Mission Yearbook: Workshop looks at stewardship and political polarization

The Rev. Greg Allen-Pickett opened his workshop at Stewardship Kaleidoscope by asking attendees to share observations on the political climate in their own congregations. Stewardship Kaleidoscope is a conference presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

His question produced a litany of frustration, anxiety, and dismay from pastors and church leaders.

Among the responses:

• “Suddenly everything is political.”
• “There is nothing that I can say that is not seen by someone as political.”
• “Everything I say is examined for a hidden agenda.”

“Politics and faith are colliding in our pews in ways that they have not been in recent time,” said Allen-Pickett, who referred to the Civil War split of the Presbyterian Church as a historical comparison. “There are even different versions of what our stewardship dollars should fund.”

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Photo by Jon Tyson via Unsplash

But Allen-Pickett, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Hastings, Nebraska, told workshop attendees that there is hope for stewardship messages in a time of political division in society and in church. Purple, he pointed out, may be used to describe congregations whose members reflect the full range of political views, but it is also the liturgical color of the two seasons in the church calendar that are focused on Christ — Advent and Lent. “By keeping our focus on the life and ministry of Christ, we have been able to have conversations about politics within the word, life, death and resurrection of Jesus,” he said.

Allen-Pickett shared stories from his church to illustrate that practice. A member of the congregation who serves on the local governing board visited him with news of a proposal to display the phrase “In God We Trust” in the courthouse and to solicit Allen-Pickett’s support. “I told him I didn’t think that was a good idea,” he said. “I think he was shocked, but we had a conversation about it.” The next day, another member came to express her disagreement with the proposal, citing her atheist husband’s opposition; he had also served in the military and felt strongly about the separation of church and state.

“So, I have two members of my congregation on opposite sides of a highly charged local issue,” Allen-Pickett said. “I ended up mediating a conversation between them to try to reach some understanding. It was hard, but I tried to model civil dialogue.”

He shared another illustration about how his church has a long relationship with Catholic Social Services. For one month every summer, church members make sandwiches and pack sack lunches. The program is popular and well attended. “We may disagree about how children ought to be fed, but we are not going to stop feeding them,” he said. “When your hands are covered in peanut butter and jelly, it’s hard to have fights.”

Finally, as part of capital campaign planning, he learned that “even solar panels can be political.” A retired ecotheology professor from nearby Hastings College advocated for installing such panels on the church roof as an act of environmental stewardship. The proposal was met with resistance from some members of the church until a conservative member who had installed panels on his weekend cabin touted the economic benefits.

“This two-pronged approach generated support across the political divide,” Allen-Pickett explained. “The church bought into it, and we are one of two buildings in town with solar panels.”

Stewardship, then, includes the financial and tangible gifts with which God has entrusted us, but also the relationships God calls us to build with each other. It is, Allen-Pickett said, “about our very lives and how we choose to live them. It is about how to make our lives a living offering to God.”

He offered four strategies for engagement in an age of sharp political division:

• Listen first.
• Focus on shared mission.
• Frame conversations biblically and theologically.
• Preach with hope.

“Almost every week, I say to my congregation that we are the hands and feet of Jesus, sharing the love and light of Christ,” Allen-Pickett said. “Our goal has always been to model the way of Christ. If I can point to the red letters in the Bible and I have built trust with them, they will come to me and have the conversation.”

Chuck Toney for the Presbyterian Foundation (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Lucille Kearns, Summer Fellow, Office of Public Witness – Washington, Presbyterian Life & Witness
Katie Murray, Summer Fellow, Office of Public Witness – Washington, Presbyterian Life & Witness             

Let us pray:

O God, help us to know each other and to appreciate the rich, cultural diversity that defines our sisters and brothers in the world. Amen.

Mission Yearbook: Pastor shares roadmap to a healthier congregation

The Rev. Dr. Corey Nelson once talked with a young graduate student who said he had a steady girlfriend — a soul mate. Yet there were other beautiful women on campus he wanted to date.

