Benevolence: Being Jesus' Hands and Feet.

I know this may surprise you .... but the church isn't made of money. Sure God owns everything. We are to be good stewards of what God has entrusted us with.

At the congregation I serve - we help with basic needs: Food and clothes. We never give out money. We partner with organizations in our community as well. We consider scriptures such as 1 Timothy 5:4-10 (Families taking care of each other) and Matthew 25:31-46. We try to help our community.

One thing is we get calls regularly for help with utilities, mortgage, gas ... and we ask several questions ... and usually they hang up ...knowing we don't give them directly money.

The other thing we recognize is that doing benevolent work isn't going to have people that you help come to your church. (You would think it would be so ...but 99.9% of the time it is not) What benevolence does it helps those that are outside the church see that you are helping others and they want to be a part of a church that is doing something to be active in their community and impacting it.

I had recently (after one of our services) encountered 2 guys who wanted money who came right after church had finished. Basically I told them "No." I said I have this or that resource ... but they got out of the door as fast as the could once they recognized I wasn't going to give them cash. I've been scammed ALOT. I'm getting to be more discerning in my actions when it comes to benevolence. (I think these guys forgot they been here before a few months ago asking for the same thing)

What does your church do for benevolence? Does it have a policy?

How are you being a good steward of what God has entrusted you with?

Why is it people feel the church needs to just give everything away free without responsibility for their actions?

What do you think about the statement "Sometimes if we give people CASH it is like putting a bandage where there is a severed arm?"