{"id":82732,"date":"2019-06-03T11:45:10","date_gmt":"2019-06-03T16:45:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/?p=82732"},"modified":"2019-06-03T11:45:10","modified_gmt":"2019-06-03T16:45:10","slug":"petty-prayer-embarrassed-to-pray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/articles\/topics\/life-issues\/challenges\/cultural-issues\/petty-prayer-embarrassed-to-pray\/","title":{"rendered":"The Petty Prayer I Was Embarrassed to Pray"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

\u201cIt\u2019s all I want for my birthday, Dad. I won\u2019t ask for anything else!\u201d Claire, my 11-year-old daughter, appealed to me with those irresistible eyes. She was talking about tickets to JoJo Siwa\u2019s D.R.E.A.M. tour that was coming to Nashville.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t know much about JoJo, except for what Claire showed me. JoJo\u2019s image is 16 going on 11. She sings fun songs about high-top shoes and staying positive when others try to tear you down.<\/p>\n

As a musical artist myself, I can appreciate the excitement over a young musician. I was in. Until I looked up tickets.<\/p>\n

JoJo had announced the tour was sold out. But it wasn\u2019t sold out to fans, it was sold out to ticket resellers who knew the power of a little girl pulling on her daddy’s heart strings. Less than good seats were $400 per ticket.<\/p>\n

But I was determined to find a way. I searched every JoJo D.R.E.A.M tour venue in America and found decent seats in Salt Lake City for $49. And I had airline miles to get us there.<\/p>\n

Trying to catch a peek<\/h2>\n

Claire and I flew in a day early to make sure travel delays wouldn\u2019t thwart our plans that were months in the making. We checked into our hotel to drop off our bags and then walked to City Creek Center. We wanted to see where we would see JoJo in concert the following night.<\/p>\n

As we approached City Creek, several tour buses pulled up beside the sidewalk. I could almost feel Claire\u2019s heart beat out of her chest when someone with a D.R.E.A.M. Tour crew shirt stepped off one of the buses. We kept walking, but Claire\u2019s JoJo radar was going wild.<\/p>\n

For two hours, I walked the mall with Claire. We had dinner and ice cream. She needed new shoes, so I bought her a pair of classic Converse high-tops. We were having fun, but Claire was distracted the entire time.<\/p>\n

I knew she had one thing on her mind. It was the same thing she had been talking about for months. \u201cDad, what if we meet JoJo? What if I get a picture?\u201d She almost squealed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t count on it, Baby Girl. But you never know.\u201d I was skeptical, yet hopeful, for my kid to get something she wanted so much.<\/p>\n

Receive more encouraging content like this delivered to your inbox!<\/i><\/span> <\/a> <\/div> <\/div>\n

Praying seemed silly<\/h2>\n

In that moment though, my father heart was torn in multiple directions. First, I wanted to explain to Claire that JoJo was a normal person. Maybe try to govern the starstruck meter a bit. But then I thought about when I was a kid, and how much those things meant to me back then. I remembered my first Monkees concert and how exciting it was to see my favorite band from TV in person. And how formative that was for me pursuing a musical career myself.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, I didn\u2019t want unrealistic hopes or expectations to leave her disappointed. But that\u2019s life sometimes. \u201cTell you what,\u201d I said, \u201cIf we see her, I\u2019ll tell her we flew all the way from Nashville. I\u2019ll ask her to take a picture with you.\u201d<\/p>\n

I whispered in my heart. Lord, this prayer seems so petty. But you delight in your children, and you made me to delight in mine. This is such a small thing. A meaningless thing, really, in light of what matters most in the world. But I want to come through on this little thing for my little girl. Jesus, please send us JoJo.<\/em><\/p>\n

Yep, a grown man prayed those seemingly ridiculous words over and over. Earnestly, Jesus, send us JoJo,<\/em> in hopes of giving my daughter such a simple thing that would make her feel loved by her father. I felt like that is part of what God describes doing with us in Psalm 149: “delighting in his people” (v. 4).<\/p>\n

But God answered<\/h2>\n

We left the mall to walk back to our hotel. Tour buses still lined the sidewalk. No one was around. \u201cDad,\u201d Claire whisper-yelled. \u201cIt\u2019s JoJo!\u201d<\/p>\n

Sure enough, there she was. Her dad stood at her tour bus door as JoJo glided in circles across the sidewalk in front of us, on a scooter.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey!\u201d I greeted them in a friendly tone. \u201cWe flew all the way from Nashville to see the show!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI like your bow!\u201d JoJo told Claire, who was wearing one of her signature gigantic hairbows.<\/p>\n

Starstruck, Claire could barely muster a word to say. So I asked JoJo, \u201cCan we take a photo?\u201d<\/p>\n

JoJo put her arm around Claire, and I snapped a quick picture. We thanked JoJo and her dad, and that was it. We went on our way. As we walked the streets of Salt Lake City, the joy that overflowed from Claire\u2019s heart filled mine too.<\/p>\n

