The "Luck" of Providence

The word “principle” is defined as: “a basic truth, law, or assumption.” The principle of luck is something that has been in the minds of human beings for a long time. Luck is defined as the belief that describes the experience of improbable events, especially improbably positive or negative ones. So, essentially, “luck” is what is used to logically justify things that seem improbable or unlikely. From a human perspective—in which one has “put God out of one’s mind”—luck appears to be true. “Luck” is just an unlikely number of little things lining up to make one thing that appears to be big happen!

We know, as regenerated followers of Christ, that nothing is outside the control of the Lord. While luck may appear true from a merely human perspective, it takes knowledge of the spiritual to understand the eternal reality of what appears to be mere luck. God does not merely step in and out of our experiences to make things line up as He demands. Rather, He is personally involved in every aspect of our lives, making sure all things align perfectly with His will.

We tend to describe positive things that line up in our lives as “lucky,” and negative things that we do not want as “unlucky”—as if they were mere accidents outside the control of the Lord. The reality is that both the things we see as “lucky” and “unlucky” come from the Lord! He is working all things for good. Many things that appear to be terrible accidents to us will ultimately produce extraordinary good. At the same time, there are many things that may appear as fantastic abundance that result in harm to ourselves or others.

There is “luck,” in the sense that we do not understand everything the Lord is doing and working, and some things might happen to us or to others that seem “good” purely from a human perspective. But this is only from our limited view. There is nothing truly random or outside of the Lord’s control. Luck is only a reality if we speak purely from a human perspective. The moment you take a step back and look at it from a spiritual perspective, you see that there is no reality but that which God has set forth.

The fact of the matter is, God is in control of everything. While, from a human perspective, there may appear to be such a thing as luck, we know that in reality God is in control of all things.

Jake Campbell