By Very Rev. Andrew Kemberling, V.F.

Core Values

Most people think of stewardship as time, talent and treasure. Yet there's more to stewardship than the commonly known as three "T's." Underneath the time, talent and treasure are four underlying or core values: identity, trust, gratitude and love. These core values are very important in developing the importance of time, talent and treasure. Once you understand these four values, time, talent and treasure take on an even greater importance.

Identity

"The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God for God." CCC, No. 27

Our Christian identity is founded upon the basic idea of God as Creator. God created us in His image and likeness (Gen 1:27). This means that we have human dignity. But don't stop there. We are created by God for God. In a very real way, we are not our own. We belong to God. Thus, we can truly say, "I am a child of God; I belong to God."

Scripture says this well.

In Psalm 95 we hear:

"Come in; let us bow and bend low; let us kneel before the God who made us, for he is our God and we the people who belong to his pasture, the flock that is led by his hands."

Psalm 100 says it even better:

"Cry out with joy to the Lord all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before him, singing for joy. Know that He the Lord is God. He made us, we belong to him, and we are his people, the sheep of his flock."

In the New Testament, St. Paul says,

"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been purchased at a price." (1Cor 6:19)

Not only do these passages tell us of our identity, but they remind us of the primacy of God in our lives. The fact remains, if we are not our own, then the things we have are not our own either. We really do not own them; we steward them. God lets us have these things and asks us to be good stewards. Even our talents are not our own. They too belong to God.

A good illustration of is this is the parable of the talents found in Matthew's Gospel chapter 25. The word "talent" is a unit of coinage, and the English word we use is derived directly from this Biblical passage.

In the story, a man, who goes on a journey, calls in his servants and entrusts his possessions to them. To one he gave five talents, to another two and to a third, one--each according to his ability. Then he went away. Immediately, the one who received the five talents went and traded with them, and made another five. Likewise, the one who received two made another two. But the man who received one went and dug a hole in the ground and buried his master's money.

Please notice that the man did not bury his OWN money, but his master's money. The "talents" did not belong to the servant. They were given to the servant by the master, and they were given to be used, not wasted. The same is true of us. Our talents are not our own, because we are not our own. We belong to God and everything we have is from God.

It's important to remember this important value of identity because as you look at your identity you begin to realize that "I am a steward." What does it mean to be a steward, a good steward? To be a good steward, you have to go back to the relationship between God and us. God is the Creator and He created us in His image and likeness.

"We are created by God" is what most people would agree upon. Of course, God created me!  But what most of us Christians have a hard time accepting is "I am not only created by God; I am created for God." I am created for God, not for myself. This is not what much of the world tells us, however. The trend nowadays is towards individualism, which emphasizes, "I was created for myself so that I could satisfy all my needs and wants." No. This is not the case. Nowhere in Christianity do you find that concept. Rather, we are created by God for God.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church,  even the Baltimore catechism, teaches us of our Universal Desire for God. It says, "The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God for God." Thus I can truly say, "I am created by God and for God, to serve Him in this world and to be happy with Him in the next."

The FOR God part is an essential part of stewardship spirituality. It is something we need to inculcate in the programs, in our talks and in what we believe about stewardship. It begins to create a detachment from things, even from ourselves. In that detachment we can see that God is the owner of everything.

In stewardship spirituality you're looking at that very basic identity issue: "Who am I?"  I am created by God, for God. This is very clear in the Old Testament, and the New Testament tells us we are temples of the Holy Spirit. We are not our own. We were purchased at a price, the price of the cross. It's there repeatedly. We really don't own ourselves.

I often remind people about our bodies. Our bodies are not ours. They are God's. It is God's body. He has given it to us and it is temporary. It dies. We get our permanent one at the Resurrection of the Dead--that's our permanent body. The one we have right now is mortal. It will die. And God asks us to steward it as we steward every other thing in our lives.

Knowing our identity and relationship with God as His creation in His image and likeness and being created for Him has a lot of implications. If I am not my own, then all the things that I "own," and all that I have are not mine either. They are lent to me by God; they are given to me by God. We are His stewards, who will take care of everything that He has given us.

Remember, a steward is someone who manages someone else's things. We are stewards of all God has given us and we manage them ourselves as well as all the other things God has given in our care. We steward our own talents, our time and our treasure and we, perhaps, steward other's treasure, time and talent, especially in our roles as parents, priests, or other positions of authority.

Trust

"Trust in God is the preparation for the blessedness of the poor."

The underlying value of trust builds upon the value of identity. Since everything we have is from God, it is God who is in charge of our lives, not us. As we live our life, we are caught up in something much bigger than ourselves. The value of trust allows us to let go of what seemingly is in our control and to "let God" do what he is already doing for us. Thus the saying, "let go" and "let God."

