generosity

What I Wish I had Known about Stewardship

By Dave Briggs

Five insights that changed my awkward relationship with this core part of the Christian life and church ministry.

I grew up in church, and my family rarely missed a Sunday. I don’t remember a single sermon, but I do remember feeling nervous about the word stewardship.

Every September our church hosted Stewardship Sunday, where the minister would preach an emotional sermon stressing the need for everyone to give more. It worked—I left those services feeling guilty. To make matters worse, when I was in high school I was recruited to visit the homes of church members and present them with a Stewardship Pledge Card. It was my job to compel them to fill out their giving commitment for the coming year. They felt awkward. So did I.

Thankfully, in my mid-20s I was exposed to some outstanding teaching about the biblical perspective on stewardship. It changed the trajectory of my life. Things I had never seen before jumped out at me. I discovered that the Bible speaks about money and possessions more than any other topic except love. Jesus talked often and openly about our relationship with money.

For the last 14 years, I have served on staff at two large churches leading their stewardship ministries. During that time, I realized a surprising number of church leaders also have an awkward relationship with stewardship—similar baggage to my own. Here is what I wish I had known about stewardship.

  1. “Stewardship,” “generosity,” and “giving” are not synonyms.

I now realize, using these terms interchangeably confuses people. Stewardship is a role, giving is an act, and generosity is an attitude. In biblical times, a steward was a respected person of high integrity who was entrusted with the master’s possessions. The steward managed the possessions in accordance with the master’s wishes. Since God created and still owns all we have, stewardship is recognizing that God is the owner and we are his managers, responsible for using God’s possessions to please him. This elevates “stewardship” for people.

Generosity involves a willingness to sacrifice for the benefit of others. Giving is merely the act of releasing something of value. Giving can be done without generosity (the Pharisees are one example), but you cannot be generous without giving. However, generosity is only one characteristic of a biblical steward. A steward’s primary responsibility is to manage the resources that are not given away. Take a look at the Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25:14–28 for a good example of both positive and negative stewardship.

  1. Poor stewardship is dangerous for you; rich stewardship is for your benefit.

When I communicate to people about money, I guide them to understand that I want something for them, not something from them. If my teaching on money is only about giving to the church, people will check their phones, and I’ll miss a great opportunity to help them grow.

Poor stewardship is dangerous for you. Between 25 and 50 percent of church attenders give nothing or next to nothing. This is not a financial problem but a spiritual one. God is a giver. Our willingness to give reveals our relationship to God.

Examples can be found throughout Scripture, but two of the most potent are found in Luke 12 and Revelation 3.

In Luke 12:15–21, we see a rich farmer blessed with an abundant crop. He gives no credit to God, nor does he give thought to being a steward. He thinks only about himself. Jesus calls him a fool, not because he had great possessions, but because his possessions had him.

In Revelation 3:14–17, we get to eavesdrop on God’s letter to the church in Laodicea. The people in the church believed their material blessings indicated they were right with God. But God exposed their blindness, nakedness, and depravity.

In both cases, a harmful relationship with wealth became the root of spiritual blindness.

On the other hand, rich stewardship benefits everyone.

The Acts 2 church provides an encouraging contrast to the church in Laodicea. In Acts 2:42–47, the early church lives out a culture of stewardship. Verse 45 says, “They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need.” This first-century church is a beautiful picture of generosity in action, even in their scarcity.

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  1. Stewardship is about hearts, not causes.

We live in a world fraught with causes to support. Yet the point of stewardship isn’t about causes, important as they may be. Jesus surprised his disciples with this principle. The story of Mary and the expensive perfume in Mark 14:3–9 is one example. During a visit to the home of Simon the Leper, a woman emerges with a year’s wages worth of precious perfume and pours it on Jesus. Some of the disciples grumbled, imagining all it could have accomplished for the poor. But Jesus wanted to focus their attention on the heart of the giver. This woman showed her deep love for Jesus through the use of her resources. The disciples missed the point. When we make God our highest priority, our desire is to honor him. This releases a spirit of love, which releases resources to meet real needs.