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The Rev. Dr. Corey Nelson, pastor and head of staff at First Presbyterian Church in Fort Collins, Colo., delivers a keynote address during Stewardship Kaleidoscope. (Photo by Gregg Brekke)

Nelson advised the young man to choose: be faithful to his current partner or end the relationship to be free to date others.

The student’s eyes widened. “But the Bible says with God all things are possible!”

Nelson couldn’t help but laugh, which inspired the young man to give the church a one-star Google review later that day.

Nelson, pastor and head of staff at First Presbyterian Church in Fort Collins, Colorado, shared this story during a plenary gathering at Stewardship Kaleidoscope in New Orleans. The annual conference is presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Churches faced with budget shortfalls often cite the same quote (Matthew 19:26), which Jesus offered after advising a rich young man to give away his wealth in order to have treasure in heaven.

That’s not quite what Jesus meant, Nelson said.

Deficits, declining attendance and such can’t be prayed away, but they can — with God — be solved if church leaders are willing to put in the work, Nelson said.

Nelson came to his current call in 2016. An interim had helped the congregation heal from a schism caused when the former pastor urged the church to leave the denomination over its stance on LGBTQIA+ issues.

Much work remained, especially on the financial front. Members were being asked for donations to meet the current shortfall, there was a large mortgage on the property, the budget was being balanced with “frozen funds” and staffing was inefficient.

Nelson shared what helped his congregation get to a much healthier place, both in money and mission, less than a decade later. Though every congregation’s situation is different, here’s what he would advise:

Build trust “on the map.” Spend time on your congregation’s vision and self-identity and build relationships. With the support of wife Miriam, Nelson hosted many dinners at his home in his first few months at FPC Fort Collins. (It was more lasagna than he’d eaten in his lifetime.)

Project a responsible budget. About 80% of the church’s income is from pledges, but pledged amounts are not used to set the budget. Deaths, moves and other changes in active membership are carefully tracked; therefore, so is active giving.

Use compelling communication. Nelson developed an “elevator speech” he uses every year during stewardship season. It emphasizes inspiration, not pressure; hope for a better world; and the opportunity to create a balanced budget to enable more focus on mission.

Develop new models for personnel. Nelson put together a team of skilled human resources professionals and brought in legal counsel (worth the investment, he said) to handle potentially sabotaging issues of staffing changes and severance packages. The staff of 18 was reduced to eight, with no administrative assistants — employees handle their own administrative tasks — and lay employees instead of associate pastors.

For planned income and expenses, use anticipated income for anticipated expenses and surprise (one-time) income for one-time expenses. Have a prioritized list of needs for one-time gifts and a gift acceptance policy.

Trust equals generosity, Nelson emphasized. “People are going to show up with gifts when they can trust us,” he said. “I believe the local church, when it’s healthy and faithful, is the hope of the world.”

Nancy Crowe for the Presbyterian Foundation (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Shelly Lewis, Administrative Manager, Finance & Accounting Controllers Office, Administrative Services Group
Tony Lewis, Operations & Accounting Associate, Operations, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation       

Let us pray:

Send your Spirit into this place, O Lord, as you did with a mighty rushing wind at the birth of your church. Rush mightily into our hearts to heal and to bind up, that we might go out to serve, to reconcile and to meet you in all people. Amen.

Mission Yearbook: ‘Christian Minimalism’ author explains why more is never enough at conference

A TV commercial years ago asked: “Who thinks more is better than less?” The answer was that of course more is better.

