Are you looking for stewardship resources to fuel your ministries and your imagination? This newsletter’s offerings are all about stories. Here are a few places to find guidance and support:
Sometimes all a social media post, a sermon or a bulletin needs is a nicely worded poem to get the message across. A scarcity mentality easily invades our mind when we think that all is lost in both the world and the church. But poet and theologian David Whyte thinks differently. His poem “Loaves and Fishes” is primed for being used in all of these ways and more as we seek to think honestly about what God is calling us toward rather than what we lack.
If you’re curious about how to best utilize not only your space but also your mission as a congregation, RootedGood has some ways to help. Providing a number of generative and inspirational resources, RootedGood is on a mission to help congregations and communities rethink how they’re being called to be stewards of their space. Take a look around their offerings and see if perhaps God is calling you to investigate how you can think imaginatively about your physical space.
In a season of transitions it’s important to remember that some of what we have, where we live and how we move is built on the land, sweat and tears of those who have been displaced against their will — namely our Indigenous neighbors. The ELCA’s Truth and Healing Movement works to educate, illumine and encourage the church to understand our history of bad stewardship of land and relationships so that we might head toward a more just and equitable future. As Indigenous People’s Day (Oct. 14) approaches, check out their offerings and see how they might be opportunities for your faith community to learn more about how God speaks through our shared past to articulate a more hopeful future where land, resources and learning are justly shared.
Have a great stewardship resource to share? Please send articles, books, movies and other media to tim.brown@elca.org.
The best gifts are those that are shared!
(From Tim Brown’s ELCA Stewardship e-newsletter)