How to be prayerful in life

How could prayer to One who is so interested in us be in vain? The knowledge of His care of us in the smallest things should encourage us in every thing to pray and with our prayers to give thanks. The better we know Him the more will we pray, and the more we pray the more will we turn to His Word. Hearing His word and speaking to Him in prayer, with the obedience that comes from hearkening and the supplies of grace and mercy that come through prayer make up our practical Christian life.

Suppose you begin the day with a sweet spirit of prayer and confidence in God; in the course of the day, in this wicked world, you will find a thousand causes of agitation; but if you are spiritually exercised, alive to see the thing's God is exercised in, everything will become a matter of prayer and intercession according to the mind of God. Thus humbleness and dependence should be marked on all a saint's actions. Instead of being full of regrets at what we meet with, if walking with Christ, we shall see His interests in a brother or the church. What a blessed thing to carry everything to God! to take all to Him, instead of constantly murmuring over failure!

The invitation to bring our requests to God — "in everything by prayer and supplication" — does not necessarily mean long hours spent on our knees pouring out our hearts in prayer. While quiet times are important, we cannot overstress the importance of constantly talking to God about everything during our daily activities.

This is what is meant in 1 Thessalonians 5:17: "Pray without ceasing;" and in Ephesians 6:18: "Praying always." Habitually referring everything to our Father in the midst of our daily routine keeps us in touch with Him so that His peace can keep our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

In Daniel's day the alternative was this, Bow to Darius, or be thrown into the den of lions. Well, says Daniel, I can only bow to God, and if I must go to the den of lions, He can deliver me out of it if He will. And so he prayed, while his enemies "assembled, and found Daniel praying and making supplication to his God" (ver. 4). Of course they knew his habits and ways, and we can well imagine the glee that filled this crew of would-be murderers, as they gathered round the house of the godly man. Ah! there he is, on his knees, morning, noon, and evening, turning to God. I do not say to you that you should pray three times a day. The Holy Ghost has said to us, "Pray without ceasing" (1 Thess. 5:17). And what does that mean? "Pray without ceasing" just means what it says. There was a great conclave of ministers who met once, and began to discuss that scripture. One thought that three times a day like Daniel was sufficient, and others thought something else. One of the company was leaving, and meeting old Betty, who kept the meeting-house, said to her, "We have been discussing that scripture, 'Pray without ceasing.'" "And what do you make of it?" said the old woman. "It is a little uncertain," replied the preacher. "It seems very easy to explain," says Betty. "How?" "Well, it just means what it says. When I get up in the morning, the first thing I do is to wash my face, and I pray God that many sinners may be washed in the blood of Christ during the day. Then I put on my clothes, and I pray God to clothe me with Christ and with humility. Then when I take up my broom, and begin to brush out the room, I think of the woman who swept the house for the lost piece of silver, and I pray to God to sweep the world, and to save lost sinners. Then when I come to brush the grate, and it begins to brighten up, I pray to the Lord to brighten up my soul, and to brighten up my faith during the day." And so Betty went on mentioning certain things during the day as providing an opportunity of approaching God in prayer. Well done, Betty! She had the sense of what it was to get to God in prayer about everything, and I believe that is exactly what you find in the history of the soul of every one who becomes a true Christian. He is constantly turning every occasion into an opportunity of approaching God in prayer.

Begin and end each day with God in prayer. Speak to Him often. Speak to Him under all circumstances. If you have sinned, confess it to Him immediately, never wait. Make God your daily friend and be sure to tell Him everything that happens — your joys and your sorrows.

Whatever you may have to set aside for lack of time, never neglect personal prayer. If necessary, cut back on your schedule of activities, but not your private time with the Lord in reading and prayer.

All that a Christian does ought to be sacred, because it is done as service to God. If this were borne in mind, it would enable us to connect the very simplest duties of daily life with the Lord Himself, and to bring Him into them in such a way as to impart a holy dignity and interest to all that we have to do, from morning till night. In this way, instead of finding the duties of our calling a hindrance to our communion with God, we should actually make them an occasion of waiting on Him for wisdom and grace to discharge them aright, so that His holy name might be glorified in the most minute details of practical life.

Hindrances to prayer. There is an antipathy between sinning and praying. The child that has misspent the day in play abroad, steals to bed at night, for fear of a chiding from his father. Sin and prayer are such contraries, that it is impossible at one stride to step from one to another.

Another method Satan has to make the Christian put off prayer is some worldly business that is to be dispatched. Take heed of overcharging thyself with worldly business, which is done when thou graspest more thereof than will consist with thy Christian calling. God allows thee to give to the world that which is the world's, but He will not suffer thee to pay the world that which is due to Him. We could not easily want time to pray, if our hearts would but persuade our heads to devise and study how our other affairs might be disposed of without prejudice to our devotions. That cloth which a bungler thinks too little for a garment, a good workman can make one of it, and leave some for another use also. O, there is a great deal of art in cutting out time with little loss. Some look upon every minute of time spent in the closet, as lost in the shop. Does the husbandman mow the less for whetting his scythe? Doth a good grace before meat spoil the dinner? No: nor doth prayer hinder the Christian either in his employments or enjoyments, but expedites the one, and sanctifies the other. "Acknowledge God in all thy ways, and lean not to thy own understanding."

Prayer and reality. Prayer is an act in which we have immediately to do with the great God, to whom we approach in prayer. It is too sacred a duty to be performed between sleeping and waking, with a heavy eye or a drowsy heart; this God complained of: "There is none that calleth upon Thy name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of Thee" (Isa. 64:7). He counts it no prayer where the heart is not stirred up and awake. Our behaviour in prayer has an universal influence upon all the passages of our whole life; as a man is in prayer, so he is likely to be in all the rest; if he is careless in praying, then he is negligent in hearing and loose in his walking. Prayer is the channel, in which the stream of divine grace, blessing, and comfort, runs from God into the heart; dam up the channel and the stream is stopped.

When we speak of prayer we are not thinking of it as a duty that must be done at stated times, and which we will do conscientiously no matter how irksome it may be, but as something that we cannot live without. A Christian poet has called it our “vital breath,” and there is much truth in that, but the importance of it lies in the fact that it is the way in which we come into contact with God, in whom we live, and move, and have our being, and who in His amazing grace has made us His children by faith in Christ Jesus. So that it is not the mere act of prayer with which we would be occupied but the God to whom we pray. “As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee” cried the Psalmist, and the man who feels like that will pray; he must, he cannot live without it.

When we speak of prayer we are not thinking of it as a duty that must be done at stated times, and which we will do conscientiously no matter how irksome it may be, but as something that we cannot live without. A Christian poet has called it our "vital breath," and there is much truth in that, but the importance of it lies in the fact that it is the way in which we come into contact with God, in whom we live, and move, and have our being, and who in His amazing grace has made us His children by faith in Christ Jesus. So that it is not the mere act of prayer with which we would be occupied but the God to whom we pray. "As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee" cried the Psalmist, and the man who feels like that will pray; he must, he cannot live without it.