Luck Is a Four-letter Word

My header, while this post is current, features the four-leaf clover, which my playmates and I would look for in our schoolyard at the beginning of each year. 

It was not an easy search, which made the activity more fun. We were told that if you found one, you would have good luck all through the year.   

That I believed, until my grandmother heard us giggling about our find.  "There is no such thing as luck!" she stressed in Ilocano. 

I do not remember her exact words, but to me this was clear, “All good things come from God.” She cited a verse, which I finally found and understood when I was older,  remembering her words. 

“. . . from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace." (John 1:16) 

In truth, only God determines how this life is played out; there is no luck. And yet, many people cling on to luck via inanimate objects. Perhaps you are familiar with these images (right).   

As my faith grew, I chose to be a mouthpiece of my grandma to children as young as I was then. Believer in Christ ought not to believe in lady luck, promote lucky ideas, have lucky rabbits feet, look for four-leaf clovers, buy round fruits on New Year, have a horseshoe hanging around his neck, re-arrange his furniture to avert bad luck—none of those.  

According to Paul, living by faith is the way to go after meeting the risen Christ on the Damascus Road. Instead of relying on rites and laws to gain God’s approval, he turned around and depended on faith. 

Luck relates to chance, and the Bible teaches us that things do not happen by chance. I believe that everything entering my life comes from God directly or is filtered through His permissive will. 

It does not matter if I understand why or how. Because that is precisely what faith is, “. . . the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1).” 

During this faith-stretching pandemic, a trial He allowed, good has been erupting. And luck has nothing to do with it. 

By faith I understand that the universe was formed at God's command; our troubles are not bad luck. Let me echo what someone wrote in one of my readings, “I don’t believe in good luck. I believe in a good God.” 

This period of quarantine has given me more time to write about this goodness.  Looking back to the years since my grandmother woke me up to the truth, I tear up, because I see God’s miracles, not streaks of good luck.  

Let me take the header down here, for the record.