Bryan in AIIAS

John Mathews, CSPG, CSP Planned Giving & Trust Services Director, Southwestern Union Conference of Seventy-day Adventists Another article taken from GC Stewardship Department In the US only 9 percent of born-again adults report they give 10 percent of their income to charity.1 Is stewardship skating on thin ice in our postmodern culture? Does it really make a difference anymore? The following facts provide a startling glimpse of the economic landscape of postmodern America. The United States is the wealthiest nation in the history of the world.2 If you earn $1,500.00 per year, you earn more than 75% of the world’s population.3 Americans save very little. The savings rate of most Americans is negative, and for those who do save, it’s a little over four percent.4 There were over one million bankruptcy filings in 2008.5 Stress has a negative influence on the personal and professional lives of half of all Americans.6 The number one reason for divorce is money or the handling of it.7...

A good article taken from GC Stewardship Dept Website . Vol-12 No 1 Empowering Servant Leadership Ray S. Anderson, PhD Senior Professor of Theology and Ministry Fuller Theological Seminary Summary: In this article we learn that God’s servant leader does not stand between the people and God, but stands with the people as the faithful steward, to provide discipline and correction, and to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord. When we received a call to Christian ministry most of us thought that in becoming pastors we were assuming the role of being a shepherd of the sheep. After all, the shepherd’s crook is one of the most common symbols of pastoral ministry. What we had not counted on was that instead of feeding docile sheep we often ended up fighting wolves, sometimes in sheep’s clothing! Very quickly we also discovered that serving as a pastor of a church was more like managing a small business whose employees were unpaid volunteers and a board of directors who each had their ...