QUESTIONS/ANSWERS ABOUT MONEY

QUESTION #236 -- I am a Christian and have talked and voted dry for years. I am now a widow of sixty years and live in Colorado. Am entitled to a pension, but part of the revenue to provide the pensions comes from the sale of liquor. I do not know whether to accept it or not.

ANSWER #236 -- I think you should accept the pension and use it for your living and for the glory of God, and keep on talking and voting dry. In a complicated civilization like ours you cannot escape some connection with the results of unrighteousness in government, when such exists, but I believe you can keep your own record clear by putting in every lick you can for God and civic righteousness. If the principle you suggest were carried out, then all who work for the federal government and all who receive pensions from the federal government would be involved, for the federal government receives income from the liquor business and then pays out to its workers and wards. If we are to merit the exaltation that righteousness brings to a nation, we must rid our states and our country of the legalized traffic in alcohol. We must come up again by way of education, local option, and statewide prohibition. But your refusal to take your pension on the ground that liquor is involved in the fund would be a fruitless way to fight the giant rum. The fact is that politicians inject this liquor business into old age pensions and other such laudable affairs to give a sort of decency to the liquor business. But the truth is that liquor income is involved in all the functions of the state which follows the license plan, and everyone who receives pay from the state or accepts any favor from government is getting some part of the liquor income. We deplore the situation and will do all in our power to change it, but while it remains, take your pay or your pension and live right, serve God and talk and vote dry.

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QUESTION #237 -- Please explain Luke 16:9, "And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations."

ANSWER #237 -- It means, "Use your money and your goods to spread the gospel and save souls, that, when you die, those whom your efforts and gifts have saved (they having died and gone on before) shall welcome you to heaven."

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QUESTION #238 -- Is it right for us who preach against the wearing of jewelry to sell it for others to wear?

ANSWER #238 -- Most of the jewelry given in the missionary collections is sold simply as old gold. Precious stones have use as mere items for investment, as well as for decorative purposes, and I believe it is right to dispose of them and use the money for the spread of God's kingdom.

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QUESTION #239 -- A man owes my husband a debt for work. The man could pay if he
would, but he says he will just take his own good time about the matter. We have been advised to turn the debt over to a collector. But we keep thinking of the passage in the Scriptures which forbids going to law. What do you think we should do?

ANSWER #239 -- I think you should keep on thinking about that passage that advises against going to law. Think of that scripture and obey it, and God will see you through some way and in the end and along the way you will be happier.

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QUESTION #240 -- Please explain the meaning of, "The love of money is the root of all evil" (1 Timothy 6:10). Should we assume that Adam and Eve had been using money in the Garden of Eden and that the love of it led to their partaking of the forbidden fruit?

ANSWER #240 -- There is nothing in this text to even suggest that evil may not spring from many other roots besides the love of money. Rather the idea is that all kinds of evil may spring from the love of money (although of course it may spring from other things also). And the Revised Version reads, "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." No, I do not think the love of money was the cause or root of our first parents' sin.
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QUESTION #241 -- The merchants of our town are giving away an automobile. Each fifty cent purchase entitles one to a ticket, and a ticket will be drawn from a barrel at Christmas time and the holder of that number will get the car. Also a leading merchant has a jar full of nuts. You sign your name, and make a guess on the number of nuts in the jar. The one guessing the closest will receive a turkey. Do you think Christian people should have anything to do with such methods?

ANSWER #241 -- No, I think these and kindred methods are appeals to the "gambling instinct," and that Christian people should avoid them. If anyone imagines they are not forms of lottery, let him ask the merchants to send notices of the plan through the United States mail. And it really seems we should not want to define lottery any more liberally than the United States government defines it.

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QUESTION #242 -- A friend here says buying "stock" is gambling, just the same as betting on dice, etc. Is he correct in this proposition?

ANSWER #242 -- Every man who undertakes any kind of business proposition must contend with some element of chance. The farmer does it when he plants his crop, the merchant does it when he buys goods, hoping to sell for a profit, the banker does it when he accepts deposits or makes loans, even the preacher does it when he buys his railroad ticket to a certain point where he is to preach and where someone is supposed to take up a collection to cover his expenses. But we are accustomed to call that gambling in which the margin of chance is unreasonably wide. For instance, when the farmer mortgages his home place to get money for the down payment on "the eighty just north of him," he is gambling. When the merchant buys an unusually large stock of goods to supply an uncertain market, he is gambling. When the banker speculates in unauthorized investments or makes large, unsecured loans, he is gambling. Stocks are issued as evidence of ownership, and someone must furnish the money to own and operate all legitimate business. Therefore stocks are just as good as the properties and business that back them, and stocks are just as "righteous" as deeds, mortgages, bonds or titles of any kind. But when investors take "long chances" of losing their capital on the slender hope that they will make a large profit, they have widened the chance margin to the extent that makes their dealings gambling. When investors are urged to buy certain stock on the plea that they will make a very large percentage of profit, they should know that they are also being asked to take a good chance of losing what they put into such stocks, and if they are wise, they will reject such offers as being "nothing short of gambling." But it would be just as foolish to regard all stock buying as gambling as it would to dub buying real estate as gambling.