Greetings,

I really like the passage of Scripture the Stewardship Committee has chosen as this year’s theme from 1 Peter 4:10:

Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in various forms.

Peter’s letter was intended for newly baptized Gentiles who were on a journey of discovery about God’s blessings in their lives. It is a letter that is full of some of the most beloved images of faith we have:

Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood…(2:4-5)

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people... Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy!(2:9-10)

Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you.(5:6)

Peter’s letter is a stewardship primer for new believers in the sense that he recounts what it means to understand our lives as being blessings from God. The message comes through loud and clear: God loves us with an infinite love and desires nothing for our lives but goodness. Within this context we understand that stewardship is about much more than the wallet or pocketbook because it all begins with God’s love towards us. In gratitude for all God has done and is yet to do, our response is total and incorporates the entirety of our lives.

Christ has made it clear to us that when it comes to considering earthly blessings it is his Church, and only his Church that will stand the test of time as a lasting institution in our lives. When all is said and done, it shall be the Church Triumphant that shall rise up in God’s Eternal City and gather us in as the family of God. Our common journey in Christ’s church today, as imperfect as that may be in this world at times, is the prelude and foretaste of what God shall yet do for us. How we live towards that vision, and the choices we make to do so, is what lifelong stewardship is all about.

In the past years, this congregation has shown how deeply it believes in this lifelong stewardship in the way it has given its time, offered its talents, supported our annual budgets and above and beyond that helped retire more than half of our building debt! The Stewardship Committee and the Session are humbled by your faithfulness and we express our deepest gratitude before God and this church.

On Sundays November 6 and 13, we will again receive and dedicate our annual stewardship pledges in the traditional way by bringing them forward during worship. Once again, we ask you to prayerfully consider the blessings God has bestowed upon you, as well as God’s call to bless others through the work of this faith community so that we may indeed always be faithful stewards of God’s grace in various forms!

In Christ, Reverend Jeff DeYoe, Sr. Pastor

File/PDF: 

stewardship_brochure.pdf