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The Rev. Dr. Becca Ehrlich speaks during Stewardship Kaleidoscope (Photo by Gregg Brekke)

It made the Rev. Dr. Becca Ehrlich uneasy in ways she couldn’t pinpoint, but she went on to write ”Christian Minimalism: Simple Steps for Abundant Living.” She delivered the message at the combined plenary and closing worship at Stewardship Kaleidoscope in New Orleans. The annual conference was presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

It was a truly New Orleans-flavored service, with up-tempo renditions of “I’m Gonna Live So God Can Use Me” and “Shall We Gather at the River?” on keyboard and trumpet. The Rev. Dr. Alonzo Johnson, coordinator for the Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People program in Presbyterian Life & Witness, also led worship.

Ehrlich, an ELCA pastor, is executive director and founder of New Breath Spirituality Center within First Presbyterian Church of Albany, New York. She said more can be detrimental. Even those who do not have the mental illness known as hoarding typically have way more stuff than they need, she said. The average American home has 300,000 things in it, and it’s not unusual to think acquiring more items, with bigger homes to fit them in, is a good thing.

“No matter how much we have, we always feel like we need more,” she said.

That’s been a problem for a while. Adam and Eve lived in a literal paradise with everything they could ever need, but with a snake’s encouragement, they wanted more — the knowledge God has. “As we know, it didn’t end well for them.”

Then there was the successful farmer in Jesus’ parable who decided to stockpile all the food and supplies he could, building bigger barns to hold it all.

“But then God is like: Guess what? You actually die tonight. What’s going to happen to all that stuff?”

Friends or family will spend days or weeks sorting it out. He could have left more memories instead.

We’re always looking for the next thing, Ehrlich said.

“We innately know what’s most important in life, but our consumer society hijacks our sinfulness so that we perpetuate this consumer cycle,” she said.

When we start making more money or buy that bigger house, we may be happier at first, but that quickly levels out. We start chasing more again and it becomes harder to be happy with less. It’s a process known as the “hedonic treadmill,” she said.

“Luckily, Jesus tells us there’s a different way to live,” she said — as he told his hearers, one’s life does not consist in an abundance of possessions. Only God can fill our deepest needs and desires.

Acknowledging this, we can receive forgiveness and do better, Ehrlich said.

So many of us cite Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” But look at the original context, Ehrlich advised.

The letter Paul wrote from prison to the believers in Philippi affirmed that, having had both little and plenty, he’s learned to be content with whatever he has. “So, Paul’s famous words about Christ strengthening him in all things is actually about being satisfied with how much or how little one has,” she said.

“God helps us to put our focus on those things that are most important, rather than our stuff,” Ehrlich said. “God is calling us to use the resources entrusted to us to the glory of God.

“How is God inviting you to live a life of enough?”

As part of the offertory, participants were invited to write down one obstacle keeping them from doing that. Then they could come forward and drop the slip of paper into a baptismal font.

The service concluded in even truer New Orleans fashion with “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Worshipers marched around the room singing, waving handkerchiefs (and at least one parasol). 

Nancy Crowe for the Presbyterian Foundation (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Penny Franklin, Executive Relations Coordinator, Executive Office, The Presbyterian Foundation
Marissa Galvan-Valle, Associate, Hispanic Resources & Relationships, Growing Faith Resources, Presbyterian Publishing Corporation

Let us pray:

Father, we thank you for calling us to be your hands and feet. We ask you to open our hearts and minds to do your work every day, everywhere, and through everyone that we meet. You have placed us here to do your work and with your help we will gladly obey. Amen.

Mission Yearbook: In churches, stewardship doesn’t have to be hard or perfect

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Maggie Harmon spoke as part of Stewardship Kaleidoscope. (photo by Gregg Brekke)

Maggie Harmon began her workshop at Stewardship Kaleidoscope with a simple aim: to guide participants in creating a stewardship plan.

But the conversation quickly turned into something more. The audience leaned in with ideas, questions and stories of their own, so much so that the workshop became a shared exploration of what stewardship really means in congregational life. And Harmon, a ruling elder at First Presbyterian Church in Oakland, California, was happy to let it happen.

“The big thing I want you to take away,” Harmon told the group, “is that it doesn’t have to be that hard, and it doesn’t have to be perfect.”

