Prayer is war. Prayer is a fight, and nothing less than that. So many of us struggle from day to day, week to week, even year to year with prayer because we simply don't think of prayer at all in this way.
We tend to forget that there is an enemy...and enemy who desires to keep us distracted...an enemy who whispers accusations against us in our ears making us feel as though we are too guilty to come before our Lord in prayer, so we don't even attempt it.
I was reading a paper a few weeks ago where the author talked about a monastery during the times of the early church. There are several recorded conversations from those who lived there, but one conversation stuck out to me particularly.
There was an elderly man who had been a monk all of his life who was once questioned by some travelers to the monastery, "What do you find the hardest Christian virtue is?" In other words, they were asking, "what do you find to be the hardest thing for Christians to do?"
His answer was simple and to the point; "prayer." He went on from there to explain that the devil, above all else, desires to keep us from prayer. That, if Satan could stop us from doing anything, he would interrupt our prayer life and he will distract us in any way that he can.
I find it fascinating that this man, whose life was entirely centered around prayer as a monk, found that the most difficult thing to do was pray.
I am sharing all of this with you because, if we properly understand how the devil is seeking to thwart us, we can better understand our stance on prayer. That, we don't need to be as passive about it as many of us are, but that we need to show up eager for the challenge, always remembering that God is on our side and that if "God is for us, who can be against us?"
It's no wonder that Paul used images such as running a race and fighting a battle whenever he tried to describe the kind of life that Christians are up against.
So, finally, take Paul's words as encouragement as you pray:
"For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds....and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."
