Rule 39: There is no such thing as a coincidence. — Leroy Jethro Gibbs, NCIS

I have enjoyed my share of NCIS episodes.  Week after week I’ve seen Gibbs and his intrepid team solve the most perplexing crimes.  Who am I, then, to argue with Gibbs?  But I am pretty sure there is such a thing as a coincidence and that we’d do well to quit trying to find the connections between all the things that happen to us and around us.

Late last year Becky and I received a “Save the Date” card from an engaged couple.  We’ve saved the date because even though it has been several years since we’ve seen the groom’s parents and longer still since we’ve been around the groom, the parents are dear friends, and we have nothing but happy memories of the groom when he was growing up in the church where I was pastor. Plus, the bride, who the groom met in college, is from a small town in western Ohio only a couple of hours away. Not a long drive at all.  We’re saving the date.

Earlier this year I became chair of a committee in our Presbytery and have begun working with my colleagues on the committee.  It is a great group of pastors and elders, and I like them all very much.  Just last week I drove a couple of hours to a small town in western Ohio to meet with a pastor who is a key member of the committee and whose friendship I am enjoying.

Long story short, it’s the same small town, the same church, and the same pastor as for our friend’s wedding.

What a coincidence! Same church where our friend’s wedding is to be held. Same pastor officiating.

What if it is only a coincidence, this same church, same pastor stuff? No cosmic purpose, no divine intervention, no deeper meaning other than it’s a coincidence. Is there such a thing as a coincidence?

Wait, I’m Reformed. Don’t we Reformed folks believe in divine providence and divine purpose?  Yes, we do.  The Westminster Confession puts it this way (5.1):

God, who created everything, also upholds everything. He directs, regulates, and governs every
creature, action, and thing, from the greatest to the least, by his completely wise and holy providence. He does so in accordance with his infallible foreknowledge and the voluntary, unchangeable purpose of his own will, all to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy.

So, for sure, it is by God’s providence that I will know the pastor officiating at the wedding of a friend this fall. And it is also a coincidence, and it may not have any meaning, other than a good time, that I will ever know – or that will make any difference in the divine plan for all of history.  Westminster goes on to say (5.2):

God is the first cause, and in relationship to him everything happens unchangeably and infallibly. However, by this same providence, he orders things to happen from secondary causes. As a result of these secondary causes, some things must inevitably happen; others may or may not happen depending on the voluntary intentions of the agents involved; and some things do not have to happen but may, depending on other conditions.

We live in a world where things have a cause and a purpose.  We rest assured in the confidence that all things are working toward God’s glory and our good even when it appears otherwise.

The wonderful doctrine of divine providence is not summed up in Gibb’s Rule 39 about there being no coincidences, however.  We will do well to get our theology elsewhere.  Some things may or may not happen.  It all depends. (Yes it depends on God, but from our perspective that can look a lot like a coincidence.)

We humans are driven by a desire to know cause and purpose.  We find cause in conspiracies left and right, in our phobias and -isms known and unknown, George Soros or the Koch brothers. We want to see purpose in chance encounters and global events. Surely there is a deep meaning and purpose in the traffic jam that caused me to miss my flight. It may not be so easy.

Rain falls on the just and the unjust, Jesus said (Matthew 5:45). That construction accident at the Tower of Siloam had no meaning other than it being an accident (Luke 13:4). Coincidences with no meaning happen.

We’re saving the date for a friend’s wedding this fall.  It is just a coincidence that I already know the church and the pastor.