Generosity Is Discipleship: Growing Givers in a Small Church

You feel the tension every month. The bills are due, the account is thin, and the temptation is to preach one guilt-laced sermon about the offering plate and hope people respond. But you know deep down that treating giving like an emergency appeal never actually changes hearts. It just makes everyone (you included) dread the topic.

Here is the shift that changes everything: generosity is a discipleship issue before it is a budget issue. Jesus talked about money more than almost any other topic. A small church that never teaches giving rarely grows generous givers, so the finances stay perpetually tight and the people never form the habit that funds the mission. When you disciple people into generosity, the budget takes care of itself. Interestingly, new works self-rank "training in generosity and good stewardship" as their number two discipleship strength, right behind being an invitational church. That tells you generosity belongs in your formation path, not just your finance meeting.

People give to vision, not to need

Write this on your heart before your next appeal: people give to vision, not to need. When you fund the deficit, you shrink hearts. When you fund the mission, you align hearts with God's priorities. Giving is not merely covering the budget, it is a spiritual response that draws the heart toward what God cares about. So lead with where you are going, not with how far behind you are.

Teach the 5 T's so stewardship is whole life

Stewardship is broader than money, and it is itself a mark of a healthy church. Teach the 5 T's so your people understand generosity as whole-life surrender:

Terrain (the Earth) we steward creation.

Time we steward our days.

Talents and gifts we steward what God built into us.

Temple (the body) we steward our physical health.

Treasure we steward our money.

When giving sits inside this bigger picture, it stops feeling like the church always wants your wallet and starts feeling like an invitation to surrender everything to God.

Run an intentional generosity series

Don't leave generosity to chance. Preach a short, intentional stewardship arc (many pastors run it in the fall before giving season or in January). Here are two outlines you can use.

The 2-week arc:

Why we give the theology of generosity, that we are stewards and not owners, and giving as a response to God.

How we give the tithe as a floor and not a ceiling, recurring and online giving made easy, and the vision your gifts fund.

The 4-week arc:

God owns it all stewardship of the 5 T's.

The heart follows the treasure (Matthew 6:21).

The joy and blessing of giving (Acts 20:35).

Giving to vision the mission your gift advances, plus a specific recurring-giving invitation.

Make giving easy, recurring, and digital

The numbers here are worth your attention. Online giving adds roughly $300 per person per year, and adoption nearly doubled from 31% in 2015 to 58% in 2020. A simplified giving page, placed front and center, can lift monthly giving by about 20%. And recurring givers give substantially more, one platform found around 42% more than non-recurring givers.

So promote recurring, monthly giving without apology. It grows generosity and it smooths your cash flow. (The platform setup itself belongs to your finance and administration work, and NetMinistry can help you automate the appeals.)

Be transparent, because trust fuels generosity

Transparency is the cheapest fundraising you have. Show people where the money goes through regular budget updates and an annual report. As you grow, pursue an independent board and an annual audit. Higher giving consistently correlates with visible accountability. People give generously to churches they trust.

Don't panic when new people give less

Here is a truth that will save you a lot of worry. Faster-growing churches often show lower per-capita giving ($1,336 in churches growing 50% or more, compared to $2,092 in stagnant churches). Why? New attenders simply haven't been discipled into generosity yet. Total dollars still rise with attendance (a 180-average church brings in more than double the dollars of a 100-average church). So the answer to soft per-capita giving is not guilt, it is your discipleship pipeline.

Watch the retention signal

Giving quietly predicts who stays. A striking 86% of departing members had no tithe record at all. A giving record is one of the strongest "who stays" signals you have. Surface it, but route the relational follow-up to your assimilation and retention work. You can start by taking the assessment to see where your church stands.

Set a SMART giving goal

Make it measurable. A simple SMART goal like "total giving increases by 5% over the previous year" gives you something to track month by month and review honestly. For a bigger vision or capital push (usually around the 100 and 100+ milestones), tier your donor list, ask each tier a specific amount, and offer all four gift types (one-time, recurring, strategic-partner, and matching).

Do this next

Stop treating generosity as an annual emergency and start discipling it year-round. Pick your series arc, promote recurring giving, and publish where the money goes. Then set one SMART giving goal you can actually track.

Your challenge this week

Draft the first message of your generosity series using the theme "Why we give," and add one clear, specific invitation to set up recurring, online giving. One sermon, one easy next step.