Articles

Sports Betting

If you have only recently watched a sporting event on television, you have no doubt been shocked by how extensively sports betting commercials and logo placement for bookies permeate the advertising. Famous athletes such as Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, and LeBron James provide star power in hawking the bookies' businesses. Sports talk shows now devote significant airtime to gambling strategies that was once devoted to coaching strategies.

It is estimated that Americans bet $150 billion on sports in 2024. Sports betting is gambling's new "it girl." It was only a few years ago that sports gambling was illegal in all but two states, and now it is everywhere. Along with the proliferation of sports betting comes a shifting of attitudes toward gambling in general. Polls show a steady rise in the number of Americans who find gambling morally acceptable. 58% of Americans in 2009 said gambling was morally acceptable; as of 2022, that number rose to 71%.

Significantly fewer people today find buying or wearing clothing made of animal fur morally acceptable than find gambling morally acceptable.1 However, Americans do not determine what is morally acceptable—God does. The Scriptures have repeatedly warned against covetousness. "Thou shalt not covet" concludes the Ten Commandments (Exo. 20:17). Jesus warned, "And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth" (Luke 12:15). Paul admonishes, "Mortify ['Put to death,' ASV] therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry" (Colossians 3:5, emph. LM). Covetousness is the inordinate desire to possess what belongs to someone else. Gambling goes beyond the attitude of covetousness in taking action toward obtaining what belongs to someone else. Sports betting inserts moral harm into what could and should be a morally harmless activity, watching sports.

1 Jim Norman, "Acceptance of Gambling Reaches New Heights," Gallup, June 7 2018, https://news.gallup.com/poll/235379/acceptancegambling-reaches-new-heights.aspx; Megan Brenan, "Americans Say Birth Control, Divorce Most 'Morally Acceptable,'" Gallup, June 9 2022, https://news.gallup.com/poll/393515/americans-say-birth-control-divorce-morallyacceptable.aspx.

[From the Berean Searcher, January 19, 2025]

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"Correcting Scripture or Correcting Us?"