What is generosity?
Simply Said
What does our money have to do with our faith?
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” – Matthew 6:21.
Do our hearts follow after our treasures, or do our treasures follow after our hearts? The answer is yes and yes. Our hearts and our treasures work off each other. Our money spent displays to us where our heart is set. And our heart’s desires lead us in the way we spend our money. If we want all of life to be all for Jesus, our money and possessions play a large factor. “Our approach to money and possessions is central to our spiritual lives.” – Randy Alcorn.
What does generosity teach us?
The path to happiness – “It is more blessed to give than to receive” – Acts 20:35. Generosity gets scripture into our lives. The blessings of giving are only known through experience.
Contentment – The more we learn how to give, the more we learn to be content with our current reality.
Generosity protects us from:
How do I practice generosity?
Learn – We find resources and environments to teach us how to use our money wisely.
Plan – We pray and decide a particular percentage to consistently and rhythmically give to the church, to the poor, to others, and to the expansion of the Gospel.
Commit – We commit to this plan to watch God use us and provide for us.
Respond – On top of our continuous giving we pray for God to display to us moments and opportunities to give above and beyond.
before you begin
Spend time in prayer and decide what you will focus your fast on. Fasts typically fit into one of these categories:
Pray
Remember the goal
Release the shame
Remove comparison
Be open to what is revealed
Give yourself grace + patience
There's nothing to prove and no one to impress
reflecting on money
Spend time in prayer and reflection to sense your current ties to money.
Pray
Reflection 1
Reflection 2
Reflection 3
learning and budgeting
Generosity takes intentionality and preparation. We need to take time to look at our financial reality to take steps to live more generous lives. Here are some simple steps and ideas that can help give guidance.
Money Audit
Set a time to do a money audit.
Look back at the last month, three months, half year or year. Take note on how much income you made vs. how much you spent. Numbers don’t lie. This is a good way of revealing what you really spend money on.
Make sure you account for everything and then write down the reflections. Where did I spend most money? How much money did I keep? How much money did I give? Does my money align with my heart for God?
Learning
Build Accountability
making a generous commitment
We should make a giving goal as a sign of trust for God’s provision. As we commit to give, we display the love of God to others and we display the unique lifestyle of those who follow Jesus. Use this guide to make goals and dream of how to bless others. Some giving targets are:
Local Church
We commit to give to our local body of believers. Through giving to the church we support those leading ministry, we support our local ministry partners, we support those in the community that are in need, and we support the financial obligations of the church.
Giving Areas at Redemption North Mountain:
General Fund – Giving for all the financial obligations of the ministry of the church.
Benevolence – Giving to the fund that supports those in need in our church community.
Camp Scholarship – Giving to the fund that supports Youth students for camp.
Building Fund – Giving to the fund that supports future building opportunities.
Other Causes
generosity worksheet
We created a Generosity Worksheet to help you work through how to practically practice Generosity in your life. The goal of this worksheet is to give a practical framework to plan continuous generosity. For generosity to impact us, we must implement and practice it.
additional resources
If you want to know more about the practice of generosity and be inspired to give, here is a compiled list of helpful resources. Because this list has many options, it can feel intimidating on where to start. Our encouragement is to just start somewhere. Pick one that seems appealing and start there.