The Stewardship Magazine Spring / Summer 2021
NEXT STEPS Bringing hope for better mental health The Rapid Response Fund goes global The house that generosity built PLUS Stewardship’s next chapter
transforming generosity
We are Stewardship. We’ve been helping the UK Christian community to give and to receive since 1906, when we started out as stewards of church properties around the country. We love making giving easy and each year help over 40,000 individuals to give around £100 million to support over 4,000 churches, 6,000 charities and 2,500 Christian workers. By offering practical, tailored support, we are committed to strengthening the work of churches and Christian charities. We also inspire greater generosity from this community, thanks to our wealth of resources, courses and campaigns for individuals and churches alike. For more than a century we have been driven by our desire to give the wider world the opportunity to encounter Jesus through the generosity of His people and the transformational work of the causes they support. We are Stewardship, and this is what we are about.
Contact us 1 Lamb’s Passage, London EC1Y 8AB Tel: 020 8502 5600 Email: enquiries@stewardship.org.uk Web: stewardship.org.uk You can contact the editor by emailing editor@stewardship.org.uk Editor: Craig Borlase Design: adeptdesign.co.uk
Stewardship is the operating name of Stewardship Services (UKET) Limited, a registered charity in England and Wales no. 234714 and a company limited by guarantee no. 90305
Editorial Faith in the Darkness Welcome to the Spring edition of Share magazine. This is my favourite time of the year as we emerge from the darkness of winter into brighter and longer daylight. It is in this season when we re-visit the most remarkable story of betrayal, suffering and redemption, as the Bible takes us from Palm Sunday’s adulation, pauses agonisingly at the cross on Good Friday and then onto the resurrection joy of Easter Day. As I look at this magazine, there are a number of words that jump out. They weave their own rich story that resonates with me as I reflect on how we have all been impacted and re-shaped by recent times. ‘Challenge’, ‘crisis’ and ‘change’ appear frequently, but also words such as ‘communities’ and ‘compassion’ that are full of hope and promise. Our CEO Stewart outlines how we at Stewardship have been on a journey of change which was accelerated last year as the pandemic took hold and how we have been able to play our part in making a difference (page 6). Gill highlights two charities whose focus on improving mental health and well-being is needed more than ever before (page 14). Craig helps to broaden our vision as he explores the impact of the pandemic in other parts of the world (page 20), and how Christians have responded with love, compassion and generosity. Seeing as April is also the time for a new beginning in the tax year, please do have
a look at Rachel’s article (page 26) with some useful information and updates. And finally, prior to Covid-19 we started a project to update the Stewardship brand, our website and accounts and this will be going live at the end of April. It’s always been important to us to make it as easy as possible for our clients to navigate through all our offerings. We hope you like our new look as much as we do. If you have an online account as a giver or as a church or charity, please do watch out for communications from us to help you switch over to our new updated online account. Frances Miles Chief Partnership Officer, Stewardship
Like what you read? Use your Stewardship account to lend your support. Cover photo credit: World Vision 2020.
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FEATURES
NEWS IN BRIEF
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WIN WIN
News in brief
Our Philanthropy Services Team have won the prestigious STEP Private Client Award for Philanthropy Team of the Year 2020.
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A time to change
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A time to grow
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A time to heal
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A time to look beyond
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Legal and financial
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Consultancy helpline
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Why I give: Emily Kendall 4
The competition was fierce, with entries from JP Morgan, Farrer & Co (solicitors to the Queen) and leading lawyers Herbert Smith Freehills and Withers. Nicola Johnson, our Chief Philanthropy Officer, summed up the team’s joy. “It’s an honour given the calibre of the other teams nominated as we have first-hand experience of working with many of them and know the level of professionalism and care that they show to their clients. We couldn’t have accomplished anything in the last year without the dedication of our clients, the wider Stewardship team and partnerships with other key organisations.” To find out what Philanthropy Services can do for you, visit them at stewardship.org.uk/philanthropy
STRONG FOUNDATIONS Our friends at Hope into Action have been helping churches house the homeless for years. Tenants report improved health, better relationships with family and friends and the power to manage their own finances. You can read more about HIA’s vision to mobilise Christian prayer, investments and relationships in a new book by founder Ed Walker — ‘A House Built on Love’.
