To watch and pray, it activates 2 different human cognitive functions within our human brain. Both are voluntary acts that are performed consciously as a result of an effort or determination. It is a voluntary act by which we are able to begin it and also to end it.
When we are told to watch, our perceiving functions are sensing and intuition. These functions determine how we take in information; through our five senses (sensing) or through patterns and underlying meanings (intuition) happening around us.
Prayer, on the other hand, involves and is related to a wider range of cognitive processes such as perception, language, planning or organization, memory etc.
Both Watch & Pray were being emphasized repeatedly by the apostles in their epistles and by our Lord Himself, as recorded by His disciples in the gospels and Revelations.
We were told to watch and pray, lest we fall into: temptations or we will miss the important event of the coming of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
Jesus knew our weaknesses of humanity that was why He took on flesh, besides, being our sacrifice as the perfect Lamb of God. We are warned to watch and take heed, lest our hearts are weighed down with the cares of this world. Many temptations in life can and will put us off-track in our earthly sojourn, ensnare us to miss the ultimate prize of following the cross. We are encouraged by Apostle Paul to persevere in his epistle to the Ephesians. Jesus cautioned us that the spirit is always willing, but the flesh is weak.
However, I found numerous bible verses, or rather of Jesus’ warning to heed the day or the hour in which the Son of Man is coming. At the Garden of Gethsemane, after His intense prayer, He found His disciples asleep. He knew what was to take place soon, the flurry of inhumane events that would usher in the dispensation of Grace. He chided Peter for not being able to watch with Him for an hour. He will and had warned us to stay vigilant, always watch and pray, as we watched the world grow dimmer towards the momentous event of His coming back to receive us. HE used different analogies to emphasise the seriousness of missing out His return. If that were so, we must take heed, as we do not know the day, or the hour in which the Son of Man is coming. His secretive coming is similar to a thief breaking into the house of unsuspecting tenants. We certainly do not want to be caught surprised when He appeared.
Hence, if we will not watch, Jesus will come as like a thief; for we will not know what time Jesus will come. Take heed!