UCG is the only congregation I’ve ever known that calls this month-or-so-long annual process of gathering pledges for the coming year “enlistment.” And every year, this fact strikes me as sort of ironic, as “enlistment” to me has clear and overwhelming military connotations, and UCG is probably the least interested in the military-industrial complex of any congregation around. I spent time in a church growing up in which a member of staff was married to someone who made his fortune designing and building prisons. I would not have been surprised if they had had an enlistment campaign… but UCG???
Other places I’ve loved and served have called this season one of “Stewardship,” of reflecting on our own personal stewardship of our resources — our gifts and skills, our time, and our finances — and how we can contribute to the work and life and the church and God However Known by pooling them together. I’ve always liked that term because it suggests a certain intentionality that is often lacking — for myriad reasons — in my own financial life. When we think in terms of stewardship, we can identify what the ways in which we serve as stewards — good and bad, wise and foolish — of the resources at our disposal, instead of just folks endlessly paying bills and saving for home repairs and vacations and braces for our tweens and spending what’s leftover.
Looking at our financial lives as intentional stewardship of our resources also allows us to reflect on budgets — our own and our communities’ and our church’s — as moral documents. The things we spend money on reveal our priorities. And so much of those churches’ stewardship campaigns — and some of ours here at UCG — invite folks to reflect on what a priority congregational life is in their spiritual lives, so that they can make it a priority in their financial lives, too.
There’s something very important about that reflection, but I’m coming around on “enlistment.” The other meanings of the verb “to enlist,” in either transitive or intransitive forms, are “to secure the support and aid of : employ in advancing an interest” and “to participate heartily [or actively] (as in a cause, drive, or crusade).” So this time, then, is about securing your support and help in financing the work of this congregation. It’s a time in which you’re encouraged to participate — actively! heartily! – in our life together. This approach is behind our desire for 100% participation in our pledge campaign. Even if your pledge is zero dollars. Even if it’s less than you’d like. We want you to fill out a card.
And, of course, if you are able to participate heartily and actively with an increased pledge, that would be welcome, too. Our pledge cards this year (they’re available here on campus, but we can send you one, too, if you’d like) feature a chart on one side that allows you to look at your income and see what a percentage of that amount would be if you gave monthly or annually. Our budget this year, which is as lean as ever and increasingly thoughtful about the costs of being the church, is increasing 8.4%. Can you help step up?
Pledging – via a card, online, or contacting Catherine Cake — at any amount, is an important way for you to stand up and be counted as part of this congregation. This year, we also want to celebrate that making a pledge is not only a financial act, but a sacred one, and so we’ll be blessing the pledge cards (symbolically; your pledge is confidential) in our Sunday services on November 20. I hope you will participate that day!
It is such a joy to serve alongside you in this wonderful congregation; to know that even in these days of political evil and economic uncertainty and environmental turmoil, that my family gets to be a part of a community that is making a difference. Is fighting the good fight. Not as part of the military-industrial complex, but as part of a beloved community.
Thank you for sharing in this life with us,
Bromleigh