To be prayerless

To be prayerless is to be without God, without Christ, without grace, without hope, and without heaven. It is to be on the road to hell. Now can you wonder that I ask the question, Do you pray?

I ask again whether you pray, because a habit of prayer is one of the surest marks of a true Christian.

All the children of God on earth are alike in this respect. From the moment there is any life and reality about their religion, they pray. Just as the first sign of life in an infant when born into the world is the act of breathing, so the first act of men and women when they are born again is praying.

This is one of the common marks of all the elect of God, "They cry unto him day and night" (Luke:18:1And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;
See All...). The Holy Spirit, who makes them new creatures, works in them the feeling of adoption, and makes them cry, "Abba, Father" (Rom:8:15For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
See All...). The Lord Jesus, when he quickens them, gives them a voice and a tongue, and says to them, "Be dumb [speechless] no more." God has no dumb children. It is as much a part of their new nature to pray, as it is of a child to cry. They see their need of mercy and grace. They feel their emptiness and weakness. They can not do otherwise than they do. They must pray.

I have looked carefully over the lives of God's saints in the Bible. I cannot find one of whose history much is told us, from Genesis to Revelation, who was not a man of prayer. I find it mentioned as a characteristic of the godly, that "they call on the Father" (1 Peter:1:17And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear:
See All...), or "the name of the Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor:1:2Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our LORD, both theirs and ours:
See All...). Recorded as a characteristic of the wicked is the fact that "they call not upon the Lord" (Ps:14:4Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge? who eat up my people as they eat bread, and call not upon the LORD.
See All...).

--J. C. Ryle (1816 - 1900)