I return today to this weekly writing practice of Five Minute Friday: Five minutes on a weekly prompt, no editing, just free-flowing words and stream-of-consciousness. And a supportive writing community hosted by Kate Motaung – head over to fiveminutefriday.com to learn more.

“So you’re telling me there’s a chance?” this line from a movie whose title is long forgotten is what first comes to mind. I think the context is a desperate boy trying to convince a popular girl that she should go out with him, and she rebuffs him, but he finds some sliver of a way in through the way she words it.

Chance isn’t something I do a lot, in terms of using it as a verb, and at least not consciously. I recently told a friend, “I’m risk-adverse in everything except for international travel,” and that really does describe me. I’ll never skydive, for example, nor would I do the really crazy high-in-the-air roller coasters. Fun fact: I didn’t ride my first roller coaster until my early 20s!

“Just leave it to chance,” is a phrase I actually profoundly disagree with. I believe in a loving and sovereign God, so I really don’t believe that “chance” exists. There’s a purpose in everything, and a loving hand guiding us. There’s a mystery in this doctrine of providence that I won’t pretend to explain away or understand completely, and I’m the first to admit that I don’t always enjoy the idea of this truth. But if God’s character and nature could be perfectly explained, then He wouldn’t be God – more likely a figment of my imagination. So I won’t leave it to chance, but remind myself to trust the good, the bad, the hard, the confusing, the inexplicable to the loving care of a God who’s over it all and in it all and committed to working all for good.

And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. … If God is for us, who can ever be against us? … And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. … nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:28, 32, 38-39 New Living Translation