A Psammead is a sand-fairy which grants you wishes when you find it. In Five Children and It by E. Nesbit, 5 children come across the Psammead while digging in a gravel pit. The children are granted their wishes for beauty, wealth and other things by the Psammead, but none of the wishes bring them happiness.
I don’t think any of us would really like it if a Psammead appeared and granted our wishes on the spot. There is no value in things that come too easily.
It occured to me that wishes are somewhat like prayers. Both are petitions to a higher power, our expressions of desires with a hope that they will be granted.
The difference between the two is this: the Psammead will take your wish literally and grant it at the time you want it - which is why what you get is rarely what you want. God sees the desires and needs behind the prayers, and answers it with the best answers at the best of times. He in fact takes your poorly chosen words (it’s tough to pray, I think all of us have found it difficult at one time or another to say the ’right’ words) and turns your wish into an even better one.
I want to search for God’s gifts, not the Psammead’s, and not confuse the two.
