Bad Connections, Busses, and "Unanswered" Prayers

Here is a rare one from the other half of this blog...

A few weeks ago, I took Jocelyn to her physical therapy down at the University of Cincinnati. I drove down to the loading docks by the football field and sat in the car while she went in. Needing desperately to get work some done, I pulled out my laptop and tried to connect to UC’s Internet.

No luck.

I tried again. Still no luck. I restarted my computer hoping that would resolve the issue. No luck. I did everything I knew how to and still had no luck. I was able to get the Internet just fine on our iPod, but had no luck on my laptop. I said a quick prayer asking Heavenly Father to help me connect to the Internet so I could get the work done that I needed. After the prayer, full of faith, I tried to connect to the Internet one more time. And you know what happened?

No luck.

Dejected, I figured this was just one prayer that wasn’t going to be answered. About that time, I heard a beeping noise behind me in the distance. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw a large tour bus backing up into the loading docks. I could see where it was headed, and I didn’t like it. The bus kept backing up closer and closer until it had the car completely blocked. The driver must have seen our car and backed up a little farther until we could get out. I looked back to make sure we had enough space to back out and noticed, right at eye level just outside our window, a sign on the side of the bus that said, “Free Wifi Hotspot”. I checked my computer and, sure enough, I was in luck.

Those who say that God doesn’t answer prayers aren’t looking hard enough or don’t give Him enough credit. It could have been easy to write that off as a nice coincidence, but I don’t choose to look at it that way. God does hear and answer prayers. He cares about us and the things that are important to us. If we but ask, He will listen and answer. Now, the answers certainly don’t always come in the way we expect. I thought that after I prayed, my computer would suddenly connect to UC’s Internet. He didn’t answer me that way. Instead He answered by sending me a bus. I didn’t recognize it as His answer at first. In fact, I first viewed it as a great inconvenience and even wished it would go away. I was frustrated and upset by its presence there. However, the very thing that was so inconvenient for me ended up being a perfect answer to my plea. How often do we push away people, things, or circumstances that we find unpleasant, inconvenient, or annoying when in fact it is the very answer we have been praying for? God usually doesn’t answer in the way we expect, I believe, to test how much we really want the answer. If we give up too early, we push away that person, thing, or circumstance and thus the answer to our prayers then turn and blame God for not answering us. His answers come in His time and His way, even if it takes the form of a bus.