Prayer Focus: Generosity and Focus
Central Scripture: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21)
Prayer:
Merciful Father, I thank You today for Your incredible generosity to us. Lord, You lavish blessings on me and have given me more than I could ever ask for. It is Your heart to give to the ones You love, and I thank You for the ways You pour out amazing things on us, Your children. Please forgive me for the ways I so often overlook the things You give, simply because in my limited sight it doesn’t seem like enough or what I expected. Help me to see every gift You give as the perfect love gift of the perfect kind at the perfect time.
Father, I pray that You would cultivate in my family a spirit of generosity that reflects Your heart. Help my husband, my children, and I to be characterized more by what we want to give away than what we want to accumulate. And yet, God, please don’t allow us to give in ways that are showy or for recognition. Let us give in secret, knowing that You see and that is enough.
God, help us not to be materially focused. It is so easy to look around us and see things that we think we need to have, but God, I pray against that tendency. The appetite for “more” is a hard one to tame, but I pray that by Your Spirit at work within us we would rise above that craving. Lord, You have told us not to store up for ourselves treasures here on earth, because those things are not what matter and will not last. Embed that truth into our minds so that no matter what we see around us…no matter what commercials say…no matter what other people have or are doing with their money, we are unimpressed and unmoved.
Please, Father, help us not to be distracted by the glitz and glamor of our consumer-driver world. Help us to keep our eyes on You above all else.
Lord, I pray that my husband and children would increase in their spirits of generosity. Help my husband to pursue ways to bless others with what You have given us, rather than to pursue ways to bless ourselves. Please give him opportunities to be an example of generosity in a greedy world, without shining a light on him as the generous one. Help him to give all glory to You.
Father God, I pray that my children would grow up seeing generosity modeled in our home and would learn habits of giving. Please shield them from the materialism of the world, preventing them from being obsessed with possessions. Help them to learn what really matters, and to live life searching for ways to pour into the lives of others.
Please cultivate a real sense of contentment in our home, Lord. Help us all to look around us and appreciate all that we have without seeing holes and things that we want. Help us to keep only the things we use and need, and show us how to give away the excess. Help us to hold our possessions with a loose grip, willingly releasing them when the time or the need arises. Lord, all that we have is from You and belongs to You. Help us to really believe that and to live like we know it is true.
Amen.