Gambling is a very familiar part of our culture here in the UK, and has been for decades, whether it's betting on a horse to win a race or on a football score, or simply buying a lottery ticket or a scratch card. According to the British Gambling Prevalence Survey 2010, 73% of all adults (16+) had participated in some form of gambling over the past year. That's around 35.5 million people. So, how much are these people spending exactly? Between October 2011 and September 2012, the British gambling industry generated a gross gambling yield of £6.2 billion. That's a lot.
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| Gambling Industry Statistics Apr'09- Sept'12, Gambling Commission |
And this is how it's being spent.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines the verb to gamble as such:
1. to play games of chance for money; bet
2. to take risky action in the hope of a desired result
Recently, I've been thinking a lot about betting and gambling, and about how they play a bigger role in all of our lives than we realise. I don't mean the examples I've just been giving, but the very concept of gambling itself: investing in something whilst believing or hoping that it will work out in our favour. This idea transfers to so many areas of our lives, from sending that "risky text" to the person we've fancied for months to buying shares in a company.
But we don't make these sorts of decisions based on nothing, do we? In most betting scenarios we first look at the evidence before investing: which team has been playing better recently?; which horse has been running well?; what are the experts saying?; has the person of our affections given any signs they feel similarly?; does the company have a good record and a prosperous looking future?
"What is the maximum you would be willing to bet on something you believed in?"
This answer to this question, of course, depends on a couple of factors.
- How important the issue/belief involved is; what impact it will have on your life
- How certain you are of the outcome; how much evidence there is in favour of the outcome
Take a couple of seconds to think about it.
So now let me ask you another question-
"What would you be willing to bet on your beliefs about God being true?"
Let's go through our points.
How Important is the Issue of God's existence?
If God doesn't exist, then we can live our lives as we please, accountable to no one except perhaps to those in power. It also means that there is no purpose in anything we do except for our own happiness and the happiness of those around us, and one day we will just die and cease to exist. Really, the non-existence of God would have zero impact on us at all as whether we believe in him or not, we will all share the same fate and die. The End.
But what if He does?
If God does exist, then what we believe regarding Him is intrinsically important. If God does exist, then we are ultimately accountable to Him for our actions and come under His Authority and Justice. If God does exist, life is no longer just about making the most of it, having a good time and then dying. If God does exist then what we believe about Him does matter as we come face to face with eternity and where we will spend it. If God does exist, then we will either spend eternity with Him, in Paradise, or without Him, in a place called Hell.
On one side, it matters nothing at all. On the other, it means absolutely everything. Are you willing to bet on it meaning nothing or everything?
What Evidence is there for the Existence and Non-Existence of God?
I'm struggling with how to put this in a way that is fair, but my own reasoning and logic tells me that there is no evidence for the non-existence of God, but only evidence against the existence of God (think about it, there is a difference), and so that is the manner in which I'm going to approach this.
One strong opposition people have to the existence of God is the existence of pain and suffering at the hands of evil. However, if we think back to the consequences of there being no God, then we can all do what we want and we're not accountable to anyone. If this is the case, then why do we care so much about evil and injustice in the world? If there is no God then there is no ultimate justice and we can all do what we want without any ultimate consequences, and that's what we want to believe until we don't like what some people choose to do with that.
"How could God allow such evil in the world?"
The evil in this world is generated from the attitude born out of a disbelief in God in the first place! People can choose to do what they want to and what makes them happy, consequently hurting other people: God doesn't exist, I don't have to answer to anyone, I can just do what I want for the sake of my own happiness and then die, leaving behind the mess I've made in my path to "happiness". God, out of His love, allowed us to have our own minds, to make our own choices, to decide whether we wanted Him or not and evil is what comes from our decision to reject Him.
One of the more recent things that is used as evidence against the existence of God is science. I can already tell you that I'm not going to give you a very good "argument" here, simply because I do not understand the logic of the idea that because we know more about how the world works it proves it developed on its own. I've studied and enjoyed learning about chemistry for the past 7 years now, and I think the primary reason I find it so interesting is because I enjoy finding out how things work, and learning just how utterly complex and amazing our world is. For me, as I have learnt more and more in the subject of chemistry, and the things I learn have become increasingly difficult, I am only further persuaded that our universe must have been designed and created. Logic tells me that finding out that something is infinitely more complex than we previously understood, takes us further away from being able to say that it all happened on its own! As far as the big bang theory and evolutionary theory go- so what? In terms of God existing, they make no difference; it doesn't matter how you believe our world came into being and developed, you can't disprove or find evidence against God having been the One to have caused it all.
I'm sure there are more arguments for there being evidence against God's existence, but the purpose of this blog is just to give you an idea. If you have anything specific yourself that you'd like to ask me about, don't hesitate to get in touch and I'll do the best I can to give you an answer.
So, on the flip side, what evidence is there to suggest God does exist? Well, I could go on forever, but that's not the point of this blog!
I could start by using the reverse of my last point: look at the world around you, you don't need to have any scientific knowledge to look at our planet and see that it is
amazing! Look at all the different types of trees and flowers, look at all the crazy amazing looking fish in the sea, look at the colours EVERYWHERE! The birds in the sky, the terrifyingly terrific wildlife of Africa, the giant immovable mountains, and the superbly small yet amazing insect world.
Look at the sky above you, the wonderfully fluffy clouds and beautiful blue sky, thundering black clouds fit to burst with water droplets, flashes of lightening that light up the entire sky. Look at the stars and the moon. What a different world it would be without them! Feel the involuntary sense of smallness as you gaze out into the universe and are dazzled by its beauty and enormity.
Look at yourself. You are amazing. You can see, you can hear, you can taste, you can smell, and you can feel, that is amazing in itself. You started off life as two cells! And look at you now! And you're intelligent, too, more intelligent than any other creature on the planet. But you're still more than that. You're not just a body and a mind, an intelligent machine meandering through life; you are a person. Think over your life, think of the pain and the heartache, think of that overwhelming joy and happiness, think of how much you love/d that person, think of that unexplainable feeling of emptiness- are you really just a well assembled piece of matter?
Look at Jesus. (I've gone over this in a previous blog, but I'll just give you a wee bit to give you the idea in context). You cannot disprove Jesus, he was a real person in history. His life and death were prophesied hundreds and thousands of years before he was even born. He lived a perfect life, he was beaten and nailed to a cross of wood, and he died. And then three days later the tomb was empty. Hundreds of people testify the risen Jesus, thousands of people at a time accept him as their saviour and are baptised in his name, his disciples go out into Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth proclaiming Jesus as the Son of God who could save from sin and more and more people became followers of Jesus Christ. They were persecuted, beaten and killed but still would not reject their Jesus.
They invested everything they had for what they believed about God.
They knew it was the most important thing in life.
And they knew what they believed was True.
Now let me ask you again,
"What would you be willing to bet on your beliefs about God being true?"
Believe it or not, you are betting with exactly what persecuted Christians all over the world have been for 2000 years:
your life.
Whether you like it or not, your whole life is at stake here. And I don't just mean your life here on earth, either. You can't afford to dilly dally around it or be agnostic- Your eternity hangs in the balance!
It's your choice to believe that God doesn't exist, but...
are you ready to bet your life on it?
'Cause you better be.
