I don’t know if she’ll be there tonight—my 83-year-old friend at
church. We have our annual Thanksgiving
supper and praise service, and she has been shut in for about a month
with health issues relating back to the two major cancer surgeries she had this
year. But she told me yesterday that she
wanted to come tonight, and she even sent her daughter a chicken to “do
something with” so she’d have a dish to bring.
She’s a giver.
My life is rich because of givers.
As a pastor’s wife, I can assure you that no pastor’s family could cultivate
a healthy church ministry without the givers—the unsung heroes of ministry whose
names are memorialized, not on plaques or marquees, but rather in the deeds of
kindness they scatter everywhere. Like
Dorcas (Tabitha) of Acts, their works speak for them.
Are you a giver in your church?
They are easy to spot, rare to find, and a treasure to keep. If you aren’t a giver, maybe you can find
encouragement from my 83-year-old cancer survivor and become one of those rare
gems.
1. Givers notice other people.
It’s easy to notice the problems in a church—the typos in the
bulletin, the gaps in the ministry, the wayward notes from an inexperienced
musician. Givers notice people.
They view the people who share their pews as people with needs,
and they seek to meet those needs. Givers do not wait for someone to notice them. They do the noticing.
2. Givers use the prayer sheet.
Most churches have a prayer sheet or operate with a prayer chain—usually
from their weekly prayer meeting. Givers
take diligent notice of the forgotten people—the shut-ins, the military, and
the missionaries. They pray for people
they don’t know. They pray for new requests,
and they follow up on others. Their prayers sheets are marked with dates and notations, folded carefully into a Bible where they will remember to pray for others each day.
3. Givers make contact with church attenders outside
of church services.
While every pastor is thankful to have a healthy relationship with
each of his church members and attenders, a truly healthy church is networked
like a spider-web, with members reaching out to one another as well. Givers make that happen. A phone call to a missing member on Monday
morning; a pot of soup to a shut in; a birthday card through the mail: Givers find ways to reach beyond just a
Sunday morning hand-shake. If your only
contact with your church family happens at a church service, you are missing a
valuable opportunity to edify and encourage!
4. Givers give.
They give their time—on a Saturday workday, or helping to clean up
from a fellowship. They give their money—tithing
10% of their income, and giving above that to offerings for missionaries. They give their resources when special
projects come along. We recently
collected ibuprofen for a missions trip to Haiti, and “givers” worked together
to send almost 9,000 tablets to a needy village in Haiti! I have observed the giving knows no financial bounds. I watched last Sunday as one of our elderly widows folded a bill and tucked it into the missionary Christmas box. Givers always have something to share.
5. Givers are dependable.
My elderly friend who longs to be back serving has been such an
example in this regard. When she is able
to drive herself to church, she comes early enough to welcome visitors. She comes to every service. She comes to our fellowships and watches to
make sure newcomers have been greeted.
Givers are just . . . there. When my friend is missing from a service, we
usually realize it by about fifteen minutes prior to service time—since she
surely would have been there by then.
The demands on churches (and on their leadership) are extremely
high. People come to church with many
expectations of what a church should be able to provide for them—financially,
emotionally, socially, and of course, spiritually. In many churches, those demands and
expectations are placed on just a few shoulders.
But to have one person who comes faithfully, ready to give:
Givers are a gift.
