Angels in the Outfield

One of my favorite movies as a kid was Angels in the Outfield.  I was thinking about this film recently and decided to watch it.  It focuses on a child named Roger who lives as a ward of the state of California.  His father shows up at the beginning to basically see his child for the last time.  Roger asks a thought provoking question to his father, “Hey Dad, when are we going to be a family again?”  His father responded, “When the Angels win the pennant.”  The Angels were a Major League baseball team in California that were in last place.  Later in the movie, we see Roger pray to God in faith.  I always have found it funny that Roger didn't know if God was a man or a woman, but he had faith in a higher power.  He prayed with a simple request. The words were simple:

God... if there is a God... if you're a man or a woman... if you're listening, I'd really, really like a family. My dad says that will only happen if the Angels win the pennant. The baseball team, I mean. So, maybe you can help them win a little. Amen. Oh, A-woman, too.

Throughout the course of the movie, in a cute and humorous way, we see angels literally helping the team win.  Though this is dramatized, having pondered on it more a connection can be made to each of us.

So What

I often like to ask the question about things, so what?  So what does this mean to me?  I learn two things from this simple, dramatized movie.

1.      God answers prayers

God, our Heavenly Father, does answer prayers.  He answered Roger in the movie.  He answered Moses’ prayers in the Old Testament, Peter’s in the New, Enos’ in the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith in our time.  I know that God hears and listens to our prayers.  He is mindful of them.

2.      God Answers Prayers in his way

We also learned from Roger here that God answers prayers in his own way and by his own methods.  The real desire and intent of Roger’s heart was a family, not the winning of a game.  The winning of the game was merely the method Roger saw as the method to achieve his desire.  In the end, George Knox, the baseball coach, adopts him and his friend J.P. and they become a family.  This could be the proof that God does answer prayers in his own way.  I have seen this in my own life.  We may want a trial to be taken away from us but rather God will give us the strength to endure.  He does answer every righteous desire but because He is the great architect of the universe and knows the end from the beginning, he knows in what methods to best help us. 

To any reading this blog, if you are wondering if your prayers are being answered, I promise you that they are.  Trust in the Grand Creator that he will answer in his way and in his own time.  He loves you and will be with you every step of the way.

I declare my love of and for Jesus the Christ.  He answers prayers.