God is not an insurance policy to use when you get into trouble.  It doesn't work that way.

After David the king repented from his sins, he made an interesting comment in Psalm 32:  "...every one that is godly (hopefully all us who profess Christ) pray unto Him in a time when He may be found..."  The time to pray is when God is listening.  When is that?

David was commenting on the condition that he found himself in--when he had committed the sins of adultery and murder.  He thought he had gotten away with it.  But God quit listening to him.  God "couldn't be found" by David--because of sin.  He was separated from God.

Isaiah  59:1 says:  "Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.  But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that He will not hear."

In other words, God has an arm  long enough to reach you--but He won't.  However, there's nothing wrong with his arm.  And God's hearing is perfect--but he won't listen to you.  There's nothing wrong with His hearing.  The Psalm says "...pray while He may be found..."  Reaching God's ear requires a repentant heart.  That does not mean "I'm sorry."  It means, "I'm sorry and I won't do that again.  Ever."  Repentance.  Then, and only then, can He be found.  God's not your personal flunky.

So you can't wait until you need Him to call on Him.  You need to be on a first name basis all the time.  Confessing known sin immediately, repenting, and asking Him to reveal that unknown sin you might be harboring.  In other words, we need to grow up in the Lord.   1 Corinthians. 3:2 says: "Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual, but as worldly--as infants in Christ.  I gave you milk, not meat, for you were not yet ready for meat...for you are worldly."  God expects us to mature.

In Hebrews 5:12-13 he says: "...you are dull of hearing...by this time you ought to be teachers, but you need someone to re-teach you the basic principles of God's word.  You need milk, not solid food.  Everyone who lives on milk is still an infant, inexperienced in the message of righteousness."