To introduce Generous June 2023, we spoke to the Revd Sera Rumble, vicar of St Denys, about how the church is growing in its generosity in all areas, despite not being the most affluent community.
“When it comes to giving to the church, not everyone is able to give money,” said Revd Sera. “St Denys is in the bottom eighth in the UK when it comes to measures of economic prosperity – there are lots of social housing and kids on free school meals. But we recognise at St Denys Church that there are many ways to give, and we summarise these as: ‘time, skills, money and prayer’. And we wanted to express in our worship the value of these different ways of giving.”
“One way we did this was through the ‘offertory plate’ (where people usually give money during a church service), because I think through the plate we can unintentionally give more prominence and value to just financial giving. So we created symbols of four ‘Giving Seeds’ with each one beginning to grow a shoot, to represent that the time, skills, money and prayer we give all can be used by God to help his kingdom grow. These symbols are always on the offertory plate for all to see and are brought forward for prayer in services.”
“We’ve also written a prayer that we often use as well, that offers our time, skills, money and prayer to God and submits them to him and his way for the growth of his kingdom. Recently a member of our church family told me that found it very moving when the plate of Giving Seeds brought and prayed for, as she was really conscious that wasn’t able to give money, she was able to give time, skills and prayers. It showed me that our symbols and actions do speak to people.”
The Prayer use with the Offertory Plate: Generous God, We thank you for all you have given us, for you are our creator & provider. We bring to you now our offerings of time, skills, money & prayer. May you bless all that we offer, so that in your time and in your way, your kingdom may grow and your love be known. In Jesus’ name we pray Amen
For St Denys, part of living generously as a church has included the use of its buildings to other social outreach causes. “It’s all about collaboration,” says Revd Sera. “We can’t meet all the social need around here on our own, so we let the Food Bank and Free Meals projects use our building to distribute food, we do the welcome and the drinks and I am there as a pastoral presence.”
St Denys Church also incorporates teaching on generosity into its preaching series. Revd Sera explains: “We’ve been doing a series called ‘The Love of God and…‘ – the subject of generosity was addressed, but then the following week we looked at the theme of ‘Rest’ and how you also need to be generous to yourself by taking rest. We hope by doing this we are not emphasising one thing to the detriment of another. We’re aiming to grow a culture in which people feel able to say ‘no’, where people believe in the vision so they join in and give because they want to, and where gifts of all types are valued and are not quantified as ‘big’ or ‘small’ – simply where people can give whatever and whoever they are.”
Despite the impact of the pandemic and the cost of living crisis, St Denys Church is seeing its generosity and giving steadily increasing – and this includes financial giving. “We have always paid our Common Mission Fund contribution in full and the PCC intentionally supports this and sees it as vital. We’ve also made it very easy for people to give. At the bottom of every weekly e-newsletter there is a ‘Click if you want to donate’ link which takes you to the easy payment system through ChurchDesk. We’re also in the process of getting a card reader to make it even easier!”
When you start really deepening a community’s sense of generosity, you find it starts to grow and people pass it on. There is a homeless person who lives in our church porch and he now gets food from the food bank to pass on to others who are in need. Generosity isn’t a one-way street!
Revd Sera Rumble
