Day 15: I wonder what God hears?

Eddie loves to play with a wooden magnetic train set. He particularly loves to connect all the trains into one big long train and pull it along a single loop. He can, in fact, do this for hours on end if left to his own devices. There's one problem. If he makes the train too long, the magnets aren't strong enough to keep it together. When he's well-rested, not hungry and generally in his best state of mind, this presents a learning opportunity to test the strength of the magnets on different trains. However, as he gets hungry or tired, or both, the frustration associated with the train breaking apart is too much to handle and he squeals. From across the house, I can tell by the frequency of the squeals how far he is from a complete meltdown. And that, triangulated with the time of day can provide me a course of action -- feed snacks, put on movie, put in bath, read books.

Other times, he comes up to me with a 2 minute run on sentence about some imaginary thing he's playing. I'm often tempted to ignore him because on the surface, the words don't make sense. But, when I listen, I can piece together a fairly deep thought. Sentence fragments show that he's remembering an event from a prior day, a conversation we had and if I really listen, I can tell that he's telling me with genuine purpose. He's often with a great number of words trying to tell me -- I love you. I want to connect with you. I want your approval. I want your attention. 

Eddie doesn't have a developed sense of self awareness nor does he have the skills to communicate coherent thoughts. But I, in love, can hear what he wants and needs in his incomprehensible squeals. I can piece together the thought that he can't fully form in his mind yet by hearing the fragments that he is able to articulate. 

This makes me wonder. What does God hear when I pray? My attempts to approach the divine like a toddler run on sentence made up of incoherent fragments. I can't articulate or fully even mentally conjure my relationship with God but I still try. I groan in my frustrations and God hears something deeper. I can't imagine what God so simply understands. The responses to my prayers are so often what I need but not at all what I expect. I wonder what God hears underneath it all...