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Prayer and chocolate cake

Audrey Carli

When my daughter Lynn was in the fifth grade, I decided to bake a cake one morning after she went to school. The phone rang, and I continued mixing the batter while conversing with a friend. After the cake was in the oven, I discovered that the three eggs were still on the cabinet. Too late! When the timer rang, the flat cake resembled . . . brownies. I called them that, and decorated them with chocolate icing.

The next afternoon, Lynn returned from school, beaming, “Mom, my friend Jacky asked for your brownie recipe after I shared them with her. She said they tasted so good!” The “brownies” turned out OK, after all – even if the chocolate cake failed.

This brings to mind those prayers we might think were unanswered. God responds to our needs in the way He wills. Sometimes I got what I prayed for; at other times, I received the strength and courage to accept things the way God had chosen.

During the early years of marriage, my college student husband lost his job. We prayed for two part-time jobs, one for him and one for me, so we could share caring for our baby. We prayed and spent two weeks applying for jobs, wondering if he would have to quit school.

At the last minute, I got a phone call offering me a job. I had never applied at the potential employer’s office, but I didn’t ask him where he had heard about me. I was glad to have the job, so why question the flexible hours, excellent pay and temporary status which would last until my husband graduated in five months?

However, on my last day at that company, I asked my co-worker how Mr. Fisher had heard of me.

“You don’t know?” she said. “A man walked up to him in church one Sunday and told him about your need.”

God had taken care of us, answering our prayer. My husband was hired to do maintenance work evenings soon after I got my job. He tended our child between his classes while I worked.

Years later, a time came when prayers for my ill husband to recover did not receive the answer I had hoped for. When he died, I felt invisible arms wrap around me. God’s peace filled and surrounded me.

Sometimes I got “chocolate cake”. At other times, it was “brownies”.

God loves us and knows our needs. Philippians 4:6-7 sums up: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

Audrey Carli is a freelance writer from Iron River, Mich.

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Last modified December 11, 2000.

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