Does Prayer Really Work?

When a strip joint opened just down the road from the Nazareth Baptist Church in Bishop, Oklahoma, the enraged congregation tried every way they knew to have the establishment legally closed down.

After talking with the mayor, the town council and the chief of police, they found that there really was no legal way to make the sex business close.

So, the congregation turned to prayer, asking the Lord to intervene on their behalf and shut the strip club down by Providence.

Three days later, at 2:00 AM, a raging fire destroyed the strip club completely. 

The congregation, of course, was happy that their prayer had been answered, and that no one had been injured in the inferno, and were proud to tell everyone who would listen that God had intervened on their behalf.

But, the owner of the strip club was not stupid.  He got lawyered up and sued the Baptist church for asking God to destroy the club.

The church lawyer responded by stating unequivocably that the church congregation had had nothing whatever to do with the fire that destroyed the building, and that it was not possible that their prayer had caused the fire.

After deliberating the case, the judge stated that, while she did not approve in any fashion of the kind of business in which the strip club engaged, it was very curious to her that "Here we have a church, whose members obviously believe in God and the power of prayer, who now deny the possibility of God's intervention on their behalf after He had answered their prayer."