How can churches address sports betting?

Sports betting or gambling has been on the rise in recent years, and now more than ever, it’s seeping its way into our everyday lives. From advertisements on our phones to the big screens, the gambling industry is fighting for our attention. But why is this such a problem? This industry preys on the weak and vulnerable, and profits off of those too addicted to turn away.

Welcome to The ERLC Podcast where our goal is to help you think biblically about today’s cultural issues. Today we’re talking about sports betting.

The Bible helps us think about gambling with wisdom and discernment. For example, Matthew 6:24-34 commands us to steward our resources well and to trust God for our provision. In addition, Southern Baptists have opposed gambling for many years, with over 14 resolutions about gambling adopted by messengers. 

While the problem of gambling is pervasive in many states, South Carolina and Texas are currently faced with legislation that, if passed, would legalize sports betting, leading to physical, emotional, and relational harm, particularly within families and communities.

Here to discuss the dangers of this issue is Bryant Simms, chief operations officer for the South Carolina Baptist Convention, who will offer advice to pastors on how to oppose this issue in their state. You’ll also hear from Dan Darling, director of the Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and church engagement strategist at the ERLC. 

Episode transcript: How can churches address sports betting?

Narration:

Welcome to the ERLC podcast where our goal is to help you think biblically about today’s cultural issues. I’m Lindsay Nicolet, and today we’re talking about sports betting.

Gambling has been on the rise in recent years and now more than ever it’s seeping its way into our everyday lives. From advertisements on our phones to the big screens, the gambling industry is fighting for our attention. But why is this such a problem? This industry prays on the weak and vulnerable and profits off of those too addicted to turn away. The Bible helps us think about gambling with wisdom and discernment. For example, Matthew 6:24-34 commands us to steward our resources well and to trust God for our provision. In addition, Southern Baptists have opposed gambling for many years with over 14 resolutions about gambling adopted by messengers. While the problem of gambling is pervasive in many states, the states of South Carolina and Texas are currently faced with legislation that, if passed, would legalize sports betting leading to physical, emotional and relational harm, particularly within families and communities. 

Here to discuss the dangers of this issue is Bryant Sims, Chief Operations Officer for the South Carolina Baptist Convention who will offer advice to pastors on how to oppose this issue in their state. You’ll also hear from Dan Darling, Director of the Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and Church Engagement Strategist at the ERLC. 

Now let’s turn to Bryant Sims’ conversation with RaShan Frost, Director of Research at the ERLC.

RaShan Frost:

I am here with Bryant Sims and he is on the executive leadership team with the South Carolina Baptist Convention, fellow South Carolina Baptist. He also was a pastor for a long time and so it is really good to have Bryant here with us as one who’s engaged churches as a pastor, discipling people dealing with various cultural issues and things like that and helping people to live faithfully for the gospel and for Jesus in these different times. And so one of the things that I have for you Bryant, is as you’ve pastored and as you see certain policy issues that are on the horizon today, in the near future, how have you had to address gambling not only as a pastor but seeing upcoming legislation being proposed to legalize sports betting in South Carolina?

Bryant Sims:

Certainly. So, during my first pastorate, Rashaan, I was co-vocational and I worked an hour from the little town I pastored in, worked 10 hours a day, but we lived in that town where I was the pastor and my wife was there alone for 12 hours a day and that’s when video poker was legal in South Carolina. And I know we’ve been dealing with the lottery for a number of years that it’s been legal, but I’ve never seen anything that was as destructive as video poker was in South Carolina. And there would literally be, I would leave at five o’clock in the morning to drive to Fujifilm in Greenwood. We lived in Calhoun Falls and people would be beating on the door at six o’clock with stories of why they needed money. But the stories were never true. They always wanted money to go play video poker and man, it was just a lie. And we saw children in homes, especially during that time. The whole town was poverty ridden of Calhoun Falls at that time, but children in homes that didn’t have food to eat that barely had clothes to wear. And the number one reason at that time that we were dealing with those types of situations in that town was the video poker issue in South Carolina. It just sucked people in. And I had a great friend that whose dad lost his business because of video poker, he literally just sat in a gas station and gambled it away.

