Stewardship

At Stewardship, we believe that God has called us to be an equipping resource to the Church in the UK and abroad. We are a service organisation, wanting to reflect the servant heart of Jesus, helping and supporting churches, Christian charities and donors. We exist to lighten the load. We lift the burden. Through our support services, churches, charities and those who lead them can be less encumbered and able to concentrate on their real work. In this way we partner with our clients to advance the gospel and the Kingdom of God.

We are an organisation that serves with the ministry of "helps" or administration described in 1 Corinthians 12:28. The biblical character we want to emulate is Barnabas - the encourager (Acts 4:36). Barnabas demonstrated generosity in his giving (Acts 4:37). He was a networker who connected people together for strategic purposes (Acts 9:27, Acts 11:25-26). He was entrusted with gifts to be reliably taken to the recipients (Acts 11:30).

Transforming Christian giving

We do this in two main ways. The first is by providing high quality services to maximise the effectiveness of Christian giving. Our tax-effective giving services allow Christian donors to plan and organise their giving in a simple and effective way. Churches, charities, Christian workers and bible college students can likewise use our services from the receiving end. We add value to them both by increased efficiency/effectiveness and by releasing them from the burden and risk of this work.

The second way is that we promote, through our Stewardship Money ministry, biblical principles of Christian stewardship. We do this through publications and other materials, through events and conferences, through a national network of volunteers, and through collaboration with others to promote this cause. The core of this is promoting an understanding and practice of stewardship as lifestyle and discipleship.

Raising standards in church/charity administration

We serve the Christian community by helping churches and charities to achieve greater administrative and financial effectiveness. We do this partly through education and information services (see next point) and partly through providing a range of specific services. These are services that a church or Christian charity can use to handle an essential aspect of its legal and financial administration. This could be its payroll or accountancy needs, mortgages or deposits, and property management or new charity formation, among others. We aim to provide professional quality, at reasonable cost, with the powerful dynamic of shared understanding of our clients' spiritual ethos and purpose.

Sharing knowledge

We are stewards of the rich deposit of knowledge in the organisation. We are well placed to help churches and Christian organisations understand the legal requirements and best practice principles that apply to charities. We do this through seminars and other training events, conferences, and publications. To succeed in this role, we aim to take what is detailed and complex and make it accessible and applicable to those we serve.

We also have a significant role to connect people with the resources they need, whether from us or from another person or organisation: we are not seeking to cover every aspect ourselves. In this, we seek to act collaboratively, partnering strategically with others. We aim to seek first the Kingdom of God, and not try to build our own little kingdom. We have come to see that we are stewards of the valuable "brand position" that God has given us - a trusted organisation, genuinely seeking the best interests of our clients.