12 Quick Hits This Morning

A Dozen Thoughts About Stewardship

1. Never think of stewardship as begging for money.  Your church does good work and you are inviting others to invest in that ministry.
2. Giving to God is not a transaction.  Anytime you give anyone a gift it is a reflection of your relationship.  Your commitment to the church should be a reflection of your relationship with God and His church.
3. We should talk about money more often.  If your members have a negative view of money in the church it may be because the only time we talk about it is when the news is bad:  we don’t have enough and they need to give more.
4. People give to change lives.
5. Money is never an end in itself in the church.  Money is a tool for ministry.  A bank account that is bursting at the seams but not used for ministry is like having a sanctuary no one is ever allowed to enter.
6. Too often we let those who are ashamed of what they give dictate the culture of money in our church.  This is like cancelling worship on a sunny day so the golfers don’t feel bad about skipping church.
7. When an elderly church member dies he is more likely to remember his college in his will than his church even though his relationship with the college peaked 60 years ago but his funeral was at the church.  Why?  Because the college is willing to ask for these gifts.
8. Money is one of the greatest sources of dysfunction in churches.
9. When a church experiences financial trouble, the first thing it is likely to do is cut funding to “outside” expenses like missions and outreach.  This begins a nearly-irreversible death spiral for both giving and attendance.
10. The members in the pews know about a tenth as much about church finances as the Finance Committee thinks they do.
11. Never underestimate the value of saying “thank you.”  Especially when those words come from someone whose life was changed because of their generosity.
12. Churches that have regular stewardship campaigns receive more money from their members than those that do not.  You get what you ask for, not what you wish for.