Harmon reminded participants that many people immediately associate stewardship with money. “When you say we’re going to talk about stewardship, they grab their wallets,” she said with a smile. “They think you’re coming for their money.”

But Scripture paints a broader picture. Drawing from Genesis 2:15, she noted that stewardship is tending, caring and helping something grow.

“Generosity and offering aren’t the same thing,” she said. “Generosity is the readiness to give more than expected. An offering is a sacrifice ceremonially offered as part of worship. What if we asked people to take a moment, breathe and think about what we are asking them to do? What is the ritual around it — not the habit?”

Harmon spoke from the perspective of a small church. First Presbyterian Church in Oakland averages 60 in worship. Most churches in the PC(USA) are under 100 members, she pointed out, and the majority of stewardship teams are only one or two people. That makes planning both critical and doable.

For pledge campaigns, Harmon advised congregations to give themselves two to three months of preparation and keep the active campaign to four to six weeks. “Longer than that and people get tired. Shorter, and you risk missing folks,” she said.

Choosing a theme rooted in Scripture, writing clear letters and setting specific goals all help congregations focus their efforts.

“The compelling story is not ‘the electric company raised our rates,’” Harmon emphasized. “The message is we want to create a welcoming worship space everyone is comfortable in.”

Harmon then walked participants through the anatomy of an effective stewardship letter:

Start with Scripture. Ground the appeal in God’s Word.

Celebrate accomplishments. Highlight three to five ways the congregation’s gifts made a difference in the past year.

Cast vision. Name two or three aspirations for the coming year, with Scripture as the guide.

Be specific in the ask. Don’t shy away from inviting people to pledge their gifts of time, talent and treasure.

Give thanks. Repeat the ask and always close with gratitude.

“Pick three to five highlights,” Harmon said. “You’ll want to list 20, but don’t. Keep it clear, keep it simple.”

Beyond annual campaigns, Harmon encouraged congregations to weave stewardship into year-round communication. Monthly or biweekly notes in bulletins and newsletters, reflections on generosity, updates on ministry goals and reminders about legacy giving all keep the conversation alive.

“What I like to do is sit down and map it all out at once, so I know the rhythm of the year,” Harmon said. “Stewardship isn’t a season. It’s part of how we live as God’s people.”

The workshop was filled with engaged dialogue: A pastor asked how to handle snowbirds who split time between two churches, another leader shared how their stewardship planning began months before their new pastor arrived, and yet another cited Habakkuk 3:17–18 as a text for a campaign in uncertain times.

The energy in the room reflected Harmon’s central message, that stewardship is not simply about balancing a budget, but about grounding a congregation’s life in faith, generosity and trust in God’s provision.

Robyn Davis Sekula, Presbyterian Foundation (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Michael Fallon, Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer, Finance, The Board of Pensions
Tina Finley, Accountant, General Ledger Office, Administrative Services Group            

Let us pray:

Help us to see beyond our own walls, O God, to the friendships we have yet to form — relationships that will help us to grow and to extend your faith in ways that bring light to all people. Amen.

Mission Yearbook: Marketing can help with selling stewardship

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Carson Brown spoke last month during the opening day of Stewardship Kaleidoscope. (photo by Gregg Brekke)

Finding ways to link your congregation to stewardship requires a marketing lens to “sell” stewardship as an essential element of the Presbyterian experience, and that “support must be earned, it cannot be expected,” speaker Carson Brown said at Stewardship Kaleidoscope.

“How focused are we on selling what we’re doing to the people within our congregation?” Brown asked on the opening day of the Presbyterian Foundation’s Stewardship Kaleidoscope 2025 in New Orleans. The annual conference was presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Brown is a graduate of Florida Gulf Coast University with a bachelor’s degree in communication and is pursuing a Master of Divinity degree from Fuller Theological Seminary.  He serves as a pastoral resident at First Presbyterian Church in Bonita Springs, Florida.

