Stewardshift

Bob Sitze

Description

The collective groan that greets stewardship campaigns in most churches can be quelled. This book offers theoretical and practical propositions by which lay and clergy leaders can ensure the sustainability of stewardship ministries to help their congregations flourish. Bob Sitze invites stewardship leaders into a broader conversation of how shifted biblical and secular stewardship concepts, practice, and identity can be incorporated into a congregation's life and help bring about lasting change.

The book has two sections: Part 1, Scriptural Stewardshifts, reinterprets familiar biblical passages on stewardship, introduces new ones, and helps congregations expand their use of the Bible in their life and stewardship work. Part 2, Secular Stewardshifts, examines the resources that are available to congregations from the "continuing revelation" that is occurring in the secular world, including brain science, financial planning, philanthropy, community organizing, and other areas. The book is written in a friendly style, with reflection questions, so-what moments, and engaging sidebars.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Christian Living
• Philosophie et théologie
• Giving
• Stewardship

Informations

• Publié par: Church Publishing Incorporated
• Date de parution: 01 janvier 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780819231925
• Langue: English

Extrait

Bob Sitze
Copyright 2016 by Bob Sitze
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
Unless otherwise noted, the Scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations marked (CEV) are from the Contemporary English Version Copyright 1991, 1992, 1995 by American Bible Society, Used by Permission.
Scripture quotations marked (KJV) are from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown s patentee, Cambridge University Press.
Morehouse Publishing, 19 East 34th Street, New York, NY 10016
Morehouse Publishing is an imprint of Church Publishing Incorporated.
www.churchpublishing.org
Cover design by Jennifer Kopec / 2 Pug Design
Typeset by Rose Design
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sitze, Bob.
Stewardshift : an economia for congregational change / Bob Sitze.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-8192-3191-8 (pbk.)-ISBN 978-0-8192-3192-5 (ebook) 1. Christian stewardship. 2. Christian giving. I. Title.
BV772.S58 2016
248 .6-dc23
2015030332
To Betty Nyhus ( ) , whose cherished mentoring first compelled me to seek the inner core and power of stewardship. ( Her legacy continues-the work is not yet done. )
Contents
Preface
First Things First: Introduction
PART ONE: Scriptural Stewardshifts
1 Economia: A Short History of Stewardship Theology and Practice
2 Assured Foundations: Scripture Shifts
3 Shifts in Familiar Passages, Stories, or Concepts
4 Promising Stewardship Scriptures
5 What Can Happen Next
PART TWO: Secular Stewardshifts
6 Continuing Revelation: Secular Wisdom
7 More Than Household Rules: Wisdom
8 Neurobiological Nudges: Brain Science
9 Wild Ideals: Natural History
10 More Than Money: Financial Planning
11 Love for All People: Philanthropy
12 When the Ecclesia Gets to Work: Community Organizing
13 Beyond Happy : Positive Psychology
14 Just Enough: Lifestyle
15 The Gallimaufry Chapter: Miscellany
16 Shifting into Next : Continuing Thoughts
Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Preface
I ve had this book in mind probably since I was a teenager. Not its writing or its outcomes, but its content, stewardship. My parents taught me well in matters of gratitude, generosity, simple living, environmental care, and charity. From their example, I learned about tithing and love of the natural world. From their congregational leadership, I learned about the intricacies of church life, including their understanding of the ministry of pastors. I chose a church vocation because of my parents stewardship of stewardship.
When I started my career as a parochial day school teacher, though, I first encountered what seemed to be inconsistencies, or at least weaknesses, in some of the practices and doctrines around stewardship. (I remember wondering out loud in a budget meeting why my salary and benefits were transparent to congregation members but their salaries and budgets remained private, out of sight, none of the church s business ) I was uneasy with the interpretations of stewardship texts that just didn t make sense to me. 1
I got the feeling that stewardship theology and practice had been cemented in place over the centuries, best not questioned or tinkered with.
Early in my work as a freelance curriculum writer, I was asked to write a Sunday school course for sixth graders on the care of creation. As part of my research, I spent a day with staff members of the Sierra Club. What emerged from that series of conversations was the overwhelming realization that these secular folks had for decades been using stewardship precepts as the philosophical underpinnings of their work They understood the varied dimensions of stewardship attitudes, behaviors, and identities without relying on scriptural proofs. And they were pushing at the boundaries of stewardship wisdom. (For example, long before neurobiologists zeroed in on the fact, Sierra Club folks were already aware that fear of death-and by extension, growing older-likely drives the economic and environmental cancer of materialism. 2 )
