Editorial shortlist
Books about prayer itself — how to pray, what to do with unanswered prayer, and how a group can practice it together — each with a written study guide. Lengths run from seven sessions to seventeen.
15 studies below, drawn from 25 in the library that fit this list. Catalog facts last updated .
A guide qualifies when prayer and spiritual warfare is one of the topics its classification assigned: the book is about prayer, or about spiritual warfare, rather than a book that borrows battle language for another subject.
by Timothy Keller
Why it’s on this list
Keller works from the necessity and nature of prayer through confession, adoration and intercession, drawing on Augustine, Luther, Calvin and Owen. Twelve sessions, including one that is simply how to pray.
by Paul Miller
Why it’s on this list
Miller's diagnosis is that we stopped being needy, and the sessions cover why we do not pray, prayer cards, unanswered prayer, and prayer in community. Practical rather than theological, and honest about how hard prayer is.
by Priscilla Shirer
Why it’s on this list
Ten prayer strategies, one per session, each aimed at a specific target — fears, temptations, the mind, identity, hurts. The last sessions build a war room, so the study ends with a habit rather than a summary.
by Priscilla Shirer
Why it’s on this list
Each session takes one piece of armor from Ephesians 6, then one more to put the whole thing together. Nine sessions and 68 questions keep the study inside a single term.
by Mark Batterson
Why it’s on this list
Batterson builds on the legend of Honi and presses toward bold, specific, persistent prayer — dream big, pray hard, pray long, pray through. Groups uneasy with promise-claiming language should read the first chapter before committing to thirteen sessions of it.
by Richard J. Foster
Why it’s on this list
Foster organizes prayer as moving inward, upward and outward, and the sessions take two or three of his twenty-one prayers at a time — examen, relinquishment, adoration, contemplative, intercessory, healing. 112 questions, the most on this list.
by Max Lucado
Why it’s on this list
Lucado's pocket prayer — Father, you are good; I need help; they need help; thank you — is taken one clause at a time. The lightest reading per session here, which suits a group with little time for homework.
by Tyler Staton
Why it’s on this list
Staton's chapters are the parts of prayer people find hardest: silence, unanswered prayer, lament, confession, intercession, persistence. Twelve sessions and 96 questions, written from inside the 24/7 prayer movement.
by Stephen Kendrick & Alex Kendrick
Why it’s on this list
Seventeen sessions covering the purpose of prayer, hindrances, posture, types, fasting, and praying for family, the lost, the church and the nation. The longest and most systematic study on this list.
by Mark Vroegop
Why it’s on this list
Vroegop teaches lament from the psalms and Lamentations across nine sessions — sorrow's road map, weeping with hope, and lonely, communal and angry lament. The right prayer study for a group carrying real grief.
by Beth Moore
Why it’s on this list
Moore's chapters each name a stronghold — unbelief, pride, idolatry, prayerlessness, addiction, unforgiveness, depression, guilt, doubt — and pray Scripture against it. It goes to hard places, so it needs a group that already trusts one another.
by Mark Batterson
Why it’s on this list
The forty-day challenge is grouped into seven sessions — pray through, think long, pray hard, circle your family, pray the Word. Seven sessions and 54 questions make it the shortest study on this list.
by Priscilla Shirer
Why it’s on this list
The guide for Discerning the Voice of God runs 11 sessions with 78 discussion questions, filed under Spiritual Growth & Disciplines and Prayer & Spiritual Warfare. It is on this list because its guide is classified under prayer and spiritual warfare; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
by Louie Giglio
Why it’s on this list
The guide for Don't Give the Enemy a Seat at Your Table runs 11 sessions with 88 discussion questions, filed under Prayer & Spiritual Warfare and Mental Health & Wellness. It is on this list because its guide is classified under prayer and spiritual warfare; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
by John Bevere
Why it’s on this list
The guide for The Bait of Satan runs 12 sessions with 87 discussion questions, filed under Prayer & Spiritual Warfare and Christian Living. It is on this list because its guide is classified under prayer and spiritual warfare; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
Christian books for small groups
Titles a mixed adult group can study together, with session and question counts.
Women's Bible study books
Studies written for women's ministry, from Scripture studies to books on the thought life.
Men's Bible study books
Titles written to men, plus the leadership and apologetics studies men's groups pick up.
Books for new believers
Books that explain the faith from the ground up, ordered from the lightest reading to the heaviest.
Marriage books for couples
Marriage and relationship studies, with a note on how candid each one gets.
Books on grief and loss
Studies on grief, suffering and loss for care ministries and groups walking through a hard season.
Christian classics for book clubs
Devotional classics and true stories, with a note on how demanding the prose is.
Christian books on anxiety
Studies on anxiety, the thought life, burnout and boundaries, ordered from plainest to most clinical.