“Why is marketing important? Why do we need to sell stewardship? Many of us come from generations where it’s just an expectation that people are going to give — not just on Sunday mornings but when their pledge envelopes roll around,” he said.

“We’ve always been able to reliably count on people to come into church and feel a sense of obligation to contribute to the mission of that church through their time, talent and especially their treasures,” Brown said.

The reality, though, is that churches compete for donations with dozens or hundreds of other organizations, many of which use comprehensive marketing tools to reach their audiences. Calls by the church for financial support faces challenges from families’ schools, nonprofit clubs such as the local theater or symphony, and other groups.

The youngest generations, teens and young adults, have a strong distrust of organizations, research shows. Gen Z tends to see society as becoming less generous. Their own levels of giving support that — but they also outshine all other generations in terms of volunteering their time to organizations.

Further, post-Covid, as more and more people decide to stay away from attending church services, why would you not expect giving to decrease as well?

Brown’s tips for selling stewardship apply equally to “selling” the church experience in general:

All marketing is communicating

Identify and clearly understand campaign principles, goals and objectives.

Develop a strategy for plainly and meaningfully communicating these things

Never assume knowledge!

Never expect even what’s plainly obvious — try to inform the congregation about church needs and how they’ll be addressed, instead of expecting people to know.

For the Boomer generation, Facebook is an excellent tool to share church news. For social media campaigns, use a good mix of cellphone videos, testimonials, info-graphics and simple calls-to-action to keep the page active.

Interestingly, people under age 45 might prefer to receive church news and stewardship promotions through the mail — because they grew up not receiving a lot of handwritten notes, letters and cards, Brown said. For printed materials, there are several easy-to-use graphic programs such as Canva that help design flyers, information cards and other marketing materials.

Still, face-to-face visits typically are most effective when it comes to sharing the church’s needs and stewardship opportunities. For smaller churches with perhaps 500 or fewer active members, in-person visits can be a great tool — but might be impractical for larger churches, he said.

Finally, when communicating with church members and the community about what’s going on, including stewardship opportunities, Brown recommends going back to the basics of logos, ethos, pathos: Use logic and what makes sense; appeal to people’s sense of what’s right; and appeal to feelings and passion.

John C. Williams for the Presbyterian Foundation (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Amanda Craft, Manager, Immigration Advocacy, Mid Council Ministries, Presbyterian Life & Witness
Octavia Craig, Treasury Assistant, Treasury Office & Central Receiving Services, Administrative Services Group 

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus, thank you for inviting all of us to participate in your mission. Guide our congregations as we disciple giving them opportunities to see your work in and through them in the world. Amen.

Mission Yearbook: New Orleans church hosts reception before the start of Stewardship Kaleidoscope

The charm and convenience of New Orleans’ storied streetcars weren’t lost on an adventurous group of Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference participants who had arrived a day early to explore the city.

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St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church hosted a welcome reception Sunday for those arriving a day early at the Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference. (Photo courtesy of St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church)

As the diverse group of conference leaders and attendees from around the country rode the historic St. Charles streetcar line together, they were visibly moved as they approached the magnificent façade of the St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church, which opened its doors on to greet them by hosting a welcome reception, complete with traditional Mardi Gras beads for each guest.

“In welcoming participants in the Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference to New Orleans, we wanted to share the hospitality of the local church and give thanks for the work of the greater church that helps resource the local church where vital ministry happens,” said the Rev. Chris Currie, senior pastor at St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church, who attended the conference with several staff colleagues. “In a time of polarization and toxic online discourse, having opportunities to build bridges, share in each other’s lives face to face, and support one another in our service to Jesus Christ is who we are called to be as Christ’s church.”

Themed “Stewardship: The Art of Resiliency,” the 2025 conference was held Sept. 22–24 at the Sheraton Canal Street, New Orleans.

