my adolescent mind, but the memory was filed away for retrieval a couple decades later.
On one hand there is a certain logic to it - if one truly believes that we are in the âlast daysâ, that the SDA church is the âremnant churchâ, that salvation is dependent upon correctly believing and observing certain teachings like the âsabbathâ, that spreading the SDA message not only determines the timing of the second coming, but affects the eternal destinies of those with whom we are in contact, then not only should ever spare moment and every spare dime be devoted to the âworkâ, but those engaged in the âworkâ (if they truly believe it and arenât clergymen for the sake of having a paying career), ought to live on subsistence wages - so that every spare dime beyond what they absolutely âneedâ, is devoted to the âworkâ. As an aside, I wonder if the author of this tome donated his royalties to the âworkâ, or if maybe he used âspareâ money for a vacation, a dinner, or tickets to a ball game.
Anyway, Iâll be spending $3 (Canadian) for a Wednesday nightâs lottery draw - since I never win, itâs essentially a donation to the general revenues of the province of Quebec, but maybe Iâll win - I have a 1-in-14 million chance (which is better chances than the âsunday lawâ being enacted). I think Iâll also put down a couple hours work worth on the Canadiens de Montreal to win the Stanley Cup. Since our team isnât great, weâre currently at +25000, and a $1000 wager will yield a quarter million. Or maybe Iâll bet on NCAA college football. Hockey (played mostly by secular Canadian, European and north US boys) doesnât have much of a tradition of praying for goals and victory, so I doubt God takes much of an interest in hockey. But with all the praying going on before football games and after touchdowns, certainly achieving correct outcomes of the football games are a major priority for the deities, and therefore maybe betting on college football is just another way of doing the Lordâs work - especially if we bet on God-fearing schools like Texas, Alabama or Georgia, and not those secular left-coast teams like Washington, UCLA or Stanford.
But no worries, if I win back any of my spare money, I wonât sully the conference coffers with any ill-gotten gains.
