Stewardship: The Works Department

James 2:14-18

And so we begin again … again. And again and again. That’s what life together entails, doesn’t it? Our lives are circular, but hopefully also moving forward. So, like a spring, or a coil, round and round, but onward and upward. Anyway … onward again this morning.

Among the certainties of death and taxes on our list, I’m going to add stewardship this year! Because for the last two decades, at this time of the year, mid-October to Mid-November, stewardship takes the spotlight, as sure as death and taxes. That original list of two things highlights the inevitability of mortality and financial obligations that are a part of our lives. So, this third inevitability fits in nicely as another financial obligation, and actually might make the tax inevitability more manageable for us – tax deductible as our monetary stewardship to the church is. Good start, good start.

But, of course, as important an element as money is, stewardship is not just about pledges for a new year’s budget. It is about the gifting and the giving of our time and talents, as well. And so we begin again with messages, liturgy, confessions, affirmations, and music (not to mention beard-growing) that all remind us of our call to be good stewards of all creation, including and most directly of our little corner of creation – our land, our buildings, our people, and the communities we serve.

Let’s pray …

This year, once again, we’re not using thermometers or balloons to track our progress. This year, in fact, we’re not using A Sanctified Art or Feasting on the Word, or some other outside curriculum to provide a theme, sermon guides, words for worship, and more. If we have a theme, it is the last question that we asked of ourselves in the past month of worship and fellowship. Does anyone remember that question? Where are you from? Where does it hurt? What do you need? Aaaand … ?? Where do we go from here?

Just last week we read from the Book of Ruth, and discovered that just as they left Moab and returned to Bethlehem in time for the harvest festival, we are returning to this Stewardship Season, a time of harvest for us in its own powerful way. Where do we go from here is the perfect question to ask in October and November as we consider the year beyond, and the years beyond that.

I continue to believe that one of the most faithful answers to this question is “wherever we choose to go.” We can go “wherever we choose to go” because all that we need – money, time, and talents – is already here. In our pockets and bank accounts, in our arms and legs and hands and hearts, and in our imaginations and music and poetry and skills. It’s all here. So .. “wherever we choose to go.”

The “curriculum” we’re using to help inform our choices this year also comes from the heart of this congregation – from our Team Ministries. We have six Team ministries that, together, carry out the ministries and the missions that we have discerned are a part of our faithful engagement in this world – our raison d’etre, our reason for even being here at all. Worship and Christian Formation, Mission and Social Responsibility, Outreach, Congregational Life, Finance and Personnel, and Property and Maintenance. Every single one of the Teams and the ministries in their care require faithful stewardship – faithful giving of our tithes, our talents, and time. And this year, on the five measly Sundays we give ourselves to get excited about giving, we’re going to lift up one Team ministry each week – two on the last week, Stewardship Dedication Sunday, November 8^th.

This morning you may already have noticed, is Mission and Social Responsibility Sunday. This is the perfect way to launch this season, because “faith, by itself, if it has no works is …” Well, listen for the Word of God from James, chapter two:

Read James 2:14-18. The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Now, before we get back to “us” and the opportunities we have to express our faith – our trust in and fidelity to the Way of Jesus, let’s dig into this writing of James just a bit.

This section of James epistle insists that faith, understood as belief, must be translated into practice, into “doing something.” I hope that this sounds so obvious to you that you wonder why it even needs saying! I hope that this is who we are here at Pewee Valley Presbyterian church. But, you know, the overwhelming evidence is that this reminder above all needs to be made over and over and over again – not just during stewardship season, but there are fewer more poignant times. There is something deep inside all of us that leads us to presume that knowing the truth or holding the right position is enough to make us righteous, to make us worthy, to “save” us – here and now and forever after. The tendency we all have to find a refuge in the church and resting place in a community of faith is constant. We seek the comfort, but not the challenge. We seek the Pastor’s comforting words, but bristle at the prophetic warnings.

It’s one of the reasons young people – and an increasing number of older people like you and me – don’t’ find this practice of religious faith very relevant. If our “faith” is  focused on doctrinal correctness, or ritual conformity, or confessional accuracy, or a pledge of allegiance to some leader or another, or the insistence on inerrancy and certainty only, or even primarily, to comfort us in our certainty, then it is dead to anyone outside looking in and asking, “Yea, but what are you doing?”

I think that’s obvious to us. I think all Christians, in fact, would agree that faith needs to be demonstrated in action. We know that in our heads. The issue is whether that understanding is actually met with an attention to action, and what sort of action a particular community – say … Pewee Valley Presbyterian Church – considers important and reflects the life and death, the Way of Jesus.