“The hospitality at the reception was wonderful, and I had the chance to meet a lot of different Presbyterians from across the denomination,” said Luci Duckson-Bramble, director of Development for the Presbyterian Historical Society in the Interim Unified Agency of the PC(USA), who co-led a conference workshop with PHS’s records manager, David Staniunas. “Being there was a reminder of the connectedness of the PC(USA), and it’s always good to hear how we’re serving congregations and the broader communities.”

Drawing leaders from across the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and other ecumenical partners, Stewardship Kaleidoscope is designed to ignite generosity in faith-based communities, give practical tools for cultivating generosity in congregations, expand the leadership capacity of those who lead stewardship initiatives, and cultivate adaptive approaches for funding Christ’s mission.

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St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church in New Orleans threw out the welcome mat Sunday to people attending this year's Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference. (Photo by Emily Enders Odom)

“It's a challenging time to be the church right now,” said the Rev. Sandra Moon, vice president of Church Finances & Property and Adaptive Initiatives for the Presbyterian Foundation. “In a time of deep social and political upheaval, and frequent natural disasters — to which New Orleans is no stranger — the 2025 conference theme, ‘The Art of Resiliency,’ is especially timely.”

Moon, who served as Stewardship Kaleidoscope operations chair, resourced and supported the all-volunteer conference planning team together with the event co-chairs, Stefanie Marsden, relationship manager for the Texas Presbyterian Foundation, and Caralee Wheeler, development program associate for the Presbyterian Foundation.

Because 2025, which marked the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the region’s — and the people’s — resiliency was always top of mind.

And while each of the preachers and speakers addressed the conference theme through the lens of their own context, experience and expertise, the Rev. Jean Marie Peacock — who was Vice Moderator of the 216th General Assembly (2004) — reflected on resiliency and stewardship in the context of New Orleans and the recovery efforts in response to Hurricane Katrina.

In addition to leading a plenary session, Peacock also offered a workshop titled, “Missional Ministry in Your Own Backyard.”

Peacock’s was one of some 35 workshops that in-person participants would be attending during the three-day conference, all while gaining invaluable insights from the speakers and preachers and enjoying unique opportunities to connect with other conferees, not to mention the conference leaders as well.

“When I saw that Alonzo Johnson was one of the preachers at the conference, I made sure to sign up,” said Theresa Purnell, a ruling elder at the Oak Lane Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, who was at Stewardship Kaleidoscope for the first time.

Purnell shared that Johnson, who coordinates the Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People Program, is a former pastor of the Oak Lane Church.

Johnson, a prominent PC(USA) leader and powerful preacher, led worship on the conference’s opening day. In addition to Johnson and Peacock, the featured keynoters and preachers were the Rev. Dr. David P. King, the Rev. Dr. Corey Nelson and the Rev. Dr. Becca Ehrlich.

Emily Enders Odom, Former Associate Director of Mission Communications, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) (Click here to read original PNS Story)

Let us join in prayer for:

Laura Bryan, Manager, Financial Aid for Service, Interim Unified Agency
Lucy Bryant, Online Service Client Relations Specialist, Operations, The Presbyterian Foundation

Let us pray:

Dear Lord, we thank you for the opportunity to serve you. Help us to continue doing your work and advancing your kingdom. Allow others to see the love we have for you through our service. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Dallas pastor challenges Stewardship Kaleidoscope audience to consider the relationship between desperation and generosity

The Rev. Amos Disasa of First Presbyterian Church speaks on the healing justice of generosity

The Rev. Amos Disasa, senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in
Dallas, speaks at Stewardship Kaleidoscope. (Photo by Gregg Brekke)

Desperation can be a faithful fundraising strategy, said the Rev. Amos Disasa, senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Dallas.

He spoke on the healing justice of generosity in a plenary gathering at Stewardship Kaleidoscope in Portland, Oregon. The annual conference was presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Disasa offered two stories, the first from an encounter on his way home from church on a hot August day. A man standing in front of a minivan on an exit ramp shoulder waved him down.

