Country music star Garth Brooks wrote and recorded a big hit in the 1990s called Unanswered Prayers. The words remind us to be thankful for some of the things we pray for but don’t receive.
The chorus goes, “Sometimes I thank God for unanswered prayers; remember when you’re talking to the man upstairs; that just because He doesn’t answer doesn’t mean He don’t care; some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.”
Brooks wrote the song about a high school sweetheart. He said he told God in his prayers every night that if he could just be with that girl, he would never ask for anything again.
But then the song recounts how Brooks and his wife ran into the old flame years later. “She wasn’t quite the angel that I remembered in my dreams,” the lyrics go. “We tried to talk about the old days; There wasn’t much we could recall; I guess the Lord knows what he’s doing after all.”
That song came to mind when I went to my 50th high school reunion a while back. One of the first ladies I saw came up and asked that dreaded question, “You don’t remember me, do you?”
She was right, but I didn’t want to offend her. I said I knew she was one of my teachers but I couldn’t recall which one. She laughed and said, “You’re still crazy as ever. Always cutting up.”
When she walked off, a classmate told me she was the girl I dated through most of the l0th grade. I did do some praying, I remember, for her not to get away.
There were other ladies there that I had gone out with in high school. I can’t imagine any of them ever praying to keep me. If they did, they must have thanked God for unanswered prayers when they saw how the years had treated me.
Mr. Carlon, a man who lived down the street from us when I was growing up, lost his wife not long after he retired from the paper mill. A good bit later, he started seeing a widow who played the upright piano at our church.
He told church folks that he was praying for that relationship to work out because he was so lonely. But he also said Miss Henrietta sang hymns off key nearly all day every day, and it was starting to get on his nerves.
Miss Henrietta had to leave town to take care of a sick aunt in some faraway place like Alabama, so things didn’t work out for her and Mr. Carlon. That might have been an unanswered prayer for a man who appreciated good hymns.
My favorite uncle owned a flower shop in Texas and enjoyed making corsages and bouquets. He was also a tough World War II veteran who had some bar fights and loved rodeos.
I spent some weekends with him when school was out in the summer, and we went to rodeos on Friday nights. He told me he had always wanted to be a bull rider.
The meanest bull we saw was named Tornado, and my uncle said he prayed for a chance to ride him even though he had never even been on a horse, let alone a bull.
He went through whatever approval process was needed to ride Tornado at a Friday night rodeo, and my folks and I were there to watch.
Tornado was in an unusually foul mood that night. He threw a rider, stomped and butted him and broke some of his bones. The bull’s owner canceled the rest of his rides that night, including Uncle Buddy’s debut. That was an unanswered prayer.
They were having tryouts for my high school play, and I really wanted the leading role. I think it was the part of a judge. I remember praying to get that part.
Everybody who auditioned for the role was better than I was. The drama teacher gave me a one-line part in the play out of pity.
When it was nearly time to deliver that single line, I started sweating and my heart pounded. It was stage fright, and the words came out in a big squeak. Thank God for not answering my prayer to play the big role.
Looking back, there have been a lot of things I prayed for and didn’t get. But like Garth Brooks wrote in those lyrics, “some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.”
REPRINTED FROM THE NATCHITOCHES TIMES