Just about every one of us has thought of winning the lottery. You know - the BIG ONE! Hundreds of millions of dollars. Many people dream of winning it. A lot of people try to win the lottery.
As a Christian, we even speculate about how much good we could do with that kind of money. We could support all kinds of charities - good causes. We could help some people whom we know are struggling to pay off some bills. We would even give a large percentage to the Lord - you know, maybe 50%. (Is that before or after taxes?) Well, maybe 25%. Hmmm?
We have read articles and heard stories about people who have won the lottery and their lives were ruined. In a few years, many had spent it all or were even broke. For various reasons, that huge sum of money didn’t produce a good outcome.
We, of course, would be able to handle it. We would be different. We wouldn’t let the money get hold of us. Right?
Let’s ask this question: Would winning the lottery be your downfall? Be careful how you answer.
We need to carefully reflect on how many warnings God gives in His word about trusting in money and about greed and covetousness. Paul writes to the Ephesian church (5:3) that greed is not even to be named among them as being improper for saints. He writes to Timothy (1:6:10) about the love of money being the root of all sorts of evils. Probably the most dangerous of those evils is that people begin to trust in it instead of in God.
Usually when there are admonitions about the dangers of money, there are also exhortations to be content with what we have and to trust God to take care of our needs. Our Hebrews scripture is one of those. Consider: If we are engaged in trying to win the lottery or have begun to seriously fantasize about winning it, we have probably already grown discontent with what we have and are no longer trusting God to take care of us. What do you think?
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