When Prophet-President Steve Veazey address the church in April and shared with the church the five mission initiatives, it sounded great. Conceptually it still sounds great. The church’s resources, of people, time, energy, monetary…. should be focused on the mission of Jesus Christ. However saying everything is aligned with them, and everything being aligned is not one and the same. How we divided our resources between the five, also will be a telling story.
So, perhaps what I want to know is in depth detail of how things have changed. Have they changed in that now every ministry, budget line etc. is now categorized under one of the five, but beyond that all is the same, or has there been strategic changes to ensure that the ministries of the church are actually living out the mission of the church in deed. Have we changed any program, gotten rid of any program, added any program due to these 5 initiatives? Are we taking time to actually ensure all resources truly are being used to their fullest for the mission of Christ. Are we re-aligning how we run various facilities of the church? Are we making the historic sites focus more on these initiatives 9allowing spiritual formation, discipleship formation, witnessing become a greater part of them, or just continue to run them as we have as educating people about history and PR for the church with the spiritual and discipleship activities secondary, a bit of passive witnessing and active witnessing even further down the line? Are we aligning the employees of the church with their giftedness and talents and the initiatives, and adjusting roles to better reflect the ministry needed in this world that we have been called and gifted to provide? Or have we just indicated that various former roles are still needed and justify them by saying they are under x y or z, without making sure they really are? I hope we re-evaluating, changing etc… but I just don’t know. the information I have seen publicly being shared, seems very surface level, glossing over and lacking depth of sharing what is truly going on. In many ways I crave and need more detail…
I got a bit more detail a couple days ago, but not really much… and it was the detail, and the lack of it, and the way it came, that made me start to think, start to reflect, and well write this post as a way for me to flush out the thoughts that are running through my mind right now.
Community of Christ HQ in the past year or so ahs sent me various mailings regarding giving. Some directed at me as an ordained minister, some more as a church member. They have focused on the financial side of things, more than other ways of giving… The most recent is no exception. I struggle with this, because while financial is important, so is the giving of time, talents, and other resources. If we focus to much on the financial giving, we may, and perhaps have, moved into a place where those in the pews feel all they need to do is show up and write a check. I know that is not what we are trying to do, the resources on discipleship formation clearly show that is not what a disciple is… but we send mixed messages when we focus on just one bit of stewardship. I also ponder how much of our limited resources have been used toward encouraging increases in ones financial giving, compared to other aspects of ministry, and what impact have they had? Have they increased the giving by more than they cost, and thus allowed us to expand our ministry or not? Have they also led to people giving more of their time? have they helped lead people into living the mission of Christ closer to 24h/7d a week rather than 1h/1d a week? I don’t know, a doubt anyone knows, except for how it has impacted themselves.
It is also hard for someone like me, with little financial resources, trying to work one’s way out of some financial difficulties that are in part due to health and in part due to my sacrificial giving of self, time, and resources to the mission of Christ as expressed primarily through the church, and preparing myself for further ministry in and with this body of believers and get back on my feet, to be hounded with messages of specific dollar amounts to increase per week… I can’t do it. (I would be in a much, much better financial position right now, and would probably fared better through some of my health issues, if it was not for my time with Community of Christ Historic Sites). Yet, while I have not been able to increase by the numbers they toss around, my giving has increased significantly over the past two years, and NONE of it was due to the mailings, etc… but rather my response to the grace and love of Christ, my sense of calling, and evaluating what I could give…. But my greatest financial gift, is one that has been my years of education, to better prepare myself for ministerial service in and with the church. In my mind the cost of my M.Div, and most if not all of the B.A. is truly a sacrificial gift to the mission of Christ, to help empower and strengthen me in my ministry and witness of the church… But there’s no accounting of that in the church’s books, nor recognition of the gift… instead just “as a member” or “as an ordained ministered” we seek to embrace the mission of Christ, this is what $10 a week more could do… But what about this is what 10 hours a month of volunteer service could do? this is what 10 hours of week engaging in Christ like ministry could do? Well inviting “ten people” or “helping 10 people be baptized” is mentioned on one page of sixteen pages of this newest mailing… and perhaps implied, but never directly engaged in the descriptions of the 5 mission initiatives and the church aligning to them, rather the focus in on the financial… Hmm, I just realized that financially, my giving of one week to serve as a counselor at camp, not counting my expenses, just the missed work… was over 1/2 the amount they asked me to increase my giving in a year, and as I did not serve as a counselor last year… perhaps I have gotten close, but again, no record, nor recognition (which I am okay with, except they keep hounding on the financial aspect rather than on the whole of stewardship so in a way seeming to de-value other needed and important forms of giving and stewardship). Perhaps as well I struggle as I want my church to be contacting me to say “hey, here are ways to utilize your gifts, talents, resources to live out the mission of Jesus the Christ, in and with your sisters and brothers around the globe” instead of “hey if you and everyone else in N. America increase giving by x a week, we can do x y and z…” in a way that seems as “others can” not “I and others can.”
