Church cashes in on lesson
Bobby Ross Jr.
Published: February 16, 2002
IMAGINE showing up for worship one weekend and, instead of putting money in the collection plate, taking home a wad of bills.
You can spend the money however you want.
A movie and a bucket of buttery popcorn? Sure. A new car stereo with a nifty CD player? Fine. A night for two at a posh resort? Wonderful.
There’s just one catch: The preacher reminds you that this cash – like all your earthly possessions – belongs to God.
Gulp.
Such was the scenario recently at Edmond’s Life Church. As part of a sermon series that stressed relying on biblical principles to manage finances, the church gave away $10,000.
The Bible contains more than 2,300 verses related to money, while two-thirds of Jesus Christ’s parables concern financial issues, pastor Craig Groeschel said.
“Christians are often afraid to talk about money when God talked a lot about it,” Groeschel said.
Each of the roughly 6,000 worshippers at Life Church’s seven Saturday and Sunday services that weekend entered a drawing. The winners – 52 in all – received envelopes containing $100, $200 or $300.
The recipients were encouraged to use the money to meet personal needs for which they’d prayed or to help others.
“I wanted them to pray about what they were going to do with God’s money,” Groeschel said. “The response was just unbelievable.”
Leila Hunt, 22, a University of Central Oklahoma student who said she lives on peanut butter and “drives a piece-of-junk car,” won $200. But she didn’t splurge on herself.
Instead, Hunt said she realized the purpose for the money when her cousin from Florida called. The cousin, eight months pregnant, was having trouble paying bills.
“I asked her if $200 would help her out at all,” Hunt wrote in an e-mail. “Sobbing, she said she couldn’t possibly take my money. I explained to her that it wasn’t my money at all.”
Before the names were drawn, Elizabeth Stone prayed and promised to give the money to her friend Curtis if she won.
Curtis, 20, has muscular dystrophy and lives in a nursing home. He couldn’t afford a telephone line in his room – until Stone won $300 in the drawing, that is.
Mary Loveland opened her envelope and found $100.
“At first, I just put it in the drawer, saying it would not be spent until God spoke to me about that certain need,” Loveland wrote. “Then, I realized that needs were coming my way every day, so to just hold on to the money would only be hoarding it.”
First, she bought a gift to perk up a friend recovering from an injury. Next, she bought a barbecue dinner for a friend grieving over the loss of a child last year.
“I still have over half the money left, and I plan to keep adding to it, so that anytime a need comes my way, I will be able to give freely,” she said. “After all, that is the way God gives to us.”
