What Is Stewardship?

by Harold Lee. NAD Stewardship Resources # 315004

What Is Stewardship?

Stewardship is a vital partnership encompassing various aspects beyond God. It influences every facet of life, urging us to responsibly manage God’s resources. Stewardship involves applying Scriptural principles to further the church’s mission and ministry.

But the key to Christian stewardship lies in the work of the Holy Spirit on the heart. This divine-human union produces love, gratitude, and loyalty - for God and his creation.

The word “stewardship” sums up the meaning of Christian life. Biblical writers used it to describe several elements of faith: Peter said, “Each of us, as good [stewards] . . . must use for the good of others the special gifts we have received from God”2

Stewardship is Partnership

God calls everyone into partnership, and this yields a proper perspective of God. We can be more effective in working among God’s people, the unchurched, and natural creation, by remembering He owns everything. We’re not “all by ourselves.” Stewardship is God’s way of raising Christians as stewards. Stewards manage the many entrusted gifts of this life - the environment, time, talents, possessions, money, our bodies, the gospel, the church, spiritual gifts, etc., we become partners with God. What a partnership! God’s unlimited resources supplement our limited means - enabling us to do what He asks.

Stewardship is Personal

Stewardship is the personal acknowledgement on our part that God is the owner and provider of all the basic goods of life - spiritual, physical, and material. Everyone is God’s steward, yet each of us has our own personal relationship with Him. We can’t gauge another’s responsibility. Each has a divine purpose in life which we discover for ourselves. But our overall objective is to restore God’s image in ourselves and in others.

Stewardship is Giving

Sometimes people balk at the Bible’s “rules.” They think God wants us to give . . . so He can get. But God’s not getting - He’s giving. “God so loved the world that he gave . . .”3 It’s God’s nature to give, and He made us in His image. We can’t be happy unless we give. As God gave, so we give to Him. We don’t give, for example, to “meet the budget.” No. We give because we love God. Then we assign our gifts to various church offerings. God gave us life and made us His stewards. In return we give Him our time, talents, money, and the use of our spiritual gifts.

Stewardship is Christian Discipleship

When Jesus called us to follow Him we became disciples - and stewards, too. We accept God’s gift of creation, redemption, and the indwelling Holy Spirit. And as Christian stewards, we take full responsibility for managing these God-entrusted gifts.

Stewardship is Management — Not Ownership

When we recognize that God owns everything,4 we also realize that we own nothing. Our houses, cars, TVs, computers, books - even our bodies - belong to God.5 Since we own nothing, we’re managing God’s things for Him. So Christians replace the notion of ownership with the concept of stewardship. We live by new principles that govern our relationship to God and His world.

Stewardship Reveals our Worth

In our crime-ridden age, violent death lurks on every hand, divorce weakens the family structure, and joblessness saps the souls of millions. We conclude that nobody cares, and life declines in value. But Christian stewardship restores value to individuals. God made us and redeemed us. He valued each person so much that He left heaven and laid down His life - just for us! Eden and Calvary trumpet the worth of the individual. God made us for a purpose, and saved us with His own blood. He entrusts us with great responsibility. If God values us so highly, shouldn’t we value ourselves as well?

Stewardship is Practical

It is faith in action: the believer’s response to the redeeming grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christian stewardship gives hands and feet to faith so it can live and act. Stewardship touches every part of the life - our attitudes and actions, our convictions and commitments, and our desires and deeds. Christian stewardship is faith made practical.

ENDNOTES

  1. Compare Matt 25:14-30; 1 Cor 4:2
  2. 1 Peter 4:10 TEV interpretation supplied
  3. John 3:16
  4. Ps. 24:1
  5. 1 Cor. 6:19, 20