LIVING AS CHRISTIAN STEWARD CHARGED WITH 

INTENSE JOY

          My continued reading of the Catholic Church’s Stewardship Letter from several decades ago, is now at the section titled “The Christian Steward.” The insert says

          “The life of a Christian steward, lived in imitation of the life of Christ, is challenging, even difficult in many ways; but both here and hereafter it is charged with intense joy.”

          This statement spoke to me because we just celebrated the Third Sunday of Advent and Joy. We are God’s co-workers; we must live for the Lord, not for ourselves.

          As Christian stewards, we are generous out of love as well as duty. We aren’t generous because we want to check a checkmark on a list, but rather “If someone who has worldly means sees a brother in need and refuses him compassion, how can the love of God remain in him?” (1 John 3:17)

          Joy doesn’t mean happiness. There are differences, such as:

·        Happiness is caused by luck, good fortune and other worldly pleasures, whereas joy is caused by overall happiness and soul satisfying incidents.

·        Happiness is more momentary, as it is a result of short-term contentment, while joy is long lasting.

·        Happiness merely pleases a person, while joy warms the person’s heart.

·        Happiness mostly comes from outside things, as it is gained by observing or doing a particular thing. On the other hand, joy lies within a person.

·        As an example: If a person wins a lottery, he is happy, but if he raises that same amount by his hard work, he would feel rejoiced.[1]

          Last year, during advent, I preached on Joy every week, from hopeful joy, to peaceful joy, to joyful joy, and loving joy. Joy isn’t limited to just one Sunday of Advent.

          Because Joy lies within us and lies within our imitation of life of Christ, it must include hope, peace and love as well.

         

 

       

 

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[1] Difference Between Joy and Happiness | Difference Between http://www.differencebetween.net/miscellaneous/difference-between-joy-and-happiness/#ixzz6gclROXcJ

 

                     MODELING STEWARDSHIP

 

          Would you like to be a model? You know, stand up in front of a whole bunch of people, parade around in a cool-looking outfit, walking a certain way, and just letting people watch you? And, then, if you did a good job, some of those people and others would want to do what you do?

          I bet, for most of you, your answer is “No, absolutely not! I can’t do that! People staring at me and watching everything I do!”

          As an introvert, I have to agree. It is very uncomfortable to have people staring at me, waiting for me to make a mistake or fall down (all of which I’ve done, by the way—and in front of others). Those are stories for another day.

          While being a model brings a certain picture to mind, at least for me, we all are models. Whether we do it unconsciously or consciously, we model stewardship and discipleship.

          So, to use the "picture" of a model, do you want people to see this:

          Or this:

• ·        We have to be conscious of what our actions and our words say
• ·       Our actions and words have to match
• ·        God’s call on our lives must be fulfilled by what we do and say
• ·   Fulfilling our call means that Jesus’ directions to us: to go and makes disciples for Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world, actually happens

·        We mustn’t keep our hands (and hearts) in a fist, grasped tight and closed

·        We have to reach out in Christian discipleship

 

          And this modeling isn’t limited to adults, it must also involve youth and children. 

            Last week, I talked about sharing our WHY so that people that know us understand our story and our personal theologies of giving, generosity and stewardship.

          Everything we do should model stewardship and discipleship, from our jobs, our vocations, our church “work”, our prayer lives, our education, our personal and corporate practices.

          So the question isn’t “would you like to be a model”, but rather “wouldn’t you like to be a model”.

           And the answer is: “Absolutely, of course I would! I AM a Christian Steward.”

         

 

       

 

  WHAT DO OUR STORIES HAVE TO DO WITH OUR WHY?

        I am continuing to read the Catholic Church’s Stewardship Letter, and am at the section titled “Promoting Gifts of Time, Talent and Treasure: Seven Steps to Success.”

        The first step is “Personal Witness.” It states “the most important ingredient in any effort to encourage giving of time, talent and treasure is the personal witness of individuals (clergy, religious, and lay) who have experienced a change of heart as a result of their commitment to stewardship.”[1]

        This is so, so important. I mean, we can read the “official” documentation and hear a statement from an “expert”, but let’s be honest, doesn’t hearing a testimony by someone we know, someone who has traveled the same path we have make us sit up and listen a little more carefully?

