A popular saying is that "life is like a poker game, you have to play the hand you are dealt."
In poker, this makes for an honest game. But in life, the thought that the hand I have been dealt was random and out of the control of the life giver?
Where I do agree with this in part, I also think it can leave a false impression.
I've played my share of poker over the years. There is something that happens every time before the cards are dealt. The dealer shuffles them. Why? Because he is showing no partiality or control over what cards go to what player.
He has no control.
In poker, this makes for an honest game. But in life, the thought that the hand I have been dealt was random and out of the control of the life giver?
That's not the image the Bible gives at all.
Psalm 139:13-16(NIV,) speaking of God, tells us,
"For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be."
There is nothing random about the life God has given us. From the body you have, to the people in our lives, to the places we live, to the number of our days.
It is all in the hands of the living God.
