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Written by Russell Mitchell-Walker
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Saturday, 22 October 2011 22:13 |
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Last Sunday, I told a story in my sermon about a woman who was poor and asked for a family rate at a fundraising concert (the story can be heard in the podcast of October 16). I used the story as an illustration of the importance of providing a way for all to participate in fundraisers. This is part of what it means to be an Affirming Ministry. I invited people to purchase a ticket for someone who may not be able to pay the full price and those who wish could ask me for a pay what you can ticket. There was very good response to this and it is just one aspect of celebrating our abundance with generosity. We live very abundantly and as a result, need to be generous with what we have. Churches are especially struggling these days, especially mainline churches. I believe we would not be suffering as badly if we had a tradition of tithing, giving 10% of what we have back to God, the church, charity. This kind of giving and generosity is foriegn to most and as a result we don't talk about our giving. This in turn results in low amount of weekly or monthly offering by people who could be much more generous. We have many who are generous at the end of the year, and this results in anxiety as the year end approaches and a foreboding deficit looms. If only we could have faith that the money will come, or if we could have commitments from folk that it will come. As we move into our Stewardship campaign next month, we will continue to communicate the message of celebrating the abundance we have and encourage our community to give generously out of that abundance. May we all take up the challenge and make commitments that will help to sustain the community that we love and appreciate so much.
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Located in Regina, SK.
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