Why Troubles are So Needful

 "This is an exhortation to prayer in extreme anxiety. Certain it is that when there is no distress there is no prayer. Or if there is a prayer it is feeble and listless, without sap and drive. That is why troubles are so needful. It is better to suffer a trial than to own a house, for all the riches in the world are not to be compared with a severe trial. The reason is that when there is no trial we are complacent and do not ask nor seek after God...No one can pray who has not known calamity. Prayers are unavailing which lack the great treasure, the holy cross."

-from Martin Luther's Easter Book, p. 32