As hard as it is to believe, everything is just the way God would have it at this very moment. Yes, evil is real and causes pain, suffering and death. But God has a plan to bring about life, and it's happening right now. Mysteriously, God brings about good even from evil; all we have to do is trust. For the good stewards, God provides everything we have. Our ability to be a provider is in itself a gift from God. He gives us everything we need.

Stewardship becomes a way of life by putting into action the trust that we have. This happens when acceptance comes from letting go of control. Our control is self-centeredness. It is the false belief that the world is created in our own image, and that somehow we are in charge. When things don't go "our" way, anger and resentment fuels a cynical view of life that is full of frustration. Trusting in God is based upon the belief in our own powerlessness. We realign our belief in God's almighty power and his total but hidden control to bring about what's best for us in the midst of a struggling world. We "let go" and "let God." Acceptance only comes when we come to the realization that we pray for God's will in our life, not our own. God does not let us down either. He sends His calming grace that says "Everything is all right, don't worry. You'll be okay." Peace of mind is the end result of trust brought about by acceptance.

This trust level comes out of our sense of identity. "I don't create all this stuff. God does, and He provides it to me. I develop an understanding that I'm not making it happen; God is making it happen." Then, our free will can confuse us. In our ability to have free will, something else that God has given to us, we think that we're causing things to happen and we trust in ourselves instead of realizing that it is when we surrender our wills, it is God who does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. That's the basic understanding of trust--our trusting in God that there is something greater than ourselves going on here--and it does take faith to believe that God really will provide for us.

People generally believe that, in some sort of nebulous way. When it comes down to paying bills and going off to work, however, you might think "I am doing this all by myself." But don't be fooled, God is really the one providing for you and your family. All we need to do is to trust Him.

If we really believe and trust that God will provide for all our needs, then we must be trustworthy also. We must be worthy of His trust; God must also trust us. We must be honest trustworthy in all our dealings. You cannot just say you're trustworthy; you must actually be trustworthy; you have to act it out.

This is particularly true in our relationships with our families, the parish structure, within the church, and back to the archdiocese; all of that has to be clean. If we're not trustworthy in reporting things back properly and in doing what we're obliged to do, then stewardship becomes a sham. It becomes an outward show with internal corruption. The internal issue of trust has to be established firmly within good stewardship because you miss the point of identity, if you don't understand the trust part. The trust comes from the fact that I am not my own. I am God's and God trusts me to take care of everything. This trust is shown in the way I handle all of my material possessions. As Our Lord Jesus says, if you can be trustworthy in a small matter, you can be trustworthy in larger matters. It means you have to act your spirituality-and that means you have to be trustworthy in your own parish.

How do you handle your volunteers? Do you misuse them? Are you honest with them? How do you deal with people's money? Are you honest and trustworthy? Are you totally honest with the diocese, with the government, and with all of our people in the way we handle the money that is given to our care?

These must not be sacrificed. It is easy to come up with excuses like, "Well, you know, it's really an unfair system, so I'm holding a little something back because in justice we've really got it coming to us." Folks, you would be fooling yourselves. You would undermine the very grace that comes from God as part of the spirituality. Trust God. You don't have to cheat your way into being a good steward.

That's exactly why Jesus criticized the Pharisees. They were excellent tithers, yet they were crooked. That's what upset Jesus. Outwardly, they would really tithe. They tithed on everything, even on their garden at the back of the house and even on the littlest, teeniest plants, they would tithe ten percent.

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you frauds! You tithe on mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law-justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former." Luke1:;42

Justice is based upon truth; you cannot be cheating. Truth and being trustworthy are an essential part of stewardship spirituality.

This is a hard pill to swallow for some people. Nevertheless, everything has to be as straight and as clean as possible. Believe it; you cannot cheat and get ahead on stewardship. God has ALL the money in the world. To the priests, I say, "Don't worry about paying your full amount to the archdiocese; don't worry about a full assessment. Just pay it. God will give you more. In fact, that's what He's counting on. How is the diocese going to get funding for their services? They're going to get it from you. God's going to give you more than you've ever had. And you can't cheat the poor, either (I'll get into what I mean by that in a latter part of the book)."

I would like to end this section with the teaching from The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which says,

"Trust in God is the preparation for the blessedness of the poor."

In identity we realize that we are not our own; we belong to God; we are created by God and for God. Our identity helps us to trust that God will provide for us; while on our part, we need to be trustworthy in all our dealings. That's the underpinning of what it is to be a steward. A steward is first and foremost honest and full of integrity.