Disasa stopped to help. He admitted the question “What will I think of myself if I don’t stop?” was in the back of his mind.

The man was well dressed, right down to his Gucci belt, Disasa said. He said he ran out of gas on the way to visit his brother in Denver and asked for money “to get to the next gas station.”

Disasa offered to take him to get gasoline and bring him back. The man, saying his wife and children were in the minivan, just wanted cash.

Disasa decided to give the man $25, but there was no way to discreetly separate a $5 and a $20 from the $69 in his money clip.

“Five would have been enough to solve the problem he identified, but I added 20 to relieve my sense of shame” at not giving the man all he had, Disasa said.

He thought that would be the end of the interaction. It wasn’t.

The man handed back the money, took off the gold ring he was wearing and demanded Disasa hold it. He then took one step back, got on his knees and said, “Sir, I beg you, please — give me all of it. Now.”

The man was desperate and irrational, begging on his knees on an exit ramp in the heat, Disasa said. “His desperation was a demand for justice. He refused to shield me from my shame.”

A few weeks later Disasa saw the man in a different place on another Sunday, again waving cars down.

The discovery did not alleviate Disasa’s guilt. “He was acting the part of real people that subsist on the scraps from our feasts of decadent consumerism, ecological degradation and unfettered capitalism. His story was fictional but revealed something true for me: Injustice always exists in the absence of generosity.”

Disasa turned to a story of another desperate man: the royal official imploring Jesus to heal his dying son in John 4:43–51.

The man was from Capernaum, where Jesus had been rejected. The royal official had left home and walked two days to Cana to beg this prophet he’d heard about to walk the two days back with him and save his son. “Sir, come down before my little boy dies,” he said.

“Have you been there?” Disasa asked. “There is nothing you can reasonably do to make someone well, so you start pondering the most irrational, far-fetched and mildly irresponsible courses of action.”

Jesus chose to heal the boy from a distance and assures the royal official his son will live. Had he made the two-day trip to Capernaum only to find the boy had died, “he would have been just in his trying. Instead, he chose to be generous in his healing,” Disasa said. In doing so, Jesus gave the royal official immediate relief from the pain, grief and helplessness he carried.

“Generosity is how you tell healing justice from justice that makes you wait,” he said. “Healing justice is different in the time it returns to the people who have acted out of faithful irrationality to demand that people in positions to heal actually do it.”

Disasa asked the audience: “What are you so desperate for, what healing are you longing for, what hope do you cling to that you would get on your knees and beg someone, ‘Give me all of it. Please. Now.’

“If it is the survival of your institution, please go and find something else to despair and be desperate about.”

A long pause followed.

“All right. I’m going to stop talking,” Disasa said quietly before leaving the lectern.

Nancy Crowe for the Presbyterian Foundation, Special to Presbyterian News Service

Let us join in prayer for:

• Jerry Cannon, Vice President, Ministry Innovation, Board of Pensions
• José Manuel Capella-Pratts & Vilmarie Cintrón-Olivieri, Regional Liaisons for Caribbean, Presbyterian Mission Agency

Let us pray:

Gracious Lord, open our eyes and hearts to see your mission in the world, and give us discernment and courage to participate in ways that bring glory to your name. Amen.

Today in the Mission Yearbook - Not by offerings alone: new strategies for sustainable ministry and good stewardship

Stewardship Kaleidoscope keynoter Grace Pomroy shows ways that ‘God is alive and active in our world today’

November 27, 2024

Grace Pomroy speaks at Stewardship Kaleidoscope in Portland, 

Oregon, on Sept. 24. The annual conference is presented by the 

Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and Evangelical Lutheran Church in 

America. (Photo by Gregg Brekke)

Grace Pomroy took her position as director of the Stewardship Leaders Program at Luther Seminary in Saint Paul, Minnesota, with joy. When she entered the building, it was empty except for two people — one wearing a makeshift mask and rubber gloves. Papers to be signed were shoved back and forth down a long table.

