Hi,
Here is my first draft for All Saints which is also the Sunday before people
turn in their pledges for our stewardship and capital fund appeal.
Paul L. Larsen
Christ the King Lutheran Church
New Brighton, MN
Grounded in Grace, Growing in Mission, Giving to Serve
My parents were saints. No, they were not perfect people - but they were
people of faith, they were believers and that is what a saint is. On this
All Saint's Sunday I hope that you will spend some time thinking about the
saints who have impacted your life. I hope you will offer a prayer of
thanks for those people who have helped you become a saint.
The theme for our stewardship and capital fund appeal is "Grounded in Grace,
Growing in Mission, Giving to Serve." We are people who are grounded in
grace because of the saints or believers who have helped us grow in faith.
Somewhere along the line parents or grandparents, pastors or teachers,
friends or other family members helped us understand grace. They helped us
to know that God loves us unconditionally. We are here worshiping today
because someone enabled us to realize that there is nothing we can do to
make God love us more and there is nothing we can do to make God love us
less. God simply loves us.
William K. McEvary is the president of the St. Paul School of Theology in
Kansas. McEvary was on his way to the airport to pick up a guest speaker.
When he neared a bridge over the river, traffic came to a dead stop and
stayed that way for 20 minutes. The next day read a story which explained
the delay. A young man had climbed over the railing and was standing in the
superstructure of the bridge preparing to jump. The police came and stopped
all the traffic. A cop put a harness and rope on and climbed down into the
superstructure also. He said to the young man, "I know you have some
trouble in your life, but there is a whole bunch of people who care about
you and who can help you. Don' t do this." Well, the young man immediately
jumped. And the cop jumped after him. He grabbed the young man and wrapped
his arms and legs around him as they dropped to the end of the rope. The
cop said to him, "If you go I go. I am going to hang onto you until hell
freezes over!"
We are people grounded in grace. We are people wrapped in the everlasting
arms and legs of a God who will hold onto us until hell freezes over.
In each of our lives we have had some saints who have helped us understand
that. We have had some believers who have helped us believe in Jesus
Christ, who loved us more than life itself.
For me it was my parents who helped me become grounded in grace. They were
committed Christians who did everything they could to help me grow in my
relationship with God. They were examples and models of the faith. They
were good stewards. I know that my parents were good givers because as a
young boy I saw the check my dad wrote out to the church one Sunday. I was
amazed at the amount and asked if he gave that much every week. He used the
situation as a teaching moment and told me not only what they gave to the
church each week, but he also talked about how fortunate they felt to be
able to support a number of other charities in a generous way. He talked
about the great joy to be found in giving.
My father wrote a long letter to us before he died of cancer in 1967. I
have carried a copy of that letter in my briefcase for more than 20 years.
At the end of the letter he explained what he had left to each of us. He
says, "I hope you will use it wisely, not just for yourselves, but for
others less fortunate. I can truthfully say that for me there has been more
joy in what I have been able to do for others than what I have done for
myself....... I commend all of you into the care of our Lord and Savior.
Keep in close contact with him and life will have real meaning for you.
‘Till we meet on resurrection morning. All my love, Dad."
I have read that letter often and it has meant a great deal to me over the
years. It has always served to remind me that it was my parents' faith that
helped me to be grounded in grace. It was their faith that caused them to
be good stewards of their resources.
I hope that you have some saints in your life that have helped you to grow
in the faith. I hope there are some believers who have helped you to
understand what it means to be a good steward of the gifts God has given
you. And in turn, I hope that you are helping your children, your friends,
co-workers and others to become grounded in grace. As saints we are called
to help others become saints also.
As saints, as people grounded in grace, we are called to grow in mission.
Saints put their faith into action. Saints are those who live out their
trust in God in their every day lives. There is a line that says
"Stewardship is what you do after you say you believe." I think that is a
wonderfully accurate description of stewardship.
It is because we are grounded in grace that I am confident we will grow in
our mission. By meeting our stewardship and capital appeal goals we will be
able to grow in mission in some exciting ways.
We want to give 10% of our capital appeal income to benevolence. $60,000
will go to start a new church in this country and $40,000 to build a church
building in Tanzania.
We want to do a better job of reaching the electronic generation - the 18
to 30 year olds. One small thing we can do there is to use a screen in
worship to project the words of songs, video clips, art, and parts of the
sermon. I have never really thought screens were that important. But in a
lecture I was told that if you don't understand the need for screens in
worship it is because you are too old! I didn't realize it showed in that
way!
We have an opportunity to purchase the house just to the east of our
property where one day we can build some housing for seniors next to our
church.
We want to increase our financial support given to the four ethnic
congregations in our synod.
Those are just a few of the ways we hope to grow in our mission. Please
read about the others in the stewardship mailings you have received.
