Randy Alcorn: Churches, people, debt, and giving

“Churches wanting to discourage their people from incurring debt should not incur debt, churches wanting to encourage giving should give. Giving shouldn’t just be something churches talk about, but something they do.”

Randy Alcorn in “Financial Stewardship 101: How Pastors Can Model and Teach God’s Word” in the Fall 2014 issue of Western Magazine (Quarterly Publication of Western Seminary) 13. Alcorn offers great advice for pastors such as those I will see today at the EFCA theology conference at Trinity in Deerfield, IL.

Our church budgets should model the way for our people. But might they actual encourage the opposite? Do our churches avoid debt and increase giving annually? Or are our churches saddled with debt and consequently giving a smaller percentage of the budget to the poor and missions each year? What message do you want your church budget to send?

“Isn’t it ironic that we enthusiastically proclaim a gospel that magnifies God’s generous and sacrificial gift of His Son for our behalf, but apparently don’t seem to have much enthusiasm for practicing that same kind of giving ourselves (even though transforming us into generous givers is one of the purposes of His gift to us)?

In biblical terms, the problem can be framed in terms of myopic and unfaithful stewardship. We fail to recognize that all we have is an expression of God’s entrustment to us that should be used in a manner consistent with His purposes and values.

If we fulfill our stewardship responsibilities faithfully, we see His work prosper and we experience the unique joy of being a generous and strategic investor whose investments bless others, now and throughout eternity. If we are derelict in this duty, then all that is squandered and a lose/lose situation results.”

Randy Roberts in “Transformational Generosity” Fall 2014 issue of Western Magazine (Quarterly Publication of Western Seminary) 2. Special thanks to my colleague at Western, Greg Moon, for forwarding this issue to me.

All of us will someday give account for our stewardship. For this reason, now is the time that each of us must ask how we will prepare for that day. Will we be found myopic and unfaithful stewards? Or will we exhibit gospel generosity while we can?

As I was only home from Asia a day and now I am off to Chicago for three days, today I want to honor my beloved wife, Jenni, for her support to model generosity to the best of our ability and her encouragement to exhort God’s people to obedient stewardship!

“As the needs of all living things must, we have proved that it is a very safe thing to trust in the Lord our God.”

Amy Carmichael (1867-1951) in Gold Cord: The Story of a Fellowship (Fort Washington: CLC, 1996) 15.

As generosity is rooted in trusting God to provide, growth in generosity can only be nurtured by learning to trust more fully, more deeply. Is there any aspect of life that you find it difficult to entrust to God? Ask God to help you in that area (cf. Mark 9:24).

Carmichael “proved” the trustworthiness of God in her day, and that’s one of our aims in ours. Why? More is caught than taught. The reason we must model the life of trust in God is so that the world may see and know that He is faithful.

“Aug. 17, 1883…Think of this, dear reader! Day by day about 2,100 persons are to be provided for in the Orphan Institution…and £10 was all that was in hand to do this. You see we are just in the same position in which we were 46 years since as to funds. God is our banker. In Him we trust, and on Him we draw by faith…God is pleased continually to vary His mode of dealing with us, in order that we may not be tempted to trust in donors, or in circumstances, but in Him alone, and to keep our eye fixed upon Him. This, by His grace, we are enabled to do, and our hearts are kept at peace.”

George Müller (1805-1898) in Answers to Prayer ed. by E.C. Brooks.

I had the privilege of flying all the way around the world in only six days. No kidding. If I could have, I would have trailed a banner behind the plane that proclaimed these words (in the spirit of Müller): “Trust in God as your banker!”

Is that how you live and serve? Do you trust God for your daily provision? We find that sometimes He gives us work. Often it results in more than enough, so we are positioned to share. Other times it’s less than enough, so He provides through other channels.

Thankfully God varies His mode of dealing with us to keep us on our toes, or rather, on our knees. That’s the posture He taught us to take (cf. Matthew 6:9-13), and we have found as a family that there’s no other way to live!

“The less I spent on myself and the more I gave to others, the fuller of happiness and blessing did my soul become.”

Hudson Taylor (1832-1905) missionary to China, as recounted by Randy Alcorn in Treasure Principle (Sisters: Multnomah 2001) 21.

Together with my long-time friend, Chi-Chung Keung, it’s been amazing to spend time with Chinese missionaries and church planters, both indigenous servants of Christ and internationals who have ministered in Asia for many years.

They give of themselves and their resources sacrificially, and the joy of the Lord shines from their lives. They have inspired Chi-Chung Keung and I to serve and support the growing church in China together and rally others to join us.

What opportunities has God put in front of you and your friends, that if you spent less on yourselves and served together 2×2, would return a blessing to your souls and touch countless lives for Christ Jesus? You might become the next Hudson Taylor!

