When Paul tells us to pray without ceasing, he wants believers to know that praying to God is an activity that should pervade the Christian life (1 Thess. 5:16–18). God won’t ask us to do things that he doesn’t give us the time to do. While the Bible doesn’t tell Christians how long they should pray each day, prayer is an essential and integral part of daily Christian life. Yet, believers shouldn’t use prayer as a reason to avoid fulfilling the responsibilities God has given them.

It’s likely that many Christians evaluate the quality of their prayer life partly on the amount of time they spend in prayer. A person who prays for at least, say, an hour a day must be someone who values the privilege of prayer and makes it a priority. Someone who prays for, say, five minutes a day doesn’t seem to be as devout of a Christian. Is there an appropriate amount of time to pray each day, and why does God want us to pray to him?

What Is Prayer and Why Do Christians Need to Pray?

Godly prayer is humble prayer; as we learn from the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector (Luke 18:9-14), the humble and lowly—those with a penitent heart—are the ones whose prayers are heard by God.

The Heidelberg Catechism (1563) teaches us that “prayer is the most important part of the thankfulness which God requires of us” (Q&A 116). When we pray, we testify that God is sovereign over all, that he hears our prayers, and that he is completely able to fulfill our requests according to his will.

In prayer believers humbly confess their sins to God, admit that they aren’t in control, and acknowledge that it is only by God’s grace that their daily needs are provided for and the debt for their guilt and sin has been paid. As theologian R. Scott Clark notes regarding the nature of prayer,

Prayer is our response. It is the instrument through which we reply from the heart, with thanks, to God for all he has done. Prayer is the first expression of the grateful, believing heart… Prayer is the act of a needy sinner.

Prayer is the exercising of the believer’s trust in God—the outworking of the gift of faith that God has given us in Christ.

Do Our Prayers Change God’s Will?

We know for a fact that some of God’s actions are based on our prayers. There are far too many instances of answered prayer in the Bible to list them here (just a few include Hannah’s prayer for a son in 1 Samuel 1:10-20, Elijah’s prayer to raise the widow’s son from the dead in 1 Kings 17:17-24, Daniel’s prayer for his people in Daniel 9:1-23, Jesus’ healing of the leper in Matthew 8:1-4, and the believers’ prayer for boldness in Acts 4:23-31).

Yet, one may ask, “So, does God’s will change based on our prayers?” The Bible is clear that God always does his holy will, and while we cannot fully understand how our prayers and God’s will are connected, we know from Scripture that God hears the prayers of his children and answers our prayers according to his good purpose in all things (Eph. 4:6-7; Rom. 8:28). It is helpful to remember both truths that 1) God is sovereign and 2) people are responsible to love and obey their Creator, including in their duty to pray. The role of our prayers in God’s sovereign reign is mysterious and vital.

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