This weekend I am preaching on the subject of giving and generosity. Sadly, speaking about handling money is one of the most unpopular topics for pastors to preach on. Often if we touch the subject at all, we do so with the awkwardness of a 16-year old chess club member asking a cheerleader to the junior prom! And the televangelists don't help us any. Many people filter their views about Christianity through the skewed lense they see in the Big-Haired, Rolex-wearing, Benz-driving guys begging for money on TV. Please understand, I'm not judging you if you drive a Benz or wear a nice watch.....unless you are simultaneously begging for money!
Back on topic, the reality is that generosity (with our money, talent and time) is a deeply spiritual issue and is addressed in hundreds of places in the Bible. Yet (along with "Hell" and the Book of Leviticus) generosity is usually one of our least favorite subjects. This should not be so! As the soon-to-be-installed new lead pastor of our church, it is my responsibility to teach the whole counsel of God - both the comfortable and the uncomfortable. You might be thinking, "Isn't that a dangerous thing to tackle before you've even been officially installed - especially in the midst of an economic recession?" My answer would be "NO WAY!" (C'mon, I recently taught a 4-week series on SEX - and nobody ran me off for that!)
Next month, our church will celebrate the 30th year of ministry of our founding pastor - and shortly thereafter he will hand the ball off to me. I am humbled by this and reminded of what life was like 30 years ago when he began at Valley Church. America was facing deep economic recession, the wake of an unpopular war, and the heat of moral upheaval generated by the 1960's and 70's. (Does any of this sound familiar?). And through it all, Valley has become one of the most influential and impacting churches in our city. Ultimately it has been all God's doing. But God works through people! Specifically, people who learn to be increasingly generous with the precious resources God loans to us in this life - our time, talents and treasure. Our founding pastor never let the challenges of the day quench his faith in God's ability to do great things - and I pray for that same grace for myself and the people who join with me on the next leg of our journey!
If you don't have a church, come join us this week at Valley or visit us online at www.valleychurch.com. And keep checking back for our new web site coming soon!
This is a great topic Jeremy. I am banking on the fact that you have named this blog "Raw and Relevant"! I am going to be pretty raw and transparent here and that is ALWAYS a risk on a blog. I am NOT out to start any arguments, these are HONEST thoughts I have and I will be the first to admit I am far from confident that I am having the right frame of mind on this topic. All I know is I have experienced a lot of stuff that makes me question and I just want to know what God says about my thoughts...sooo, here I go. I have no problem giving of my talents, time and money. The issue I have with this topic is the fine line between doing it out true love for Christ and doing it out of obligation/expectation. Unfortunatley, I had to learn about this "fine line" the hard way. I feel churches need to be cautious in how they lead and direct their people in this area. I don't think most church leaders INTEND to guilt their people into service or giving of their money, but it is a line which is easily crossed and often does not come across as "in your face". Because churches are dependent on their congregation for money and service to function, it is easy to make people feel like if they are going to serve they should serve in one of the churches ministries and give all 10% of their tithe to their church. I am not sure that is right. I have experienced churches pressure their people to serve in ministries because "the workers are few". However, if you are not CALLED to that ministry, should you be in it? Do you fill a space just to keep the ministry running or do you seek those who are truly called? What if your personal "ministry" directs you outside the church walls? What if this outside calling makes it so you NEVER serve within your church? I have experienced churches devaluing that and even frowning upon it because it is not directly related to THEIR church. My point here is that if you are called to serve inside your church then do it if that is where God has you. However, there are SOME people who get pressure to serve within the church or they are not viewed or even recognized as "serving God", that is wrong! Now money is a whole other can of worms I can open here! I am struggling with the question of does your 10% need to ALL go to your church? I have been taught that this is expected. How can I give with a happy heart if I feel called to give some of my tithe toward another ministry outside of my church? Am I expected to give "above and beyond" to cover that? I never heard a tithing sermon that has NOT said we should tithe 10% to our church. I have never heard a tithing sermon that says "the Bible says to give 10% of your income, but it is ok if you split the percentage between the places God has laid on your heart to give to". Now I confess, I have yet to do my own indepth search of the scriptures to answer this question, but the little I HAVE done has never said you must give all 10% to your church. What are your thoughts on this? Like I said, please don't view my comment as angry, defensive or challenging, I simply want to know what is right. Thanks for this venue, very cool!
ReplyDelete