Brian Dodd: A church cannot grow without being generous

“I have come to believe that just because your church is generous does not necessarily mean it will grow. However, I also believe that a church cannot grow without being generous.”

Brian Dodd in “A Common Link between 10 Growing Churches” blogpost on 22 August 2012.

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Matthew 5:48.

“I notice that every day she tries to please Jesus in everything. She is very busy, but she does not spare herself. She is very humble…her deeds are very simple, but the perfection with which she does them, is what Jesus asks of us.”

Sister Mary Gabriela, I.B.V.M. on Sister Teresa when she was 27 years old, before becoming known as Mother Teresa. Letter to Father Jambrekovic on 25 November 1937.

“When we joyfully meet God’s grace in Jesus, we are empowered to live out our belief that God is Owner of all. We dedicate all of life as an act of worship to God. We commit ourselves to participate in God’s saving work.” (cf. Titus 3:3-8).

Mark Vincent in A Christian View of Money: Celebrating God’s Generosity (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 1997) 67.

“Christ leaves us free to accept or refuse His healing touch. Our cooperation with Christ’s healing action lays the Cross upon our hearts, freeing us to pour ourselves out in spendthrift generosity on those who need healing, not those who deserve it.”

Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941) in Evelyn Underhill: Spirituality for Daily Living, comp. Annice Callahan (Lanham, MD: University Press, 1997) 120.

Hold on
Is this really the life I’m living?
Cause I don’t feel like I deserve it
Every day that I wake, every breath that I take you’ve given
So right here, right now
While the sun is shining down

I wanna live like there’s no tomorrow
Love like I’m on borrowed time
It’s good to be alive, yeah

Hold on
If the life that we’ve been given
Is made beautiful in the living
And the joy that we get brings joy to the heart of the Giver
Then right here, right now
This is the song I’m singing out

I wanna live like there’s no tomorrow
Love like I’m on borrowed time
It’s good to be alive

I won’t take it for granted
I won’t waste another second
All I want is to give You
A life well lived, to say “thank you”

I wanna live like there’s no tomorrow
Love like I’m on borrowed time
It’s good to be, it’s good to be alive

I wanna live like there’s no tomorrow
Love like I’m on borrowed time
It’s good to be alive

I won’t take it for granted
I won’t waste another second
All I want is to give You
A life well lived, to say “thank you”

Jason Gray, “Good to Be Alive” Youtube Music Video:

“Money can indeed a servant, but it is a dangerous servant. It is a servant with such amazing potentialities that it requires a master big enough to control it, or else the roles may be reversed.” (cf. Luke 16:13-15)

J.R. Burkholder in “Money, Master or Servant?” Gospel Herald (1974) 783-784.

“If you had a very good friend who would come to you on a particularly cold night and ask to borrow your jacket, would you give it to that friend? It’s doubtful that there is anyone who would not lend a very good friend the very coat off his or her back!

But now, what if it were a stranger whom you had never met before? There may be some generous souls who would even give a spare jacket to a stranger.
And now the big question: what if it was someone who you know despises you? Would you give that person your jacket, or even a spare jacket, or even an old jacket, if that person asked?

Jesus sets a very high standard. Jesus says we should treat even our enemies the way we would treat our very best friends. Who knows? Maybe this is His way of telling us how to make friends of enemies.”

Gary Lauenstein in The Redemptorists of the Denver Province email on 13 September 2012.

“As stewards of money and possessions, we are to live simply, practice mutual aid within the church, uphold economic justice, and give generously and cheerfully. As persons dependent on God’s providence, we are not to be anxious about the necessities of life, but to seek first the Kingdom of God. We cannot be true servants of God and let our lives be ruled by desire for wealth.”

Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective, Article 21 on Christian Stewardship (Herald Press, 1995) 77-79.

“When [wells] are in disuse they grow foul. And so do riches grow useless, left idle and unused in any place; but moved about and passing from one person to another, they serve the common advantage and bear fruit … [Your grain] is not your own, but for common use of all. You were born naked. Why are you rich, and this other man poor? Is it not solely that you [the rich person] may earn the rewards of compassion, of good and faithful administration, and that [the poor person] may be honoured with the glorious rewards of patience?” (cf. 1 Tim 6:7-10).

Basil the Great (330-379), Bishop of Caesarea, Homily 6.5; 6.7 in S.R Holman, The Hungry Are Dying: Beggars and Bishops in Roman Cappadocia (Oxford: OUP, 2001) 107.

“The ongoing daily pressure of being financially overextended by a consumptive lifestyle is a recipe for a host of stress-related physical maladies and has a detrimental effect on our spiritual formation as well as our interpersonal relationships…

With a stack of bills to pay each month, you may feel economically trapped in a dead-end job. Wherever you find yourself in your vocational journey, it is important to cultivate a deep sense of contentment. Scripture tells us that true contentment is not found in accumulation of financial wealth or a fulfilling career, but in a fulfilling and intimate relationship with Christ.” (cf. Phil. 4:11-13)

Tom Nelson, Work Matters: Connecting Sunday Worship to Monday Work (Wheaton: Crossway, 2011) 170, 180.