Last updated 24th October 2024

Joyful Generous Stewards

Vision 2026 calls us to give generously of our time, talents, and money to the cause of Christ.

Christian Stewardship is part of our daily lives and discipleship journey, not a quick campaign or program. As disciples, our giving is a sincere way of showing our love for God and a thankful response to His endless care and generosity.

In July 2023, Blackburn Diocese committed to ten key principles outlining what it is to be a Joyful Generous Steward. You can read about them here, or listen to the video below.

Resources available. 

Joyful Generous Stewards Roadshows

Thank you to all who attended our Roadshows through the autumn. We hope that you were inspired.

If you missed our Joyful Generous Stewards Roadshows, don’t worry! You can still explore all the great resources we shared. Simply click here to access our Goodie Bag and catch up on everything we covered.

Establishing Generosity - A 5 week Giving Resource pack for New Local Congregations which are new dynamic expressions of fellowship and ministry and need a dedicated toolbox of flexible, practical and impactful resources that inspire Generosity and Stewardship. This resource is available here.  

Embedding Generosity - Resources for Children. As with the rescources for young people, inspiring a culture of generosity involves ensuring that our resources of biblical teaching and peaching are appropriate for all ages. Specifically designed for those leading ministry with children, these materials aim to inspire and educate children and about Christian Stewardship and Generosity. The materials for this resource are available on the DBE website here.   

Embedding Generosity - Resources for Young People. Inspiring a culture of generosity involves ensuring that our resources of biblical teaching and peaching are appropriate for all ages. Specifically designed for those leading ministry with  young people, and created in the format of the existing resources produced by the Board of Education, these materials aim to inspire and educate young people about Christian Stewardship and Generosity by providing a toolbox of resources designed to equip leaders to effectively teach the principles of becoming joyful, generous stewards. The materials for young people are available on on the DBE website here.  

Transparent Generosity - Tools to help with clear Financial Communication. To enable church members to grow in their understanding of the financial position of their own church, a simple template enables you to input information from your accounts to produce a summary document that will give you the information for your finance return and some charts to help engage the wider church at the Annual Parochial Church Meeting (APCM) you can see an example here).   As we are unable to upload the resource to the website, if you would like a copy please email Stephanie Rankin

Talking Generosity. Recognising the awkwardness many feel in talking about generosity and stewardship, we have developed a set of conversation starters, ‘Talking Generosity’,  designed to open up conversations in a non-threatening manner. This resource aims to facilitate discussions on Christian Stewardship and Generosity within PCCs (Parochial Church Councils) and small groups or during a service. You can download a printable pdf version here

Preaching Generosity.  The Stewardship team in the Diocese of Rochester have created a series of short reflections, based on the lectionary readings, which are intended to help inspire you to consider how to inspire generosity in the liturgy of the Word, improving our understanding of money, stewardship, and giving. You can access them from their website here.

Enabling Generosity.  We need to provide a choice of giving mechanisms to enable people to give in ways that are convenient to them. These include:

• The Parish Giving Scheme - a simple system for regular and one off giving that enables donors to give monthly or one-off donations, reduces the workload for treasurers and includes Gift Aid reclaimed each month by PGS.  More information is available here.
• Digital Giving - both contactless and online giving.  You can find out more about contactless giving and how to buy a device through Parish Buying here.

Enduring Generosity.  Legacies, regardless of their size, have the ability to transform communities.  Useful resources for individuals and PCCs include:

• A draft legacy policy that a PCC can introduce to help people understand how the church might use any legacies
• The ability to write simple wills free of charge using Farewill
• Suggestions for how to talk about legacies in your church using the Christian Aid Faith Will Resources

Encouraging Generosity.  God is generous and through reading the bible we learn what it means for us to be generous.  New bible study materials will be developed for future years but if you are looking for ideas now then you could try:

• Generosity Gift and Grace - a 5-week DVD/YouTube based course for small groups developed in this diocese.
• Surprised by Generosity - a 7-week video-based course developed by the Diocese of Exeter
• The Generosity Project - a book by Tony Payne and Geoff Robson (avaiable online or at Christian Bookshops) that aims to help either small groups or individuals change the culture of a church towards one of generosity.

Supporting Generosity.  Alongside colleagues from the finance team, Stephanie and Christy are available to support treasurers with their questions and queries regarding accounts and Gift Aid. 

Reviewing Generosity.  Giving Campaigns might seem 'old fashioned' but most of us need a nudge to review our giving and a giving campaign provides a great opportunity for this.

• Stephanie and Christy can visit parishes to look at giving and talk about how to review this and hold a giving campaign or use the Giving in Grace resources to teach about giving
• The National Church has produced a "Generous Church Check Up" tool to help your PCC or sub-group think about how you can encourage giving in your church.
• The National Church Generosity Week resources provide an annual opportunity to encourage people to review their giving.

Inspiring Generosity.  Short 2-4 minute videos intended to inspire and teach about generosity, featuring diverse contributors from across the diocese covering key topics such as 'What Does Generosity Mean to Me?, 'Why Give?' and 'Generosity Stories.' To access our playlist  Click here. 

Resources in development  

For more information about Joyful Generous Stewards and any of the items above, contact Stephanie Rankin (Lancaster Archdeaconry) or Christy Sawyer (Blackburn Archdeaconry).

_{Stephanie Rankin and Christy Sawyer July 2023 and regularly updated; last time by Sarah Marston May 2024.}