Life is a Gamble

Last week I was certain that I was going to win the lottery. I kid you not. I almost never play the lottery. Unless I feel "led" to play, I agree with all you graduates of Financial Peace University: the lottery is dumb. But the circumstances were right:

1. I had a weird dream. In the dream I am on vacation in Africa and spot a giant giraffe. I say "giant" because the face of the giraffe was so big that I didn't realize it was a giraffe until I was on much higher ground.
   
2. June also has a dream (she never remembers her dreams). In this dream a bunch of stuff happens that I don't remember because I zeroed in on her saying there was a miniature giraffe in her dream. 

So I was thinking: GIRAFFES! So I looked up the lottery numbers that  corresponded with dreams of a giraffe and played them all. Pick 3. Pick 4. Then I arranged them into a couple of different sets for Mega Millions. I lost. Five dollars down the drain of foolishness. But since it was a small sum of money my heart was not crushed.

I went to the Maryland Live! casino a couple of weeks ago for a friend's birthday celebration, and I lost $200. Quick. It smarts (a little) when I think of all the other things $200 could have bought; however, I had set aside that exact amount of money to either be the seed money for my winnings or the extent of my losses. So, since I was in control of it...that didn't really hurt either.

Lots of our most commonly used metaphors depict human life as a gambling game:

"I'll take my chances!"
"It's worth the risk"
"It's a crap shoot"
"He's totally bluffing..."
"Dating is a numbers game"
"Where is he when the chips are down?"
"Winning!"

And the list goes on and on. Gambling seems stupid, but we have (at least in our speech) marginalized our very existence to a game of risks and rewards...and we play our lives out like that.  This had me really down because (as noted above) I lose. I lose a lot. There are other gambling stories that have been omitted, but none of those have happy endings either.

But those are just games. Surely a Christian never treats life as a gamble...or do they?

Our faith? Our hope? Are these the currency we gamble with? Like maybe this next prayer will be the one that wins big?

I've thought about this and...no. This is why the Bible says:

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts. - Isaiah 55:8-9

...I should just end the blog right here. I hate to tell you, even my thoughts criticizing old thoughts is probably dumb (especially compared with the knowledge of God), but I still have something to say.

As early as yesterday I was thinking of faith and hope in terms of gambles. "Step out on faith." "Keep asking, keep praying." All of that seems like "take-a-risk" language to me;  like one of these prayers will "hit" or like "somebody's got to win." The more I thought of it like that, the more tragic my life started to feel. It was like God was Maryland Live! and "the house always wins." And I always lose. So at the end of every prayer, as my chips of hope and faith are swept away, a still small voice whispers "My grace is sufficient for thee" (cue evil laughter)?!! 

When prayer is a numbers game rather than a faith game, I think maybe we're dealing with "wishes." And then it actually is a lot like gambling, thinking "maybe this will happen", or "maybe that will happen." I was more certain I was going to win the lottery last week than I have been about some of my prayers coming to pass. Because I was convinced that the two giraffe dreams meant something! However, the scriptures and past experiences had proven less convincing.

Faithless praying. I think I do that when my heart is too crushed to believe anything anymore. If you ask someone how to fix it, they'll say: pray. Except, take the "maybe" out of it. Take the gambling out it. Pray believing that it's working. From the moment the words leave your mouth...believe that they are working. 

"And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him." - Hebrews 11:6

But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. - James 1:6-8

That person comes intending to lose $200, because to him...life is a gamble.