NEW PARTNERSHIPS
ANY CHANGES?
We’re delighted to announce that we’ve entered into two new partnerships with Pioneer and Acts 29. We’ll be supporting them on stewardship and governance issues as they plant new churches. As they fulfil their vision, we’ll assist with their missional work, providing services, guidance and new products as and when they’re needed. You can find out more by visiting stewardship.org.uk/churchplanting
As we begin a new tax year it is a good opportunity for us to remind you it is your responsibility to let us know if your circumstances have changed in any way that affects your eligibility for Gift Aid. Please email the Giving Services Team giving@stewardship.org.uk or the Philanthropy Services Team philanthropy@stewardship.org.uk to let us know if this is the case. 5
CHURCH STEP FORWARD Our CEO, Stewart McCulloch, outlines what’s next for Stewardship
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s I write this, the world has just tuned in live to a bright January morning in Washington D.C. and the inauguration of the 46th President of the United States. In the months of endless media coverage and infinite scroll of articles that have explored the election from every possible angle, one particular anecdote has stood out for me. It wasn’t about either the outgoing or the incoming President. Instead it was about Dr Jill Biden and the fact that taped to her mirror is a Kierkegaard quote: ‘Faith sees best in the dark.’ Like any great quote, the meaning is open to interpretation. Still, there can be little debate that we live in challenging times, or that as Christians, there’s something familiar about Kierkegaard’s words: ‘even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.’ Psalm 139:12, NIV At Stewardship we’re in no doubt about either the depth of the darkness or the brightness of the light. We’re aware of the scale of the challenge facing communities today as well as in the months and years ahead. We’re also inspired about the role that churches and charities will play as they work to bring hope and transformation where it is needed most. Most of all, though, we’re excited about the ways that we at Stewardship can support that work and resource churches and charities to provide the fuel for their light in these dark times. We’ve been hard at work on this since early in 2019. The journey began when we launched our new initiative to philanthropists – offering a personalised service to help maximise the impact of generosity and
We’re in no doubt about either the depth of the darkness or the brightness of the light.
advising on complex giving arrangements. Being awarded Philanthropy Team of the Year in 2020 was a wonderful start, and spurred us on to our second challenge. We are currently working hard to refresh our online presence. In the coming weeks, generous Christians like you will notice changes to your online account – changes that I believe will dramatically improve the way we serve you. The new look interfaces are even simpler and easier to use, making it even easier for you to express your generosity, helping you make an even greater impact on the causes you’re passionate about. Then there’s the third phase, where we become more relevant to a church as it steps forward in this challenging season. As those on the front line meet the great needs that surround us, Stewardship has a unique role to play in raising and stewarding the resources that are so vital to that work. (You can read more about this on page 20.) So, yes – there’s darkness around. But to me and my colleagues here at Stewardship, it’s obvious that there’s faith too – generous, courageous, life-changing faith. With the church rising to the challenge, the days ahead are full of possibility. 7
Photo credit: Chris O'Donovan.
FROM SQUATTERS’ RAVES TO BROKEN RECORDS How Tab Church Lewisham is on a transformational journey 8
They told me we needed a new building. I said, ‘We haven’t outgrown this one yet!’
