Known To God
In Philippians 4:6 it is written, "Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known to God."
We are aware that our omniscient God knows all things, so why the term to "make your wants known to God'? Digging into the Greek word, one of the descriptions is to declare. When we bow down in prayer to God, we are declaring to Him what is important to us, what we do not have the ability to manifest on our own. We are humbling ourselves, regarding and revering Him as the Creator, and asking Him to intervene.
Many people can swiftly come to God in prayer for healing, but do not approach Him with the same eagerness and faith regarding their finances... even though Paul made it clear in our opening verse above how broad the invitation from God is - anything, every circumstance and in everything.
The words also point to this being beyond meeting our basic needs - which of course we want to bring in prayer, but the verse states to make our wants known to God. We are not to be requesting a fleet of Rolls-Royce's, but God intends to give us good things to those who ask Him (Matthew 7:11).
Take some time and get honest and sincere with God, identifying if what is needed is an increase in finances, a decrease in spending, or both. A great way to engage in prayer is to bring God's Word before Him, which strengthens your faith in the request. We'll look at some applications next.
Looking at increase, obviously we consider our vocation and we can bring Deuteronomy 28:12 in prayer of "The Lord will bless all the work of your hands". We can humble ourselves and bring to the Lord James 1:5, "If any of you is deficient in wisdom, let him ask of the giving God Who gives to everyone liberally and ungrudgingly." At position, we can call upon Psalm 75:6-7, "For not from the east not from the west nor from the south come promotion and lifting up. But God is the Judge! He puts down one and lifts up another."
But I can also share that our own "day-to-day" faithfulness in our work can move God to bring unexpected blessings. My manager once called me into her office, concerned if I was happy (I was). A few minutes later I was assigned some minor duties and given more than a 10% raise. My wife Karen, working for the government, out of the blue had a reclassification to her position resulting in over a 15% raise. In another instance, after a merger the company decided to increase my pay by a substantial amount - to be equal with those in our company nationally at the position.
I also encourage you to pray for your companies, that they would use Godly wisdom and integrity and that they would prosper.
Turning to a decrease in spending, which many have a need of in order to remove debts, we can ask God to help us obey the promptings of the Holy Spirit as in Galatians 5:16, "Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh." We can seek to and ask according to Psalm 91:1 of "He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall remain stable and fixed under the shadow of the Almighty." Asking Him to help dwell closely to Him and being stable and fixed will help us tremendously against the temptation to overspend.
And along the same lines we covered earlier in James 1:5, we can ask God to give us wisdom in handling our finances and to spend less than we make. I believe a sincere prayer requesting wisdom in this area will result in God providing direction to the areas, small and large, where changes can be made to see an impact.
In closing, be encouraged to dismiss any hesitation of bringing your financial needs and wants to the Lord in prayer, for He has spoken these two beautiful verses:
"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." (Jeremiah 29:11)
"Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us." (Ephesians 3:20)
God Bless you and may He show Himself greatly to you,
Paul