The Power of Prayer

Alright so check this out. About a month ago my basketball team had a tournament. And not just any tournament, a State Tournament, and we had a shot at first. Before the first game, I prayed for like, 20 minutes straight, and not this "let me win this tournament and ill follow you forever" crap, I came to the lord and said 'help me and my teammates to play to the best of our abilities and do good in your name. There it was. No making deals with God like some of us try to do, no begging, just me saying hey, your will be done.
During the game we played our hearts out, coming back from a twelve point deficit to being up by 1 point in the fourth quarter. There was about 15 seconds left in the last, and we had the ball, and remember, we were only up by 1 point. The idea was to hold the ball for those last seconds and just pass the ball around, so the other team wouldn't have a chance to score. So we passed the ball around and for about 6 seconds we did good, until I got the ball. I was wide open, i mean nobody around me for miles, so there I was on the three point line, wide open and ready to shoot. Guess what? I shot. You know what else? I missed. Just barely. The other team got the ball and headed up the court for a fast break, only about 6 seconds left. they got close but a teammate of mine fouled him to stop him from going to the basket. At that point I realized what I had done, I had lost the game for my team, if only I had held the ball and passed it around we could have won. My team was in foul trouble, so any time we fouled they got to shoot, regardless of whether or not they were shooting when we fouled them. The ref called double-double and number 25 went to shoot his free throws. There were only about 3 seconds left on the clock. At that point the gravity of my failure hit me and I dropped to my knees. I had tears in my eyes and sweat pouring down my face, number 25 was one of their best free throw shooters, I thought there was no way we could win this game. Right there and then i prayed to God, I said 'lord you control what happens, your will be done". Needless to say I couldn't watch the guy shoot free throws, so I bowed my head. It was dead quiet in the gym, nobody even dared to breathe heavy. Anxiety, fear, depression, and hope all danced about in my head, and my heart dumped a bucket of butterfly's in my stomach. All was silent. Suddenly the crowd roared and I thought surely he had made it, but I looked up to see the ball roll of the back of the rim. It was our fans cheering! he had missed. But he still had one more to shoot. If he made this shot we would go into overtime, if he missed we would win. Thinking it to much to hope for him to miss, I began to prepare myself for overtime. Once again the crowd was silent, there must have been 200 hundred people in there, all waiting and hoping for different outcomes. Passing him the ball the ref stepped back to allow number 25 to shoot. This time i watched, ready to see the outcome with my head held high since i had a second chance at this. I watched the ball go up, i knew it would go go in before it ever did. It didn't. My teammate skied up to grab the rebound as time expired, 3.... 2..... 1..... It was over. We had won by 1 point, number 25 had missed BOTH his free throws and we would be playing for 1st tomorrow. Of course my team and our friends and fans and family immediately exploded into celebration. My team became a huge huddled mass of jumping and hugging and people we didn't even know stood to their feet and applauded. After words, while I was alone I gave thanks to God for like an hour merely acknowledging his presence and power and care for everything. Let me tell you, I received quite a bit of ridicule and jokes after that game and I joined in the laughter, I knew Id made a stupid choice and I will admit some of those jokes were funny.
The next day was not fun. My whole team was oddly quiet and everybody secretly thought about, but never said aloud the possibility of us losing. Nobody really wanted to say it, because if you did, the dream would be lost, even just whispering it would shatter our hope and resolve. We joked to try to make ourselves comfortable, we laid around and did stupid jokes to one another to try to loosen ourselves up but you could still feel the tension, the full weight of what was about to happen. Later on it was the quietest locker room Ive ever been in, everybody's heart seemed to be stuck in their throat. Finally the time came, we jogged out onto the court and began to warm up. Now let me fill you in on the situation that i forgot to mention earlier. Our point guard was out, he was away on a church trip so he wasn't at the tournament. Who does that leave? Me. Here's the thing, I am a two guard, which is similar to a point guard but still different, and whats more im possibly one of the worst point guards ever, not really, but im definitely not great. Point guards an important position, and I wasn't use to playing it so there was a lot of pressure, in all honesty a lot of people didn't expect us to do too great simply because our regular point guard wasn't there. Before the game I prayed again, my prayer was shorter this time, but the same stuff was meant and said. Despite the pressure we played like animals. All the junk our coach told us to do we did, we got the ball in the paint and we rebounded pretty well. But still the team threatened to come back on us since we weren't up by a lot. Then we got a 15 point lead and kept it til the fourth. Domination? I do believe so. In the last 2 minutes of the fourth quarter we lost some points and only won by 5, but that's because we started subbing in other guys who didn't get a lot of playing time. It didn't really hit me what had happened until later, the fact that we had won just couldn't seem to stick, it was almost as if it couldn't be true, it was what I had dreamed about for the past 3 weeks. Once the game ended we lined up and shook hands with the other team like all good sportsmen should, but for some reason I still didn't feel it, that elated feeling you see in movies you know? When u see the whole team jumping on each other and screaming we won? Nope none of that. I hugged my teammates and went back to the bench. Some official lady went out and presented the 2nd place trophy to the other team, and then it got quiet. She called our team name and we stepped out onto the middle of the court and there it was. This super-heavy trophy made of wood and gold that was in the shape of the Texas state, it was beautiful. She turned and looked expectantly at one of us to take the trophy and to my surprise, everybody looked at me. I wasn't the team captain (far from it) but I had played point guard when that wasn't my position, and directed my team as best I could. I might sound conceited or prideful, and I don't mean to, but just wait and you will see what I'm saying. Anyways she handed me the trophy and we took pics and partied til like 2 in the morning at Double-Dave's. It was epic.
Now here comes the not-so-awesome part. Just this last week we went to Virginia for a National tournament. Here's the thing, I didn't pray. bum bum BUM! Why didn't I pray? I just forgot to, seriously it just never crossed my mind. Well it didn't at least til i got home, then it hit me and I realized what happened. I'm not saying that we lost because we didn't pray, don't get me wrong, I'm saying that without asking for Gods divine direction and help, I might not have played to my fullest potential.
So where does this leave us? Lets consider what happened. State tournament- I prayed before, during, and after each game for my team and myself. We won. National Tournament- I think I prayed once before I ate some pizza. We lost every single game. So while prayer might not win the game for you, I do think God will recognize you giving it all up to him and help you out and bless you for giving it to him.
Thanks for reading- Caleb