Have you ever experienced opening a fortune cookie and finding a message that seemed very appropriate to your situation?

A while back, I was in a Chinese restaurant. My dinner companion ate three fortune cookies and found three messages:

• “You can be lucky today regarding your romantic enterprise.”

• “Fun and excitement will soon be yours.”

• “Today is the day to make your move.”

Together, the three fortunes presented a very clear message, a very clear path forward for my dinner companion. My dinner companion might have considered the message very seriously and moved forward in his quest for romance—if it weren’t for the fact that he was four years old.

When a golfer hits a hole in one (puts the ball into the hole with only one strike of the ball), it is considered a remarkable achievement. But is it really? The European Tour has set up a “Chase the Ace” promotion in which it gives one of its professional golfers 500 chances in a row to hit a hole in one on the same hole. Several have tried and failed. Would it be so remarkable? Average golfers get a hole in one once in every 100,000 tee shots. Professional golfers on the European tour do it once in every 2500 tee shots. Skill will get the ball close to the hole but will not guarantee a hole in one. Consider that there are multiple variations in the golfer’s swing, minute differences in the placement of the ball, and vagaries of wind, green slope, and grass blades. It is impossible for a golfer to control all of these variables. The reality is that if a golfer drives enough balls toward a green, eventually he will get lucky and one ball will go in.

The same is true for fortune cookies, fortune tellers, and other forms of “magic.” If you make enough predictions, eventually one will turn out right—and that is the one that will be remembered, just as it is the lucky hole in one that the golfer remembers.

There is in the human mind a desire to have magical answers to the dilemmas if life, to have someone or something tell us exactly what to do—so that we will be absolved of the responsibility to make a decision.

The God of the Bible does give guidance, and sometimes it is clear, specific, and direct. But often God lays out the general realities of life, the principles of proper behavior, and leaves it to us to choose to do right or not. We want to know which option will bring success and prosperity. God is more interested in us choosing the option that is loving, just, and good.