That’s a big part of what our conversation is about this year. The overall budget of any institution, and a church’s budget most especially, is on of the most powerful mission statements we will ever issue. The way in which we engage our time and talents is crucial, as well. But we can “see” line items and “year to date expenditures versus income”, and spending deficits or surpluses in ways that share not only what we believe, but what we’re doing with that belief, that faith. How we are putting our money where our mouth is. So, as part of this year’s stewardship messaging, we will be looking at six parts of our overall budget, exploring how we express our faith in our giving. You see these numbers every year at our annual meeting on the last Sunday of February. But, in these weeks well break them down a bit so your eyes aren’t quite as crossed! And then we’ll offer opportunities – certainly not exhaustive, but a way to begin for you – to use your time and your talents, too. We begin with our Mission and Social Responsibility Ministries.

Take a look at your insert now. There is a very brief description of this Team’s mission taken from a booklet we published two years ago. And there’s a copy of the Team’s budget for this year, 2026, not quite over yet – we budget on a calendar year. The Mission Team’s budget is our third largest Team budget. I’m sure every church, and I know for certain this one through our Session’s desires and our Finance Team’s directions, would love for this budget to be it’s biggest. But with the property, buildings, bills, and personnel that we have acquired and committed to, the mission budgets of almost all congregations are their third largest – second, perhaps if they don’t have physical property. That’s fairly inevitable with the giving patterns of mainline Protestants.

So, what we strive to do here – like many or most others – is to make our Mission and Social Responsibility budget at least ten percent of our overall budget. This number reflects the hope that each of you will give ten percent of your annual income to the church in your yearly monetary pledge. How many of us do that?! Well … it’s a hope. A goal, we hope, for many of us. And it is for your church as a whole. This becomes increasingly difficult as utilities and maintenance costs increase exponentially and the cost of the healthcare and benefits you provide for your Pastors and other staff sky rockets. But it remains a goal for us as a whole church. (I will tell you that we have already taken some very generous gifts from members of this congregation, one in particular, and applied it to the Mission and Social Responsibility budget for 2027, seeking already to reach this faithful target.)

As you look at this past year’s numbers for this Team, the Mission budget was eight and a half percent of our total income from contributions, not total income, but from what we pledge and receive in unpledged amounts. So, a bit under ten percent. We would be able to increase that number if we included some of our other ministries, particularly of our Outreach Team. But we’ve lodged those ministries under a different Team in these years to better follow the growth of new initiatives like The Parish House and other community engagement initiatives that have taken shape and are starting to bear fruit. We’ll consider Outreach next week, actually.

What you see in this budget are our commitments to the larger denomination, the PC(USA), through shared mission support of the national General Assembly, the regional Synod, and the more localized Presbytery. (I am personally very proud of this number. I wish it were more, but it hasn’t decreased in eighteen years, and represents a commitment to the larger church of which we are part, and the incredible global and national outreach that the Presbyterian church still has.) You also see the Presbytery apportionment, which is also denominational giving, the majority of which remains in our own Presbytery and helps all the congregations of Mid-Kentucky to access loans, ministries, curriculum, and other resources they (we) may need to enhance, or even continue, their own “doing of faith.” We can be proud of our connectional giving.

The Haskins Fund listed here is the only endowment fund we have here at PVPC (Laura or Ron?). The Haskin sisters, Iris and Elizabeth (Betsy), set up this endowment currently administered by the Presbyterian foundation so that “one half of funds received (from the endowment) shall be used for the general operating expenses and programs of said church (PVPC) … (and) the remaining one-half of said funds received shall be used for the mission program, foreign or domestic, of said church.” We receive about eight thousand dollars every year as “funds received,” and you see that offered four thousand this year to the Mission and Social Responsibility budget. It is worth noting that in her fund restriction statement, Iris includes this: It is (our) hope that the funds earmarked for mission programs of said Pewee Valley Presbyterian Church will stimulate others to contribute to said mission, which purpose has always been of utmost importance to … Elizabeth and me. Another beautiful way to engage in stewardship – estate planning and legacy gifts. We use the Haskins Fund to support four different mission endeavors – Promise Housing, St. George’s Scholar Institute, UKirk campus ministries, and our Laundry Love mission.

You see the other line items here for your mission budget. I believe it’s been about ten years since we issued a congregation-wide call for other ideas on which missions you might suggest we support. So, anyone with new ideas should get in touch with the Session liaison, currently Rick Fletcher, anyone else on the Team, or one of your Pastors and let us know so we might consider them.

This morning, and every morning this season and beyond, you will have an opportunity to talk with members of each Ministry Team and to take a look at only a few ways you might give of your time and talents through volunteering. On the table outside is a short list of those opportunities. Go on and put your name down and you will be called – and not just by GOD, but by someone here! Your stewardship through Mission and Social Responsibility – through “doing” your faith.

In his writing, James shows how false is a faith that refuses to act, and insists that his readers be not only hearers of the Word, but also doers. So do we. You need to give … your time, your talents, and your tithe … for the works of our beloved community.  Where will we go from here?

Wherever you choose to go. And, we’ve only just begun.

Lord, you give the great commission … give us, too, courage to engage. Amen.

Reverend Joel Weible, Pastor

Pewee Valley Presbyterian Church / October 11, 2026