Have you noticed the trend of sharing in our society? Instead of owning everything ourselves, it is now common to use ride-sharing programs such as Uber or to rent a vacation home through Airbnb. We can find financial backing for new business ventures through peer-to-peer lending platforms, and can even access our own share of organic produce by participating in community-supported agriculture.
It seems that society has learned that there is value to sharing and working together. Not only is it more efficient than doing it on our own, but we can often do more and stretch our dollars further when we pool our resources.
This is something that the Christian Reformed Church has known for a long time. Since its earliest days, the CRC has encouraged congregations and members to combine their funds in order to provide shared ministry that benefits us all. This system is called ministry shares and is a stewardly and cost-effective way of providing a solid foundation for our denomination.
The attached PDF provides a quick overview about ministry shares and how they work. It is an idea resource for new member orientation or for congregational meetings where the budget is being discussed. Note that this document is also available in Korean and Spanish.
For additional information and resources, visit crcna.org/ministryshares.
Comments
A few weeks ago we were blessed to have a presentation on Ministry shares in Vanastra CRC in southwestern Ontario. The creative and engaging story of the octopus made a very dry topic interesting and exciting. It would be nice to see a link here to the bulletin insert we received that day.
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