Summary: Leadership and ministry in God’s church begin with giving God room to work through us. Confidence in God is the best solution for the temptation to control others through financial pressures, guilt, or any other form of manipulation.
Stewardship as the human response to Jesus Christ as lord begins with the fact that God is still God. Know that the Lord is God. It is He who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture (Ps. 100:3, NIV). Stewardship is about recognizing that God is God, and letting Him function as God.
God in our lives gives us the strength and confidence to face a life caught up in the daily currents of our society. He gives us courage to work with a church struggling to live out Christianity in a sinful world. He gives us grace to minister with members struggling to respond to the guidance of the Spirit while dealing with the forces of habit and sinful nature. God is present and at work. This is His church. He is still God. He is still able. Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commands (Deut. 7:9, NIV). Each issue in life is a choice of who will be God, who will be in control. Leadership and ministry in God’s church begin with giving God room to work through us. Confidence in God is the best solution for the temptation to control others through financial pressures, guilt, or any other form of manipulation.
Thus the first task of stewardship ministry is to encourage and strengthen the walk with God so that we and those we work with can effectively allow Him to be God. We will succeed as Christians and as a church when we let God be God in our lives, individually and corporately.
