Giving Series Part 2 - Giving In Worship

Every church has some liturgy or order of service. While we might not give it much thought, the order of service says something. Liturgy shapes us. Not overnight but over time. The repeated acts we perform in worship inform our minds and shape our hearts (For more on this, checkout James KA Smith - You Are What You Love). Christian churches have a variety of approaches to liturgy. Some follow a loose structure but a structure nonetheless. Others have a more rigorous and set pattern of worship. Before reading on, it might be worth pausing and considering your church's liturgy. What are some regular repeated patterns of worship? How does the service start and stop? What is in the middle? Do you sing a certain number of songs before the sermon each week? What are the different elements of liturgy in your church? Is there scripture reading, corporate prayer, confession, etc.? When is the Lord’s Supper observed?

At some point in your church's liturgy, there is likely a time for giving. If the regular patterns of worship shape us, what might your church’s giving liturgy teach you? Imagine that your church has no mention of giving in the gathering.  What is this forming in you? It might communicate that giving is disconnected from worship. Perhaps giving is not something we can talk about at church! Perhaps that money is not a spiritual subject and has no place in gathered worship. Let’s imagine another church where the very first part of the service is giving. Welcome to First Prosperity Church; we want to start the service by asking you to give now! What would this communicate? Do you see how each liturgy could say very different things about giving? 

For some reading this, you attend a church with an established liturgy of giving. You are not looking to change it (nor could you). But it’s helpful to consider what it’s saying to you and those you worship with. Others might be in a pastoral leadership position (especially church planters). You can think intentionally about how you will lead an entire church to practice giving in your service. I don’t think there is a single right way to do this, but I do think it’s important for leaders to consider a best practice for their context. 

Let me give two examples of how churches might work this out in their context. First, Church A has decided they have far too often avoided giving completely. Their congregation has been shaped to see giving as merely transactional or pragmatic. This church decided they wanted to bring giving right into the heart of their gathering. So they created a time before the sermon where they spent 1-2 minutes reminding the church about the why of giving (many of the principles I touched on in my last article). They decided that rather than passing an offering plate, they would direct people to give boxes in the back of the room. Their conviction was that giving was a central part of worship. Because of this, they made it a central part of their liturgy. They also recognized the poor teaching around giving and decided to briefly teach each week during giving to help people approach giving from a biblical perspective. 

Church B has a similar problem. Early in their existence, they were careful not to come across as overly focused on finances. This led them to leave giving out of their worship services and only address it in the occasional sermon series or members meeting. After some time, the church elders sensed a need to bring giving into their regular patterns of worship. They wanted to ensure that giving was understood as a response to the Gospel of grace rather than something that earned favor or blessing from God. This led them to put it in the response section of their liturgy following the Lord’s Supper each week.  

If you share my conviction that giving is a vital part of Christian worship, I would encourage you to consider how that plays out in your church's worship. From the perspective of a worshipper, you might not control how your church practices giving each week, but you can consider how you approach it. What if you took a moment to stop and consider your giving each week when it was time for the offering? Offer it in prayer to the Lord with a heart of thanksgiving. Even if it’s happening online, maybe stop when you send it to recognize it as an offering of thanks for all God has done for us. Create your own regular pattern to guide your mind and heart to give joyfully and sacrificially.

For leaders who can shape how they give in the gathering, I would encourage you to think through your church’s biblical convictions on giving. From those convictions, consider how your liturgy can reflect and shape those convictions in your church.

Once you establish a regular practice of giving in your liturgy, logistical and administrative needs, come up. Who will collect the offering? Who and how will we count it? How do we record it, and who deposits it at the bank? What safeguards should we implement to ensure we do all this with integrity? These are the questions I aim to address in the next post.