I went through a period recently where I was unable to pray. I don’t mean that praying was hard for me, but that I couldn’t utter a word. It was as if the ability to reach out to God had vanished.
We all go through spiritual droughts, but this level of rock-hard muteness–a gut-level inability to even wrench out the Lord’s Prayer–was something new. It was so intense that I couldn’t even feel bad about it. I reached out to a few good friends. “I can’t pray,” I told them, “I need you to do it for me.”
Then I went about my days. I wasn’t happy, but I wasn’t going to fall in the trap of fretting over it, either.
Sometimes people tell me things like, “You’re such a prayer warrior!” or “You have such deep faith!” and I guess that’s both true and not true. We all waft in and out of spiritual focus, more aware of God some days or moments or months than others. Some of our attention in prayer arises from determination, and some of it is a gift; some our failure to stay on track is our fault, and some of it just… is.
I’m pretty sure that even the apostles had their ups and downs. Maybe part of the reason they didn’t grasp everything Jesus told them was that their minds wandered off to notice a passerby or to wonder why a Pharisee’s beard was so scruffy.
Once during church I found myself wondering how many people at the service were distracted at any given point in time. The thought made me chuckle, and then I felt a surge of tenderness toward the fallible faithful around me, and that turned my heart back to God. I was able to worship more fully knowing that I wasn’t alone in my fickleness.
READ MORE: 7 WAYS TO PRAY WHEN YOU CAN’T PRAY
I think this tendency for our minds to wander and for our spiritual lives to have waves of greater and lesser depth is one reason we’re called to praise God together. As a church there’s a “we” to our worship: When I am deep in prayer my flow carries you along, and when my heart is arid your prayers water my heart. On average, as a church, it evens out.
But to get back to my original story… I am glad to report that either my friends’ prayers worked or the devil got bored of trying to get me to obsess over my prayer life. One night I was surprised to find familiar words of thanks on my lips again. Prayer didn’t flow easily, but it was possible.
I’ve been working on it, grinding out confession and praise and petition, and it’s getting better. Which is good, because perhaps you’re going through a dry spell, and I can return the favor of the prayers you’ve said for me.