In 2 Corinthians 8:8, Paul addresses this same concept when challenging the early Macedonian church: “I am not commanding you, but want to test the sincerity of your love.” Generosity, even amidst poverty, reveals our love for God (2 Cor. 8:2).

  1. We need more teaching about money, not less.

When I became a stewardship pastor, I was shocked to discover how much people were struggling financially. Money is an emotional topic, so people want to hide their financial struggles. They often feel they are not in a position to be generous. Avoiding the topic of money only deepens the problem. Preaching frequently about money creates a greater willingness in your people to address their financial health.

Here are three aspects of money to address to help your people grow as stewards:

The practical aspect: This involves teaching people how to organize their finances and manage their money. We have all preached at some point on the Good Samaritan, but have you taught this parable from a financial perspective? In Luke 10, the Good Samaritan not only gave of himself, but he was also a good steward. He saved money in advance for an unknown and unforeseen need. Because he was a saver, he had a surplus from which to express his generosity to the wounded traveler.

The emotional aspect: This is rarely addressed and usually leads to bad financial decisions. When it comes to money, if the heart overrules the head, the result is frequently disastrous. Just follow teenagers around the mall to see what I mean.

The spiritual aspect: Your people will never be good stewards if they do not align their financial decision making with the wisdom of God’s Word. It’s that simple.

A powerful example of how our relationship to money impacts our spiritual lives is found in the parable of the four seeds and the four soils in Mark 4. Beginning in verse 18, Jesus explains the meaning of the third seed: “Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful”. Don’t miss the striking message here. A wrong relationship with money robs God’s Word of its fruitfulness in our lives.

However, Jesus gives us good news in explaining the fourth seed: “Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.” Isn’t this the kind of multiplication we want to see in every area of our lives and churches? Teaching your people to resist the deceptive power of wealth will keep the door to their hearts open to accept the Word and to experience fruitfulness.

  1. Your relationship with money impacts your relationship with God.

This energized me to leave behind the financial apprehension of my childhood and commit to helping people grow in this area. Stewardship is not a financial ministry; it is a discipleship ministry. If people don’t hear teaching and preaching about money, they are left exposed to one of Satan’s favorite tools.

In Matthew 6:24, Jesus says it is impossible to serve two masters. Either we will follow and serve the powerful force of Mammon (greedy pursuit of wealth) or we will serve the one true God. It is not possible to do both.

In one of the saddest passages in Scripture, we experience a conversation between Jesus and a rich young ruler. In Luke 18, the intelligent and influential man asks Jesus what he must do to gain eternal life. Jesus engages him in conversation and learns that the man believes he has kept the commandments from an early age. Knowing the one thing holding the young ruler back, Jesus asks him to part with his wealth and follow. When confronted with prioritizing Jesus or his wealth, the rich young man chooses his wealth.

The stakes are high. We cannot leave our people lacking a clear understanding of the spiritual implications of their relationship with money.

As I’ve learned over time, if you build a healthy stewardship culture, your church will never be the same. Your people will grow closer to God, your congregation will experience increased spiritual vitality, and greater resources will be unleashed for kingdom impact.

This article was originally published at: Christianity Today

 

Taking Care of the Poor: The Most Ignored Command in the Bible?

By Tyler Huckabee

From cover to cover, a few consistent themes arise in the Bible. The idea of a creator God, the Messiah, and the afterlife are just a few of the Bible’s more frequently revisited topics. But any list of the Bible’s most commonly discussed subject must include this: the persistent, passionate, unwavering stance on the poor.

Whatever else the Bible may remain mysterious on — whatever its other intricacies and tensions — it could not be clearer on how to treat those in poverty. God loves the poor and commands us to give to them. It is as simple as that.

This is true of both Testaments.

