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Pray Always

Last week I shared powerful scriptures to remember when faced with temptation. However, the devil is very powerful as well. We need a lot more tools than just a scripture to defeat him. The most powerful tool available to us is prayer. Brigham Young said, “Prayer keeps a man from sin. Sin keeps a man from prayer.”

Prayer keeps a man from sin
The Lord admonishes throughout the scriptures to pray always to avoid sin:
  • “Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak” (Mark 14:38)
  • “Pray always, that you may come off conqueror; yea, that you may conquer Satan, and that you may escape the hands of the servants of Satan that do uphold his work” (D&C 10:5)
  • “Therefore let the church take heed and pray always, lest they fall into temptation” (D&C 20:33)
  • “Pray always, lest ye enter into temptation and lose your reward” (D&C 31:12)
  • “Pray always that you enter not into temptation, that you may abide the day of his coming, whether in life or in death. Even so. Amen” (D&C 61:39)
  • “What I say unto one I say unto all; pray always lest that wicked one have power in you, and remove you out of your place” (D&C 93:49)
  • “Verily, verily, I say unto you, ye must watch and pray always, lest ye be tempted by the devil, and ye be led away captive by him. . . . ye must watch and pray always lest ye enter into temptation; for Satan desireth to have you, that he may sift you as wheat” (3 Nephi 18: 15, 18)

Get the message?

Sin keeps a man from prayer
We’ve all heard that the time we feel least like praying is when we should pray the most. But do we really do it? Do we really believe it? We should, because it’s true. Sin makes us feel ashamed and unworthy to kneel before Heavenly Father. Satan tells us that we are too unclean to talk to God. But by staying away from Him, we only make our situation worse: we become more vulnerable to sin again and we feel more miserable and hopeless. This is exactly what the devil wants.

Heavenly Father wants us to come to Him and seek repentance and forgiveness through Christ’s Atonement. He wants us to pour out our heart and soul to Him in prayer. He wants us to talk to Him, ask for His help, and trust in Him. He promises so many blessings if we pray! And if we really want to follow Christ and not Satan, then we should pray, “for if ye would hearken unto the Spirit which teacheth a man to pray ye would know that ye must pray; for the evil spirit teacheth not a man to pray, but teacheth him that he must not pray” (2 Nephi 32:8). And when we’re not praying vocally, we should always have a prayer in our hearts (see Alma 34:27).

Challenge: Next time you don’t feel like praying, for whatever reason, remember that is what Satan wants. Follow the Spirit instead and talk to your Heavenly Father.

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Comments

Anonymous said…
prayer is something i do with my wife, with our daughter, as a family and as an individual several times per day- yet i could use improvement and i try to thank Him more often. I also pray that people will look at your blog and comment-DAD
September 10, 2009 at 2:07 AM
Anonymous said…
Prayer is vital for our journey on this earth. Humility in prayer is important. May we remember both.
Mom
September 15, 2009 at 9:37 PM
Jim said…
Hi, I am preparing a talk on this topic, and found your collected scriptures and quotes by B.Y. very helpful. I don't know your name, but I will credit your web/blog. Thank you.
September 16, 2009 at 10:31 PM
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