THE DANGERS OF NEGLECTING PRAYER AND BIBLE STUDY
A Devotional Article
The story goes that during the years of the Great Depression in America there was a foolish old farmer who tried to save money by feeding his mule on sawdust. He felt his mule was costing him far too much in oats, so he decided  to mix a little sawdust in with its feed. This went on for a week  without any apparent  ill effects  on  the animal.  As time  went  on the farmer continued  to reduce  the amount  of oats and increase the sawdust. The mule didn’t seem to notice the gradual change, so the farmer thought things were fine- that is until one morning he found his mule dead.
Every so often I come across Christians who thought that they could  maintain  their relationship  with God without feeding  themselves  spiritually. With  the pressures of life they had become “time poor” meaning something time wise “had to give”. They looked around at what they could cut back on and thought that their Christianity and  their relationship  with the One Who suffered for them  was  costing  them  too much  time. They felt it took too much  time to go to Communion regularly, to read their Bible and pray and far too costly time wise to be in a Bible study house group. Gradually, bit by bit they reduced  the amount  of time they spent on these Godly pursuits. At first there didn’t seem to be any adverse effects and so they reduced their “time with God” even further. Still there appeared  to be little change – until suddenly  without warning,  the whole spiritual edifice of their life came tumbling down and they found themselves desolate, alone, empty and in spiritual peril.
Without warning, they found themselves  besieged by all sorts  of different  problems. These  problems manifested themselves in a variety of ways such a in relationship issues, temptation, worries, a lack of peace, an inability to cope with the pressures of life and so on. Even old problems they had sorted out long ago returned with a vengeance. They noticed  a change in their personality at an emotional and psychological level and they had a profound sense of being remote and distant from God. Owing to their “starvation diet” they had left themselves spiritually defenceless and being emotionally, psychologically and spiritually exhausted  they were left in no condition or state of mind to face these troubles.
In Ephesians 6:10-18 St Paul gave a chilling warning to every Christian. He warned  that unless a Christian ACTIVELY works  at his spiritual life, he will become spiritually defenceless against the powers of darkness. He warned  that in this life “we do not wrestle against mere flesh and blood but against…the evil spiritual powers of  this  age…”. The primary location of this battle is in a person’s  heart and mind.
Repeatedly, Scripture states that the human  race is set in the midst of a spiritual war and warns that there are spiritual forces at work attempting to influence people’s hearts  and  minds  towards darkness and despair. The only way  to counteract these dark influences  upon  us and  keep  these  foes at bay is to actively “take  up the whole armour  of God so that we may be able to stand in this evil day”. Taking up the whole armoury of God means using everything God has given us for our protection  and  growth  such  as Holy Communion, Bible reading,  praying and  having regular fellowship with other Christians.
When a person  turns to Christ and sets their heart on fire with love for Him, they need to keep on “feeding the fire” or it will go out. Every prayer time, and every Bible reading  time,  every  Church attendance  and fellowship time is like a piece of coal or wood being put on this fire to stop it going out. A person  doesn’t just become a Christian as though it was some one off event, they have to ACTIVELY REMAIN ONE,  constantly feeding the fire of love and faith with spiritual logs and coals.
The individual Christian is sometimes likened to a “fortress” in the desert. When that Christian spends regular quality time with God by having a daily prayer time etc, the defences are well maintained, the weapons are oiled and polished, the walls are high, the gate is up and all is well. The danger comes when an individual thinks “oh this is too time consuming”, the walls become neglected,  gaps develop, the gate falls down and before they know it their spiritual fortress is all but destroyed.  The frightening thing is that such  neglect actually invites “attack”. As we are warned in 1 Peter 5:8-9 “Be sober and vigilant,  because  your enemy  the devil walks about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. Resist him steadfast in the  faith.” Moreover, like the mule and his sawdust, this spiritual neglect  may be so gradual  it can  go unnoticed until something  major happens.
Scripture  teaches that making time for God is not “an added  extra” to our life, it is a profound  necessity. People are not saving time by neglecting their spiritual life, quite the reverse;  it is an invitation to all sorts of problems which may take months  or years of effort to resolve if indeed  they can be at all. The old phrase “A stitch in time saves nine” truly has a spiritual application. Making time for our relationship  with God is the most important  thing we do, it is the deciding  factor as to who has God in their life and who hasn’t.
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