Proverbs 18:18

The lot puts an end to quarrels and decides between powerful contenders.

[Proverbs 18:18]

People are a study in contradiction. On the one hand, we tend to want control, to decide what happens to us and to everybody else. On the other hand, we hate responsibility, in our fallen state; we strongly dislike the realization that we will be held to account for the results of what we do. Of course, no real contradiction exists here; it’s an oxymoron or a paradox, not an impossibility. We want to eat our cake and avoid the sugar rush, the health impacts, the over-fullness. The two goals are inconsistent in fact, because success in one entails failure in the second, but they aren’t conceptually contradictory. Both, in fact, are expressions of our sinfulness- desiring more power than we have authority, but hating the consequences of having authority attributed to us. Ideally, in our fallen state, we want to be omnipotent masters of creation who really aren’t to blame for anything that goes wrong.

We also, as a rule, dislike giving in to somebody else, a corollary of our lust for autonomy.

One pragmatic use of this verse’s teaching is as a bypass for that pesky ‘responsibility’, at least in the psyches of many. By putting the matter up to ‘chance’ to decide, many can trick themselves (a favorite human occupation) into forgetting that they’re still the ones making the decision, even if they prefer randomness to evidence. Throwing ‘lots,’ whether by flipping a coin or some more elaborate scenario, provides a psychological barrier against responsibility, regardless of its actual inefficacy. After all, if I didn’t weigh the evidence, I cannot be held to account for getting the decision wrong (true). The problem, of course, is that I can still be held to account for making the wrong decision, regardless of how I came to it, can still be held to account for abdicating my responsibility to weigh the evidence.

Of course, lots fulfill another purpose: dealing with indecision. When presented with a decision we can’t come down on one side of with peace, we can choose an easier decision: heads, that way; tails, this way. The coin flips, and the decision, hopefully, is made. This sort of use, we’ll have to come back to later. It’s not all bad.

The crucial point, what the world determinedly ignores, is that ‘random chance’ or ‘fate’ aren’t real. Nor are the gods up there deciding what the lots will say. No, the outcome of all such throws of ‘chance’ depend on God (Josh. 7:14). He decides where the sparrow feeds (Matt. 10:29) and also where the coin falls. God makes the choice.

Does this mean we ought to submit all things to the lot, in order to outsource all decision making to Him?

No. God commands us to use wisdom and discernment (Prov. 8:14-15; 1 Pet. 2:9) in nearly every decision. In every place where moral judgement is commanded, we have an absolute duty to apply it to the fullest extent humanly possible. Doing otherwise is committing the sin of presumption which 1 Samuel 15:23 names equivalent to “iniquity and idolatry” by demanding God do our jobs.

Yet there is a Christian use for the ‘lot,’ in the crannies where it is commanded and the cracks our judgement does not penetrate. For the first, we find not only specific commands to use the lot in land allotment (Num. 34:13) and sacrifice (Lev. 16:8-10) but the giving of the “Urim and Thummim” to Israel (Ez 2:63; Neh. 7:65). That giving, however, implies a category of situations in which consultation of providence by the lot is acceptable, a situation which perhaps continues into the present day.

If we consider the sin of relying on lots, we find its constituent elements. They are: to abdicate a responsibility I should fulfil; to rely on another than God; to regard a thing as more authoritative than it is. The second we can set aside, as Christians, for if we use lots, assuredly we must use them in search for His word. The third is the danger of according authority to the lot which it does not possess, and proper avoidance of the first should avoid this too.

The first, then, is where the great danger lies. If I am given the responsibility to make a choice from the evidence, I sin if I make the choice via lots. In the case of indecision mentioned above, though, I have (hopefully) already fully tallied the evidence and found no certainty; possibly it is an issue which does not admit of hard-lined number analysis. Possibly I simply lack the ability to find sufficient evidence.

In such a case, I must be certain, first, that my uncertainty rises from a parity of evidence, not from motivation. If I hesitate because I do not want to take one course, but I know the other course to the be the worse of the two, I may not use the lots; I know my duty already. If, however, I find at last that I cannot find the result, that I cannot find the moral weight greater on either side, I can take the second step: prayer and search for guidance. Sometimes, if God wills and by wisdom from the Spirit (John 14:16-17), the lot will be of use; perhaps much more often, He will guide me to an understanding I did not before possess, obviating the indecision on the facts (and, by His grace, the indecision in motivation).

The summary is this: do not use the lot like a pagan, but rely on the Lord always. In my every act, the Lord’s hand guides, even when I sin and am sent towards discipline (Heb. 12:5-6; Rom. 8:28). Rarely, particularly in important decisions (in unimportant decisions, like flavor of ice-cream, the consideration need not be so strict or weighty, and the metaphorical ‘lot’ may be more common), the lot is His tool to guide me. In all places where He commands I use judgement, however, I have no right to abstain, to flinch from the responsibility which he gives me the power to fulfil (Gen. 9:1,7; Acts. 1:7-8).

God bless.

Written by Colson Potter