As I shared with you, my readers, the 19th Step on John’s Ladder is difficult to truly understand in many ways. No one, not even the saints, can live without sleep. But if we truly love prayer (especially when we know that work and other obligations will be devouring a good deal of our time), we can spend a little less time in bed so that we can spend a little more time at prayer. The more the flesh is disciplined and subjected to the will of the spirit, the easier this becomes. That’s John’s advice.

However, tiredness or lack of sleep can affect out prayer. It is surely better to get a reasonable amount of sleep and spend less time praying, but with an alert and focused mind, than to deprive ourselves of sleep only to stand there trying to pray while half awake. While this is true, we must consider whether it is tiredness or despondency that is interfering with out prayer. But whatever the case, a more acute perception of God’s presence is the remedy for that problem. St. John writes: “The man who considers with sensitivity of heart that he is standing before God will be an immovable pillar in prayer.”

What do we consider important enough to stay awake and alert for? It is easy to become enthralled by a late-night movie on the television that forces us to stay awake till the end, even though we make have wanted sleep. I could have chosen more important things than a movie over sleep. Perhaps the same is true for prayer.

Why is it that the spirit, which is strong, is overpowered by the flesh, which is weak? It is because we are not sensitive to the presence of God. We give the flesh what it wants and starve the spirit of what it needs. If only we could sense and perceive His presence every morning, every night, every day.

We must desire to gain God’s presence!