Short Prayers: Christian Perspectives from the Past

Notable Christians from the past have not always emphasized long prayers. Some of them highlighted the benefit of short prayers. For example, when he was discussing Jesus’s teaching on prayer, Augustine (d. AD 430) emphasized that true prayer does not depend on length. Augustine reflected on how Jesus spoke of Gentiles who use many words in prayer: “Our Lord then first of all cut off much speaking, that you might not bring a multitude of words unto God, as though by your many words you would teach him.”¹ Augustine said that when you pray, you “have need of piety, not of wordiness.”² In other words, it is not the prayer’s length that matters. What matters is a heart of faith in God.

Augustine also mentioned Christian brothers in Egypt who were known to pray short prayers frequently throughout the day. The reason they did that, he said, was due to a proper understanding that to engage the heart in various short prayers throughout the day is preferable to praying long prayers without the heart. If a person can pray from the heart for a long time, pray on! But if he can pray from the heart for only short periods, do that instead. Every Christian is different. Some find it difficult to pray long prayers. Others find it easy to pray frequent, short prayers. Again, what matters is the engagement of the heart. Augustine refused to imply that long prayers were godlier than short ones.

Augustine did teach that longer prayers were profitable as long as one was not neglecting “good and necessary works to which duty calls us.”³ As we learned earlier, Paul called Christians to work and labor in various vocations. Augustine taught that we should not let our prayers get so long that we neglect other things God has called us to do. It is not a mark of piety to pray for an hour while avoiding your neighbor in need or your spouse who needs help cleaning up a huge mess in the kitchen. Go show love. Serve your neighbor and your spouse. You can always pray later.

Martin Luther (d. 1546) echoed Augustine’s sentiments on prayer. When reflecting on Christ’s words in Matthew 6:7–9, Luther wrote about the manner of prayer, noting that true prayer comes from the heart and is not defined by many words:

This manner is: that we pray in few words, but with a true and deep sense or feeling sensation. The fewer the words, the more real the prayer. And, the more the words, the less real the prayer. To pray with a few words and with a deep sensation is to pray as a Christian. But, to pray in many words and with little sensation, is to pray as a heathen.⁴

Luther may have been speaking in hyperbole, but the point stands. He knew about the monastic prayers of his day. As a monk, Luther himself no doubt prayed some long-winded prayers, thinking they were meritorious before God. Therefore, when thinking about Christ’s words about the pagans rambling on in their prayers, he wanted to emphasize that Christians must not do that. Instead, Luther taught that we ought to pray little prayers with big faith.

In a different context, Luther wrote similar words:

The Christian prays, and because he knows that God hears him, he does not need to prate everlastingly. Thus, the saints in the Scriptures prayed, as Elijah, Elisha, David, and others, with short, but strong and powerful words. . . . Therefore, the old fathers have very properly said, there is no use in many long prayers, but they praise the short impassioned prayers, in which one lifts a sigh heaven-ward with a word or two.⁵

Luther understood that a true Christian prayer can be as short as one or two words. “Help, Lord!” “Heal me!” “Father!” Words like these from a heart of faith are indeed strong prayers. As Luther also said, “In summary, one should pray short, but often and strongly; for God does not ask how much and long one has prayed, but how good it is and how it comes from the heart.”⁶ Luther labored to keep prayer a response to the gospel instead of a new monastic law to follow.

There are other examples in church history that show how appropriate and acceptable short prayers are. The 1662 Book of Common Prayer is, of course, full of prayers. But very few of them are more than a paragraph or two in length. Or consider Thomas Boston’s insight, that we should put no confidence in the quantity of our prayers, “that is to say, how long or how many they are. These things avail nothing with God, by whom prayers are not measured, but weighed.”⁷ Boston said it is better to pray a fervent, humble, faith-filled sigh to God than to pray for a whole day with those things lacking.⁸ Although some Christians in the past may have lauded long prayers, many have also emphasized the appropriateness of short prayers.

Excursus: Long Public Prayers?

