We lift our voices,
we lift our hands,
we lift our lives up to you,
we are an offering.
— ELW 692
Dear church family,
For some of you, this hymn might be a little unfamiliar. It is new to many Lutherans, appearing for the first time in Evangelical Lutheran Worship, published just a few years ago, but it has been extremely popular in other Christian groups for many years. It is called “We Are An Offering,” and we’ve been singing it in worship for a few weeks now as our offerings of bread, wine, and money are brought to the altar in preparation for Holy Communion. The music is uplifting and has a way of staying with you through the day. But more importantly than that, I can think of no better words to capture the essence of what stewardship is for Christians.
So often stewardship sounds like churchy code language for money. When we hear that the Stewardship Campaign is about to begin, we can be tempted to think “uh oh, here they come asking for money again.” And, to some degree, you’d be right. The church does count on your generosity in all sorts of ways to help keep God’s ministry in this place vibrant and growing. You’ve been hearing about some of those ways at the beginning of worship as we get closer to Commitment Sunday (Nov. 21) and you can read about even more ways on page 8 of this month’s Echoes.
However, if we focused only on money when we talked about stewardship, as if we were “paying dues” to be part of some group, we’d be missing the point entirely. Stewardship is not an annual fundraising appeal; it is a reminder that everything we have is God’s gift to us: our home, our possessions, our food, our church—even our own lives. We don’t “pay dues” for any of it; God gives it to us, as Martin Luther says in the Small Catechism, “out of pure, fatherly, and divine goodness and mercy.” We could never “pay God back” for what God has given us.
What we can do is lead lives of gratitude; we can be good stewards of what God has entrusted to us. A steward is someone who is given the responsibility of taking care of something that belongs to someone else. As stewards of God’s creation, it is, as we say in the Eucharistic Prayer each Sunday, “our duty and our joy” to give thanks to God at every time and every place—by making sure that everything God has placed into our hands is taken care of, and gets used not only for our benefit, but for all God’s children.
One way we do this is with our money. We return to God a portion of what we have to ensure that God’s message of love and forgiveness continues to go out to all the world through the ministries of this congregation and beyond. But just as important as our money is our hearts. As this song so clearly says, we are an offering—not just what we have and can give away, but what we are on the inside as people. God has given each of us gifts for ministry and for the building up of the body of Christ (Ephesians 4:12), and I firmly believe that includes everyone. Each person in the FLC has something to contribute, whether it be creative ideas, music, time, labor, or hospitality.
This church is what it is because of you. You are the building blocks built on Jesus the cornerstone. As you prepare for the stewardship season this year, remember that. Remember that you are an offering. Thanks be to God!
Yours on the journey,
Jon Niketh +
0 Responses to “We are an offering”