In addition, fervent prayer is the primary means of understanding and studying the word of God contained in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. The Holy Scriptures contain the highest truths of Divine wisdom, which the limited and sin-darkened human mind is unable to comprehend. And whoever tries to comprehend the mysteries of the Divine economy with his own mind, as a rule, deviates to the path of false teachings. Therefore, a Christian who wants to understand the true meaning of the Divine Scriptures must "pray fervently to the Giver of wisdom, God" (2:18).

Prayer is also a powerful weapon in the struggle of a Christian with the spirits of evil. Always and everywhere he must be ready to repel every enemy pretext with prayer (3:444).

The heart of a Christian who converses with God in prayer is filled with the desire to distance himself from everything sinful and ungodly; In his soul there is maintained and strengthened a salvific zeal for a decisive struggle with sin and passions (1:191). During prayer, the heart of a Christian is freed from the bonds of earthly attachments and base desires. This factor is decisive in the struggle against sinful inclinations. Every sin, every impure passion arises, grows, and strengthens in man to the extent that he is attached to the flesh, the world, and the devil. But whoever performs a true and God-pleasing prayer not only dissolves the union with the source of sin, but also eliminates the possibility of further development of passions in his soul. That is why, even after praying, a person must maintain a prayerful mood in his soul and avoid ungodly deeds, sinful thoughts and desires. Following this path, a Christian acquires a special sensitivity to any sinful movement or pretext that constantly arises in the soul or is instilled from without. Prayer, therefore, protects the Christian from sinful inclinations, and in the event of a fall it is the best means for his healing (4:115).

The life path of a person on earth is difficult and thorny. Bodily illnesses, the death of loved ones, undeserved insults and oppressions, sudden disasters and various kinds of misfortunes weigh heavily on the shoulders of every person. On this thorny path, prayer is the best joy and consolation. Uniting man with the heavenly world, it convinces him of the Lord's immutable fatherly love for him, delights the heart with faith in the all-good Providence of God. And in the sorrows and sufferings that have come upon a person, prayer, in the best possible way, contributes to the cessation of hopeless anguish, despondency and sorrow, encourages the soul of a person, and encourages him to worthily bear the cross of life (2:325). In any trials of life, prayer teaches us to see the good sides in them, develops patience, courage, and devotion to the will of God. In addition, turning to God in prayer not only gives consolation in sorrows and trials, but often saves from troubles and even from death (1:191).

It is absolutely impossible to give an exhaustive answer about the significance of prayer in the matter of building the Kingdom of Heaven in the soul of a Christian. This remarkable virtue not only attracts saving grace into the soul of a Christian, but also unites him with God.

As great and priceless as the fruits of prayer are for a Christian, so pernicious is it for him to be weakened in prayer and neglect of it. Any good deed and undertaking that is not sanctified by prayer, i.e. not done for the sake of Christ, does not benefit a Christian in the matter of salvation. "Without diligent prayer," writes St. Tikhon of Zadonsk, "all diligence is in vain" (3:122). The soul of a Christian experiences special harm from abandoning prayer, when it is constantly occupied only with earthly cares and worldly cares.

In this case, it is afflicted with passions, darkened, loses the desire for a holy, God-pleasing life, and is likened to a bird that has no wings, or to a warrior who is in war without weapons (5: 167). And if in the soul of a Christian there appears a constant coldness, an aversion to the prayerful feat, then this is always a sure sign of spiritual weakness and illness. The one who abandons prayer is no longer a soldier of Christ and voluntarily yields victory to bodiless enemies in the invisible spiritual battle (4:51). The spiritual disorder of a Christian, resulting from neglect of prayer, can turn into an irreversible process leading to the spiritual death of a Christian, for after negligence about prayer, as a rule, there is an impoverishment of faith and its gradual extinction. A person loses the fear of God, begins to lead a vicious life, becomes corrupt, falls into despair because of a multitude of sins, and, finally, takes the path of obvious destruction (2:325).

In order to lead a virtuous life and not deviate to the path of sin, every Christian must know what a correct and God-pleasing prayer consists of and what are its signs. True prayer, created in the depths of the human spirit, may not have its external manifestation. A striking example of such a prayer is the heartfelt call to God of Moses, when he led the Israelites to the Red Sea. No one saw him praying at that time or crying out to God, because all this was happening in the recesses of his heart. Yet the Lord said to him in a loud voice, Why do you cry out to me? (Exodus 14:15). In the same way, Hannah, the mother of the prophet Samuel, spoke nothing with her lips, but only sighed to the Lord from the depths of her heart — and her prayer was heard (1 Samuel 1:13) (4:413-414). The main thing in prayer should be a living sense of God's presence and a deep, heartfelt feeling, because God looks at the heart of man. From this it follows that the prayer of a Christian should be concentrated and purposeful.