Gratitude

"We thank God the Father, through Christ in the Spirit, for the gifts of creation, salvation and sanctification." CCC, No.___

Trust and acceptance naturally lead to the next core value of gratitude. Coming to the realization that enough is enough is fueled by acceptance. It is an attitude shift of looking at what we have, not at what we don't have.

The greatest gift is our relationship with loved ones. People are more important than things. We come to accept that God has given us just what we need. We come to believe that God does for us what we can not do for ourselves. And God's way of providing is for our own good. Our detachment from material goods places them in their proper perspective. We appreciate them for what they are--a gift.

Gratitude fills our heart as we realize the wisdom and forethought God has in giving us what we need. If we don't have it, perhaps we don't need it. If God wants us to have something, we remember that nothing is impossible with God. What we have is shared with us by God and we appreciate his trust in us to be stewards of the good things of life. Our thanks to God is an offering in itself. It is our way of responding to the relationship founded upon God's love.

Gratitude is like the fruit of the first two because as you start losing yourself, you start focusing upon the things that you have been given. All of stewardship sees everything as a gift, a gift from God. Listen for the gift language in the Eucharistic prayer. You hear it all the time. "Oh God, we present these gifts to you and all the gifts that you've given us." Thus in the Eucharist, "We thank God the Father, through Christ in the Spirit, for the gifts of creation, salvation and sanctification." CCC, No.___ Indeed, God has given you every single thing in your life. Thus you won't take anything for granted. You realize how God's action and control has made everything happen in your life.

Gratitude is born out of trust because the ultimate trust is letting go of the control. God is in control. When you realize that God is in control and you realize he's given everything as a gift, gratitude is born.

Greed and Envy

The opposites of gratitude are greed and envy. Greed and envy are qualities in our world that are destructive to gratitude because greed and envy want more, more, more. With gratitude we say, "I am not trying to seek what I don't have. Rather, I appreciate what I already have." It changes the focus. It's like taking a 180-degree turn in gratitude. You start seeing a different picture.

Thus, you say, "I have this, and I have that," and you begin to realize what you do have instead of being filled with covetousness, with avarice, and with wanting more. You appreciate what you have. You begin to say "I don't need so much, I can live with less." That's what gratitude does. It helps you realize you can have less. You don't have to have all that you want. Instead, you say "I have enough. In fact, I have too much already. Look at all God's given me!" You start to take an inventory of everything you have and you say "I have more than I've ever needed!"  And then you begin to realize, when you compare what you have to what other people have, that: "I am blessed; I am truly blessed."

This is especially true for travelers from First World countries to Third World countries. You can be a real wimp when it comes to getting ready in the morning, with hot water and a shower readily available. This might not be the case in Third World countries and it could be a very hard experience for some. Thus, when you go home, you'll be thanking God for hot water! 

When was the last time you thanked God for that? It reminds you of how much we have, yet we take them for granted --even the most basic creature comforts of life. I thank God for a private bathroom, and I thank God for drinkable water. Imagine not having potable water!  Most often in Third World countries, you have to drink out of bottles. Thus, we realize how much we have in our country.

Gratitude is a quality of humility. We need to lose our selfishness and, perhaps, some sense of control, and we need to become humble. Humility does not focus on oneself;  rather, it upon the ultimate. The ultimate is that God is God and He gives us everything we have. Then we realize we don't need anything more because we already have so much now.

Everything we have is a gift. That means there's this relationship of giving and receiving that's very important to stewardship spirituality. God gives and we receive; and then on our part we learn how to give. Just as God gives us everything, we too, need to learn to give as part of this spirituality. This is not an intellectual process. These are actions that come from your heart. This is very moral--things you have to do. And so in this spirituality, gratitude means you need to be thankful. You cannot just think thankfulness; you have to act out being thankful.

Love

Faith, hope and love; and the greatest of these is love. 1Cor 13:13

We have identified the three core values of identity, trust, gratitude and now we come to the last core value of love. Scripture tells us that there are three things that last: faith, hope and love; and the greatest of these is love. (1Cor 13:13) As God loves us, we love God. Love is the requirement of the Christian. It is NOT optional.

I often remind people that love is also in our language as another word--it's called charity. When people hear charity they immediately think money! When you think of love you don't think of money. But we say faith, hope and love: faith, hope and charity. Charity and love are the same thing; they are interchangeable. We use them all the time in theological context. But if you're going to move it into a spiritual context, that means if you are going to love, you are going to have to give.

Charity, therefore, is the requirement of a Christian. Love is not self-seeking. Love itself requires one to give. One cannot love if all one does is receive, receive, receive. Think about it. If in our family relationships, all that we do is receive, would we call that love? No. Love therefore, requires us to give, to give of ourselves. To give time to God in prayer is an exceptional sign of our love.

