Becoming Prayerful

I USED TO BELIEVE prayerlessness had everything to do with time. If I didn’t pray, it was because the day got ahead of me. The clock is a lot like my oldest daughter, an untempered leader. The calendar too. Every single day there is something to do. Much of which is good. Working from home or an office. Lunch with friends from school, or church, or wherever. Then there are the pesky duties like laundry. Somewhere in the world, there’s a pile of clothes on the cold side of the bed, abandoned and ignored for better joys. When there are life, friends, church, children, school, husbands, wives, nine-to-fives, and five-to-nines, where in the world is prayer supposed to fit? This all made sense to me. It gave me a reason and a finger to point until I opened the Gospels and saw the truth.

Truth is, Jesus was busy too. The Father had business Jesus came to handle. A woman at a well to give water to. A Lazarus to raise. Streets to straighten. Wine to turn. Bodies to heal. Even at rest, when a few waves prompted the disciples to wake Him, He got to work by speaking peace. And yet, at no point in any Gospel do you see Him neglect prayer. He made it His business to meet with the Father, sometimes in the morning and other times all the way through the night. Often before making decisions and creating miracles. Even on His dying day, He met with God about a cup, and while it was poured, He spoke with God on a cross (Matt. 26:39; 27:46).

There was no way, in heaven or on earth, that anything would ever keep Jesus from meeting with the Father. Time has never been the reason anyone doesn’t pray; the heart is. Prayerlessness is almost always a humility issue—the natural consequence of a heart that tends to believe it is good without God. Yes, you may be busy, but it’s possible that you are also proud. Pride is the true enemy of your prayer life. Pride deludes us into thinking we’re self-sufficient. That our jobs supply our needs. Our relationships provide comfort. Our intellect and ambition make us successful. But in fact, everything you are and everything you have is because God rains on the just and the unjust (Matt. 5:45).

So then, to become more prayerful, we have to be humble. To be humble, we need to be honest. Each morning, tell the truth. The truth being, you are needy even when it doesn’t feel like it. Then, turn toward God and pray.

Thank you for reading!

This plan was adapted from Upon Waking (B&H Publishing, 2023) by Jackie Hill Perry. Click here to learn more or purchase your copy.