Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Luck

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights (James 1:17).

A young mother was alone with her three children on a remote farm in central California. The children had been swimming in their pool, when the mother suddenly noticed that the two-and-a-half year old was floating motionlessly at the bottom. She got the child out as quickly as she could, and just then a neighboring farmer came by. He immediately began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to try to save the child. After several agonizingly long minutes life stirred in the little form, and doctors later confirmed that the prompt treatment had prevented brain damage.

In the days following, people who had heard of the child’s rescue from drowning would tell the parents "You sure were lucky! You sure were lucky!" But the father told his pastor, "When people would say that to me I replied, ‘It wasn’t luck at all. My wife and daughter were on their knees praying while our friend was working on my son.’ What a wonderful opportunity I had for witnessing to Christ again and again as my friends spoke to me about my son being saved."

I can’t begin to count how many times I hear people give thanks to luck when something good happens in their lives. But a Christian should never speak about 'luck'. To do so implies that random events shape our lives. But the Christian knows that life is shaped by two great, invisible powers. The lesser of those powers is that of evil—the power of the sin that has distorted our world into a caricature of what God had created, and the influence of Satan and his demonic allies. The power of corruption has brought disease, decay, destructive weather and death into God’s perfect creation. Every bad thing that happens to us has its ultimate origin with sin and Satan. But Scripture tells us that every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights. Every truly good blessing that we experience comes from our loving heavenly Father. "Luck" has nothing to do with it. Pleae join me in praying:

Help us, Lord Jesus, to recognize Your loving care in every good thing in our lives. Teach us to stop saying, "that was lucky," and instead start saying, "thank You, Lord." Amen.

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