Class 10 · English · First Flight · Chapter 1
A Letter to God
By G.L. Fuentes (Translated by Donald Yates) — A story of unshakeable faith, irony, and the goodness of ordinary people. Complete summary, Q&A and exam tips for CBSE 2026-27.
📖 Chapter 1
✍️ G.L. Fuentes
⭐ Board Important
🆓 Free
📋 Summary
Author: G.L. Fuentes (Mexican writer) | Translator: Donald Yates | Setting: A farm in Latin America
Lencho is a hardworking farmer who lives with his family on a hill. His entire crop of corn is ready to be harvested. He is expecting a good harvest and is confident that everything will be fine. He compares the raindrops to new coins — big drops like ten-cent pieces and small ones like five-cent pieces.
Suddenly, a hailstorm destroys his entire crop. Not a single leaf remains on the trees. Lencho is devastated but his faith in God is unshakeable. He believes God will help him. He writes a letter addressed simply to \"God\", asking for 100 pesos to restart his farm and survive until the next harvest.
A postman at the post office finds the letter and shows it to the postmaster. The postmaster is moved by Lencho\'s deep faith. He decides to collect money from his employees and friends. Though he cannot gather the full 100 pesos, he manages to send 70 pesos to Lencho.
When Lencho receives the money, he is not fully satisfied. He counts the money and believes that God could not have made a mistake — the remaining 30 pesos must have been stolen by the post office employees. He writes a second letter to God asking him not to send the money through the mail as he believes the \"post office people\" are a \"bunch of crooks.\"
🔁 The Central Irony — Most Asked in Boards
The very people who showed extraordinary generosity and humanity — the postmaster and his employees — are called \"crooks\" by Lencho. His blind faith in God makes him unable to see the human goodness around him. The story ironically shows that sometimes faith can make us blind to the kindness of fellow human beings.
📝 Important Questions & Answers
Q1. What did Lencho hope for? Was his hope fulfilled? ⭐ BOARD
Ans: Lencho hoped for a good rainfall that would give him a rich harvest of corn. He compared the expected raindrops to coins — big drops worth ten cents and small ones worth five cents. However, his hope was not fulfilled. A heavy hailstorm destroyed his entire crop, leaving not even a leaf on the trees. He was left with nothing to feed his family.
Q2. How did the postmaster help Lencho? What does this tell us about him? ⭐ BOARD
Ans: When the postmaster read Lencho\'s letter addressed to God, he was deeply moved by Lencho\'s unshakeable faith. To protect this faith from being shattered, he decided to collect money. He gave a part of his own salary and asked his friends and employees to contribute. Though he could only gather 70 pesos instead of 100, he sent it to Lencho signed as \"God.\" This shows that the postmaster was a compassionate, generous and sensitive human being who went out of his way to help a stranger.
Q3. What is the central irony of the story \"A Letter to God\"? ⭐ BOARD
Ans: The central irony is that Lencho calls the post office employees \"a bunch of crooks\" — the very same people who had shown him extraordinary generosity. The postmaster had given his own money and collected from friends to help a stranger. Yet Lencho, in his blind faith, could only see that 30 pesos were \"missing\" and concluded that the money had been stolen. The story ironically shows that extreme faith in God can sometimes make a person blind to human goodness around them.
Q4. Was Lencho\'s faith in God justified? Give your opinion.
Ans: Lencho\'s faith was genuine and admirable in its depth — in his darkest hour, he turned to God with complete trust. However, it was blind faith, lacking wisdom. He never considered how God would send him money physically, and he failed to recognise that God\'s help often comes through good people around us. The postmaster and his colleagues were, in a sense, God\'s instruments — but Lencho\'s rigid belief made him unable to see this. So while his faith was sincere, it needed to be paired with gratitude and awareness.
Q5. \"Lencho showed not the slightest surprise on seeing the money.\" Why?
Ans: Lencho was not surprised because his faith in God was absolute and unquestioning. For him, God sending money was entirely expected — he had no doubt that God would help him. This is why he did not feel grateful or surprised; he simply accepted it as God fulfilling his request. His naivety and deep religious belief prevented him from wondering how exactly God had managed to send physical currency.
Q6. How does Lencho describe the hailstorm and its effect on his crop? (Short answer)
Ans: Lencho describes the hailstorm as coming suddenly like \"a plague of locusts.\" He says the hailstones fell on the valley \"like new silver coins.\" The effect was devastating — in one hour, the entire crop was destroyed. Not a leaf remained on the trees, the corn was ruined, and the flowers had been beaten off the bean plants. His entire year\'s harvest was gone.
🔥 Value-Based & Higher Order Questions
Q. What values does the postmaster display? Which value do you think is most important and why?
Ans: The postmaster displays empathy (he feels Lencho\'s pain), generosity (gives from his own salary), selflessness (expects nothing in return), and sensitivity (protects Lencho\'s faith by signing as \"God\"). The most important value is empathy — because without it, he would never have been moved to act. Empathy is what turns good intentions into meaningful action for others.
Q. \"A single act of kindness can restore someone\'s faith in the world.\" Relate this to the story.
Ans: When Lencho lost everything to the hailstorm, his only hope was God. The postmaster\'s act of collecting money — though Lencho mistook it for divine help — actually restored Lencho\'s faith and gave him hope to continue. Even though Lencho was ungrateful, the act itself was noble. This shows that genuine kindness does not need recognition; its impact is real regardless of whether the recipient acknowledges it.