The weak fluorescent lighting in the parking garage made it seem as if a dimmer switch was left two-thirds of the way down toward dark. The porous cement columns and floors held in them the scent of decades’ worth of exhaust, motor oil, and cigarette smoke. As the reporter waited for his source to arrive at this clandestine meeting, he was anxious, on edge—he knew that he was on the verge of something big. But he was also aware that one wrong word on his part—one moment of pushing too hard or asking too much—and the source and the story could disappear into thin air, along with his chance at a Pulitzer.

The reporter heard shuffling, accompanied by a strong waft of nicotine, and the source appeared in the shadows. After an awkward silence, the source spoke. “Where are you?”

Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) answered, “Stuck. The story has stalled on us.”

“And you thought I’d help?” responded the mysterious Deep Throat (Hal Holbrook), shaking his head in frustration.

A back-and-forth exchange followed with Woodward probing for answers while the whistleblower played an enigmatic game of informational cat and mouse. The names Hunt, Colson, and Mitchell were spoken. Deep Throat related a bizarre story of a man named Gordon Liddy, who held his hand over a flame at a party until his flesh burned.

At one point, Woodward mentioned a lawyer who carried $25,000 in a brown paper bag.

“Follow the money,” interrupted the source.

Taken aback, Woodward paused, processing, then probed for more information. Deep Throat declined to elaborate. “Just follow the money,” he said again.

As I develop the plots for my books, I often find myself going back to four great motivators for criminal activity—ideology, fear, revenge, and money. Most of your great novels and movies can trace their story lines to those four great forces. But they are not only instigators in the fictional world.

That is why, as I read the recent decision of the Supreme Court in Calvary Chapel Dayton Valley v. Steve Sisolak, Governor of Nevada, et al., that classic scene from All the President’s Men came to my mind—“Follow the money.” Now don’t get me wrong. I am not intimating that the Supreme Court justices received any financial incentives in their decision upholding the Nevada governor’s mandate imposing severe restrictions on the meeting of houses of worship due to the coronavirus, while at the same time allowing much greater gathering freedom to gambling casinos. Nor am I suggesting that government officials in Nevada are involved in graft. We have seen no evidence of that.

I am saying that it’s not so hard to understand why Nevada wants to keep its casinos open. Just follow the money. The gambling industry is a huge financial windfall for the state. So while nearly every state is taking a financial hit in this time of coronavirus, Nevada’s punch might end up being the hardest. According to 24/7 Wall St., a financial news and opinion company, because of its dependence upon tourism, Nevada is ranked number one on its list of those states likely to experience the worst economic damage due to the pandemic.[1]

Casinos make the State of Nevada big bucks. Churches, which are nonprofit and thus pay no taxes, do not. It’s hard not to conclude this is why Governor Sisolak is being so completely biased in favor of casinos and against churches and other houses of worship.

His administration has established occupancy limits for various businesses and meeting places. When it comes to churches, synagogues, and mosques, he has limited them to fifty people maximum, no matter the size of the facility. If a church sanctuary holds two hundred people, its maximum occupancy is fifty or 25 percent. If a sanctuary holds two thousand people, its maximum occupancy is still fifty or 2.5 percent.

When it comes to casinos, however, there is a vastly different standard. Rather than occupancy maxing out at fifty people, gambling establishments are allowed to fill to 50 percent capacity. Thus, using the same numbers as above, if a small casino holds two hundred people, its maximum occupancy is one hundred or 50 percent. If a large casino floor holds two thousand people, its maximum occupancy is one thousand or 50 percent. In a state dependent upon tourism and gambling, it is not hard to understand this double standard. Just “follow the money.”

Is this the way our nation should operate? Hardly. First, the governor’s decision is a violation of the freedom of religion provisions in the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. The governor has every right to keep legal casinos operating at 50 percent capacity in a time of crisis. But he must be fair to all other institutions, allowing them to operate at 50 percent capacity, as well. For the moment, the Supreme Court has sided 5–4 with the governor, but that is an outrageous violation of the constitutional rights of people of faith. As one of the dissenting justice noted, the Constitution does not give a governor the authority to favor blackjack and slot machines over prayer and worship.

At a deeper level, the governor’s decision reveals a deep bias against the role of faith in society. In a time of fear and economic struggle, what is most important? Is it providing a diversion for people so they can momentarily forget their problems as they drop their coins in machines? This may work until the coins run out and people leave even more depressed and in a worse financial situation than when they came. Or is the greater benefit found in a place where hurting people can find more than just a diversion, where they can find hope and truth, a place where they can discover a joy that comes from knowing that no matter how bad things may get in this life, there is a God who loves them and has an eternity waiting for them?

Prioritizing gambling over God is such shortsighted thinking. It is going after the temporal fix. It is pouring all your efforts into dealing with symptoms and not the cure. Emphasizing casinos in a time of COVID-19 is like giving a glass of salt water to someone dying of thirst. Keeping churches open, on the other hand, offers streams of living water to the thirsty. In the Las Vegas desert, it is in healthy, Bible-teaching churches where people will find the water of Jesus Christ—a cool drink that when tasted “will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14).

—Joel

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[1] Michael B. Sauter and Samuel Stebbins, “Nevada, Hawaii Are among the States Most Likely to Feel the Economic Hit by COVID-19,” USA Today, May 8, 2020, https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/05/08/state-economies-most-likely-to-be-crippled-by-covid-19/111645576/