Intentional and fervent prayer is essential to a fulfilling and fruitful faith life. The problem, though, is that prayer is not exactly self-explanatory. When we treat prayer as a conversation with God, as we should, we can immediately begin to feel as if our prayers are going unanswered because it does not seem like God is responding to us immediately. On the other hand, if we utilize the extensive collection of written prayers offered by the Church, we risk relying on them in such a way that our recitation means nothing because our hearts are not expressing the words coming out of our mouths. Jesus Christ taught us how we should pray - to not babble like the pagans, who speak much. Instead, God wants us to speak to Him with words that are deeply meaningful to us. Whether we use the prayers offered by the Church or we simply seek a personal conversation with God, our prayers must come from the heart. They must be intentional and they must be fervent. 

In this passage from the Deuterocanonical addition to the book of Esther, we hear a story of the eponymous queen praying to God. This is a unique passage, since it is a Greek addition to the book and is therefore rejected by non-Catholic Christians as a part of Scripture. But this beautiful prayer gives context to the story of the book: Esther is a Jewish orphan in Persia who is chosen by the Persian king to be his new queen. In an effort to save the Jews in Persia from mass execution by the king’s viceroy, Esther implores the Jews to pray and fast for three days. The drama of the story is when Esther reveals her Jewish identity to the king and the king saves the Jews; however, the intervention of God in the story is subtle, though central to the plot. In response to the prayer and fasting of the Jews, the Jews are saved by multiple moments of serendipity. What is so beautiful about this book is how much it can apply to our own prayer life; unlike other books of the bible, prayers to God are not answered with clear and explicit moments of divine intervention. Instead, God takes in the pleas of his people that are clearly coming from deep within their hearts, not just out of a place of desperation or self-preservation. As God takes these prayers in, He begins to work through the story as an invisible force, leading the king to come to realize the benevolence of the Jews, which ultimately saves them. This is how God actually responds to our prayers. We are not immediately granted exactly what we ask for in prayer, nor do we hear a booming voice from heaven respond to our petitions or our thanksgiving. God answers our intentional and fervent prayers through subtle signs. We might identify His answers as mere serendipity. 

God delights in our prayers. As a result, His role in our lives in response to our prayers is to ensure that we are protected from the evils of this world in a pleasant and delightful way. This isn’t a gospel of prosperity; when the will of God and the gifts of God are all that we ask for, even the smallest inconveniences and sufferings become delightful to us because we are satisfied with what the Lord gives us and with what He takes away from us. Consider the life of the Church, where holy men and women were tortured and killed for Christ. They died for something greater than themselves, and their testament to the truth of the Gospel “serendipitously” led to the growth and eventual acceptance of the Church. God answers our prayers, but He does so in subtle ways according to His own time, not ours. His response is so much more than serendipity; it is the application of His Divine Will. Of course we would recognize it as delightful, which is why we must conform to what He asks of us.