The Lord detests dishonest scales, but accurate weights find favor with Him. When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom. The integrity of the upright guides them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity. Proverbs 11:1-3
“Fiscal operations in the church or nonprofit religious organizations requires a keen sense of attention to detail on the part of the administrator because of the double-edged sword of trust in the leadership that is inherent in the Christian community and necessity for honest and accurate records the responsibility demands.
Many venues in ministerial leadership can be forgiven when less-than-exceptional performance comes to light, but the administration of the fiscal resources is not one of them — either from the local parishioner’s point of view or from the legal authorities that monitor the contributions to those entities.”
Robert H. Welch in Church Administration: Creating Efficiency for Effective Ministry, second edition (Nashville: B & H Publishing, 2011) 185.
Over the next three days I have multiple meetings in Guatemala City with John Van Drunen, ECFA Executive Vice President. We have been invited here to meet with ministry administrators and financial professionals to discuss Standards of Responsible Stewardship.
Our prayer is that these meetings find favor with God and that the Holy Spirit moves so that national leaders form a coalition (and someday a peer accountability group like ECFA) for Guatemala to champion the faithful administration of God’s work and encourage greater Christian generosity.
Make it so, Lord Jesus!