Prayer Point: The Most Important Prayer

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"I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe." Ephesians 1:17-19

Father, I come before you today to pray for my children. You are a gracious and merciful God, whose love is unending. You are always patient with me, forgiving me time and time again. I am so thankful for Christ's death for me which opened the curtain into your presence, allowing me to call you Abba.

I confess that I so often come to you in prayer about the health and behavior of my children. I've prayed for their healing from illness and from surgeries. I've prayed for particular behavioral changes. I've asked for help and wisdom in dealing with tantrums and defiance and in weeding out discontent and selfishness.

But increasingly more and more, I've come to see that while those prayers are good, that you do hear them and accept them, there is one prayer that stands above them all. While asking for healthy bodies and good behavior certainly makes my life easier, it doesn't address my children's most serious and deadly ailment: their heart.

The most important prayer I can pray for them is that they would see their sin and their need for you. I ask that you humble them before you. Pierce their heart so that they would see their need for the gospel of grace. I pray that they would know that there is nothing they can do to earn your love or to keep your love. Draw them to the foot of the cross. I pray that they would be overcome and overwhelmed by your love for them. I ask that it would so fill their hearts that their love for you in response to your love, overflows beyond measure.

I pray, along with Paul, that my children would know the hope that is theirs in Christ. I pray that your Spirit would enlighten them, grant them wisdom, and understanding. Help them to come to know you in deeper and deeper ways.

You have been teaching me in my own heart that change happens from the inside out. Help me to parent them in this way. I ask that you would give me grace to speak to their heart and model the grace of the gospel in all my interactions with them. Please keep me from being a barrier between them and the gospel.

I thank you for the power of the gospel. May it be the motivation for my children's growth as well as my own. I thank you that because of Jesus, all is grace.

In Jesus' name, Amen
Christina

P.S.  Christina has a beautiful printable of this prayer for you to download and print for free!  I love it!  -Desiré

Christina Fox is a homeschooling mom to two young boys, 7 and 4 years. She is also a licensed mental health counselor. Prior to having children, she worked as a child psychotherapist. She blogs transparently about her struggles with depression, her growth in faith, challenges in parenting, and her homeschooling journey at www.toshowthemjesus.com. When not homeschooling or writing, she can be found reading a good book with a mug of black coffee at her side.  You can find her on facebook as well.