Leading During Financially Challenging Times—4
Yesterday, Troy asked, “Craig, I am curious, how do you model being a generous pastor other than just saying it from behind the pulpit?”
Great question, Troy.
More than just generosity, pastors are wise to model whole life stewardship. It’s difficult to be radically generous when you’re sinking in debt. I’ve tried to model a debt free lifestyle which can lead to extravagant generosity. (I know that is very difficult for many. At least a pastor can be aggressively working toward becoming debt free.)
Our family hopes to give away the highest percentage of our income of anyone in our church. Although we may never know if we achieve this goal, we do know if we are increasing our percentage each year.
It’s also good for the church to model generosity. Our church is excited that we make our resources available for free to other churches. The church loves that we made www.youversion.com available for free as well as the iPhone Bible App. They also embrace when we give offerings to other churches, give thousands of shoes to people in need, or purchase Christmas presents for less fortunate children. All these acts of generosity spur more acts of generosity.
I also believe God honors what my family does in private. Even though few people would know where and what we give, God knows. And when I preach on generosity, I do so out of a strong personal conviction, not just trying to get others to give more. My private actions strengthen my public messages.
What do you to model generosity?
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I am new to this blog and have greatly appreciated your ministry Craig. You may have a past post on this but I would be interested to know what are your processes for planning and staying organized. What tools do you use personally and as a team.
I try to be openhanded in many ways - to quietly give a gift to someone in need, to bless a team member when they’ve done something above and beyond, to share my resources, to help out other worship ministries in the area, to live more simply and give out of my abundance. I hope that it teaches.
I’ve been amazed at how much it means to families in our ministry when myself and our other pastors are generous with our time. We’ve had this modeled from our Senior Pastor, and it is the foundation of all generosity.
When I take the time to hit the football game, to show up at the dedication of the school building, to meet someone for lunch - it is at these places I learn what the needs are and can aim our resources.
Generosity breeds generosity. It opens doors. It is the gospel in motion.
WHOOOHOOO! We just made our last payment and are 100% out of debt!! Can’t wait to see where God leads us to use that margin.
Thanks for the response to the question.
I totally agree with the issue of debt. Our family was extremely blessed to get out of debt about 18 months ago. I honestly felt that I couldn’t even talk about getting out of debt until I did it myself. It’s so much easier to lead when you don’t have the monkey of debt on your back. Thanks Craig.
Kendra, Amazing! Congrats to you!
Troy, You’re welcome. Way to go on leading your family out of debt. Your church will be blessed and challenged by your example!
Last Christmas I made it a point to let my church know that I asked family to give money to help underprivileged people oversees, rather than receive a gift for myself. I did this to model generosity, not to bring attention to myself. God knows our heart and we need to take the opportunities to brag on what God is doing in our lives in order to point people to what God can do in their lives. “Follow me as I follow God”
Thanks Craig for the great challenges you bring our way - iron sharpens iron.
“Let your light shine so that people see your good works and glorify your father in heaven.” We don’t do it to be seen ourselves, but so that our works are seen in such a light that people also see God though us.
In this vein, I just live a generous life and let it all hang out. I tell my stories. I celebrate other’s stories. We often buy a few tidbits (like turkeys during thanksgiving season) and give them away randomly to folks during the service, commissioning them to give the item away to someone outside our church that week. No excuses. Here’s an idea. Here’s the idea in flesh — the turkey. You can’t keep it. Go.
Craig,
Thanks for the topic this week. I like to model pastoral generosity by placing one of those giant “prize checks” in the plate every week. There’s usually balloons, confetti, and swimsuit models, too. I’m not saying this would work in everyone’s area, but it’s been effective in our mid-sized California farming community.
Jeff
You truly let God lead your life…
Craig,
I love reading your blog and I truly appreciate your ministry. I just recently finished your book “It”, great stuff. Currently our church is facing some serious financial pressures and I shared your post from a couple of days ago with our staff. It was a timely word. In our short five year history we have always tried to position ourselves to be a generous church. Twenty five percent of our budget goes to ministries outside of ourselves. Like you we have tried to model what it means to live open handedly. We believe now more than ever God is calling us to hold to Him and live by faith. It has been an incredible journey. I appreciate your blog and your perspective. Keep it up! Praying for you and your ministry. God Bless You!
Orlando
In my Church many members give their offering through the Sunday School, I always give during the morning service. As pastor I naturally sit up front, but my offering is usually first in the plate. I don’t make a big deal out of it, but I believe it is important for people to see a regular example of giving.
For our capital funding campaign I asked the Treasurer to make sure that I got envelope set number one. He is the only one who knows (I think), but it was important to me that I make the effort to show that giving is a priority for me and my family.
Believe me when I say we are from a very economically place in central Ohio, still I am amazed at our people’s generosity! We have received 600 names of the neediest kids in our county identified by local agencies and will be providing Christmas for them! More of a blessing to our congregation then to the kids!
we’re going through a series about “be the change” in the world, and one of the principles we camped on for a week was “downsize your life.” Whether this means hyper commitments or just the wealth of “stuff” that requires financial maintenance - storage facilities for our stuff, cable packages, routine stuff that is oppressive to living a faith-driven life.
Both myself and our SP have both voluntarily downsized from nice vehicles (newer, paid off) to more efficient ones - but because we had to, but because it was prudent. It allows us to live on less, give more and freed up resources to contribute towards focus causes our community is engaged in.
The contrast of generosity with stewardship is gradually noticed. Give abundantly, help and assist many - and just as people start thinking you must have a golden egg farm somewhere, they also start noticing that you shop at Goodwill or catch deals, that you do side things to facilitate cost-savings, etc…
[...] Craig Groeschel continues with practical, helpful advice. Two weeks ago, he spoke about leading teams. You can read the intro here, and the follow-up posts here, here and here. This past week he wrote about leading during financially troubling times. You can read what he had to say here, here, here & here. [...]
It is true. If you do not lead they will not follow.