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PRAYERLESSNESS SOMETIMES FEELS LIKE BUSYNESSSaturday October 17, 2026…E. M. Bounds spent much of his life calling Christians back to prayer.He had seen something that remains painfully relevant in our generation:It is possible to be busy with good things and still become spiritually weak.It is possible to preach, serve, organise, build, work and remain constantly occupied — while the secret place slowly disappears.Bounds wrote:“Much time spent with God is the secret of all successful praying.”His point was not that prayer should be measured mechanically by a clock.It was that communion with God cannot survive indefinitely on leftovers.Bounds observed that the men and women who deeply affected their generations for God were usually people who gave serious time to prayer. Prayer was not an occasional addition to their work. It was part of the source from which their work flowed.That challenges our generation.We have never had so many tools designed to save time.Yet somehow we still do not have time.We wake up and reach for our phones.Messages are waiting.Work is waiting.Family responsibilities are waiting.News, videos, notifications and unfinished tasks are waiting.And prayer can quietly become:“Later.”Then later becomes tomorrow.Tomorrow becomes next week.And eventually we can become Christians who still believe in prayer but rarely spend meaningful time praying.The danger is that prayerlessness does not always feel like rebellion. Sometimes it feels like busyness.Jesus Himself lived under constant demand.Crowds followed Him.People needed healing.His disciples needed instruction.Opposition was growing.Yet Mark 1:35 tells us:“And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.”Jesus did not wait until there was nothing left to do.He withdrew while there was still work waiting for Him.That is important.Because if we wait until life becomes quiet before we pray, we may never pray.There will always be another message.Another deadline.Another bill.Another responsibility.Another distraction.At some point, prayer must become something we protect.A question for your personal reflection:Has your life genuinely become too busy to pray — or has prayer simply lost its protected place in your life?Let us pray.Heavenly Father, forgive us for the times we have allowed legitimate responsibilities to crowd You out. Teach us again to value the secret place. Give us the discipline to withdraw from noise, distraction and endless activity so that we may spend time in Your presence. Restore hunger for prayer in us, and help us to become men and women who seek You consistently. In Jesus' name, Amen.This burden is one of the reasons we have made our new book, Too Busy to Pray: Recovering the Secret Place and Rediscovering the Power of Prayer, completely free.It was written for believers who know prayer matters but have found themselves distracted, inconsistent or overwhelmed by the pace of life.Evangelist, Tim HallNancy 42544