“If there is a poor man among you, one of your brothers, in any of the towns of the land which the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart, nor close your hand to your poor brother; but you shall freely open your hand to him, and generously lend him sufficient for his need in whatever he lacks.” (Deut. 15:7-8)

“He who is gracious to a poor man lends to the LORD, and He will repay him for his good deed.” (Prov. 19:17)

“But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you.” (Luke 14:13-14)

“If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.” (1 John 3:17-18)

Here’s the thing. I doubt many people reading this are terribly surprised by this. Chances are, you’re well aware of what the Bible says about the poor. You know the Bible says we should be generous in how we treat them. Very few Christians would argue that God wants us to be stingy around poor people or suspicious of them.

So here’s the question: why don’t we obey?

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EXCUSES, EXCUSES

A study last year by the Kaiser Institute and the Washington Post found that 46 percent of Christians are likely to blame poor people for their own poverty, as compared to just 29 percent of non-Christians. The divide is even stronger when you single out white evangelicals, 53 percent of whom blame poverty on “a lack of effort.”

In contrast, atheists, agnostics and “unaffiliated” persons are more likely to say difficult circumstances are to blame for poverty by a margin of nearly two to one.

So what gives? Why are Christians, whose own Bible is stuffed to the binding with instructions to care for and be gracious to the poor, so much likelier to consider them lazy?

Helen Rhee, a historian who studies wealth and poverty in Christianity, told the Washington Post that she thinks it has something to do with Christian eschatology. That is, as premillennialism — the theology that holds that Jesus could return at any moment — became the dominant end times theory in American evangelicalism, Christians grew less concerned with making the world a better place. From this perspective, Rhee told the Post, “the world is already lost. Things are going to get worse and worse …You’ve got to just focus on what is important – that is, salvation of the soul.”

This has led to an attitude that implicitly ties poverty to morality. Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, described this attitude to the Post this way: “There’s a rightful Christian impulse to consider poverty a moral issue …[but] I think conservative Christians often have a very inadequate understanding of the structural dimension of sin.”

In other words, sin is the cause of all poverty, but not all poverty is because of individual sin. There is also communal sin that results in widespread poverty: greed and corruption that leave innocent people poor.

You can see this in the Bible, where the authors – far from condemning the poor — repeatedly identify them as blessed, even Christlike. Beyond Jesus’ famous “Blessed are the poor,” there are verses like Proverbs 19:17, which says, “He who is gracious to a poor man lends to the LORD, and He will repay him for his good deed.”

And then Matthew 25, where Jesus says that “the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”

In these verses and many more, it’s entirely clear that God Himself identifies with the poor. Far from holding them responsible for their current state, He Himself is manifested in them.

GRACE

“They did this to themselves.”

“If I give to them, how do I know they won’t abuse it?”

“I’m going to wait until a better time to give.”

These are the excuses we often use for not being generous with the poor, but the more you look at the Bible, the lamer they sound. What if God dispensed His grace with the same cautious frugality we use in giving our money? “She did this to herself. If I’m gracious to him, how do I know he won’t abuse it?”

No. In God, we have a perfect picture of what generosity looks like, and it’s one we ought to follow. Perhaps there is some wisdom in making sure we’re not using our money to enable unhealthy addictions, but at this point, many of us have poisoned our generous spirit with so much suspicion that we tend to assume anyone who’s poor is just going to misuse whatever money we give instead of being giving to them the way God told us to: as if we were giving to God Himself. Do we really want to spend our lives suspecting God of being someone who will misuse our money on drugs and alcohol?

The Bible is clear. The need is clear. The mission is clear. And it’s also clear that the excuses Christians have invented to protect themselves from financial generosity don’t stand up to the slightest bit of scrutiny. Commands about the poor may not be the most discussed subject in the Bible, but they could very well be the most ignored. It’s time to turn that around.

This article was originally published at: Relevant Magazine

2017 Thank Offering for the World Evangelism Fund

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We must fix our sights on places where the church is not yet, engaging in intercessory prayer, sacrificial giving, and physically going to and mobilizing others to go to these places. Each time you give to the World Evangelism Fund, you send the message of the gospel into areas where “the church is not yet.”

For more information and to download the resources visit the official website: nazarene.org/generosity

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