It’s that time of year again: Stewardship Season! There are a multitude of approaches to encouraging financial support of the church budget and plenty of other places with better resources than we can develop. BUT – we want to know what you are doing in worship as part of your Stewardship Season! How do you receive pledges? Do you have a litany or special prayer that you can share? Any ideas for what you would like to try differently? Put your ideas in the comments!
Special thanks to @MightyMere for suggesting this topic!
https://twitter.com/#!/MightyMere/status/128473967760642049
We are doing Commitment Sunday on November 6th…which is also Communion Sunday. So we will be taking the weekly offering…celebrating the work of the church by offering our commitment to the 2012 budget and the ministry it supports…and then gathering around the table to remember and to celebrate our past, present, and future work together. (I will post some liturgy for that this weekend). 🙂
I would love some resources! It is not something out church has ever done well (i think… at least not since I have been there). We need to better communicate why we give, what it supports, with the liturgical atmosphere to remind us that it is a spiritual act.
I have absolutely no idea what the stewardship team and head of staff have planned. I’m going to miss consecration sunday because I’ll be on the high school youth retreat (oh darn!) so…I just hope it works well!
In the past we’ve done a movement, where at the offering time we put two large baskets up front. Everyone was invited to come forward and place their offering in one basket, their pledge card in the other basket. Then we prayed over these gifts in a slightly longer version of the regular prayer of dedication. I don’t know that that necessarily worked any better than just having people turn in their pledge cards to the office….I think we needed a better liturgical set up than whatever we said that day (which I probably made up on the spot, because the interim pastor wasn’t sure what was going on, since it was like her 2nd week on the job!).
What dedication ideas do y’all have? If we get together here and write a dedication liturgy, I know we would use it!
I wonder if a new dedication litany could include the acknowledgement that we are afraid to give because our resources seem more scarce than previous years…but still we trust in God to provide for us as individuals and families and for our church…and maybe a line about God multiplying both our faith and our gifts? or something?
I DID NOT write this…I have no idea of its source, they’ve been using it at my church forever…we are NOT using it this year, though.
Let us look at our hands, see the touch and the tenderness.
God’s own for the world.
Let us look upon our feet, see the path and the direction.
God’s own for the world.
Let us look into our hearts, see the fire and the love.
God’s own for the world.
Let us look upon the cross, see the Son, our Savior, is risen.
God’s own for the world.
Let us look upon our tithes, our offerings, our commitments, our dedication to this church and its mission,
God’s own for the world.
This is God’s world.
And we will serve God in it.
Creating God, bless us to be a blessing to all of creation and to all we meet. Loving God, preserve this and every corner of the church with great care and give us the wisdom and courage to lead our lives with love and courage.
Christ’s warm welcome, come, shine in our lives,
transform the gifts we offer and the commitments we
dedicate this day. Make of them peace in heart and home,
love in word and deed, and grace in our living and our
loving. To God be the Glory now and forever, Amen!
It is our practice to take up the offering, and those who cannot come forward put their pledge cards in the plate…those who can come forward and do it seperately. This year we are adding something. We are using “Saints Alive” stewardship stuff this year, and their symbol is a tree. I took that and ran with it…We started on Reformation Sunday…and placed paper leaves in a orange color bearing the names of great reformers past and present…last week for all saints, we placed leaves with the names of all the of members who have died since the merger that created Good Shepherd 25 years ago. This week, as people make their pledges (or not) all will be invited to come forward take a leaf with their name on it and place it on the walls as well…the great swirl of leaves being a symbol of our place on the tree of life.
It’s from the Iona Abbey Worship Book, with a few modifications. 🙂
Michael, I love the tree idea with the leaves. Let us know how it all turns out–with pictures if you can! It sounds great.