Why doesn't God give me what I pray for?

As I proclaimed the Gospel of Luke this weekend I had the privilege of telling the story of Jesus explaining to the apostles how to pray.  He chose this setting to share with us the beautiful prayer we know as “The Lord’s Prayer”.  He also gave the apostles some succinct commentary on the nature of prayer, encouraging them to be persistent and bold – to knock on the door, to seek, to ask.  Furthermore Jesus explained that the Father, infinitely good, certainly would look after his children since even in our midst “What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish?  Or hand him a scorpion when he asks for an egg?”
On first reading, one could almost be left with the impression that Jesus is giving us a “cosmic candy store” from which we can pick anything we want and it will be granted us.  A little time to reflect (and I do mean very little time) tells us that this just isn’t so, doesn’t it?  How many times have we asked for things which in retrospect were a little selfish?  Perhaps money, or for that person to fall in love with us, or for the car to make it to the gas station.  Well you get the picture, don’t you?  And, lo and behold, we did not win the lottery, the pretty girl fell in love with the quarterback, and the car, well it might have made it far enough on the gas in the tank if the transmission had not blown.  Even when we ask for things that are not overtly selfish, it often times doesn’t work does it?  I ask for the health of a co-worker, or for a neighbor to find work, or for world peace and it just doesn’t seem to be happening.  And I stop and wonder.  I asked for a fish, and I got a snake.  I asked Him for an egg and I got a scorpion.  How unfair!  Is He listening at all?
If I could be so bold as to offer a few observations.  Firstly, we are certainly an impatient group of subjects, aren’t we?  That king of ours, how dare He not fit his plans into our timing?  There is a bit of that here, isn’t there?  Oh, even if we ask for the good and the unselfish, we want it in our time, don’t we?  Do we ever stop to consider that God has to keep a whole big universe ticking and it may be that the timing of His will and the timing of our request just don’t quite line up?  We kind of expect Him to drop everything and do it our way and right now.  While the farmer with one crop is praying for rain for his crops to grow, the other is praying for dry so he can get his harvesting machinery into the field.  The batter crosses himself as he steps into the box and the pitcher voices a silent prayer before he winds up.  One family of an ill person prays for recovery while another asks for an organ donor.  Do you begin to see where a problem might arise?  Someone is not going to get what they want today, are they?
Another observation is that we might be inadvertently asking for the scorpion or the snake and not realizing it.  I think this is a particular danger when we pray for material goods.  Asking for money and the like carries with it a potentially grave consequence.  If you doubt it, just read some of the stories of people who won the lotteries.  Their lives were ruined by a sudden rush of riches.  Addicted personalities may well wish for their poison.  Could it be that we are no better in our quests for material goods and other things of this world?  Could it be that God is really giving us what is best for us by some times denying us that for which we ask?  After all, He does know best, doesn’t He?
I do believe, though, that the root cause of these issues is an inability or unwillingness on our parts to align our wills with God’s.  Ending the gospel passage of this past Sunday is, “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”  Could it be that this problem is as simple as failing to have used our prayers to ask for the gifts of the Holy Spirit?  In my experience, I have not seen an honest request for those gifts unfulfilled.  Praying for those gifts - Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel,  Fortitude, Knowledge,  Piety,  Fear of the Lord - will allow us to accept the will of the Father and recognize that in His eternal love he has given us everything we need, not everything we want.  In the eyes of God, the eternal Master who desires for us to spend eternity in paradise with Him, what we need are those gifts and nothing more!  We do not need money, food, good health or anything else of this earth to get into heaven.  Some times, perhaps many times, that is a difficult thing to accept, not because we are evil or bad, but because we just do not understand God’s ways.  I know, because I’m guilty, too.  With those gifts we will not only begin to understand, but just as importantly, we will accept the will of our Father, who art in heaven.
God bless you, with love.