There is nothing more beloved than the Mincha prayer. The afternoon offering — the one between the morning and the evening — is the prayer that comes at the moment when the day is still in motion, when the world's business has not yet resolved itself. Daniel prayed for twenty-one days without answer and was finally heard at the time of the Mincha offering (Daniel 9:21). Elijah at Mount Carmel waited all day while the prophets of Baal danced and bled, and then at the time of the Mincha offering he stepped forward and called down fire (1 Kings 18:36).
Psalm 141 frames it: "Let my prayer be set forth as incense before You, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice" (Psalm 141:2). Prayer as incense — something that rises, that fills the space between the human and the divine, that has scent and substance and lingers. The lifting of the hands as sacrifice — the gesture of offering something without knowing exactly what it will accomplish, trusting that the act of giving is itself received.
The midrash about Elijah at Carmel is specifically about timing. He did not pray early. He did not pray when he was strongest. He prayed at the turn of the day, at the moment of maximum suspense, when the crowd had been watching for hours and the showdown between the God of Israel and the gods of Baal was still undecided. The Mincha prayer is the prayer of the middle — the prayer that comes when you are neither at the beginning of hope nor at the end of it, but right in the middle of not knowing.