Instead of passing a plate, bag, or KFC bucket during services, my church collects tithes and offerings through tall, narrow, plain wooden boxes placed at the entrances to the worship center and in a few other buildings. When I attended the new members class, the pastor explained the elders made this decision to reduce the perception among visitors that the church “only wants their money.”
I hear this all the time—that many seekers (and not-so-seekers) believe the church talks too much about money or cares more about people’s giving than their salvation. This is ironic because, first, Jesus talked about money all the time and, second, many pastors I know are terrified to confront the issue at all much less overdo it, and, third, with the high rate of debt and low rate of savings in our society it seems we have an obligation to teach people about biblical stewardship.
But I digress. What I find interesting about the offering boxes is that even though the method of collecting the money is different, the idea is still mentioned from the pulpit each week. Without fail, the person doing the welcome and announcements will mention the presence of the boxes and remind members to give as part of their worship.
It’s also interesting that the principle is important enough to our leaders that they are willing to forego a tithe of another kind. The senior pastor estimates the church could receive 10% more money each year by passing the plate—those impulsively-given fives and tens add up. But they choose to do without that cash in favor of making a statement.
Finally, it’s interesting that our church is a very generous church. Whether this is caused by the offering-box method or happens in spite of it, I don’t know, but we consistently make or exceed the budget for each year plus give many thousands of dollars to the poor and needy of Orange County and to special efforts like hurricane relief.
So what conclusions to draw? The practice doesn’t seem to be hurting us, and I’m not aware of a biblical precedent for passing buckets so the question seems more practical than theological. What do you think?
2 Comments »
Leave a comment
Jennifer Taylor
My Other Sites
Twittering @seejenwrite- seejenwrite: Looking forward to hearing @susanisaacs and @donmilleris tonite. Flexing my fingers in preparation for copious note-taking.
- seejenwrite: Buying tix for trip to Orlando in January!
- seejenwrite: Here are my thoughts about the Twilight craze, from earlier this year: http://ow.ly/E3Vc
- seejenwrite: @FlowerDust See you there!
A friend emailed me this comment because he couldn’t figure out how to leave it through Blogger–I appreciate his perspective and thought you might want to read it, too:
Jen,
It’s not the whole idea of having boxes in the back vs. passing the plate that gets me really worked up but here’s where I have the beef. Many of those same churches that are choosing to leave non-descript boxes in the back (while still giving some kind of lip service from the front) have the tendency to almost be apologizing for taking an offering of any kind.
For example, my own home church bugs me terribly when one of the pastors will say from the front without fail, “Ushers, please come forward and this is the time to collect the offering. If you are a guest here today please don’t feel pressure, this is a time where those of us who call ______ (my church) home take care of some family business.” Well, that leaves me more flat every time I hear that.
We will stand and rant and rave about some kind of youth activity (how the kids need more funding to go to Nicaragua) or turn away kids in the Sunday school without a certain kid to adult ratio while the community around the church is going to hell, but excuse me, I hope we don’t pressure anybody who may feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit. What is that about?
Why apologize or even act apologetic? When you have that attitude or begin to seem to down play the role of the offering within the corporate worship experience, it feels to me that it cheapens the whole gig. I mean God owns it all, right? If it is about ownership anyway, why would you not want to be teaching your guests, visitors, or regular attendees that?
However, if you didn’t believe in something yourself or weren’t already sold-out I could see how you would want to down play that part. But how much more exciting for guests rather than be encouraged not to give but rather be boldly shown and told how much more ministry could be accomplished by our collective participation.
It is about what is currently going un-done that could be getting done if we all responded to the Holy Spirit as He calls us.
I think however the method, it’s all about the attitude of it. We implemented the box idea in our previous congregation after seeing it done at my friend’s church in Michigan. They (and we) called them “joy boxes.” When the pastor announced the offering time from the stage and said, “joy boxes” everyone cheered. He would then explain that it is our duty to give cheerfully. The method was more conducive to the way our worship area was set up rather than passing plates. But it was still considered a part of the service rather than anything apologetically hidden away.