Well if we're going to get nerdy, Obi-Wan mentions Anakin was a Jedi and a pilot, and Luke is a pretty good pilot too.
Luke's flying a combat aircraft is a major suspension of disbelief regardless of how you look at it, but ultimately the movie uses him flying an X-Wing/blowing up the Deathstar as both the climax of the movie and of Luke's arc. The mentions of him being a pilot/good pilot, the drone training scene showing he's "special", the Obi-Wan force pep-talks, and all the various other monomyth checkpoints, pays off with him flying at the end.
Rey nearly starts the movie flying the Falcon through a Super Star Destroyer, there isn't remotely same level of build-up. Does it need that same build-up to justify, or be the climax of the movie? Absolutely not. But if we are going to speculate why Luke's flying might be more accepted by some people, my point is it comes at the end of the movie after slightly more build-up, aka the audience hand was being held a bit more.