RaShan Frost:

It’s interesting you say that. We don’t ever think about the devastating effects of gambling. We think it’s harmless. We think what’s the problem with having a little fun? But you’ve obviously laid out pastorally, situations that you’ve had to deal with. And so how did Baptists, knowing what was going on, how did South Carolina Baptists help influence the state to outlaw video poker?

Bryant Sims:

Right. I think it was a different day and time and that’s one of my big concerns for what’s going on in South Carolina right now in the legislature. I feel like it was a different time in the lives of our churches where we were more quick to engage on the issue at a state level. It was easier to get people to call their legislators and, talk about this issue. And it was easier honestly to talk about it from the pulpit than maybe it is today. And until your white paper that recently came out, I was concerned that we had lost this issue, that we didn’t have the passion for it anymore because I do believe that it affects families in a powerful way across our state. And the only thing that I really know to compare it to is maybe meth. When we were in the depth of the meth epidemic in our state, you know, people were just literally stealing from their parents and taking from their children to get that next hit of meth. That’s what video poker looked like. And I think the desperation of that helped drive our people to call because everybody knew a story, right? Everybody had a story. And now those stories seem to be so far removed from us that I’m afraid we’re gonna have to endure that again before we’re able to go back and address it. And this time if it’s a casino coming into South Carolina or it’s sports betting coming in South Carolina, we might open a door that we’re unable to close this time.

RaShan Frost:

I appreciate your thoughts about that. And so knowing what you’ve experienced, knowing what could possibly happen, how do we raise the alarm for pastors and associations? Beccause obviously Texas is dealing with the same issue and there are other states, so it’s not legal in all 50 states, which means legislatures are wrestling with this. So how can churches in those states, someone who’s on executive leadership, someone who’s been a pastor, how would you sound the alarm for states and churches that are having to wrestle with this issue on the horizon or is in the legislative session now?

Bryant Sims:

Right. So I think this is where Baptists might even have an upper hand is, this has to be relationally done. People don’t read emails like they used to. Our state convention sometimes sends out videos on important topics and we’ll see something like a 20% open rate on the email and then people will watch five seconds of a two minute video and shut it off. So this is gonna have to be a relational grassroots type of movement through the great tool we have of the local Baptist Association and through our local churches, pastors who have a passion about this or who see and understand it, but it’s gonna have to be relational person to person. And then the other thing is, the only way that we can battle this at a state level, these guys have mega dollars behind them, right? I mean they have more money than we can think of behind them.

The South Carolina Baptist Convention is 200 years old. We have three universities, a children’s home, a retirement center and state convention headquarters in Columbia. And our total net assets, the last I checked, is somewhere around two and a half billion dollars. That’s what the lottery does a year in South Carolina. Over 200 years we saw that net worth through all of our connections. They do that in a year. And so we can’t combat them by putting people in the lobby. We can’t combat them by serving barbecue to legislators. You know, we have to have people calling elected officials and that’s the only chance we have to probably stop this.

RaShan Frost:

So then in kind of wrapping it up, and this is one of the things that has concerned me and I think it’s an opportunity as associations that you’ve mentioned can really press towards the local church to consider this in our discipleship pathways and different strategies for church planting. There was a survey by sports spectrum that said I think 42% of self-professed Christians held a somewhat positive or very positive view of sports betting another 25 or 30% held a neutral perspective, which means of professing Christians the majority either see this as a good of some sort or is neutral in some way. How can we as pastors talk about this as a discipleship issue?

Bryant Sims:

Sure. I agree that I think it’s easier sometimes for us to talk about the social ills, the experiences that we’ve seen, the hurting families, but it is at its heart a theological issue. Right? I wanna say that I appreciate the paper that you wrote for the ERLC because that’s where you start is with the theological foundations of where we stand on this issue of gambling. And I think that from a discipleship based issue, there are a couple of ways that we can go and a couple of talking points that we can have. The first is it diminishes the idea of gambling itself diminishes the idea of faith in God, right? That I trust God to be my provider and to give me everything that I need to have in life. It diminishes the idea of Christian contentment of having all that we need in the Lord.

