THE MEANING OF THE WORD LUCK

That, my friends is one word that I personally cannot stand - and have worked hard to purge it from my vocabulary.   I have been wanting to get my thoughts on this down forever - hopefully to do my part in purging the word from our collective vocabularies.  I cringe when I hear it across a pulpit - not so much from others who really do not know better.  I believe it will fade away in the Millennial model as obsolete and a silly thing of the past. 

It comes from the root word luz which means light in my second language, Portuguese - and some have said there is a connection to "luz -ifer", or light bearer.  I think most anyone would have a hard time making the entymological connection on that one.

I used to hear repeatedly my Mission President, Helvecio Martins (who became the first black Quorum of the 70 just as I was leaving the Fortaleza, Brazil mission back in 1990 and actually helped him with his english pronunciations as he prepared to give his first General Conference address), that "No hay que sorte, somente bencoes"; or, "there is no such thing as luck, only blessings".  He was a big believer in hard work - as he had pulled himself up by the bootstraps from a waif on the streets of Rio de Janiero to one of the corporate heads of PetroBras, now a world player in the oil industry as that country's national oil company.

Truly, if we believe in the concept of luck, we negate all that the Plan of Salvation is built upon, which is personal sacrifice and hard work - combined with grace, as supplied by a loving Father through His Son's atonement.  The grace covering where we cannot after our best efforts of laying our offering on the altar, presentable before the Father.  The plan of the d'evil one relied upon the concept of "something for nothing" - you just get a free pass because you are you.  This is the major problem I have with religion that is not revealed; you thrive in that alternate plan of salvation because you are you, not because of any effort or striving on your part.  Basic laws of physics state that if you put no energy into something (of a telestial nature at least), it will fall to its lowest state of being.  Just try and not mow or weed your back yard all summer long and you will get the message.....  We have been put into this fallen state so that we can learn the concept of work and progress.  We only have the fruit of the efforts after we have passed the test of mortality and live in a higher order; but it takes work to get there.

So luck, while there may be no direct connection of the word to lucifer, there is indeed an indirect one to the plan that was rejected in the Councils of Heaven.  We are either a lazy and indolent "something for nothing", lucky people, or we have the correct perspective and understand the concept of qualifying for (through striving) and enjoying the blessings of a loving Father in Heaven.