Check out the whole Life as a Church Administrator series here.
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I remember many a staff meeting, discussing finances and wondering how in the world God would provide. I remember saying “no” a hundred times to fixing things, replacing things, or buying simple things to make someone’s serving position at church easier because we just couldn’t afford it. I remember spending so much of our staff meeting time in prayer asking for God’s perspective.
One staff meeting in particular still stands out to me. It was during one of the lowest lows, and we all knew we just needed to get in God’s presence and get His perspective. Mark, our Pastoral Assistant and Youth & Children's Director, went and grabbed his guitar, and we just worshiped and sang together. It was so powerful to experience God take our low and turn it into a beautiful moment of trust and rest in Him. We all got something from this time, and I remember what God told me vividly: He said we were on a motorcycle with Him, and we were coming up to a big curve. When you are in this situation, you need to slow down and lean into the curve. If you hit the brakes or if you try to gun it through, you’ll wipe out. He was telling us to trust Him and lean into the curve and not fear because from our perspective everything was slowing down and tilting drastically--that this needed to happen for us to speed ahead around the corner.
So we moved forward in faith, and Pastor began his series on tithing.
God showed up (like He is always faithful to do). That fall, beginning a few weeks before the series, attendance began to rise. And then it continued to rise. And the finances shot up. It was amazing and awe-inspiring to see that the Holy Spirit had clearly been working ahead of us, softening people’s hearts and using this series to bring people to new levels of freedom in finances. We got so many testimonies of God’s provision and people wanting to share what God has done in tithing, that it took months to let everyone share who wanted to!
I remember in December, being so thankful for all God had done. We had begun looking at the yearly financial reports, and we realized that at this rate even though God had moved in amazing ways and we were no longer in danger of making more cuts, we had not received enough to make up for the low months earlier in the year. Because like any business, we make our budget for the next year based on the past whole year, we were a little discouraged that we would still have to hold back on some of the goals God had put before us. But overall everyone’s tone was completely positive--God had clearly provided and gotten us out of that rut and back on much more stable ground.
And then the miraculous happened. In the last few offerings of the year so much came in that we were shocked and completely dumbfounded. Looking back comparing 2012 to 2011, we received...get this: over 10% more than in 2011.
WHAT!? I wish you could have seen the rejoicing that went down in the office of New Day Community Church that week! It is amazing to have a job where you see God move, in big ways, when you least expect it.
My friends, stick around for the end of God’s story in your life. If you’re in the season where it seems God is making promises and not following through on them, don’t give up. If you’re in a high right now, racing forward, make note of the testimonies you’re gaining right now so you can coast right through the next low season that may come. No matter what: don’t give up.
