The Fastest Answer to Prayer

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Last night around 8:30pm, I was riding the bus back to the hotel from a friend's house where we watched the UFC 101 Pay-Per-View event (excellent show, by the way). Across the aisle were a man and a woman who were clearly not in a good frame of mind. She was all clingy and trying to snuggle, and he was growing more irritated by the minute. Because of how my seat was, this entire drama was playing out right in front of me. Over the course of ten or fifteen minutes, this woman was alternating between hugging the man and sobbing in her chair. The sobbing was usually brought on by his turning away from her. As the matter escalated he became more demonstrative in his disdain for her, uttering some choice words and even throwing his shoulder back into her face as if he were shrugging her off. Her nose took a few uncomfortable shots, and she buried her face in her hands to cry off the pain of the hit and the pain of rejection.

By now my "fight or flight" response system was bubbling up. I didn't want to be a witness to an altercation and, unsure of whether their mental condition was drug-induced, I didn't want to put myself in a situation that could land me at the police station or in a hospital. Right at that moment I turned my head and whispered, "God, please give them the grace to deal with each other reasonably."

No sooner than I uttered that prayer, the man got up from his window seat, forced his way past her into the aisle and moved up to the front of the bus. At the next stop he got off the bus and left her on it.

I have never seen God answer prayer so quickly. Maybe I ought to pray more often and more specifically.

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