It was an exhausting day. There is so much to do. Time is scarce. I have prior commitments. The children need my attention. I didn't sleep well last night. These ad hoc reasons probably sound familiar. We have all employed them at one time or another as grounds to put off prayer or we have interjected them to excuse our lack of active prayer. Time seems to be against us so to speak when prayer is in mind. But if we are honest with ourselves time is not the bane of prayerlessness so much as how we use our time is.
Those aforementioned reasons are indicative of how we manage our time or what we prioritize. Time is not against us as it where...our priorities, though are. Maintaining that time is against us or asserting that there simply isn't enough time in the day are both red herrings (a logical fallacy where pieces of information are inserted to distract or mislead from the actual question or issue). How often do we allow time for prayer to escape us by putting it off because the tyranny of the urgent or the business of everyday life? So we resolve to pray later. Yet later more often than not is reduced to never!!
Martin Luther gave preponderance to this pitfall in a letter to his barber, Peter Beskendorf, entitled A Simple Way to Pray (for Master Peter the barber). He penned that,
"It is a good thing to let prayer be the first business of the morning and the last at night. Guard yourself carefully against those false, deluding ideas which tell you, "Wait a little while. I will pray in an hour; first I must attend to this or that." Such thoughts get you away from prayer into other affairs which so hold your attention and involve you that nothing comes of prayer for that day.
Prayer, by and large, has become a casuality of this mentality. We have busied ourselves with so many other lesser things that prayer has been reduced to an after thought. From the vantage point of scripture, however, prayer is not something to be 'put off' or even done later. Prayer was so central to the busy apostle Paul that he urged his readers to pray at 'all times' (Eph.6:18) while doing so "without ceasing" (I Thess. 5:17). He elsewhere urges the church to, "Continue steadfastly in prayer" (Col.4:2) while desiring for men in every place be given to prayer (I Tim. 2:8). He instructed the Romans to, "be constant in prayer" (Rom. 12:12)
What is more Paul, himself exemplified the constacy of prayer he promulgated. He assures the Thessalonians that he "constantly" mentioned them in his prayers. (I Thess. 1:2; cf. Rom. 1:9 where similar verbiage is employed). The salutatory allusions to prayer and concluding doxologies found in the lionshare of his letters further underscores this. Paul was clearly a praying man.
What is more, we do not find him providing reasons to excuse prayerlessness regardless of his missionary work, persecution, letter writing, tent building et cetera. He had every reason to advance for not prioritizing prayer. And yet we find him praying constantly and commending every Christian to do so. (a survey of the role of prayer throughout the life of Christ would serve to magnify this modus vivendi or way of life. Ex. 'In the days of His flesh , Jesus offered up prayers and supplications...Heb. 5:7)
The reality is when we elect to put someting off, whatever it may be, it ostensibly isn't as important to us as what we are not putting off. The putting off of prayer in our lives needs to desist.
Here are some helpful questions to pose to gauge the absence of prayer. How often do you pray? What reasons do you give for not praying? Do you find reasons for not participating in prayer meetings? What don't you put off in order to pray? How often do you put off prayer? Do you pray beyond giving thanks before a meal? Why don't you want or desire to commune with Father God vis a vis prayer? Do you consider it an intrusion when the church reminds you of corporate prayer?
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