So my life verse is different from some folks, it’s Psalm 23:1 and you know that the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. My understanding of that verse is actually that a better translation, the Sims translation, I joke about it sometimes, is that it really means this, the Lord is my shepherd. What more could I want? What more could I want? So at the heart of the gambling issue is desiring more than God. And what he gives right is this idea that he’s not enough and we need more than that to find the contentment that we need in life. And then I think it also diminishes a biblical work ethic. The Bible’s very clear, Proverbs talks a couple of times, think Proverbs 13:11 says, wealth gained hastily will dwindle, but whoever gathers little by little will reap a reward for that. And so all throughout scripture is this idea of a biblical work ethic.

And gambling tries to circumvent that by finding that wealth another way. And I think that’s one of the reasons, you know, again, multiple places can give us statistics on this, but we all know the stories that people that gain wealth by gambling is not long lasting. They lose it almost as quick as they gained it. And usually if you hear anecdotal stories of that their life is not better off after the winnings is worse after the winnings because that’s not where the purpose of life is. The very simple principle, the love of money, not money itself, but the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And so we see that and experience that through gambling in multiple ways. I don’t think any state that has adopted either sports betting or casino gambling is better off for having done it.

Narration:

Bryant experienced firsthand the tragic effects of video poker throughout his ministry with the looming threat of gambling becoming legal in South Carolina. Again, Bryant encourages states with a similar issue to build relationships through local associations and churches and to make their voices known to public officials in order to keep this epidemic away. Now let’s turn to Dan Darling’s conversation with RaShan to find out what’s happening in the state of Texas.

RaShan Frost:

I’m with my colleague Daniel Darling and we are here just talking about gambling and of all the important policy issues that we have to deal with in the public square. Why is the ERLC focused so heavily on gambling?

Dan Darling:

That’s a great question RaShan and it’s great to be here to talk to you about this. Yeah, Southern Baptists have always been a little bit uneasy about gambling going through our history. But I think in recent years there’s been a greater concern among pastors and others about the proliferation of sports betting since the Supreme Court legalized it a few years ago. You know, I’m a huge sports fan. I love NFL football, I love college football, NBA, baseball, all those sports. And I listen to a lot of podcasts. I watch TV coverage of those and it’s amazing how ever present the ads for sports gambling are and how much it’s almost taken over the sport. And there’s real concern number one, about what it’s gonna do to sports in general, particularly amateur sports and college sports, but also from a perspective on what it will do to families, men who are addicted to sports gambling.

And we know that you look at some of the studies that gambling addiction can be as bad as a drug addiction in terms of what it does to your brain, how that’s gonna destroy families economically. But also worried about young men RaShan, that they have a smartphone in their pocket, they have an app, they have their dad’s credit card and could get themselves in real trouble. And you know, one thing I tell my children <laugh> is that the house always wins. You know, these companies are not in business to make you money. They’re in business to make them money. So I think it’s a real concern.

RaShan Frost:

You’re absolutely right. You know, it’s interesting, I was traveling to the airport and just when you mentioned smartphones and the proliferation of ads and gambling, I was in an Uber. So I’m on my Uber app just tracking it and in the app is an ad for gambling. So it’s the proliferation of the internet and those ads and the access to gambling now through smartphones, it magnifies the problem of gambling and it increases the access by which more people will fall into the trap. As you aptly said, the house always wins, they’re in it to make money. So with all that being said, and you are tied to the local church, your job is working in church engagement. How have you seen it affect the members of our churches or how have you heard pastors discuss how it’s affecting our churches?

