Best Practices: Stewardship

A steward takes care of something on behalf of the owner. As all that we have and all that we are belongs to God, we are stewards. In this understanding, money is part of stewardship, but so is our time and so are the abilities God has given us. Terry Parsons has a helpful definition of stewardship as “Using the gifts God has given us to do the work He is calling us to do.”

At its best, your congregation’s stewardship program provides a conversion opportunity. This is the most important goal and is an act of the Holy Spirit for which one can only provide plant the seeds. This conversion of heart and mind around how one uses the gift of time and money will most likely involve a confrontation with or comparison of the messages of the culture versus the invitations from the Kingdom of God. For someone to go from “paying dues” to having a real theological understanding of giving back to God is a gift to that person. This is life changing in ways beyond what the church will receive.

Basic Assumptions

• Stewardship is about joyous acts of thanksgiving in response to all that God has given us. Therefore, stewardship is not about making people feel guilty.
• Stewardship is about changing hearts, minds and lives, which is a work of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, stewardship is not about cohersion.
• Stewardship is deeply involved in our relationship with God. Therefore, if you’re not talking about Jesus, it probably isn’t stewardship, but might be engaged in something more akin to collecting club dues.

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Some Best Practices

• Connect all stewardship materials to the vision, mission, and plan for your congregation. What is the vision? What will you do with the funds to further the mission? What will you accomplish when even more money comes in?
• Design your own pledge cards. Canned materials can not fit your congregation as well as what you create.
• Look for specific skills needed when recruiting a stewardship committee, then ask the people with those skills.
• Have lay people in the church talk to other lay people about their own giving, either through newsletter articles or speaking briefly during announcements in church.
• Change up the stewardship campaign each year, so that you are teaching new things, and using new ways of asking for and gathering pledges.

Next week, I will discuss four patterns for a stewardship campaign. Please share with me what your congregation is doing for stewardship so that I can share it here with the Diocese.

The Rev. Canon Frank Logue
Canon to the Ordinary

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