BY SISTER LAURETTA LEIPZIG
Do you hear yourself saying at times, “I can’t believe how everything worked out perfectly and I didn’t even plan or expect it?” Experience has shown us that there have been many circumstances that were aligned beautifully in our lives. Were they coincidences or God’s work?
…Your car won’t start so you go back to the house and then you get a call that there was an accident in your neighborhood. The exact place you were going to be.
…Someone desperately needs money and while cleaning finds $10.
You can name many such situations that touched your life. For most of us these instances are more than just coincidences. In his book, an author named Beltman states that there are two most popular explanations for what the world terms coincidences 1) God-Mystery and 2) random chance. As believers we definitely believe the first explanation that all things that happen are acts of a Divine Being who sincerely cares for his creation and for each of us individually. But I think it would also be correct to assume that what the world accepts as random chances we would also see as acts definitely orchestrated by God. For we believe that God is in charge of all things of our world – the big as well as the little, everyday experiences. Scripture clearly says that God cares even about the little sparrow and the hair upon our heads.
When we want to explain unexpected events as coincidences, a writer once reminded us that “Just because we are taken by surprise does not mean that God is!” From a worldly vantage point, our lives seem to be events termed “chance,” “random events,” or even “bad luck.” However, that’s not how it is! Nothing is impossible and nothing is random with God. There are no coincidences with God. It’s just that God doesn’t always give us prior knowledge of the direction that leads to the end. We don’t have a complete map view so we can’t see every turn we’ll eventually take. Usually we have only bits and pieces of the plan. It should be consoling, however, that everything that comes to us passes through God’s Providential Hands first.
So let’s give God thanks for his constant work in our lives. God helps us if or when we don’t even know it. It’s no coincidence; God has a plan. But let’s remember — God also answers prayer at the right time!