No one likes greedy people. Nor does anyone want to be surrounded by those who take more than they give. Sadly, this is the natural default mode of human behavior. Therefore, becoming a generous person can only be accomplished through the power of Jesus Christ.
After watching countless people grow in their generosity, I have identified The 4 Stages Of A Generous Church Giver.
The following is just a portion of the content I will be teaching in a free webinar this Thursday, September 17th entitled How To Raise More Money In 2016 Than You Ever Thought Possible. The online coaching will take place at 2:00 PM EST. You can sign up by clicking HERE. Now onto The 4 Stages Of A Generous Church Giver:
The year was 2008 and I was sitting at my INJOY Stewardship Solutions desk doing normal work on an otherwise nondescript day. My phone rang and it was a gentleman I had spoken with a few times named of Joseph Sangl. Joe had recently become a ministry partner because of his personal finance ministry I Was Broke. Now I’m Not. He wanted to discuss how his products could be leveraged into our sales environment and campaigns.
This was an intriguing relationship because no other stewardship company offered a personal finance component to their campaigns. The relationship with Joe had the potential to give us a competitive advantage. Ironically, Joe would go on to two years later becoming our owner and CEO.
As we spoke God began to reveal to me the uniqueness of this relationship and the benefits it would have for the local church. I realized there is a BIG difference between DOING a capital campaign and getting the people READY for a campaign. God in His kindness had now granted us the ability to not only do both, but do both in the context of a singular discipleship journey. Let me explain.
As I contemplated the journey of giver, I realized givers go through a process of personal growth. So sitting at my desk six years ago, I developed the 3 Stages Of A Generous Giver. It has since been expanded to 4. The 4 Stages Of A Generous Giver are the following:
Struggling
Most growing churches are reaching young families. Young families often come into a church with a house note that stretches them, two car payments, credit card debt and student loans. The ministry need at your church can outpace your financial resources.
Stability
For churches to disciple generous givers, they must help these young families. They must help them get out debt, stay out of debt, develop a spending plan, and work giving to their local church into their personal budget.
Surrender
As people begin giving to God and their local church on a regular basis, their faith deepens. Their trust in God deepens. God proves himself to be reliable and faithful. God shows Himself to be Jehovah Jireh, the God who provides.
Sacrifice
Now that givers have gone through the process of Struggling to Stability to Surrender, it is only now they are ready for Sacrifice. They are now ready to participate in a capital campaign. The mistake many growing churches make is because of great need and urgency, they leapfrog straight to sacrifice. When a church leapfrogs the process, unknowingly, they disenfranchise a large number of people who would have loved to have helped the church, they just can’t.
Struggling to Stability to Surrender to Sacrifice. These are the 4 Stages Of A Generous Giver. I hope you can join me on Thursday’s webinar. Click here and sign up.