In that moment, I heard a heavenly whisper in my heart, reminding me of how much God delighted in giving me such a simple thing that made me feel loved by my Father. He does care about even the seemingly insignificant details of our lives. I was reminded yet again that what I see as petty prayers may not be so petty at all.<\/p>\n

\n

Copyright \u00a9 2019 Matt Hammitt. All rights reserved.<\/em><\/p>\n

Matt Hammitt is Grammy nominated musical artist, speaker, and author. Find him on Twitter and Instagram @matthammitt.\u00a0 And online at Matthammitt.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tickets to JoJo Siwa’s sold out D.R.E.A.M. tour is all my eleven-year-old daughter wanted for her birthday. I was determined to find a way to take her. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14950,"featured_media":82901,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"Tickets to JoJo Siwa's sold out D.R.E.A.M. tour is all my eleven-year-old daughter wanted for her birthday. I was determined to find a way to take her.","_seopress_robots_index":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2848],"tags":[],"equip-category":[],"cwp_profile":[3564],"class_list":["post-82732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultural-issues","cwp_profile-matt-hammitt"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2019\/05\/a-birthday-wish-a-small-prayer-and-jojo-siwa-1040x326-1.jpg","spectra_custom_meta":{"_vc_post_settings":["a:1:{s:10:\"vc_grid_id\";a:0:{}}"],"_edit_last":["90"],"_wp_page_template":["default"],"_ultimate_layouts_video_link":[""],"_nectar_gallery_slider":["off"],"_nectar_quote_author":[""],"_nectar_quote":[""],"_nectar_link":[""],"_nectar_video_m4v":[""],"_nectar_video_ogv":[""],"_nectar_video_poster":[""],"_nectar_video_embed":[""],"_nectar_audio_mp3":[""],"_nectar_audio_ogg":[""],"_post_item_masonry_sizing":["regular"],"_nectar_header_bg":[""],"_nectar_header_parallax":["off"],"_nectar_header_bg_height":[""],"_nectar_header_bg_color":[""],"_nectar_header_font_color":[""],"_disable_transparent_header":["off"],"_wpb_vc_js_status":["false"],"_at_widget":["1"],"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":["Jojo"],"_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":["Tickets to JoJo Siwa's sold out D.R.E.A.M. tour is all my eleven-year-old daughter wanted for her birthday. I was determined to find a way to take her."],"_yoast_wpseo_linkdex":["68"],"_yoast_wpseo_content_score":["90"],"_yoast_wpseo_focuskeywords":["[]"],"_yoast_wpseo_keywordsynonyms":["[\"\"]"],"_read_more_url":["https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/articles\/topics\/life-issues\/challenges\/cultural-issues\/"],"_listen_more_url":["http:\/\/familylifetoday.com\/topics\/life-issues\/cultural-issues\/"],"_read_listen_all":[""],"_read_more_only":["read_more_only"],"_listen_more_only":[""],"alt_author":["82769"],"_alt_author":["field_5ac3df572642e"],"_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":["159"],"_oasis_task_priority":["2normal"],"_oasis_is_in_workflow":["0"],"_thumbnail_id":["82901"],"_nectar_love":["0"],"_wp_old_slug":["a-birthday-wish-a-small-prayer-and-jojo-siwa","petty-prayer-embarassed-to-pray"],"_eael_post_view_count":["651"],"_eb_reusable_block_ids":["a:0:{}"],"_seopress_titles_desc":["Tickets to JoJo Siwa's sold out D.R.E.A.M. tour is all my eleven-year-old daughter wanted for her birthday. I was determined to find a way to take her."],"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":["Jojo"],"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":["none"],"_uag_css_file_name":["uag-css-82732.css"],"_uag_js_file_name":["uag-js-82732.js"]},"meta_box":{"_cloudsearch_visibility":"","profile_obj_manual_select":false,"profile_obj":false,"separator":false,"enable_link":false,"login_restricted":"","content_type":"","disclaimer_banner":"","currency":false,"pricing_subtext":false,"element_type":false,"date_field":false,"date_format":false,"theme_header_position":"","post_header_is_sticky":"","is_header_overlay":"","series":false,"ignore_sticky":false,"conditional_blocks_category":false,"cta_selection":false},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2019\/05\/a-birthday-wish-a-small-prayer-and-jojo-siwa-1040x326-1.jpg",1024,321,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"tlane@familylife.com","author_link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/author\/tlanefamilylife-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Tickets to JoJo Siwa's sold out D.R.E.A.M. tour is all my eleven-year-old daughter wanted for her birthday. I was determined to find a way to take her.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14950"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82732\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82732"},{"taxonomy":"equip-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/equip-category?post=82732"},{"taxonomy":"cwp_profile","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cwp_profile?post=82732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}