Draft of Stewardship Letter

In seasons past, you have found a copy of a budget (either a ‘Line-item’ or ‘Narrative’) accompanying the yearly ‘Stewardship Letter.’ Using either of the two documents, you’ve been asked to consider the financial needs of 1^st Presbyterian Church of Phoenix as you made your financial plans and commitments for the coming year, and you’ve been encouraged to give generously. This year, in anticipation of 2011, you are invited to consider something quite different: your own particular needs.

This invitation is not intended to be an exercise to assess how much you’ll be able to give the church, whether the particular financial situation you face at home can be flexed to free up some additional financial contributions, or whether the increased expenses and decreased income translates to less contribution in the offering plate for 2011. It is intended to be a reflection, a meditation, a prayerful consideration of your needs: your need to give.

There are many reasons why we give; there are just as many (if not more) ways to give. We can give of our time; we can share the talents, gifts, skills, and abilities with which we have been blessed, and all for the greater glory of God. We can (and do) give to medical research, to charity organizations, to philanthropic causes, to the person standing on the street corner. We can (and do) give to those organizations and causes that impact our lives, help make us better, seek to make the world a better place to live. We give so that people whose lives have been uprooted by tragedy need not be swallowed up by despair; we give so others will know they are not alone. We are a giving people, and the truth is, it feels good to give.

Why does it feel good to give? Because that’s the way we’re internally hard-wired. In creating humanity in God’s own image, God imbued humanity with the best of the Divine’s traits: the capacity to Love, willingness to be in relation with others, and desire to do all things with a generous spirit.

Another way of speaking to purpose is to imagine a cup. The intent of cup is not simply to be full, where it may sit on a table or on a shelf with contents near to spilling over the rim, but to be filled, and then drained, to be filled, and once more drained with the anticipation of being filled yet again. That is the intent and purpose of a cup.

Similarly, God blesses generously; God fills to overflowing, not that we should ever be satisfied or content with just being full, but that we should be fulfilled in living into our purpose by allowing God’s abundance to joyfully flow through our God-created lives. It’s joy we can experience as we render to God from the abundance that God has given us.

In this season of giving thanks for the promise of Life that God shares, you are invited to prayerfully consider the joy with which you will share God’s blessings in the coming year and into the years to come.