Correct prayer is always accompanied by a feeling of the deepest humility and reverence before God. Praying to the Creator of the visible and invisible world, who possesses infinite perfections, a Christian must clearly realize his unworthiness and believe that all the material and spiritual goods that he possesses are nothing other than God's gifts. In the depths of his spirit, the praying person must feel his insignificance and poverty, that he is unworthy to stand before the eternal and omnipotent Lord (4:39). He should not have even a shadow of conceit or a thought of any of his merits before God. Without such an attitude, prayer is useless, and appeals to God are in vain (2:39).

The heart of a true man of prayer is filled with Christian faith, hope and love; without them there can be no God-pleasing prayer (2:319). Living faith, firm hope, and unfeigned love for God arouse in the soul of a Christian a feeling of complete devotion to His all-holy will. A true man of prayer has the heartfelt assurance that the Lord knows all his physical and spiritual needs and is always ready to satisfy them, if only it is useful for his salvation.

Before any prayerful petition, a Christian must glorify God for His supreme holiness and perfection, thank his Creator for His care and providence for every person living on earth (3:258). Having given praise and thanksgiving, a Christian can ask the Heavenly Father for everything that serves for his own spiritual and physical benefit, and first of all, that the Lord strengthen faith in the soul, grant forgiveness of sins, purification of the heart from passions, strengthen in sorrows, troubles and temptations. Requests for bodily health, clothing, food, peace and other worldly goods should not be alien to the heart of the one who prays. Moreover, in prayer for spiritual needs, he should not doubt that he will receive what he asks for, for God Himself has confirmed by an oath that He does not want the death of the sinner (Ezekiel 33:11). Prayers for material goods cannot always be fulfilled by God, and this is because people very often ask for useless and even soul-damaging things for them (3:102-103).

But a Christian should pray not only for his own spiritual and bodily blessings. In his Christian love, he is obliged to compel himself to pray for other people, to ask God for mercy on them both in temporal and eternal life, for all Christians are one spiritual body, having one Head of the Lord Jesus Christ and enlightened by the one Spirit of God. Just as in the bodily organism all the members take care of each other, so in the spiritual body of the Church all its members must show the same care in prayer (2:328). Thus, every Christian should pray for the authorities, for church pastors, for relatives, loved ones, friends, and in general for all Christians. The most perfect and God-pleasing prayer is the one that is lifted up for enemies and ill-wishers. The Saviour Himself teaches His followers such a prayer, saying: "Pray for them that do you harm, and cast you out" (Matt. 5:44) (3:105).

The content of prayer can be determined not so much by the thoughts and feelings of a Christian, as by the influence of God's grace on his soul, for man himself, according to the words of the Apostle, does not know what to pray for as he ought to pray (Romans 8:26). When, stirred up by grace, prayer proceeds from the heart, when a person briefly but earnestly cries: "O Lord, have mercy! Oh, Lord, be merciful! O Lord, hear and save!" – such a prayer passes through heaven and ascends to the throne of the Lord Almighty (4:342). Prayer performed in the depths of the human spirit can also be manifested in the external actions of the person praying, such as raising his eyes and hands to heaven, kneeling, pronouncing the words of the prayer aloud (3:105). However, the power and significance of prayer lies not in the mechanical pronunciation of words, not in the number of prostrations, but in God-pleasing thoughts and feelings. That is why all Christians should listen to God alone in prayer, "so that both body and spirit they may fall before Him, and what the tongue speaks, the mind and heart should not be silent; in a word, so that the inside of the one who prays is in harmony with the outside" (4:40). Earnestly standing before God with his body in prayer, a Christian must see to it that his inner disposition also corresponds to the movements of the body, for it often happens that, standing before the body in prayer, his mind and heart are far removed from the heavenly world.

Of great interest to all those who deal with questions of Christian asceticism is the teaching of St. Tikhon of Zadonsk on how to learn true and God-pleasing prayer. The Holy Father was prompted to elucidate this question in detail in his works by the unworthy attitude of his contemporaries to the prayer activities; many of whom either completely abandoned the work of prayer, or prayed with "extreme negligence", without understanding the content of prayers, not knowing "to whom and for what they pray" (4:316-317).