Doing a Slow Burn

The pre-flop bets were made.  The dealer held the deck up, almost to eye-level.  Then he took the top card, and moved it to the bottom for dealing the flop.

 

"Hold it," a man to his left said.  "You can't do that."

 

"Sure, I can do that," the dealer answered.  "In all my years playing poker, I've never cheated."

 

"You don't burn cards like that," the man insisted.

 

"I can deal the cards any **** way I want to!" the dealer said with anger growing in his voice.

 

Welllll -- no, he really can't.  We pointed out under the rules, he HAD to deal off the top of the deck.

 

"I did that," the dealer said.  And yes, he had.  The issue was the "burn card," and how he handled it.

 

Burn cards are removed from the top of the deck before the flop, turn and river.  From watching poker on TV and seeing dealers in poker rooms, we're used to them being put face-down on the table -- off to one side, or under chips already in the pot.  That's how we handle them when we're dealing.

 

This dealer apparently has a habit of doing things differently.  But when someone objects to such things, some guidance from the apostle Paul comes to mind:

 

Abstain from all appearance of evil. - I Thessalonians 5:22 (KJV)

 

You may be perfectly right and within the rules.  But if it makes someone else uncomfortable, we should consider that other person's feelings.  Paul put it this way elsewhere:

 

Give none offense, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God: Even as I please all man in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved. - I Corinthians 10:32-33 (KJV)

 

We must note if another person asks you to do something unethical or sinful, that's a very different case.  Doing things the right way before God always comes first.

 

So how did the hand with that burn card turn out?  Stay tuned; the answer will be in a future post.