Reflections From Sunday Evening

We are talking about Generosity this month. In talking about generosity and how it relates to the church I am pointing out two different philosophies. The more traditional way churches seem to operate would be from a commitment to "limit increase". The conversation usually begins with how much did we get last year? How may we hold the line on expenditures? Is it possible to decrease the budget this year? What will we do to "limit the increase" if there is one? There is a place for this line of thought. Denominations and even annual conferences tend to operate in a way that year after year requires a shrinking pool of donors to contribute ever larger amounts. Obviously this cannot go on indefinitely. Thankfully our church is not in that position. We do not have a diminishing pool of generous donors. As a matter of fact we experience healthy change and growth. The other philosophy is driven by a "high expectation" culture. Frankly we Methodist folks do not gravitate toward high expectation. It is something we need to nurture and live into. In a high expectation church people are taught and encouraged to practice generosity. When it comes to budgets the first question is "what is God calling us to do?" Uninformed projections are not helpful. There is still a somewhat fine line between faith and presumption! But it is not difficult to estimate a congregations capacity. I could take our average worship attendance. This is a general figure that denotes the number of people who support the ministry. Actually average attendance is becoming almost as misleading a statistic as membership. We probably have 25% more people attend church in any given month that our averages would indicate. That is because normal attendance patterns are more like once every 4 - 6 weeks than each weekend. But that is another matter to discuss sometime. Once you get the figure that represents your participation it is time to take a look at average household or per capita income in your area. Google average household income in Platte County, Missouri and you will get your range. Multiply your participation number by the average income and you get your total assets to work with. Now figure 10% of that and you see what might be a "high expectation figure." With all this done it is time to step up and discern what God is calling His people to do. We will continue to speak of generosity. Generosity will fuel high expectations. It's been a good day. I hope you've had a good day too. steve