In the midst of our busy lives, we can sometimes wonder whether we really have the time to pray. Won’t prayer hinder our productivity? Won’t prayer keep us from getting done all the things we need to do?
When facing such questions, we would do well to consider that if we are too busy to pray, we are simply too busy! Martin Luther once lamented the busyness of his life but then exclaimed, “I have so much to do that I shall have to spend the first three hours in prayer!” Though he may have been speaking tongue-in-cheek, he meant to communicate something of the essential nature of prayer. He was too busy not to pray. And here Paul Miller speaks words of wisdom: “Learning to pray doesn’t offer us a less busy life; it offers us a less busy heart.”
While praying will not check items off our too-long lists of things to do, it will quiet our hearts as we do them. It will enable us to submit ourselves, our responsibilities, and our to-dos to the one for whom we do them.
