The Emerging Model of Stewardship

This May I started a class for an Executive Certificate in Religious Fundraising from the Lake Institute on Faith & Giving, part of the Lilly School of Philanthropy at Indiana University. The Lake Institute is the premier place to learn about stewardship and religious fundraising and I am thrilled to be taking this course. As I write this post, I am two weeks into the class and I have already learned so much.

One of the helpful and clarifying points they make is about the shift happening in stewardship from what they call the “traditional paradigm” to the “emerging paradigm.”

This graphic helpfully contrasts the two paradigms. In short, we are moving away from giving out of a sense of duty and obligation, giving which is focused on the institution, and seeing the church as different from business, to being focused on donors (relationships, thanking, offering opportunities to practice generosity), cultivating diverse income sources, giving which is value and mission-driven, and an embrace of business principles and practices. One reason I am taking the class is to help us to navigate these changes and the way we think and talk and practice our stewardship.

From my perspective, UDLC straddles these two paradigms—largely traditional with some emerging mixed in. For us to continue to thrive, we will need to lean into the emerging model and I hope you’ll start seeing, healing, and feeling a difference in the ways we approach stewardship, giving, and our practice of generosity.

In the presentation below, Kyle Small helps us reflect on the relationship between giving and generosity, meaning-making and money. I look forward to sharing more of my learnings and course materials with you along the way.