Dan Darling:

Well, it’s a growing problem. It’s one of a number of, I would say predatory vices toward young men. And let’s be clear, there’s women that gamble too. It’s a problem there. But it really is primarily young men keeping them in perpetual adolescence, getting them in all kinds of debt to where they probably can’t get married or it’s harder to get married, maybe they can’t finish college. It’s just all sorts of things. And then there’s obviously the more dangerous and seedier side if you get into massive gambling debt, right? You can be blackmailed in the sort of criminal underworld that’s there. So I think it’s a real problem for the pastors are talking about, it’s sort of under the radar right now RaShan where part of me feels like it’s kind of where the opioid epidemic was maybe 10 years ago, maybe five years ago, where it was present, it was hurting people but there wasn’t a lot of awareness and then all of a sudden it became a big thing. I think that’s gonna happen and you’re already seeing even secular folks say this, right? There was a big article in the Atlantic a few months ago talking about some of the addictive things. I’ve seen this in other places. And so even folks who are not believers are starting to say, no, this is really troubling and we need to watch this.

RaShan Frost:

You’re absolutely right. And unfortunately that’s kind of the trend that I see as well is that it’s already starting to rear its ugly head since the ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court. Because there’s been time now, you know, there’s been now time to do research and have studies and the good news is that we have data now that’s showing it on the front end. The bad news is the effects that are happening as a result of it. So you know, you’re in Texas and obviously there’s some things happening legislatively in Texas. That’s a big deal. And so explain to our audience how the ERLC is focused on the legislation that is happening in Texas. Can you just provide a brief overview of what that legislation is and how we and the Southern Baptist churches in Texas are actively involved in making sure this legislation doesn’t pass?

Dan Darling:

Yeah, so it’s something that’s kind of almost flying under the radar for a lot of folks, but there’s a real push to expand gaming here in Texas. And one of the arguments is that Texans are going to Louisiana or Oklahoma to gamble and we wanna bring that business here to take advantage of the economic benefit here. And so they wanna bring it here. It’s had a significant impact and it’s really a kind of a bipartisan issue where there’s a lot of Democrats and Republicans concerned about gambling and there’s a lot of Democrats and Republicans in favor of it; it doesn’t really cut left and right. I’ve been getting a ton of, you know, even text messages on my phone, people you know asking for you know, support and we gotta bring this money here, there’s gonna be resorts, there’s gonna be all these economic benefits and you know, I just think Christians have to be wary about it.

And I think even a lot of Christians RaShan will say, well what’s the big deal? It’s just fine harmless entertainment. Fortunately the lieutenant governor Dan Patrick is against it. But our governor, Greg Abbott, who we otherwise agree with on a lot of things has become a proponent of it. And really the push is to legalize online sports gambling here and to expand it and to build casinos resorts. The new owner of the Dallas Mavericks for instance is a casino CEO of a lot of casino places around the country. So it’s a big push here, it’s gonna be a big fight, but a lot of churches are really concerned about what it’ll do to their communities. There’s pastors that have actually fought it from expanding into their community. So we’ll see where that goes.

RaShan Frost:

And you mentioned something there that I thought was really helpful. It’s actually a great segue for a follow up question where you were seeing how a lot of Christians, while some are seeing that it is an issue, there are some that don’t see it as a problem, that some are saying what’s the big deal if it brings revenue into the state and things like that. And from your perspective, biblically, historically, as we’ve thought through this and have had resolution after resolution, but also in a call to fulfill the great commission, what would you say to those who say legalizing gambling isn’t a big deal if the tangible benefits are good?

Dan Darling:

Well I’m glad you said that. And believe it or not, Texas is still one of 13 states that doesn’t allow technically legal sports gambling. Now there’s ways that folks get around that of course. And so the push in the legislature is to overturn that or to change that. But you’re right about Christians, and this is an issue that is a little bit more nuanced and complicated when it comes to applying scripture. It’s not as clear as say some of the Christian sexual ethic where it’s very clear, you know, in terms of marriage and sexuality, there’s not as much content in scripture about this. But I do think you can really draw and RaShan, I’d love to hear your perspective. You can really draw from scripture that gambling is unwise, right? There’s a lot of things we would say are unwise for Christians that are current modern things that don’t necessarily have a scripture and verse per se.

