Giving Revisited
It’s been a long, hard year! We normally think of giving as people in the seats putting dollars in the plate. Well, we haven’t had people in the seats of our churches for months now and it may be a few more before attendance picks up. Statistics from Horizons Stewardship tell us that only 6% of churches are meeting in sanctuaries, now. Another hard truth is that 74% of church giving comes from people born before 1964. Only 26% comes from people born after that date. This is a long term trend and the pandemic seems to have nothing to do with this fact. Churches must refocus on how to deal with giving and stewardship.
Personal financial training is a step in the discipleship process that we somehow have missed. Churches have become complacent because in the past someone would step up and write a check to cover the need. Today that often is not the case. I pastored a church once where a wealthy man who owned a factory would write a check for whatever the church needed. Members of the church began to rely on that and became very happy to let this man do it. What is missing in this concept is that giving and generosity were never meant for a few but for all! Some can give more than others but all are called to give.
Churches are becoming more and more ethnically and economically diverse. As recently as 2002, 69% of American households gave to charity. That number fell to 55% in 2014 and the trend continues. I had a church that had over 49% of its members giving zero!
The church today is not teaching percentage giving. We are not challenging our people to tithe (10%). Tithing is an important spiritual discipline that must be taught. In Korea, leaders are not asked to serve unless they are tithers. If you want to help lead the church, you must practice what you preach. Percentage Giving is an important spiritual discipline that derives from a person’s need to be generous as an act of gratitude of God’s goodness in our lives. We must teach our leaders to view generosity and stewardship as part of a year-round generosity development effort – not just a fall event.
The pandemic has taught us that God’s Church will survive. We have learned that it’s going to be okay even when everything that we have experienced as normal has changed. We need to teach our people to be generous and to tithe and that giving is important all year long. We need to give because God has given us so much. We need to realize that generosity is needed twelve months of the year. Our people have learned to give digitally so that giving is a weekly matter and not just when we show up for worship. Church Funding will take all of us – not just a few! Take a look at your giving and your stewardship today and decide if God would be pleased with your giving!
Author: Tommy Herndon
