I have assurance of my salvation, but my prayer life is still awful. I never have any desire to pray, and when I do pray, it's always half-hearted and empty. I've tried disciplining myself and just forcing myself to pray even when I don't feel like it, but that usually leaves me more discouraged than when I started. I feel so guilty over my prayerlessness, but I can't seem to improve. I've cried out to God so many times, begging Him, "Lord, help me to pray more," "God, give me the discipline to pray," and "Father, please give me motivation to pray." But it never changes. I just want to be able to enjoy communion with my Savior.

raeray

Date posted: 6y

I understand this all too well. I have gone through this a lot. Something that helped me is just talking to God randomly. Like yesterday when I saw 2 sunflowers growing in the freeway. I just said God thanks that was cool to see. It may not seem like a prayer but I believe prayer is a conversation with God so I see stuff and thank him or pray for the situation I come across. I may do it halfhearted but it’s still talking to him. As long as you’re including Him I honestly think you’re good.

keith11

Date posted: 6y

I completely relate. This is one of those instances where mental health and legitimate Christian desires converge and get blurry. I am a Christian and struggle with what is called "scrupulousity" in my OCD. As a matter of faith, a question to ask here may be "do I really believe, based on what God has revealed in scripture, that He wants me to feel like a worthless guilty failure because I don't _______ often enough?" If the answer is no, then we can start there. Maybe the issue is not that we don't pray enough, but that we feel there is some certain amount we must pray to keep God's affections. When you think of it like that the OCD may get exposed for the imposter that it is, tricking us and invading our faith. Hope that makes some sense.

keith11

Date posted: 6y

Also, it helps to bear in mind that so much that is preached and written in Christian teaching is done so with a "normal" audience in mind. When we hear a sermon on prayer, and the need to pray more often, our personal struggles send us down a path the preacher probably never intended. We rarely consider that the majority of the audience being spoken to may need to hear that to motivate them from complacency. We have to apply a different lens sometimes because we understand our own unique position in this scenario... again, hope that makes sense.

ButterflyStar

Date posted: 4y

Are you still on this app??? Plz help me

Farhadi28

Date posted: 6y

Like raeray said, prayer is just talking to God. It doesn't have to be all formal or anything, you can just talk to God throughout your day about anything. Maybe just every day start off by thanking God for His love that saves you and makes you His child. Right there you just prayed in a very simple and beautiful way. Or what concerns you tell Him about it and that is considered prayer.

Kruisergirl

Date posted: 11w

Excessive Prayer spiral

Hey, So whenever I pray, often I will end up not feeling genuine when I pray and I don’t feel God when I pray and then I panic and end up basically trying to force my emotions to “feel right” and I repeat my words over and over and over again. It’s so frustrating and I want to stop but it’s hard. Does anyone have any tips on breaking this?

G C

Date posted: 8w

Religious ocd

It’s so hard to pray to God. I don’t want o put him on the back burner but I get anxiety talking to him and sitting in his presence. Then I will force myself to but then I just feel dumb since my flesh doesn’t want me to. And I pray and rush it then immediately scroll on my phone after cuz I get stressed and don’t know how to hear from him bc if I pray and just wait for Him I will get intrusive thoughts over and over and like I can’t even hear him anyway my mind is constantly going 1 million miles an hour and I have so many real life problems too on top of the ocd that makes it even harder.

Cammy123

Date posted: 7w

Doubting, feeling numb & blasphemous thoughts

About 2 years ago I gave my life to Jesus. I've always been a "Christian" but never truly lived liked one until then. One day I had a thought about is God real? It bothered me so bad and I went into a massive spiral. Doubting everything. My faith. if I was good enough. Am I really saved? Do I have enough faith? Is my doubt real? Is it too much? Have these blasphemous made God not want me anymore? Or Jesus? :( Then I started having horrible blasphemous thoughts, then it would go back to doubting thoughts then back to the blasphemous ones. I hated the thoughts and doubts. The thoughts are so mean towards God, Jesus & HS. It’s anywhere from evil thoughts to cussing thoughts to rejection thoughts/denying. Demonic thoughts. Literally anything bad you could think of! Even thoughts of if I really love them or wanna follow them. I feel so trapped or my faith isn't the same. Which makes me sad because I want my faith! I feel like I've gotten lazy and honestly that I don't deserve them or am "too far gone" from them. I feel like idk how to be a Christian or how to have faith or just exist tbh. I’m in a constant struggle of fear, anxiety and sadness. I wanna love God & Jesus! I want faith! I just feel kinda stuck. Please help. I feel so numb and don’t know what to do. Has anyone gone through this or has advice or tips?

Religion & Spirituality OCD

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