Prayer and Giving, Part 4: Prayerful Generosity
“How do I decide where to give?”
I get asked that question often. This post suggests three ways to practice prayerful generosity.
Let’s start with the prayerful part:
What do you pray about? Whom do you pray for?
Giving and prayer are both spiritual practices. And practices take practice. Don’t worry if you need to keep starting over, grace has you covered!
Let your money follow your prayers.
One: The local church - a generosity experiment
If you’re a person who prays in a worship setting with other believers, giving money to that congregation makes a great place to start. “Lord, help me to be generous.”
Choose an amount you can afford and give regularly. Consider it an experiment in generosity: Does it increase your connection to your church? Did you miss the money? Spoiler alert: probably not.
Amp up the experiment and pray for your giving:
“Dear God, thank you for everything you’ve given me. I’m especially grateful for your grace in sending Jesus. Please accept this gift and use it to bless my church. Help my church to be a blessing to others. Help my heart to grow bigger. Amen.”
Align your prayers and your generosity.
Two: Community Connections
What are your church’s community connections? It might a food bank, homeless shelter etc. They might teach English to newcomers, help kids with homework, check in on seniors and all sorts of wonderful things.
Sadly, churches often assume people know what they do. People do not know. Trust me on this, I’ve drunk coffee in many church basements. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ll know that “tell stories” figures frequently in my advice to church leaders!
Check your church’s website, ask around and see what your church does in the community. If you can talk to someone who works or volunteers at a charity your church supports, it makes it easier to connect and donate.
Align your prayers and your generosity.
Three: Love your neighbour
Neighbours can be both close and far. I am always encouraged when churches can work together in loving their neighbours. For instance, the Canada Food Grains Bank (CFGB) works toward a world without hunger. Their website lists support from Seventh Day Adventists, Baptists, Lutherans, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, the Catholic Church, Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, Evangelical Missionary Church of Canada, Mennonites, Church of the Nazarene, Presbyterian Church in Canada, Anglican Church of Canada, Salvation Army, United Church of Canada, Christian Reformed Church in North American and Tearfund Canada—which is an association of eight denominations.
That’s quite a list! Is your denomination on the list? It could be that through your giving to your local church, you are already supporting your denomination and that your denomination supports CFGB.
“Wait, Lori, are you suggesting that when I support my local church, which supports my denomination, that I am helping to feed hungry people around the globe - cooperating with other Christians - and no one has mentioned this, not once?”
Yes, it’s entirely possible. Again, some detective work may be required. Not every church supports their denomination and denominational funding is complicated. Like I said, churches frequently understate (or keep entirely silent!) in communicating their impact in the world.
Giving to help create a better world is another way your money can follow your prayers.
Local church, community, neighbours far away. This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but I hope it helps you imagine what prayerful generosity can look like!