I have also been thinking about long public prayers. As a child, I remember some pastors who seemed to pray forever during a worship service. I admit my adolescent concept of time was incorrect, but I do know that quite a few people napped during the ten-minute “long” prayer! This makes me think of John Newton’s (d. 1807) advice to those praying in public settings: “The chief fault of some good prayers is that they are too long.” He continued, “Not that I think we should pray by the clock, and limit ourselves precisely to a certain number of minutes; but it is better of the two, that the hearers should wish the prayer had been longer, than spend half or a considerable part of the time in wishing it was over.”⁹ Newton said there have been times when long, fervent public prayers have not seemed like a tiresome task for the hearers. But, he noted, it sometimes happens in preaching and in praying that pastors are apt to “spin out” their words “to the greatest length” when they have “in reality the least to say.” They talk much but say little.

Newton also wrote this about praying in public: “Long prayers should in general be avoided . . . or else even spiritual hearers will be unable to keep up their attention.”¹⁰ For those of us who are pastors, we must not give the impression that long prayers are more pious and godlier than short ones. We can and should pray short prayers in public during worship and elsewhere. Perhaps the words of Ecclesiastes 5:2 are appropriate here: “Do not be hasty in word or impulsive in thought to bring up a matter in the presence of God. For God is in heaven and you are on the earth; therefore let your words be few” (NASB 1995).

Conclusion

If you have been thinking that you need to pray long prayers every morning to be a better Christian, let me free you from that incorrect notion. You do not. Some people may have told you or implied to you that the best Christians pray for a long time. But the Bible does not teach that. Notable Christians in the past have taught contrary to that. You can stop thinking that long prayers are superior to short ones.

If you cannot pray for an hour or two every morning, do not worry about it. If a podcaster or a famous pastor you know has a lengthy prayer time every morning, good for them! You do not have to follow their exact spiritual practices to be a good Christian. You can be a strong, solid, godly Christian even if you never pray for an hour or more while kneeling. God does not time your prayers; neither should you. Our Father does not need your many words. In Christ, all your prayers are acceptable to him. So pray when the need arises throughout the day. Pray one-sentence prayers. Pray paragraph-length prayers. It does not matter. Just pray often from the heart to your Father in heaven. He hears you, cares for you, and will answer your prayers in his own time and way. Even though we are unworthy, God will, for the sake of Christ, hear our prayer as he has promised in his Word (Heidelberg Catechism 117). Do not turn the wonderful privilege and blessing of prayer into a law that leads to legalism, guilt, and despair. It is for freedom Christ has set you free!

Notes

1. Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament, Library of Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church, Anterior to the Division of the East and West (Oxford, 1844), 1:69.
2. Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament, 1:69.
3. Augustine of Hippo, “Letters of St. Augustin,” in The Confessions and Letters of St. Augustin with a Sketch of His Life and Work, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. J. G. Cunningham, Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (Buffalo, NY, 1886), 465.
4. Martin Luther, “Martin Luther’s Explanation of the Lord’s Prayer, for the Simple Among the People,” in Select Works of Martin Luther: An Offering to the Church of God in “The Last Days,” trans. Henry Cole (London, 1826), 2:378.
5. Martin Luther, Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, trans. Charles A. Hay (Philadelphia, 1892), 249.
6. Luther, Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, 250.
7. Thomas Boston, The Whole Works of Thomas Boston: Discourses on Prayer, ed. Samuel M’Millan (Aberdeen, 1852), 11:383.
8. Boston, Whole Works, 11:383.
9. John Newton and Richard Cecil, The Works of John Newton (London, 1824), 1:262.
10. Newton and Cecil, Works, 1:262.

© Shane Lems. All Rights Reserved.

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Post authored by:

• Shane Lems

  

  Shane Lems is a graduate of Westminster Seminary California and has a DMin from RTS Orlando. He has been a church planter and pastor in the URCNA. Since 2013 he’s been serving as pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church (OPC) in Hammond, WI. He is married and has four children. Shane has written numerous articles for Modern Reformation, New Horizons, and other publications. He is also the author of Doctrines of Grace: Student Edition and manages a book blog, The Reformed Reader.

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