The Canons of The Episcopal Church list thirteen specific duties of Rectors and Priests-in-Charge. Among those thirteen duties is the duty “to ensure that all persons are instructed concerning Christian stewardship, including: reverence for the creation and the right use of God’s gifts; generous and consistent offering of time, talent, and treasure for the mission and ministry of the Church at home and abroad; the biblical standard of the tithe for financial stewardship; and the responsibility of all persons to make a will as prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer” (Canon III.9.5.a.2).
My performance of this duty has never required a canon as motivation! As far as I am concerned, the ability to be stewards is a gift of God that distinguishes human beings from all other creatures. It is a privilege to exercise that gift as an expression of faith in the Creator. There’s no more important priestly work than that of helping those given into our care to develop a healthy relationship with their possessions.
Our Lord had the same conviction. More than half of his sayings concern possessions. He wanted to liberate people from bondage and knew that our possessions have a way of possessing us. If you don't think you've given your possessions power over you, take a moment and consider how you've felt about them – or the loss of them – during the last couple of years. Jesus mission was to restore us to unity with God and one another, so he spent a lot of time helping people sort out their relationship with whatever estranges us – mainly, our possessions. He has entrusted that mission to us.
The invitation to make an annual "pledge" to God for the work of the Church is an opportunity to take a step toward healing our relationship with our possessions. We are invited to make a new commitment concerning what we will give to God, in acknowledgement of God’s sovereignty over our stuff.
One expression of stewardship is to practice tithing, the ancient biblical custom of returning to God one-tenth of what God has entrusted to us. Gay and I learned to tithe from the clergy who taught us in our childhood and from our parents. We do not regard tithing as a law or obligation, but as a spiritual discipline that helps us maintain a healthy relationship with our possessions so that they will have less interference in our relationships, so that we will be free to be stewards. To us, it is a precious vocation and we commend it to you as you consider your stewardship decision. We grew into tithing by starting with a percentage we could live with and then adjusting our lives so we could add at least 1% annually until we reached 10%. We now regard that tithe as God’s. Amazingly, the remaining 90% has always been enough.
Whatever we have, whether spent or saved or given away, is a sacred trust from God. We believe the least we can do is return the first portion of it – for us, a tithe – to God who has entrusted 100% of it to us to invest it in those things that further God’s ongoing Creation. We invite you to join us.
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