Winning Prayers
My Korean friends, Agnes and John, and I share animated conversations. It’s always a pleasure speaking with them when I drop off or pick up laundry at their local dry cleaners. Agnes and John are fairly fluent in English, but we often get stuck due to my not understanding any Korean and English being their second language. So, we fill in with a lot of lively hand gestures and laughter.
Last night we talked about the lottery drawing and its 564-million-dollar jackpot. The sum was the third largest Powerball and the fifth largest lottery prize ever in the U.S.
Agnes made the insightful comment that spending a few dollars on a ticket is good for our mental health. “We are winners when we have that ticket in our hands,” she explained while waving her imaginary tickets. “Until the drawing, we are happy and dream of how we will spend our riches.”
John added another profound dimension to the conversation. “Prayer is like that. We have great hope when we send out our prayers.” What’s more, he said, “that makes us all winners.” John knows that God doesn’t always answer prayers in the way we expect but always in our best interest, even if we do not understand.
So, what’s your preference—spending $2 on a lottery ticket or 2 minutes on a prayer? Or perhaps you were one of the many last night who prayed right over their lottery ticket.
©2015, Mary K. Doyle