But we can draw from scripture that it’s unwise. The Bible talks about Ill-gotten gain and talks about working for your money. That money should be the result of hard work. Talks about praying on the poor. You know, gambling, we know as an industry preys on poor and working class people when vices like this are let loose in a community, whether it’s legalizing marijuana, whether it’s legalizing gambling, it’s not the elites that are affected as much because they have the money and the wherewithal to cushion against the negative outcomes. They can go to rehab, they can pay their gambling debts. They may have a line item in their budget for gambling. It’s the working class folks who are disproportionately harmed. And so I think this is something that Christians should stand against. We see what happens and we also know who’s getting rich and who’s not. People’s lives are torn apart.

Even things like the lottery that seem, okay, we have a lottery we can pay for education. A lot of states have that. If you look at lottery winners, people who win the lottery, very few of them have flourishing lives afterwards. And in fact it, it actually is, it can be devastating. So these are things that we care about because we care about the vulnerable. But I personally believe, and I’d love to hear your perspective, that for a Christian, most if not all forms of gambling are really unwise. It’s very much connected to a worldly sinful element that I think we should avoid.

RaShan Frost:

That’s great. And I’m with you there. The way I think about it, and I frame everything from the great commandment, love the Lord your God with all of your heart, mind, soul, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. And so if you take the first part, what gambling does is it actually replaces God in the throne of your heart to money. Covetousness, ill-gotten gain, the idea of quick money, and greed thrives off of covetousness. I want what someone else has and if I can get it easily, I’ll do that. And so, you know, when the scripture says you can either serve God or mammon, you know, Jesus is making it clear that the two are fighting for the allegiances of our heart. So that’s the first part. And the second part you outlined perfectly where the gambling industry is predatory and it preys on the vulnerable.

When you talk about the elites and those who have that large economic cushion where it’s like, oh, this is just play money. Well, there are people who are, they’re gambling their paychecks, they’re gambling their grocery bills, you know, things for living. And that’s the group that is constantly feeding the profit margins of the industry. And so when I look at it that way, I try to take it from that larger framework and then flow it out there. That gambling at its root is going to deal with our affections toward God and our relationship with others. And one of those studies that came out within the last couple years is even how gambling leads to an increased rate of domestic violence, inter partner violence. And like you, I’m a sports fan, I love college athletics, but it breaks my heart if somebody betting on that game leads to someone’s spouse getting abused, seeing someone’s child abused, you know, where a bet in the Super Bowl or the World Series or the next MMA fighter, whatever that is leading to domestic violence. And that is the complete antithesis of neighbor love. Like I said, like you, I see it is unwise, it’s an unwise use of your resources, it’s an unwise use of your time. Like, you know, those are trying to spend all this time trying to find ways to hedge their bets. There’s more productive ways of managing and stewarding your time. So I appreciate that. And Daniel, thank you for joining us on the podcast. Is there anything that you would like to leave with the audience before we leave and sign out? 

Dan Darling:

Yeah, I think one thing I would just say, pastors really need to start teaching on this. And we have some really great resources that you have put together and others to help guide pastors on how to teach on this and how to equip their people. Because people are involved in this more than we realize. Two things I wanted to point out. One is this really affects the family. If you look at the statistics from gambling, it really hurts families and anything that hurts the nuclear family, we really oppose it. We want families to stay together, fathers to be hardworking and faithful in their families. And the gambling industry is at cross purposes with that. The second thing is, and and you see this even from a fiscal conservative, almost every place where there’s expansion of gambling, there’s an expansion of social services. The government, the state has to step in because the dads are addicted to gambling, they’re consumed with this. The families are split apart. So it really affects the whole socioeconomic climate. So this is why we’re raising the alarm on it and glad that we’re able to kinda raise a flag and hopefully we can curb some of this before it gets out of hand and hurts too many people.

Narration:

As scripture repeatedly affirms everything we own, belongs to God, and we’re called to use these gifts wisely and charitably not to throw them away or be beholden to them. Even though gambling may seem like harmless fun, the truth is it destroys families and drives us further away from the true joy only found in Christ. Leaders like Bryant and Dan who are fighting for a culture that protects the vulnerable from this predatory industry, set an example for all of us within our communities. To learn more about how to navigate questions about gambling in your church, go to erlc.com/guides to download our free gambling guide. 

Thanks for listening to this episode of the ERLC podcast. Join us next time as we answer frequently asked questions about the ERLC.