What If I Don't Desire to Pray?

John Onwuchekwa, Sam Emadi

• Publisher: Crossway
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781433568053
• eBook ISBN: 9781433568084
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Many new believers have questions about what it means to live as a Christian in the context of a local church, and pastors are looking for resources to pass along to their congregations to help them think biblically about the Christian life. 9Marks Church Questions is a new series that seeks to provide ordinary Christians with sound and accessible biblical teaching by answering common questions Christians have about church life. Each volume offers biblical answers and practical applications with the goal of nurturing healthy church practice and commitment. This booklet aims to encourage Christians to speak to their heavenly Father through prayer as it helps them understand the basics of why, what, and how to pray, especially as they worship and serve alongside other Christians.

Prayer is like oxygen for the Christian. It’s how we breathe.

But praying is hard. It often feels like duty, not delight. Like eating our vegetables, we know it’s good for us. We feel guilty for not doing it, yet we shove the plate to the side. So it is with prayer.

Our prayerlessness isn’t rooted in a lack of ability but in a lack of desire. We know how to pray. You could stop reading right now, close your eyes, bow your head, and pray. But instead, you’ve picked up this book because you realize your problem isn’t that you don’t know how to pray. It’s that you simply don’t want to pray.

What do we do when we don’t want something we should want? A how-to manual won’t help. Again, the problem is the heart, not the head. So how do we train our hearts to want something more? Is that even possible?

In short, yes, we can grow in our desire for prayer. If Jesus can transform hearts of stone to hearts of flesh (Ezek. 36:26), he can certainly reshape our affections and give us the desire to pray.

Don’t Give Up! You Want to Want to Pray

If you’re struggling to pray, don’t throw in the towel. The very fact that you’re reading this book shows you’re moving in the right direction. It shows you want to want to pray. That impulse should be celebrated.

Let me encourage you with a few other thoughts about this struggle.

1. You’re Not the Only One

If I’ve learned anything from my years of using Google as my de facto problem solver, it’s this: I’m not the only one struggling with this problem. I just typed “struggling to pray” into Google and got 31,000,000 results. Clearly, you and I are not alone in this struggle.

The Bible told us as much. Just consider the twelve disciples. This group of guys spent over three years with Jesus. They’d eventually become pillars of the church (Matt. 19:28; Eph. 2:20). And yet, they found themselves struggling to pray on more than one occasion. In fact, Mark 14 records that when Jesus commanded them to pray on the eve of his death, they closed their eyes, bowed their heads—and fell asleep (Mark 14:37–41)! If you’ve nodded off in prayer, remember the apostles did the same.

Not to mention, I’m with you in this struggle to pray. I’m writing this book not because of my successful prayer life but because of my own struggles. You’re not the only one.

2. This Won’t Be the Last Time

If you’re struggling to pray, this won’t be the last time. You’ll be here again. Not wanting to pray isn’t like the chickenpox—experience it once, and then you’re immune. Prayerlessness is rooted in pride, and pride is more like the flu—different strands are always evolving, and there’s no immunity this side of eternity.

A host of things can awaken pride. Tragedy can cause us to forget God’s promises and make our pain the focus of our lives. When we sow seeds of bitterness, crops of prayerlessness spring up. Prosperity can also make us forget God, leading us to prayerlessness (Deut. 8:10–18).

Regrettably, there’s no one-time vaccination for pride. It finds a way to rear its head again and again. We cannot completely eradicate it, but we can know what to do when it comes back. I’m hoping this book will provide a set of directions for you to follow whenever the pride of prayerlessness appears.

3. People in Worse Situations Have Changed for the Better

Finally, people in worse situations have changed for the better. You can begin to want to pray. At the risk of sounding like an infomercial, you can change—maybe even before the end of this book!

Remember those disciples who nodded off while praying? They went from falling asleep at Jesus’s prayer meetings to leading a movement fueled by prayer (Acts 2:42; 4:23–31; 6:1–6; 8:14–15; 12:1–5; 13:1–3; 20:36).

What transformed these sleepy apostles into tireless men of prayer? And how might our hearts change to desire more prayer? That’s what we’ll discuss next.

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Table of contents

• Cover
• Newsletter Signup
• Endorsements
• Other Crossway Books
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Chapter 1
• Notes
• Scripture Index