        When my husband and I have considered whether to donate to a cause, or an organization, or church, or another not-for-profit, whichever it is, while we are generally generous, there is a lot more motivation when (1) we hear the story of how our gifts will make a difference; (2) we see someone’s life changed; and (3) someone who has come before us or is walking along side us tells of how they are motivated to be generated for this exact moment.

        Of course, none of us are at the exact same point on the exact same pathway. For that to happen, we have to be wearing the exact same pair of shoes (at the same time)! Some are walking side-by-side with us, some are up ahead leading the way but still in eyesight; others are so far ahead we can’t see them anymore; and some are behind us, maybe coming close up behind us and maybe lagging behind.

        It’s impossible for us to be the same person and for our situation to match someone else’s, but our situation, our story is important for others. Not to brag, but to share. Not to say I gave this amount of money, aren’t a wonderful; but to share our WHY.

        Sharing our WHY shares our hearts, our good and our bad, our positive and our negative, how God is shaping us and sharing our hearts, our motivations and our actions.

        Share those stories!

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[1] The 1992 pastoral letter, Stewardship: A Disciple’s Response, by U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship.

 

                      THANKSGIVING STEWARDSHIP

        I am writing this one day before “Thanksgiving”, the day that was declared a national holiday by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863. It was a day that “celebrated” the First Thanksgiving in America, celebrated by the Pilgrims in November 1621 at with their neighbors, the indigenous peoples of the land that taught them and shared their bounty.

        There’s argument whether that was actually the first thanksgiving, but true or not, in a proclamation by President Lincoln, when he entreated all Americans to ask God to “commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife” and to “heal the wounds of the nation.”

        Over time, the holiday became more and more about food and family. Of course, food and family are important, but on this Thanksgiving 2020, when many of us aren’t able to experience our Thanksgiving traditions. Steve and I will be home together, which is wonderful, but there won’t be sitting around a large table with extended family.

        I think many of us will be experiencing this same thing, for some of us, because we want to make sure that our loved ones are safe, and as I read on social media, having a Zoom Thanksgiving means we can avoid an ICU Christmas; for some of us, because we have lost a loved one, either because of COVID or for other reasons; and for some of us, because our health is suffering because of COVID or for other reasons.

        Because of this, maybe we can make this a spiritual Thanksgiving, where we can experience a Thanksgiving renewal!

·     We can commend to God and thank God for those persons, the essential workers, who gave their lives to keep us safe during a pandemic that we could not have planned for;

·     We can commend to God and thank God for those persons, those serving in law enforcement and the Armed Forces, who have given their lives to protect us and grant us freedom;

·     We can commend to God and thank God for our loved ones, whether they are gathered around our table or are gathered around their own;

·     We can thank God for the abundance that is God’s blessings.

 

        A cornucopia is often seen on Thanksgiving tables and on alter tables in churches during this season. Also called a horn of plenty, it often overflows with vegetables and other symbols of a harvest and fall season.

        What if our cornucopia, our horn of plenty, is filled with God’s blessings and God’s abundance: love and grace, joy and gratitude, generosity and stewardship?

        Happy Thanksgiving! May it be a blessed one filled with blessings and love for you and yours!

 

                      CREATION AND STEWARDSHIP

            My continued reading of the Catholic Church’s Stewardship Letter[1] from several decades ago, is now at the section titled “Living as a Steward.” This takes time to talk about creation and stewardship. God wants us to be God’s collaborators in the wok of creation, redemption and sanctification, and it all started with the first story of God’s love for us and that was in the creation…. “in the beginning, when God created the heavens and earth.” (Gen 1:1).

            I have always said that Genesis 1:1 is the first stewardship scripture! I have approached this Scripture regularly as a way to explain that nothing we have is ours, if God created everything. Therefore, keeping our “stuff” and ourselves, whether its our time, our work, our love or our bodies, to ourselves is NOT stewardship and goes against Scripture.

