House Rules

I play a lot of board games. (Let's just take this moment to practice spelling that- B O A R D games, not bored games). I play a lot of new, kind of geeky board games that a lot of people have no idea how to play, too. Settlers of Catan, Ticket to Ride, and Bang!, are played more often than Risk or Monopoly. I play a lot of poker too, Texas Hold 'Em specifically. Lots of these games have really complex rules that everybody has to learn to be able to play, and that can take a while, so sometimes it turns into this sort of learn-as-you-go experience. Everybody knows how to play Monopoly or Scrabble, but the rule books for some of the newer games seem to go on for ages.

Because of the amount of rules and guidelines to follow, it can be easy to forget the protocol for a specific situation, and instead of going through the book to find out what we should do, the host makes a "house rule", and we do whatever we want to do. Obviously we can't change anything of immediate importance, but playing with Aces as only high cards and never low doesn't seem like the end of the world, and starting with the resources for your first settlement in Catan as opposed to your second shouldn't change who wins the game. In this way, as we fantasize about having control and immerse ourselves in the different worlds created by our games, we use house rules to sort of circumvent the system, and "stick it to the man", if you will.

But what about the real world?

God gave us a rule book, and I can guarantee it to be longer than the one that comes in the box of whatever board game you choose. Do we know the rules? Do we follow them? Or do we make our own "house rules?" Usually only the host gets to declare a house rule, but who is our host? Do we owe it to the God who put us here to give up our right to change minor parts of the game? Or as long as they don't change the outcome of our lives is it okay? Some things to think about.