Archive for December, 2014
The Role of the Pastor in Year-End Giving in Your Church
What is the role of the pastor in year-end giving in your church? Do you have any responsibility in regards to biblical stewardship in the life of your people? I believe we do have a responsibility for biblical stewardship in our church.
Year-End Giving and the #1 Question we Need to Ask Our People Repeatedly in December
In the month of December, we are in the final month of giving for the year. Every non-profit ministry in the country will make appeals to the members of your church to support their ministry financially. While these may be good and some are worthy of consideration, the church should receive the #1 priority in the lives of our people.
The key question we need to ask repeatedly: As you review and understand clearly ALL of your sources of income in 2014, have you honored God by giving at least the first one-tenth to your local church? If you have not, then insure you do so before December 31 so that you can know you have walked in complete obedience to God in 2014 in relationship to biblical stewardship.
Your Two Major Roles as Pastor in Year-End Giving
I want to suggest that you have two major roles in relationship to biblical stewardship in year-end giving:
1. Lead Your People
Lead your people by example in biblical stewardship and lead with the authority of God’s Word. The only people that want you to be bashful about biblical stewardship in the church are the people that do not practice biblical stewardship personally. Lead the initiative weekly in worship by asking people the key question above.
2. Challenge Your People
Challenge your people to obedience to God in their stewardship. I don’t believe you would back away from challenging them to personal holiness, evangelism, discipleship, or the Great Commission. Therefore, you should not shy away from boldly challenging them to walk in complete obedience to God in their stewardship of all their resources.
How You Can Lead and Challenge Your People
Consider these suggestions as you lead and challenge your people to biblical stewardship:
1. Write each member a letter and extend the challenge to answer this key question: As you review and understand clearly ALL of your sources of income in 2014, have you honored God by giving at least the first one-tenth to your local church? Thank them for what they have given, and challenge them to finish with complete faithfulness to God. Share a testimony or two of what God is doing through the life of the church because God’s people have been faithful to give.
2. Weekly, as you extend the offering, ask them to answer the key question above. Again, thank them for what they have given already. Share testimonies of what God is doing in the church because of their giving.
3. Challenge your people to give above the first tenth in a special offering to the church or join you in giving to support international missions. In our Southern Baptist churches, we have a special annual offering we call the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering. Lottie Moon was a missionary in China over 100 years ago.
Last year, our 46,000 plus Southern Baptist churches gave $154 million to international missions through this offering. This past week, I began challenging our people. I will do so boldly and gladly, as Jeana and I have already given to it sacrificially. Any church can give to this offering, so I want to encourage your church to join us or join your own global missions offering in your denomination.
Finally, Pastor, step up in December by leading and challenging your church to complete 2014 in obedience to God in regard to personal, biblical stewardship.
Yours for the Great Commission,
Ronnie W. Floyd
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is the President & CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee.
Sheltered in God’s Forgiveness
Have you ever been faced with the need to extend forgiveness but you didn’t really want to? Has the wound ever been so deep and the grief so painful it felt as though holding the grudge was actually a healing balm rather than the poison it is?
Forgiving Can Be Very Difficult
In some respects, forgiving others is the most difficult thing God commands of His children. It can be harder than giving offerings, and more challenging than awaiting an answer to prayer. Much sanctification is accomplished in the process of forgiveness. Forgiveness is as much about us as it is about the one who has offended us.
Jesus taught us in the Sermon on the Mount to forgive (Matthew 6:12), to forgive as often as we are offended (Luke 17:3-4), and that we should forgive those in our churches who sin (2 Corinthians 2:7). In fact, continuing to forgive is the norm of the Christian life (Ephesians 4:32).
Writing in Bible Studies for Life, Philip Nation addresses the difficulty we often face when we need to forgive. “Forgiveness is a gift that’s often hard to give. Why? Because it costs so much. The person doing the forgiving essentially forks over the whole payment; the main cost is letting go of the hurt and giving up the offense that was committed. Forgiveness means you walk away from the judge’s bench and stand united with the guilty party.”1
Forgiveness Involves Surrender
Forgiveness is not saying we were not really offended. Forgiveness is not saying the other person really didn’t do anything wrong. Forgiveness is not saying, “It didn’t really matter.” Forgiveness is willfully surrendering the punishment for the offense to God, who judges all things rightly. It is an admission that our offenses toward God are worse than another person’s offenses toward us.
The Bible ties our need to forgive with our having been forgiven by God. In other words, the basis of our forgiving those who sin against us is that God has forgiven our offenses toward Him.
God’s Forgiveness Shelters Us
The forgiveness of God is a shelter for our lives. The psalmist wrote these words of great hope and encouragement, “Then I acknowledged my sin to You and did not conceal my iniquity. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,’ and You took away the guilt of my sin…You are my hiding place; You protect me from trouble. You surround me with joyful shouts of deliverance” (Ps. 32:5, 7, HCSB).
We gain nothing when we run from God after sinning. Our best hope is to run toward God and seek His forgiveness. He alone provides shelter in forgiveness. He alone can cleanse and restore us. He alone can protect us from the vile, destructive side effects of bitterness and nursing a grudge.
Seeking God’s forgiveness brings us before Him in reconciliation and restoration. Fellowship is restored instead of broken. Fellowship replaces loneliness, assurance replaces doubt, and guilt is washed away in the glorious joy of the love of God.
Yours for the Great Commission,
Ronnie W. Floyd
Senior Pastor, Cross Church General Editor, Bible Studies for Life President, Southern Baptist Convention
References
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is the President & CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee.