MikeContagious Generosity: Creating a Culture of Giving in Your Church. They, along with a number of other thought leaders and practitioners, are shifting the conversation on this important subject. For far too long, the church has been held hostage to legalism (“you must tithe”), fear (“I’m scared to talk about money”), or satisfaction (“if you tithe, God won’t ask for more”). Willard and Sheppard deal with all these issues and much more in their book. Contagious Generosity offers a nice blend of biblical teaching, practical wisdom, and examples (both good and bad) from actual churches. It deals with the pastor’s own attitudes toward money and generosity, ways to relate to high-capacity givers, metrics, communication, and more. Perhaps the most important theme of the book is to reframe our understanding that encouraging a culture of generosity is not a play to get more money for the church, it is a discipline that will help people grow in their faith as they break the grips of materialism. Three of my favorite quotes:
- Either you are leading your people toward a lifestyle of biblical generosity, or you are watching them drift toward selfishness and the world’s economy.
- We can easily convince ourselves that our good intentions will become good strategy if we think and talk about them long enough. That’s like thinking about exercise and expecting to produce the same benefit that exercising produces.
- High-capacity givers … need confidence that their investment today will yield a much greater “ministry return on investment” down the road. If they sense that the church isn’t moving in a singular direction with purpose and mission, it will erode their confidence and willingness to unleash the giving potential God has given them.