The good steward understands that our charitable giving is based upon the key idea that we have a need to give before we give to a need. Our need to give is our response in love. We give back what is not really ours. God does not want all of it back--not yet. He will, when we die. He does not want half of it back, like the elderly man who won the million dollars was willing to do. No. God asks a tithe back in thanksgiving for what God has done. He asks us to give of our time, talent and treasure. As God loves us we love God. When God sees our response in love, God gives us even more. God cannot be outdone in generosity.

The love we have for God is manifested in setting nothing before our relationship with him. Out of love, our first priority is God. We don't let things get in the way. Remember, God made us; we don't belong to ourselves. If we don't belong to ourselves, then the things we have are not even ours. They are lent to us. Just as when we rent something, there is a real owner, and that owner is God. This is particularly true when it comes to spending money entrusted to us. Put God first before paying any bills or setting any money aside.

When we rent something, we have to return it, give it back. Renters can be careless, which shows lack of respect for the owner. An even greater insult is for the renter to use an item and never to return it. That's stealing from the owner. God is the owner, and we are the managers of his treasure. God, however, says, "Keep 90%; use it even though it is not yours. Give back only 10%--a tithe." A tithe is not what's leftover, or the table droppings. It is the best portion, the first portion. It is a sign of our love to give the very best.

I ask you wives, would it be love if all your husbands ever did was receive, receive, receive? No. That's not love. You need to give. It must be mutual giving. That's what we believe marriage is. It's a covenant of mutuality. It means you give and you receive. You receive and you give. You learn how to give back and forth. And the requirement of the Christian is to love. The requirement of the Christian is to give. You need to learn to give.

What do you give? Well, we believe there are a number of things you can give but we have categorized these as time, talent and treasure. Often, we think that giving is optional. It is not optional. Love requires us to give; it's part of loving. You can think your way through love, but when you act your way through love you have to give of yourself. For those of you who are married, you entered a covenant of receiving and receiving. You love each other. You know how to give. You give of yourself. You don't give 50/50. You give 100/100. You give your whole self. And by giving yourself, you hold nothing back and you become even greater because you're giving yourself away. That's what the sacrament of marriage is about. It's a beautiful image. And it really is born out of this image of love.

Love is important in stewardship spirituality. It is expressed in giving. If we say we love God, why is it hard to give to the collection basket at Church? Why do so many make excuses when people do not give? This, to me, diminishes the value of love. If people give, even as little as it is, it teaches them to focus on someone else rather then on himself or herself. It focuses on a relationship, a deep and loving relationship with God. Remember first core value of identity--that God created us for Him.

One way to look at love as a requirement of the Christian is what Scriptures tell us in the Old Testament: "do not come empty handed when you come to the altar." In biblical times, there were the three times a year when they were required "to celebrate a pilgrim feast' to God (Ex 23:14). They didn't come empty-handed. They had to give, "the choicest first fruits of your soil you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God." Ex 23:19.

It was a way of life then in the Old Testament, and it's a way of life for us now. To explain this further, I would like to go back to that identity issue. One of the images we came across while promoting stewardship as a way of life in the Philippines was this idea of the spousal image of identity. Remember what scriptures teach us: God has married us; we are married to God. We are His spouse. In addition, Jesus calls himself as the "bridegroom" and the Church is his bride. The Church is our spouse. That's a beautiful image.

Of course, we also have another image which is more accepted within the church and that is: "the Church is our mother." It's a beautiful image, a very beautiful image. Indeed, the church provides for and feeds and looks after us just like what a mother does for her child. It's very tender, and there's trust and the sense of security.

Let's face it though, little children grow up. And when you grow up, you don't marry your mother; you don't marry your father. You marry your spouse; you marry your husband; you marry your wife. And if you can see the Church not as just your mother, but as your husband or as your wife, then you also see an obligation that comes with loving a spouse--loving a wife or a husband. It is in that spousal relationship that we challenge a poor parish to ask: "How would you treat your wife? Would you treat your wife this way by giving her nothing?" You would go out of your way to make sure she had everything she needed.

Remember, that's what spirituality is--applying it--asking people to take seriously that the Church is their spouse. Are you in love with your spouse? Look at her. Look at him. Are you in love with him? Are you only thinking you love him? Are you showing your love for your spouse?

Even the poorest people know about marriage. They know that image. You don't have to explain it too hard. They get that one real fast because they know what it is to have a husband and a wife. They know how to be good to their spouses. When they think of the Church as their spouse, they learn to now to treat the Church with that same understanding.

Remember, love is a requirement of the Christian. We love, and then we know how to love, especially those of us who are married. They know how to love. If they can understand the kind of love there is between husband and wife, they can transfer that to the Church. That's an important start, but it's just a start.