Last week I wrote about gospel generosity and the need to pray for and display gospel generosity in giving up resources from our congregation to other ministries.

During the week many people have asked questions and made comments so I thought it helpful to think a bit more about the topic by moving out from congregational generosity to consider generosity more widely in a parish and Diocesan setting.

Generosity is always a gospel issue and an issue of the heart. By the grace of God, through the power of His Spirit, God makes us willing to seek the good of others at cost to ourselves. That said, generosity seldom comes naturally and so we need to think of ways to entrench generosity in the way we relate to others.

Parish generosity

Years ago parishioners went to church twice on Sundays. We now live in a world,  where once a Sunday is seen as good. A consequence of this is that people attend only one congregation of a parish. This means that congregations become self contained and even within a parish operate independently of each other.

It makes sense that each congregation has its own identity and partners take ownership of their congregation, but we are also in danger of losing a generous heart, even to other congregations within our parish.

So what is the way forward?

Fellowship (or generosity) is created by mutual love, care and prayer. Congregations need to pray for the ministry of other congregations in their parish. They need to rejoice when others rejoice and weep when others weep. Do we have members of one congregation report to the other what God is doing in their midst?

There is often financial cross subsidization between congregations. We need rejoice when our congregation is supporting another congregation, especially when it mans our congregation has reduced resources. This takes education and modeling.

It strikes me that practical generosity also needs to be embedded in our lives together. Each congregation needs to do practical things, where we ‘get our hands dirty’ for the benefit of the other congregation. For example the evening congregation (which is often young and childless) could take on the responsibility of providing the Kid’s Church and Youth Group leaders for the morning congregation. The morning congregation could support the evening ministry by hosting Home Bible Study groups, or once a term putting on an evening meal before church for the evening congregation. Activities such as these foster gospel generosity.

Diocesan Generosity

Some parishes have many resources and some few. I wonder what would happen if a well resourced congregation took on the responsibility of supporting a less resourced parish?

What form would this take? It will affect the pocket, prayer and partnership.

Maybe the well resourced parish could supply a paid student minister to the under resourced parish? Better still, perhaps each parish could undertake to man and conduct a holiday club in the sister parish? By working side by side, gospel generosity is extended.

Of course these suggestions will always cost the supplying church. It may mean that you will not be able to take on the extra staff member, but analysis shows that usually extra staff members have a diminishing return anyway. Regardless of whether this is true, becoming like Jesus in generosity has to be worth it.

Finally, at Synod this year parishes will be asked to vote on a levy to meet the needs of the Diocese’s central functions. While I am convinced that parishes are where the action is, because of gospel partnership and generosity it cannot be fundamentally wrong to give up some resources to others in need. Considered in this light such an act will aid our spiritual life.

Generosity. We all want to be more generous. We need to teach it, model it, and entrench it in practical action.