Faith & Generosity Resources

Faith & Generosity Resources

A Parish Journey

Sherborne with Pamber reflects on their journey towards growing a generous culture within their parish. They were able to grow their finances to sustain their practical needs. They also recognised the power of prayer and the faithfulness of God through the process (you may need to ‘accept cookies’ via a pop up box – which should appear on your screen – in order to view this video content).

Faith & Generosity Worship Resource

Worship resources to use as a programme over four consecutive weeks, or independently.

Booklet Version

A version of the resources above but in a larger font more suitable for printing as a booklet – either all pages, or just those pages from one or more themes.

Faith and Generosity Parish Resource

A resource which examines some of the practical steps we can take as churches and parishes to live faithfully and generously as ‘people of God’ (1 Peter 2:10).

Reflections

‘Home grown’ video reflections will be available shortly. Meanwhile, the ‘Living Generously’ video reflections below from the national Church provide a rich resource for use in varied worship and study settings.

In this eight session course, Director of Giving, Jonathan de Bernhardt Wood, explores the simple, powerful moment in which Mary, a friend and follower of Jesus, displays the kind of astonishing generosity God Himself pours out on us. The wonder of the gospel is that this can be our story too as we discover the freedom of living generously.

Mary’s first generosity is with her time. There were other things she could’ve been doing. There are even things that could have been seen as more virtuous, as Martha, her sister points out.
Mary’s second generosity – that of her attention – is one for this day and age where we are constantly distracted by news, opinions, information and gossip.
Mary had just seen her brother raised from the dead, so when she was generous with her wealth, she knew that her ‘sacrifice’ was utterly insignificant by comparison.

Like us all, Mary had God-given gifts and talents. This film explores her generosity with ‘whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable’.
The cost of the neared Mary used is one thing, but it was also a treasured possession – what can we be generous with that’s not necessarily expensive, but precious to us?
Could we be more like Mary – willing to be misunderstood, unfairly criticised or wrongly perceived? Mary’s generosity with perceptions of herself are a reflection point for us all.
When Mary anoints Jesus’ feet and wipes them with her hair, she would have been crouched in the dust and the dirt, in a position normally occupied by a servant. It can’t have been pleasant but she was generous with her personal comfort.
To live a generous life is to be liberated from thinking everything is ours or under our control. This film helps us understand our response to the seven generosities through the generosity web.