$12 a day: The Beauty in a Child's Simple Prayer

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

The Beauty in a Child's Simple Prayer

One of my son's most special toys right now is this tiny cat figurine that he got out of one of the quarter machines at the front of the store. He named the little grey kitty with green eyes "Whiskers." He adores Whiskers. He even snatched a scrap of fleece from my sewing supplies to make Whiskers her very own cozy blankie. Yesterday on the way out of work I plopped two quarters into one of the machines at the front of the store and purchased a friend for Whiskers. There was no doubt in my mind that little Abe would be thrilled when I arrived home and presented him with the tiny brown dog. You'd have thought I'd spent several hundred dollars on the gift if you had seen the surprise and delight in my little guy's eyes.

Little Abe played with Whisker and Pappy (the little brown dog) all evening yesterday. The two little critters had quite the lot of adventures together and even got to take a tubby after all their hard adventuring. Most of the adventuring involved going for walks together, hiding in caves at any sign of trouble, and somehow still managing to get trapped underneath a cup that Pappy was always certain had delicious ice cream underneath it. It didn't. There was no ice cream. It was always a trap and then Whiskers had to say all kinds of strange code words to get the cup to let Pappy go.

When darkness fell and I had to let the real dogs outside for one last time Little Abe wanted to bring Whiskers and Pappy outside with us. I told him there was too great a possibility of them getting lost, if he dropped them and to leave them inside. We let the dogs out and my boy ran circles around the backyard like the Tasmanian Devil on Looney Tunes. The boy ALWAYS has loads of energy even right before bedtime. When it was time to go inside little Abe stopped in his tracks at the back door, opened up his clenched fist and proclaimed, "Oh no! I lost Pappy!" There Whiskers sat in his little hand but his new little pal was no where to be seen.

In truth I was pretty mad. I just told him he couldn't bring the two of them outside. Now here we were ready for bed standing in the dark of night in our backyard and one of Little Abe's most precious treasures was laying somewhere in the grass and Whiskers was all alone. My child convinced me to get a flash light and he'd wear his miners hat so that we could look for a little while. And we did, for probably 20 minutes. We looked and looked and we found nothing. I told him we'd look again in the morning but that Pappy was going to have to sleep outside tonight. There were a few tears. He was very worried Pappy would be sad and lonely. I told him in my frustration there was a very good possibility we'd never see Pappy again.

Morning came. I woke before the little one, made coffee and sat down to read. Before long my best buddy woke, walked to the living room, gave me my morning snuggles and then he looked at the front window and says, "oh, sorry mom but you see, the sun is up now. Let's go outside and find my puppy." I made him feed the real dogs first but then we headed out. Before we got outside I told him, very matter of factly, "Abner you better say a prayer to God that He helps you find your puppy. There is a chance we might not ever find him." He told me that he surely would but that he was going to wait and say a prayer under the lilac bush. I started making small passes through the yard (again), the same way I'd done the night before. Little Abe ran off to look and I saw him run under the lilac bush. I was on my third pass when I saw the little brown dog between a few blades of grass. I truly was not expecting to find it. I was hoping but not expecting. My heart jumped.

I picked the dog up, placed it in my pocket and started walking back to the lilac bush to tell little Abe. I saw that he was whispering under the lilac bush. He began walking towards me with a smile on his face when he saw me coming. I put my hand in my pocket to retrieve the surprise when little Abe said, "mom, God told me that He knows where my puppy is." Less than a second later I opened my hand and showed him the small brown dog and tears welled up in my eyes. He gasped and clapped and I don't remember what he said exactly but it was something like, "see I told you God knew."

I know that God answers prayers. I absolutely believe in miracles. This is actually the second time that God has directly answered a prayer said by my child. You can call it coincidence or whatever else you'd like. My heart can call it nothing short of God's perfect timing and an answer to a child's heart felt prayer. Little Abe was overjoyed. I left for work really really happy, feeling truly blessed. Like I said the other day, there has been darkness, heaviness, darkness, and more heaviness consuming the news lately and it makes everything seem so bleak. This morning was really beautiful.