THIS happened a few years back when I flew back home. While meeting friends in New York, many would tell me how they longed to visit India, “But your flights are so long!” they groaned, “Seventeen long hours! How do you manage?” Well I’ve managed pretty well, I must say, and quite often have been upgraded to business class, which meant luxury seating and extravagant service, otherwise I’ve found myself occupying a whole row of empty seats where I could stretch out and read or sleep.
But one time as usual I prayed, yes prayed for a comfortable flight! “We couldn’t get you a window seat dad!” said my daughter after they checked me in online. When I reached my seat, I saw that the guy next to me had a shoulder and muscles to match that stretched across his seat into mine, and since mine mentally had already lost a battle with his, would be kept imprisoned on one third of the seat.
“Didn’t you hear my prayers God?” I moaned as I sat and felt my shoulders ache. “You slept like a baby!” said Ibrahim Alfaqieh, my broad shouldered Jordanian neighbor. “Did I?” I asked. “Well we’ve just landed!” he said with a smile. I’d slept the whole flight through! And yes ‘like a baby’ as Ibrahim had mentioned. And that’s when I realized that God’s answers to prayers are different from what we perceive His solutions to be. I asked for a good seat, He gave me a good sleep!
A few decades ago, when I’d just got into full time writing, our family suddenly needed finance for a medical problem. I knew I had to make money quickly, and decided on three ways. One, a ‘friend’ wanted to sell his house. I asked him what he expected to get. He told me, and I asked whether I could help sell it, using ingenious, out of the box ways, and earn for myself anything extra I made, “You can’t Bob!” he said, “I’ve already told you a very high figure. But do try!”
I did. I made a handsome profit. But the ‘friend’ with his money and with what I was entitled to disappeared to New Zealand. I was then called to design a doctor’s clinic since that was a field I had been in. The doctor showed me his clinic. I worked on the design, and suddenly got a call from him, saying he was buying a ready-made already designed clinic.
Two deals falling flat, and the third one, also a business deal, went kaput! “Why didn’t you allow me to make that much needed money?” I cried out in prayer, and then lo and behold found the money was not needed as the medical problem had disappeared. “Sleep my child!” whispered a God above on that flight, “Don’t worry if your window seat didn’t work, I just increased your sleep dosage..!”
—Email: bobsbanter@gmail.com
