Too busy NOT to pray

This is Part 2 of a 3-part series I’m calling “Things I’m Bad At” because I don’t pretend to be an expert on these three subjects – just someone trying to learn, grow and improve. Last week I wrote about managing our thoughts, and next week I’ll look at how we might grow old gracefully.

If you know a Christian who feels he or she prays enough, I’d like to meet that person. But what keeps us from it? Many possibilities exist: Busyness. Making other things a priority. Disappointment with seemingly unanswered prayers. Wobbling faith. Not feeling qualified to pray. Feeling we’re not good enough to approach a holy God.

If any of the above apply to you, my first suggestion is to take your situation, including any feelings of unworthiness or doubt, to Him.

“You don’t need fancy words or religious phrases,” said Jim Cymbala, pastor of Brooklyn Tabernacle. “Just tell God how it really is.”

As to the time excuse, consider this quote from Martin Luther: “I have so much to do today that I must set apart more time than usual to pray.” We generally do the opposite, don’t we? We think: “Because I have such a busy day, I’ll cut short my prayer time. I need to run.”

Prayer is a heavy subject, so let me insert a bit of humor from Ruth Bell Graham, wife of Billy Graham: “God has not always answered my prayers. If he had, I would’ve married the wrong man – several times!” 

So much could be said about prayer. All I want to do is share a few things I’ve been learning lately, and maybe my tips will help someone else.

1)     Experiment with committing to different time slots. How about “Whenever I load the dishwasher, I’ll pray.” Or “When I’m alone in the car, I’ll pray.” Or perhaps “When I’m mowing the lawn, I’ll talk to God.”

2)     When someone asks you to pray about something, tell them “praying now.” Then pray now. It’s all too easy to forget later.

3)     Keep a prayer list of requests and answers, either with paper and pen or something digital or audio. Include both those for others and for yourself. Two benefits: a) when you pull it out, you’ll have reminders to cover all those requests; b) what a faith-builder to look back and see how God answered many prayers!

4)     Intertwine Bible reading with prayers. Let one inspire the other.

5)     Peaceful Christian instrumental music as a backdrop may help you get started and keep you focused. But if it gets in the way, turn it off.

6)     Use prayers in the Bible not only as examples but as actual words you can pray for yourself or others. One great example? Ephesians 3:14-19.

7)     Take the words from many parts of Scripture and transform them into prayers. I went through a time recently when the words I was reading in the Bible lacked life; I’m not sure why but they almost seemed no different than words in a magazine or a novel. I decided to try something: I took those same words and turned them into prayers. Guess what? They jumped off the page and became meaningful to me, even powerful. Here’s an example from Psalm 119:18: “Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in Your law.” Dwight L. Moody wrote “The Bible without the Holy Spirit is a sundial by moonlight.”

You may have heard that nothing makes the enemy of our souls shudder as much as when a Christian prays. Perhaps it’s one reason why we struggle so much with making time for it – and why, when we do pray, so often our minds wander and we’re so easily distracted. Satan is a defeated foe, so do not allow him to influence you. “Get lost” works just fine.

Author John Blanchard wrote “We need more Christians for whom prayer is the first resort, not the last.” Let’s make it our first resort.

Finally, these lyrics from “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” get to me every time: “O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”