There are many people who look at history and see quite clearly the guiding mind of a god, citing the frequent times in history when an event benefiting human kind happened almost fortuitously. Most recent would be the election of Churchill when he wasn’t the front runner, to Prime Minister in 1940. Many others could be mentioned as disparate as new foods being found, decisions being taken by individuals that meant the difference between success and failure even when they were not too sure why they chose as they did.
The problem with choosing the timely events as demonstrations of a god is what do you say of those times when terrible things did happen for the same reason; a timely event resulting in mayhem and murder. There are two real problems in this way of thinking. The first is that people even look for some power above them working in their lives and the second is that we still look at events from our own perspectives of political and societal assumptions so what we consider very good others may not.
So yes Columbus was very lucky but the human beings living in the lands he told others were there, were devastated. It was excellent for the British to make money out of the potato, but it killed the Irish.
Actually fortuitous events happen because of the mix of people and chance and for no other reason.