Enough of that, lets get back to the 5 mission initiatives:
- Invite people to Christ – 18.64%
- Abolish Poverty, End Suffering – 14.04%
- Pursue Peace on Earth – 7.61%
- Develop Disciples to Serve – 38.57%
- Experience Congregations in Mission – 21.14%
The percentages following each initiative is the percent of the budgeted world mission tithes giving that has been assigned to each priority. It is these numbers that give me some pause… though I must remember that this is the percentage of 51% of the budgeted income. Income from other sources make up another 49% and the mailing does not include how that 49% is divided up. Since 20 of that 49 is endowment support, and the Temple and its ministries fall under Pursue Peace on Earth, and there is an endowment fund specifically for the Temple perhaps when we add in the 49% of total income Pursuing Peace is closer in its funding to that of other initiatives than the tithing portion alone indicates… But that’s the thing, we don’t know. All I know for sure is what has been shared, the amount of the 51% of income that comes from contributors that is budgeted toward each of these categories, and that if those levels are not met from giving directed at each initiative, then that given to “use where needed most” will go to fill it out, and then other income sources to try and make sure those amounts are realized…
So I have some problems, which may not be problems depending on how that other 49% is divided up, and what all falls under each of the 5, and how these %s will change over time. I believe in concept and description all five are needed, and meaningful. I however am worried about how we are (possibly) prioritizing/valuing the 5.
Yes, we need to help develop members (and others) on the path of discipleship so that they become active in the sharing of their time, gifts and talents… so that they are spiritually fed, and can feed others, to live in Christ focused ministry/mission 24/7 and not just show up to church once in awhile, not grow in relationship to Christ…. We need to have educated and trained leaders… (I would not have spent 9 years of my life in undergrad and seminary if I didn’t think so)… but should that receive more than the combined amount for the two initiatives that clearly are aimed at ministries focused on healing creation? perhaps it is needed at first, perhaps we need to train, educate, and empower people in their discipleship so they will respond and serve to embrace these needs… If these ratios stay the same over time and are truly this vast when we include the other 49% of income, we have a major problem. Community of Christ since it was founded in 1830 as Church of Christ, has been called to alleviating poverty and ending suffering…we’ve made a lot of mistakes, but it is a major part of our historical calling, our present calling and until the day poverty, hunger, suffering, war is no more a major part of our future calling… yet only 21.64% combined for these to initiatives…. Perhaps it could be explained by the other income sources, perhaps it can be explained in that many ways of using resources, many ministries could fall under several of the 5 initiatives so while Developing disciples get’s 38%, perhaps a significant part of that, and of the congregational ministries’ 21.14% could also be classified into Poverty/suffering and Peace?
Well, I’ve got to go rest a bit so I can go preside over a service in the morning… but I’m glad I wrote this, for while it may sound like a lot of complaining and concern 9which yes there is some) it has led to me see with new eyes the possibilities than when I started… Perhaps the division isn’t as bad as I thought once we add in the other income, and realize so many things can fall into various initiatives, and it seems they have chosen to let them fall in one or another… still I would like more detail of how we have “aligned” ourselves… what actual changes have transpired and are expected to happened due to embracing these initiatives?
How will we start to change the message from a focus on financial stewardship and giving to a holistic message of discipleship including all forms of stewardship and giving and not just monetary?
Peace,
— Lyle II