The miraculous thing about practicing Giving is that it can take us from a feeling of lack and emptiness to a joyful realization of our abundance and generosity.
– Full Spectrum Joyfulness , by Amanda Aikman
When the phone rings at 10:00 Sunday morning and your caller ID says it’s your Stewardship Committee rep who’s scheduled to give a campaign update and testimonial at the 10:30 service, you answer the call.
“Jeff, I can’t do this!” she exclaimed breathlessly.
“What’s the matter?”
“Reverend reviewed my remarks and she made a lot of edits to make it more urgent. I’ve been reading through these and I’m not comfortable saying this. My whole message is about joy.”
“Okay, well I’m sure when you do the walk-through with her this morning you can discuss this and tell her what you’d like to say.”
“I’m on my way now, but I won’t get there until 10:30. I won’t be at the walk through.”
Uh oh. She sounded on the verge of panic. This was the youngest member of our stewardship team, a new and enthusiastic member who brought much-needed energy and fresh perspective – exactly why we had asked her to do the update on our behalf that Sunday. I needed her to feel confident about her message and to deliver it from the heart. I was participating online this Sunday so I couldn’t coach her from the pew.
I asked about the changes. She explained how the urgency felt negative, how she and other members of our Young Souls group had talked about how dark and depressing all the messaging had seemed to them lately, how they needed more joy on Sunday morning.
I made an executive decision. “Give the message you want to give. That’s what people need to hear. That’s why we asked you to represent – the joy you bring to this is what we want you to share.”
I went on to explain that the urgency that had permeated so much of the messaging was in part driven by members’ concerns that we were not responding forcefully enough to the threats and crises looming around us. Our DC based congregation was being directly affected by layoffs of federal workers and budget cuts; the National Guard was patrolling our streets; our very diverse and multi-cultural neighborhood was feeling threatened. The list of concerns was long, and our social justice activity was in full swing.
“But as we talk about this,” I reflected, “it occurs to me that joy itself is a form of resistance.”
“That’s really good,” she replied, “you should write that down.”
So here it is, for you to share. Joy is a form of resistance. And by the way, she was fantastic – people loved her energy and she hit it out of the park. Our minister agreed, the message was just what people needed to hear.
Joy is the secret ingredient to successful stewardship. Too often our annual fund drives are grounded in the language of urgency. We’ll have to cut the budget – we can’t deplete the endowment any further – our building has serious repair needs – we can’t keep doing more with less – everyone needs to pull their weight. All this can be true of course; a lot rides on the success of the annual fund drive or a significant capital campaign. But joyful giving doesn’t rise from desperation. It rises from a sense of connection, meaning and accomplishment. From being part of a group that achieves good and important things together, for the congregation and the broader community.
The UUA has a whole set of curricula designed around this – Stewardship – The Joy of Giving. It’s a bit dated, but what I love about it is it has a series of lessons designed for various ages, from pre-schoolers to adults. We teach the value of generosity to our children, while reminding ourselves the joy and meaning that shared stewardship – caring for each other – brings to our lives.
My congregation’s annual fund drive this year utilized visiting stewards – volunteers calling and visiting congregants to talk about stewardship. At the visiting stewards training we emphasized that these were not fundraising “asks,” but rather conversations about the importance of All Souls in their lives, how and why they came to be here, what it was that mattered to them. We talked about the things we were able to accomplish together, what we meant to the community. And we shared our own stories about why we were involved in stewardship and the joy that it brought us. The goal was to deepen feelings of connection to the community.
There was a lot of energy in the room, provided largely by a significant contingent of first-time stewards, many of them younger. They asked challenging questions, pressed us to value volunteering in the stewardship discussion, offered to put together a fact sheet on volunteer needs and opportunities to go with the handouts.
As I concluded the training session I wondered if I had let it go too far afield, reminding myself that an important element of inclusion is not just having diverse voices at the table, but listening and making room for them, even when their perspective is different from our own. At that moment, two of our older members, long-time stalwarts of the church and among our more significant donors, came up to me glowing about how great the discussion had been and how energized they were by the younger voices in the room. Another member approached me with excitement, exclaiming that “this is the one-to-one ministry that we need.”
When the stewardship volunteers gathered for a celebratory dinner at the end of the campaign, we shared stories about the many affirming conversations we had and how much the stewards had enjoyed the opportunity to connect deeply with so many of our fellow congregants. There was a deep sense of satisfaction and camaraderie that made me look forward to next year’s campaign, a feeling I believe (I hope!) was shared by my colleagues.
Let this be the guiding light of your funding drives. Stewardship, taking care of each other, our children, our congregation, our community, is among the most important ministries we perform. And when it’s done well, collectively, it’s joy we can all share.
Jeff Wilklow is a long-time UU with more than 20 years of fundraising consulting experience. He believes stewardship is one of our most important ministries – helping congregations connect more meaningfully with each other through their mutual support of the church and the community. He is based in Northern Virginia and a member of All Souls Church Unitarian in Washington, D.C. You can reach Jeff at Team@Stewardshipforus.com.