I’ve never liked the word “lucky”. In my opinion, there is no such thing as luck. The Lord gives a different and unique life to every one of us, a path that we are meant to walk until we ultimately get to meet Him face to face. But we, as humans, look around at the lives of everyone around us and say, “Ooooh, I like their life better. They have a bigger house, they drive a better car.” And then we shrug and say, “Well, they’re just luckier than I am”. Nope, I don’t agree with that.

I’ve always had a great relationship with my dad. He’s the neatest guy I’ve ever met in my entire life. Okay, yes…I’m a little bias because he’s my dad. But if I step back and just look at his life, his career, his work ethic, his family, his accomplishments, I still say—as a spectator of his life—that he’s the neatest guy I’ve ever met!

Recently a friend of mine said to me, “Well you’re just lucky, because you had a great dad.” That statement bugged me a little. Yes, I do have a great dad, but that doesn’t mean for a second that I haven’t had my share of struggles. As if having a “great dad” erases all pain in life and paves the way for me to skip down the yellow brick road laughing and giggling all the way to the Land of Oz. Nope—I can assure you that having a great dad has not done that for me. I’ve had to battle my way through life just like everyone else. Life is hard; sometimes things don’t go the way I think they should. In fact—that happens more times than not! But I can’t look around at everyone I know and complain that they’re just “lucky” and that’s why they are happier than me. Everyone has struggles in their lives every day that they don’t show, we can’t for a second assume that our friends are just “lucky” and that’s why they have a better life than we do.

I like to look at life as a game of solitaire—you know, the card game you played when you were a kid. We are each dealt a particular hand of cards, and they’re different for everyone. It’s up to us to play those cards the best we possibly can in order to win that hand. Sometimes in solitaire, you get stuck. You try to move the cards around in order to open up a play, but you just can’t go anywhere. So what do you do? You gather up your cards, shuffle them around and start over! No big deal. God’s grace allows for us to start over—isn’t that great news?! He welcomes us back into the fold and says, “Here, let me help you get back on your feet.” Praise the Lord for that! You see, God isn’t sitting up in heaven looking down at us saying, “Oh well…that’s just your luck…you were destined to be miserable. Too bad for you.” Our days are not determined by “lady luck”. No, we have an almighty God who is gently guiding our growing lives, holding our hand every step of the way.

Jeremiah 29:11—you’ve heard it before—“’For I know the plans I have for you’, declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you HOPE and a FUTURE!’” So here’s my challenge today—I dare you to give up on finding “luck”, and instead learn to enjoy the life He created you to live for. Follow His lead, He’ll show you the way—I promise.