Good vs. Evil and Prayer

I just read a "tweet" from Chris Johnson, the Tennessee Titans star running back that just signed the highest paid contract in the history of the NFL for running backs.  He "tweeted", "I like thx everyone who prayed for (John Doe).  he beat it was not found guilty. Pray works all the time".  I don't know CJ and I don't have a bone to pick with him (except for his grammar).  However, his remarks like many other's, show that his thinking, while so culturally accepted today, is so completely wrong.  Let me explain.

Chris Johnson prayed that his friend would not be found guilty and sent to prison.  His friend obviously was not.  Great. So I wonder if Chris Johnson should have prayed to gain more than 6 yards yesterday?  If God answers CJ's prayers just like CJ wants, why stop with his prayer for his friend?

And what about why bad things happen to good people?  Surely a quick prayer could stop lots of pain, both physical and emotional.  You know the "age-old" argument, right?  If God is so kind and loving, why would he allow things like rape and murder and getting stuck in traffic happen to good people, especially when we could just say a quick prayer and skip all the bad stuff?

Well, I don't pretend to know the answer to that question.  Most people just say that it is God's plan and something good will come of it.  But personally, I don't buy it.  I have seen good people not recover from a botched surgery and die.  I have seen people and businesses so devastated with a seemlingly endless "string of bad luck" that they are never able to recover.  I had a brother pass away at a very young age.  Why did that happen? 

I don't have an answer to the question about good vs. bad and why prayer doesn't seemingly work all the time.  I think our views of good and bad are so incredibly limited that we could not even begin to figure out what is going on here.  And the 'Santa" image of God has to go also.  I guarantee you that sooner or later CJ, and many others, will be disillusioned with God because their prayers are not answered the way they think they should be answered.  (LIFE OVER GOD in the book With would explain this idea in much more detail and much better than I am able)

Asking the question about good vs. evil and using prayer to get the things we want is our way of trying to control God.  And I am more than certain that trying to control God won't work.