As I grew into the later stages of my career-denominational executive, resource producer, leadership consultant-I began to see that much of the church s practice and philosophy of stewardship seemed to be bound into tight, formulaic constructs and time-honored-perhaps even time-worn?-language. The same Scripture verses and stories appeared over and over again, the same conclusions drawn from their interpretation. The voices of other, possibly helpful passages seemed muted. I noticed how difficult it seemed to be, almost universally, for church leaders to find enthusiasm for stewardship ministries-locked into annual pledge drives and time/talent/treasure verbiage. As I looked closer, a nagging possibility grew stronger: Something was missing, something wasn t working. Denominational and congregational leaders seemed to be pushing uphill an ecclesiastical stone that was vaguely disturbing or perhaps even dangerous. And their hard work didn t seem to move that metaphorical load very far uphill.
When I began working in stewardship ministries in the national offices of my home denomination, my colleagues and I explored an essential question: How could stewardship ministry in congregations become vital, exciting, and energizing? We read widely and listened carefully to leading scholars and thinkers, encountering new strands of thought about Scripture, philanthropy, and generosity. We delved into research findings, and we tried to reframe our approaches to congregations-new methods, new language-so that they matched with realities in the pews and on the ground. We went about our stewardship leadership with emotional and intellectual honesty. We could sense a shift in the ways our denomination was beginning to approach stewardship. It felt like we-and stewardship leaders in other denominations-were onto something new; stewardship could draw together the disparate elements of congregational life into realistic, reliable, and effective practices and identities.
The ecclesiastical history of the ensuing years proved us overly optimistic. With the onset of an all-encompassing discipleship theology and practice in Protestant Christianity, stewardship seemed to lose its strength as a primary organizing principle for congregational life. Its precepts and practices were subsumed into marks of discipleship and other newly minted themes and programs. Even though newer forms of stewardship theology and practice held their ground, it was apparent that stewardship was a subset of discipleship and not the other way around. Discipleship became the preeminent organizing principle underlying mature faith and congregational vitality.
One final note about the personal history that underlies the writing of this book: Early in my career, convinced that I didn t have competence in matters of daily life Christianity, I dropped out of professional church work for a period of time. During those years I worked in the world outside of church culture, living out this newfound conviction about God s way of getting work done: In their homes, relationships, and vocations, the people of God labor to bring God s will to bear on the world. The church s role is to gather the people in, equip them, and send them out.
By the time I came back to professional church work, I had also learned one other important lesson: God s people probably know more about steward ship than church leaders assume. Those of us who claim to teach lay-people about stewardship-related matters-generosity, money management, care of creation-might admit how little we know about God s revelation outside of Scripture and humble ourselves to learn about stewardship wisdom from our supposed students.
My life journey has brought me to this book: a conversation that I hope brings you a fresh look at stewardship wisdom in the Scriptures and in the world outside the church. Why do this? For the good of congregations and the ultimate goal we share: to fulfill God s holy will for the world God loves so dearly.
This book is about shifts that might be important for stewardship theology as it s taught and practiced in congregations. If you re a stewardship professional, it might seem like I m raining on your parade. I get that. But I also understand what Anne Lamott says in Help, Thanks, Wow (her delightful witness about her experience of prayer): If you want to know only what you already know, you re dying. 3
Let me be direct: It feels to me that stewardship ministry in congregations is stuck in neutral, perhaps most noticeably among younger generations or newer Christians. And it s becoming more and more obvious that, out there in the world outside the church, stewardship-related wisdom and enterprises are growing in number and influence.
Whether you re a stewardship professional or a congregational leader trying to make sense of the rapid changes in church life, you probably can t afford only to keep trying harder to persuade others about what you already know. The time may be coming when your congregation or your denomination devolves into the kind of desperation (about money and members) that will keep you from thinking and acting with clarity, focus, and hope. This anxiety, when it s left to grow or fester, produces opposite states of mind that can paralyze you into fighting, fleeing, or freezing-not especially fruitful frameworks for ministry.
I believe that the shifts proposed here-looking at Scripture w