“Meeting a person [is] a great thing, but it’s not the greatest thing. The greatest thing any person can do for another is to confirm the deepest thing in him, in her–to take the time and have the discernment to see what’s most deeply there, most fully that person, and then confirm it by recognizing and encouraging it.”

Martin Buber, Jewish Theologian as quoted by Eugene Peterson in Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians (New York: HarperCollins, 1997) 54. Special thanks to my friend and brother, J.D. Walt, for encouraging me to check out this book in his blog!

I have met some incredible Christ followers on this trip to Chiang Mai and Hong Kong. In the words of Buber, meeting them has been a great thing, but I pray by the Holy Spirit that by listening to them and celebrating how God is at work in their lives, that I have been able to affirm their giftedness and participation in God’s work.

Does someone come to mind for you today along these lines? Can you think of specific people that you could reach out and confirm the deepest thing in their lives? Follow the leading of the Spirit and give them this gift the next time you see them.

It is said that David Livingstone’s made this statement in response to hearing of the spiritual needs in China.

“It is my desire to show my attachment to the cause of Him who died for me by devoting my life to His service.”

David Livingstone (1813-1873) as quoted by William Garden Blaikie in The Life of David Livingstone (London: John Murray, 1903) 12.

Like Barnabas and Paul sojourned together encouraging Christians around the ancient world, Chi-Chung Keung and I traveled from Hong Kong to Thailand to meet missionaries and church planters who have dedicated their lives in service to Christ in China. May God give us eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart to discern how we might best serve and support them.

Halfway around the world my daughter, Sophie, is visiting Asbury College in Wilmore, KY, with my wife, Jenni, and sister-in-law, Joanna. Why consider a school like that? I am thankful that she desires to study creative writing and performing arts in service to Jesus Christ with the same zeal that Livingstone exhibited as he put his medical skills to work for God.

“Never lay up money for yourselves or your families. Trust in God from day to day, and verily you shall be fed.”

Adoniram Judson (1788-1850) missionary to Burma (Myanmar) in “Advice to Missionary Candidates to the Foreign Missionary Association of the Hamilton Literary and Theological Institution” June 25, 1832, in The Life of Adoniram Judson, Volume 3, by Edward Judson (New York: Anson D. F. Randolph & Company) 577.

I arrived safely in Hong Kong today with my good friend, Chi-Chung Keung. We will meet church planters this weekend that serve God throughout Asia. If they ask my advice, I will likely share something similar to this statement that Judson gave with nine other brief statements to missionary candidates. Why? There’s no other way to live than to depend on God from day to day.

“I wish with all my heart, that everyone who loves our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity, would in some way or other engage in [missions]…In respect to contributions for defraying the expenses, money will doubtless be wanting; and suppose the rich were to embark a portion of that wealth over which God has made them stewards, in this important undertaking, perhaps there are few ways that would turn to a better account at last. Nor ought it to be confined to the rich; if persons in more moderate circumstances were to devote a portion…of their annual increase to the Lord…here would not only be enough to support the ministry of the gospel at home, and to encourage village preaching in our respective neighbourhoods, but to defray the expenses of carrying the gospel into the heathen world.”

William Carey in “An Enquiry into the Obligations of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathen” (Leicester: Ann Ireland, 1792) 84-85.

Over the next week I will be traveling to Hong Kong and Thailand with Pioneers Hong Kong. Consequently, the focus of my meditations over the next week will center around comments from noteworthy missionaries and Christian servants who spoke of the connection between the resources in our stewardship and the deployment of the same toward missions. The apostle Paul described this engagement as “partnership in the gospel” (cf. Philippians 1:3-6)

Few make this connection more clearly than Carey, whose two points are both profound and pointed. First, he argues that “there are few ways” funds could be used better. Seriously, can you think of a better use of funds than helping a spiritually dead person find life in Jesus Christ? Second, he says that if the rich and those of moderate means all participated, then money would not be an issue at all, in the work of the gospel both at home and abroad.

“Stewardship is nothing less than a complete lifestyle, a total accountability and responsibility before God. Stewardship is what we do after we say we believe, that is, after we give our love, loyalty, and trust to God, from whom each and every aspect of our lives comes as a gift.”

Ronald Vallet in “The Church: Its Mission and Its Funding” in Journal of Stewardship (Indianapolis: Ecumenical Center for Stewardship Studies, 1994) as recounted by Wesley K. Willmer in God & Your Stuff: The Vital Link Between Your Possessions and Your Soul (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2002) 53.

I am working on an outline that I will co-teach with mentor and friend, Wes Willmer, so I was re-reading parts of his classic book, God & Your Stuff: The Vital Link Between Your Possessions and Your Soul, which is must-read if you have not already read it.

I appreciate Vallet’s definition because when we understand our role as stewards and embrace the attitude that everything is a gift, it changes how we interact with God, with others, and how we handle all that God has placed in our stewardship. We take a step toward becoming grateful, generous stewards.