            But this letter looks at it a little differently, still in the context of stewardship. Exercising dominion over creation, as it says in scripture is not abusing the earth, but, rather, continuing God’s work by cultivating and caring for it. The letter says all of that boils down to one word and it is “work,” but not as a punishment for sin but because it is “necessary” for human happiness and fulfillment.”[2]

            So if work is necessary for our fulfillment as humans, that means that working is a way to be in cooperation with God’s creation. Our work, our vocation, are all means of living out our call from God. Of course, sometimes our work is messy, and sometimes our work is hard, and sometimes we just want to leave work and put our feet up and complain about everything. But if we look at our vocations as a response to a call from God and not as work, how would our understanding of work change?

            If our work is not a true fulfillment of God’s call, we need to look at our lives and

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[1] The 1992 pastoral letter, Stewardship: A Disciple’s Response, by U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship.

[2] Ibid.

 

                              JESUS AS STEWARD

            My continued reading of the Catholic Church’s Stewardship Letter[1] from several decades ago, has led me to the section titled “Jesus’ Way.” Reading the title of the section made complete sense to me, of course, we must follow Jesus, and as Christians, we want to love like Jesus. But then, I started reading the section, and it took a little differently about the example of Jesus that we must follow.

·         The Beatitudes and Sermon on the Mount describe our lives as Christian disciples (Matthew 5:3-7:27)

·         Jesus described a disciple’s life in terms of stewardship…not because stewardship is the whole thing, but it is part of it. (Matthew 25:14-30)

            A steward is someone to whom the owner turns over responsibility for caring for what is owned, managing everything and making the sources yield as much as possible. You can’t be a steward if there isn’t trust and accountability.

            But it’s not just our “stuff.” Everything—worldly and spiritual—were created by and come from God.

• ·         Spiritual gifts like faith, hope and love
• ·         Talents of body and brain
• ·         Relationships with family and friends
• ·         Material goods
• ·         Achievements
• ·         The world itself

The stewardship letter says:

“one day God will require an accounting of the use each person has made of the particular portion of those goods entrusted to him or her.

Each will be measured by the standard of his or her individual vocation. Each has received a different “sum”—a unique mix of talents, opportunities, challenges, weaknesses and strengths, potential modes of service and response—on which the Master expects a return. He will judge individuals according to what they were given.” (20)

            So, it seems it’s not about the tithe (giving of 10% of what WE have); it’s not about “what would Jesus do”; it’s about being responsible with everything we’ve been given.

            And we must ask ourselves:

·         What will be used for God’s work?

·         What will we keep clenched in our fists for ourselves?

·         What will be returned go God?

  By the way: the two pictures at the top are from my trip in January 2018 to The Holy Land and were taken at the Church on the Mount of the Beatitudes.

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[1] The 1992 pastoral letter, Stewardship: A Disciple’s Response, by U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship.

 

 DO WE HAVE A CHOICE BUT TO SERVE AND LOVE THEE BEST OF ALL?

            I’ve been reading the Catholic Church’s Stewardship Letter from several decades ago, and have been moved by some of what I have been reading. Today, I’d like to visit a bit of the section titled “The Call.” It says that “the Christian vocation is essentially a call to be a disciple of Jesus.” The letter goes on to say that the stewardship is part of that.

            However, the line that grabbed me said “Christians are called to be good stewards of the personal vocations they receive.”

            How often is our understanding of stewardship limited to money or serving in the church? Too often! What if our understanding of stewardship is taken with us outside the church walls and outside our church “work” into our “work” lives? That may seem easy if the call is to “ordained” work or “church” work. But…

• ·         What if your call as an attorney is Jesus’ call on your life?
• ·         What if your call as a farmer is Jesus’ call on your life?
• ·         What if your call as a day care provider is Jesus’ call on your life?
• ·         What if your call as teacher is Jesus’ call on your life?
• ·         What if your call as [fill in the blank] is Jesus’ call on your life?

            Jesus calls all of us to follow him. Jesus called the original 12 disciples to follow him, to leave their lives and to become “fishers of men.”

            We are called by Jesus as individuals. Just as each of us is unique (just like snowflakes), our calls an our vocations are unique. We are called and we must respond!

