Have you ever considered that every decision is a decision of stewardship? Every choice we make is an opportunity to choose what we will do with what God has placed in our hands. How will we steward our money? Our time? Our health? Our relationships?
Everything we have comes from the Lord. We didn’t earn anything that we have — whatever we have in our lives was gifted to us by God. He gives freely and abundantly without expecting anything in return. All he asks is that we model our lives after Jesus, living a life marked by generosity.
Generosity and stewardship work in tandem. Stewardship is about taking care of what God has entrusted to us, and generosity is taking what God has entrusted to us and giving above and beyond.
We believe that generosity is not a repayment, it's our response. Generosity comes in all forms. At VOUS, we like to give people opportunities to give of their time, talent, and treasure.
1. TIME
Time is arguably one of the most valuable things we can offer. We say that as we love our city, God will change our city. There is never a shortage of ways we can give our time. It can be serving on team during a Sunday service or at one of our monthly outreach events. It can be a call with someone in need of prayer or a conversation in the courtyard after service.
What’s crazy about time is that once it’s gone, we can’t get it back. We have to make an intentional choice to lay down our preferences and use our time to serve those around us in need.
2. TALENT
God has given each person a unique blend of strengths, talents, and gifts. Our response is to use our gifts to serve and build God’s Kingdom. At VOUS, we have several teams people can choose from to walk out their gifting and give their talents:
- Creative — Design, Communications, Social Media, Environments, Photo, and Web teams
- Production — Audio, Broadcast, Lights, Stage, Stage Design, and Translation teams
- Worship — Worship and Dance teams
- VOUS Kids — Registration, Dreamers, Heroes, Legends, and VOUS Buddies teams
- VOUS High — Junior high and high school Crew leadership
- Operations — Facilities, First Impressions, Guest Experience, Next Steps, and Bricklayers teams
- VOUS Care — I Love My City, Prayer, and Foster Care teams
- VOUS Crew — Crew leadership
3. TREASURE
One of our church values is that generosity is our privilege. During every Sunday service, we take a few moments to come around our giving. Whether it’s online or in person, we provide an opportunity for people to give financially — not out of obligation but out of obedience to God’s instruction to practice tithing.
We never discuss giving without extending gratitude. Our church would not be where it is without the sacrifice of many people giving their time, talent, and treasure. And because people are generous to our house, we are able to be generous to people and organizations in our community.
Those who feel called to give sacrificially above ten percent become a Bricklayer. The Bricklayer team goes above and beyond in their giving and are committed to accelerating the vision of our church.
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Culture tells us to look out for ourselves, keeping a tight grip of control around what we have in our hands. Kingdom tells us to give above and beyond. As we start to walk in radical generosity, more often than not, generosity sparks more generosity.
No matter how we choose to give, we get to lay the pathway for others to encounter Jesus. We don’t think about opening our home to people in need — we’ve decided in our hearts that our home is a place for people in need. As we become more and more like Jesus, generosity is not only our privilege, it becomes part of who we are.
