Good morning to my Hump Day readers. I had a different devotion for today, however, the Holy Spirit has a tendency to “change my mind” and I figure when she does that it means something significant. And as always, the Spirit is spot-on because the last few days if I have heard it once, I’ve heard it probably 25 times—a variety of words that use ‘luck’ in them. And if that isn’t enough, when grocery shopping the other day there was a huge sign for discounts on “Lucky Charms” cereal…I must confess, I was hooked—not on the cereal, but the leading of the Holy Spirit!

So, I switched my previous devotion and decided to share with you all something interesting about humanity’s history about luck and superstitions. This conjures up all kinds of stuff but I’m going to use ladders and stars because there are some very interesting historical facts that you may not have heard before. Here goes:

Many of the small superstitions people have today are rooted in misunderstandings of Christians years ago—yes, we Christians we not separated from the crystal ball folks! For an example, the medieval theologians argued that since a ladder leaning against a wall forms a triangle which is the symbol of the Trinity, anyone who carelessly blunders through this ‘mystical space’ is risking divine wrath—really? Who’d a thought Christian theologians would make up such hooey, but they did, and…it didn’t take long for people to avoid walking under a ladder…after all, who wants to incur punishment from the Almighty?

As this ‘ladder syndrome’ became more common (mostly in England, Scotland and Ireland), those condemned to hanging were required to walk under the ladder that stood against those gallows. Why? All for the executioner who wanted to have a clear conscience because of the job he had to do. Obviously, this was not a sign of good luck for the condemned!

Stars also had a big impact in regards to luck. The phrases such as “thank your lucky stars” or “wish upon a star” actually reflects the ancient belief in the influence of stars over human destinies, and was well believed by both Christians and secular society. Ben Jonson’s play Every Man Out of His Humour from 1599, cemented the words that have been used for centuries now. There are variations of it but they all pretty much say the same thing. The sad part of this simple phrase is that it’s embedded with horoscopes and foolish divination. No star has the power to grant you a wish or give you your desires—period.

We hear phrases like these all the time. If we were honest, we’d say we have used them ourselves. I mean, who hasn’t said “good luck” to someone or, like me when I’m embarking on a project that I’m not sure about, I often say to myself “good luck-ha!” Just yesterday a lady next to me in the grocery store practically shouted “Oh, my cookies are back in stock, well bless my lucky stars.” I laughed at her outburst but agreed that it’s nice seeing stuff we like back on the shelves again—even if the costs are sky high!

What does the Bible say about luck and superstitions—a resounding “there is no such thing!” Proverbs 16:33 from the Voice translation says it well:

“We may try to control the roll of the dice, but actually,
the Eternal decides what they will determine.” 

In other words, every outcome is determined by God beforehand so luck and stars and other superstitions are worthless so don’t put any stock in such meaningless stuff!

For those of us who have faith in Christ, we know that every outcome in our lives really comes from God, who has a perfect sovereign plan for every nook and cranny of our lives. In those times where we find our confidence in God waning, the best thing we can do is pray and pray again, asking God to give us full confidence in his plan for our lives—no matter what God determines the outcome to be. Yep, that last phrase is the hardest part for us, isn’t it? If God doesn’t get us the “quick fix” many turn alternatives—such as superstitions, betting on luck and lucky stars and other crazy ideas—well—good luck on that! AMEN.