We have some ambitious goals. It means raising 1.1 million dollars in our
three year capital fund appeal and increasing our annual stewardship giving
by more than 11%. But we can do it. God has blessed us with the ability to
do these things and God is calling us to greater commitment. God is calling
us to do great things.
There is a poem I like that says:
"Doubt sees the obstacles - faith sees the way!
Doubt sees the darkest night, faith sees the day!
Doubt dreads to take a step, faith soars on high!
Doubt questions, ‘Who believes?', Faith answers, ‘I."!"
I know that we have the resources and the ability to reach our stewardship
and capital fund goals. It is like the pastor who announced to his
congregation that he had some good news and some bad news. He said, "The
good news is we have the money we need for our new church building. The bad
news is it is still in your bank accounts!"
We have a God who loves us and has richly blessed us. We are grounded in
grace. We are called to grow in mission and we have the ability to do that.
If there is a barrier to our reaching our goals and growing in our mission
it is not because of a lack of commitment. It is because of an
over-commitment to the wrong things. God asks us to be the number one
priority in our lives. God does not just ask for our money he asks for our
very lives. Our gifts of money are merely a sign and symbol of that
commitment. Jesus said, "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be
also." (Matt. 6:21). If we want to check on ourselves and see if God
really is number one in our lives, then we should look at where and how we
spend our money. We should examine what percentage of our income we are
giving to God's work and ask ourselves if it reflects our commitment to God.
I know that some of you are tithers. You are giving 10% or ever more of
your income to support God's work in the world. For those of you who are
not yet tithing I would ask you to prayerfully consider it. If you do, I
know you will find great joy in it and it will be a source of spiritual
growth for you. Sometimes we mistakenly say, "I will grow in my giving when
I have grown in my faith." The truth is when we grow in our giving then we
grow in our faith.
Now I know that asking people to tithe is not popular. Some people consider
it impossible. In fact, I heard the following story recently. A preacher
was walking on the beach finds a bottle that has washed ashore. He picks up
the bottle opens it and out comes a genie. The genie is so grateful he tells
the preacher he will give him one wish. The pastor says, "I have always
wanted to go to the Holy Land, but as I am terrified of airplanes and I get
seasick just thinking about boats, I need a road built, so I can drive
there!" The genie says, "Well, it is impossible to build a bridge that
long. Let's be reasonable. Give me another wish and I will fulfill it." So
the pastor says, "Well, then I wish that all my church members would tithe."
The genie sighed and said, "Did you want that to be a two lane or four lane
bridge?"
Tithing is not impossible. Esther and I have been tithers for a number of
years. In fact we are currently giving about 13% of our household income to
support God's work. Not all of it goes to Christ the King, but most of it
does. We have found great reward in that. We have found great joy in it.
And I know you can each find joy in your giving also. When we first
discussed our gift to the capital campaign we decided we would give a gift
of appreciated stock that would total about $9,000. At one of our meetings
Jim Harrison, our stewardship consultant from the James Company, said,
unless people give more than what they first think about giving we will not
reach our goals. So we spent some more time thinking and praying about our
gift and we have decided that regardless of what the stock market does we
will give a gift of $10,000 over the next three years to our capital fund
appeal. We have also committed ourselves to increasing our annual pledge so
that our total giving will be just over 17% of our income. Now I am not
telling you that to brag. We are excited about being able to do that and we
find joy in giving. I am telling you that so you will know that it can be
done. I know that many of you give generously and give in ways that would
affirm that there is joy to be found in giving. If some of you are not
finding joy in your giving, maybe you are not giving enough! Please
consider tithing if you are not already doing it. Please consider growing in
your giving even beyond a tithe for I know you will find great reward in it.
A pastor made an appeal for world hunger. After worship a woman came up to
him and handed him a check for $500. As she gave it to him she asked if it
was satisfactory. The pastor immediately replied, "If it represents you."
There was a moment of soul searching thought and then she asked to have her
check back.
She left and a day or two later she returned handing the pastor a check for
$5000 and again asked, ‘Is my gift satisfactory?" The pastor gave the same
answer as before saying, "If it represents you." As before she thought for
moment and again took back her check.
Later in the week she came again with a check. This time it was for
$50,000. As she placed it in the pastor's hand she said, "After earnest and
prayerful thought I have come to the conclusion that this gift does
represent me and I am happy to give it."
As you prayerfully decide what your gift will be to our annual stewardship
appeal and to our three year capital fund appeal I hope you will ask
yourself these questions.
Do my gifts represent the way in which God has blessed me?
Do my gifts represent my gratitude for all God has given me?
Do my gifts represent my desire to help do God's work in the world?
If we all give gifts that represent the fact that we are saints grounded in
grace, if they represent our desire to grow in mission, if they represent
our need to give in order to serve God, then we will not only meet our goals
we will exceed them. Amen.