Stewardship in the New Year

The start of a new year is a great time for us to take another look at our support of our parish.  Committing to stewardship of time, talent, and treasure is an important part of living a Christian life, and real Christian living asks a lot of us and is not easy. Making a commitment to stewardship is a serious challenge, including with recent years’ COVID challenges to our health, our finances and our loss of full community with family and friends.

It is important to invest in our relationship with God and recommit ourselves to the life of a good steward by making a promise of our time, talent and treasure for the coming year. In order to do that, we must enter into our decision to give intentionally, plan to make good on the decision we make, and budget our time, talent and treasure so our gifts are proportionate to what we have been given.

As we decide on our personal giving decisions, let’s keep this in mind:

Intentional: If we give “just because,” that is not intentional. That does not show understanding of our call to stewardship. As a steward, we make a deliberate decision to live out the Christian life in a certain way. That way is to thank God for all his blessings by returning to him a portion of our time, talent and treasure.

Planned:  As with any life event, we must make plans and adjustments to ensure important things take place. This is true in our sacrificial giving as well. We must plan ahead and make stewardship of time, talent and treasure part of our lifestyle and budget.

Proportionate:  In biblical tithing, a percentage of one’s income is given back in gratitude to charitable causes. But a tithe applies only to financial gifts. In stewardship, an intentional decision is made to give a certain percentage of our time, our talents and our income. This expands the tithe to what it should be – a proportionate giving of ALL gifts.