Struggling with lack of desire to pray

[GodLovesCats]

At a time in my life when I am suffering and need to pray, whenever the thought to pray about my new health issue (abdominal pain and lack of appetite), I immediately tell myself, "I do not want to pray." So I have not prayed for recovery yet, as much as I want that. How can I start? I have personal experiences with the impact of prayers and read stories about prayers working so it is not a lack of faith. Somehow I just do not have motivation to pray for my health today.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

At a time in my life when I am suffering and need to pray, whenever the thought to pray about my new health issue (abdominal pain and lack of appetite), I immediately tell myself, "I do not want to pray." So I have not prayed for recovery yet, as much as I want that. How can I start? I have personal experiences with the impact of prayers and read stories about prayers working so it is not a lack of faith. Somehow I just do not have motivation to pray for my health today.

God knows your heart.

 

[Jesus is my Superhero]

Make a list of things to be thankful for and give thanks in prayer to God almighty for all of these blessings. Beginning prayer with thanksgiving can cause a natural progression towards other topics.

 

[Berserk]

Make a list of things to be thankful for and give thanks in prayer to God almighty for all of these blessings. Beginning prayer with thanksgiving can cause a natural progression towards other topics.

Yes, Paul identifies gratitude as a key to effective petitionary prayer (Phil. 4:6). But expressing gratitude in an unfelt cerebral way is worthless; one must get to a point where one chronically feels grateful. But how can we do that when we feel abandoned and disillusioned? Like Jesus is My Superhero says, make lists of things to be grateful for and meditate on that ever growing list until a permanent mood of gratitude gets established. Medical research shows that those who feel grateful regularly have a great adventage in experiencing healing.

In the 19th century J. Hudson Taylor founded the China Inland Mission and is considered one of the greatest and most effective missionaries ever. Despite the tragic loss of family members on the mission field, Taylor's intercessory prayers were powerful and effective. So one of his prayer secrets is striking. He famously said, "I realized that I received my greatest answers to prayer when my heart felt like wood." When we're hurting, the prospect of prayer often breeds the cynical expectation that God will not intervene in a healing way. So we "try" to believe--a death warrant for faith because the very concept of "trying" unconsciously creates doubt and a sense of inevitable failure--and we don't want a sense of failed prayer to make us feel even worse. So we need to spend substantial amounts of time regardless of our feelings in the hope that we will reach a state called "praying in the Spirit" (Eph. 6:18; Jude 20), a state in which the Spirit guides our thoughts and words (in our own language) and we experience a peaceful flow of effortless holy thoughts and petitions. Paul makes it clear that praying in the Spirit is a key to waging effective spiritual warfare (see Eph. 6:18; cp. 6:11-17).