It was March 2020.

“The pandemic was one of the darkest times in my faith journey,” Pomroy told those gathered in a plenary session at the recent Stewardship Kaleidoscope  in Portland, Oregon. The annual conference was presented by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

The Covid news kept getting worse. Then George Floyd was murdered in her community.

“All I wanted was for the God of the Bible to show up,” she said. Teaching future pastors while experiencing her own dark night of the soul felt increasingly uncomfortable.

Pomroy’s pastor suggested she look for God in the little places rather than the big ones. Pomroy at first didn’t think much of that answer, but as she took it to heart, glimmers of hope and joy emerged.

So did the research that fueled her presentation: “Funding Forward: Finding Hope in a Season of Decline.”

Churches are experiencing their own dark night of the soul as buildings age, budgets shrink and attendance drops.

“For many faith communities, it has or will become less and less feasible to fund their missions on tithes and offerings alone,” Pomroy said.

Relying so heavily on this funding system can make it all too easy for stewardship conversations to be about the church’s need to receive rather than the giver’s need to give. It creates temptation for the pastor to preach or minister a certain way in order to keep the lights on, or for larger donors to have more sway.

This “closed circuit financial system” also discourages partnerships outside the congregation.

Confronting these truths creates an opportunity to explore where God is calling congregations to go next. That could mean forming new community partnerships, tapping underutilized resources, diversifying income streams and returning the offering to a spiritual practice rather than a commercial break, Pomroy said.

In the course of her research, Pomroy worked with First Presbyterian Church of Gulf Shores, Alabama. The pastor, the Rev. Chrisy Ennen, came on board during the pandemic. She knew the church had financial challenges, but nearly nine months in she discovered she’d been hired with only two years’ salary available.

The congregation considered many options. At the same time, Ennen kept hearing two needs expressed in the community: affordable child care and affordable rental office space, particularly for entrepreneurs.

The congregation ran the numbers. Child care probably wouldn’t work. Renting out their space just might.

The church had space sitting vacant during the week. However, “that beautiful space was full of church junk. Any of you have that problem?” Pomroy said as laughter filled the room.

Luckily, a gentleman had just retired and returned to First Presbyterian, someone who probably wouldn’t join a committee but loved to pick up his tools and get to work.

“In less than a year, they had a church full of renters,” she said. In fact, one new renter is a child-care provider.

Did all of those renters come to church on Sunday? No, but other people in the community heard what First Presbyterian was doing and decided to check it out.

Pomroy cautioned that solutions like these are anything but cookie cutter, as every church and community will have different ingredients.

Pomroy’s research identified 200 congregations across the U.S. and Canada doing one of three things:

• They had one income source outside of the offering plate.
• They had a self-sustaining ministry.
• They had reduced their budget by 10% or more in an intentionally missional way.

More details can be found in her recent book: “Funding Forward: A Pathway to More Sustainable Models for Ministry.” You can download the first chapter free.

“This project has re-enlivened my faith in ways I couldn’t have imagined,” she said. “God is alive and active in our world today.”

Nancy Crowe for the Presbyterian Foundation, Special to Presbyterian News Service

Daily Readings

• Morning Psalms 96; 147:1-11
• First Reading Zechariah 12:1-10
• Second Reading Ephesians 1:3-14
• Gospel Reading Luke 19:1-10
• Evening Psalms 132; 134

Today’s Focus: Stewardship Kaleidoscope keynoter Grace Pomroy

Let us join in prayer for:

PC(USA) Agencies’ Staff
Jeffrey Arnold, Executive Director, Association of Presbyterian Colleges & Universities (APCU)  
Molly Atkinson, Administrative Assistant, 1001 New Worshiping Communities, Presbyterian Mission Agency 

Let us pray

God is good; all the time. All the time; God is good. For that is God’s nature. Amen.