            The call is for us. The call is now. The call is urgent.

            So what is our response? It can be no, like the rich young man:

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth. (Matthew 19:21-22)

            But when we say yes, when we become a disciple of Jesus Christ, then that response leads directly to stewardship.

 

            Stewardship is the evidence of discipleship. Stewardship is discipleship. We must apply the resources that we have been trusted with to further the kingdom of God. We must make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world, so that “thy kingdom come, thy will be done. On earth as it is in heaven.”

            Hear these words of the hymn, “Jesus Calls Us” with new ears:

Jesus Calls Us

Text: Cecil Frances Alexander, 1818-1895
Music: William H. Jude

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1.      Jesus calls us o'er the tumult of our life's wild, restless sea; day by day his sweet voice soundeth, saying, "Christian, follow me!" 2. As of old the apostles heard it by the Galilean lake, turned from home and toil and kindred, leaving all for Jesus' sake. 3. Jesus calls us from the worship of the vain world's golden store, from each idol that would keep us, saying, "Christian, love me more!" 4. In our joys and in our sorrows, days of toil and hours of ease, still he calls, in cares and pleasures, "Christian, love me more than these!" 5. Jesus calls us! By thy mercies, Savior, may we hear thy call, give our hearts to thine obedience, serve and love thee best of all.   Serve and love thee best of all!!

 

            DO WE HAVE A CHOICE?

            Bishop John J. McRaith, an original member of the U.S. Catholic Bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship, had this to say: “Once one chooses to become a disciple of Jesus Christ, stewardship is not an option.”

            This statement by Bishop McRaith summarizes what I believe is important to understand about stewardship: it is intrinsically linked to discipleship. Too often, we view stewardship on one hand as fund raising and talking about money, and if we are really profound, as a way to give back to God a portion of what God has given to us. On the other hand, we look at discipleship as a way of being in relationship with God. Both of those things are correct (partially), but we miss the fact that both of them, stewardship and discipleship, have to work hand in hand. There isn’t a choice.

            Discipleship requires us to surrender ourselves. Once we become disciples of Jesus Christ, then we realize our responsibilities and work

·         on being God’s hands and feet in the world, on sharing the love and the good news of Jesus Christ with the world,

·         on being in service to the world, and

·         on making disciples of Jesus Christ in the world.

·         But, as disciples, we also have a responsibility to share part of what God has given us.

 

            Nothing that we have is ours. We can’t work hard enough or long enough; we can’t buy enough stuff; we can’t….essentially, the operative word is WE. None of it is ours. We don’t have the power all on our own because everything is God’s. God loves us so much that he gave us grace (unearned), gave us Jesus Christ to forgive our sin (unpunished), essentially God gives us everything!

            In a stewardship message that I shared earlier in the month, I used the example of ten apples. All ten apples are given to us by God, and God loves us so much that we are allowed to use nine apples any way we want. We are only asked to offer back one of the apples so that God’s work in the world can be accomplished.

            Note the word offer? It would, of course, be a whole lot easier if God simply gave us the nine apples and kept the other one for God’s self. But that’s not what happens. Because we are in partnership with God, we HAVE to be part of it and we do that by making the offering back to God…not because God needs anything from us, but because we have to make that offering in love and as disciples.

            “As each one has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewardship of God’s varied grace.” (1 Peter 4:10)

            So using the gifts we receive shows us being disciples and being good stewards. How? Stewardship: A Disciple’s Response gives various examples of the works, services and ministries of a good steward:

·         Evangelism and witness to the Gospel

·         Faith formation

·         Stewardship of the church

·         Stewardship of simplicity of life

·         Stewardship for ecology of the globe

·         Witness in the marketplace and institution

·         Financial accountability in person and parochial affairs

·         Stewardship of collaboration in church life and ministries

·         Stewardship of social justice and the work for peace.

            Do you suddenly feel the need to look back at the series of blogs I did earlier in the year about John Wesley’s Manifesto? I did, because so much of it seems to match, doesn’t it?

            So, as disciples, we are stewards. As stewards, we are disciples. There isn’t a choice. You can’t be one without the other. May it be so!