Purpose of Prayer

In the story, one of the women(I believe it was Miss Watson but I am not entirely positive) tells Huckleberry that if he prays to God, he'll get whatever he asks for. Huck begins to pray to God asking for a fishing hook, and when God doesn't answer his prayers, he gets frustrated and angry. Eventually he gives up praying altogether. If the she had accurately presented prayer to Huck, he could have had a much better experience. When I read the woman telling Huck that he would get whatever he asked for when he prayed, I had this moment where I was like "I wish." If that really happened, there would be a lot more Christians in the world, I think. But prayer is supposed to be a way for us to communicate with God and foster our relationship with Him, not just ask Him to give us stuff, whether it be a promotion, a good grade on our test, or something more serious like for someone to be cured from cancer. While I wish that was how prayer worked, I've had it explained to me that when we pray, God will give us one of three answers: Yes, no or not right now. I feel like ninety percent of the time I either get a no or a not right now, but I have to remember that God has His reasons and His plan and that in the end it will all work out ten times better than it would have if I had gotten everything that I wanted. There was a reason that Huck didn't get that fishing hook. I don't know what it was, but if the widow would have explained that to him, his prayer experience could have been greatly improved, and if we look at prayer the right way, it will be a better experience for us, too.