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itting with his wife and co-pastor, Donna-Maria, Pastor Michael White is reminiscing. “All my earliest memories centre around church. If my dad wasn’t preaching or out planting other churches and supporting them, he and my mum were off around the world on mission trips, planting churches and developing leaders. Dad was a bit of an Indiana Jones figure. One minute he was battling snakes in rural Guyana, the next supporting a new urban congregation in south east London. He founded around 75 churches – church planting was in his spiritual DNA.” When Michael became Senior Pastor at the Tab Church, Lewisham in 2003, he faced a mammoth task. “I’d liken it to turning a ship around. Numbers had dwindled and the congregation was mostly elderly. We spent the next nine years building up the people and the culture of the church. We prayed, we worked, we listened and then in 2012 we started to
experience the hand of God blessing the church with exponential growth. There were about 120 members in 2003 and now we’ve been blessed with over 1500.”
Pastor Michael White
A prophetic word of growth was spoken over Michael by some of his father’s peers in the church in the early days. “They told me we needed a new building. I said, ‘We haven’t outgrown this one yet!’ As we got more involved in our community, numbers went up and we realised they were right. We run Lewisham Central’s largest foodbank, getting through up to 18 tons of food every year and we haven’t got the room to store it all in our current building. Add in all our other ministry initiatives and the need for new space is an urgent one.” 9
With Tab running two to three Sunday services in a Neo-Gothic edifice in need of modernisation, conditions were becoming untenable. The search for a new building began in 2009. “We got offered loads of buildings, none in Lewisham. Generally, when a building comes up for sale in the borough, the local government gives priority to developers. We started to wonder if we should be moving outside Lewisham, but God told us, ‘No! You are to be here.’ Eventually, the old Methodist Temperance Hall on the High Street came up, so we went to view it. We agreed it was all wrong for us! There was extensive fire damage, asbestos, it was listed, and it was chopped up into lots of different spaces. We could see it would need a huge amount spent on it. So, we said no. After a while, we viewed it again and the eyes of our understanding began to be enlightened. God gave us the boldness to walk forward with it and we bought it in 2012.” 10
Eight painful years followed. “We fixed the roof and got rid of the asbestos, but because it’s listed, we had to work with Historic England on every single decision which took a lot of time and plenty of patience. Eventually we put in our plans and got planning permission.” Which is where Stewardship comes in. “Having done our sums and worked out what needed doing, we knew we’d need a mortgage. We’d been using Stewardship’s services for years, but we didn’t realise they offered loans. I said to the team, ‘Listen, why don’t we reach out to Stewardship because they always give us such great quality advice and are outstanding in what they do. They’ll know who we should use.’ So, we called, and the rest is history. We now have a £4.4million loan facility, the largest in Stewardship’s history, which has freed us up to do all the work we need to do.”
Z-ers who love Tik Tok. We cherish that diversity. Jesus intended the church to be like this, a bunch of interdependent people looking to Him.”
The Tab’s plans for their new building are wide-reaching. “Our new building is the largest standalone structure on Lewisham High Street. We’re going to be able to store loads more food for our food bank, we can serve hot meals to those without homes, expand our work with recovering drug addicts, run our Evergreens senior group, which is for everyone in the community, expand our CAP classes, organise food for kids in the borough in the holidays who are on Pupil Premium and open a community café which will also be a safe space for young people. None of this would be possible without Stewardship’s help.” Even with the limitations of their current building, the Tab membership reflects the culture and diversity of the borough of Lewisham. “We love that we’ve got barristers worshipping alongside people who’ve just stopped selling drugs and given their lives to Christ; great grandmas next to Generation
The church is very much of its community. “One night, we were up in London at a leaders’ dinner and got a call from a member saying that squatters had moved in and a rave had kicked off. We called the police but there was nothing they could do. We gave them a couple of hours to rave themselves out, then a few of us went down there to have a word. We told the guys on the door, ‘Listen, you need to leave. This is our building and it’s going to be a church.’ One of them asked, ‘Which church?’ As soon as we told them who we were, they shut the rave down and told everyone to tidy up and get out. We believe that one of them was a local gang member whose family had been positively impacted by the church. The building has been protected ever since then because of those gang connections.” Thanks to the loan offered by Stewardship, the new building will now house an 800-seater auditorium. “It’s going to be the biggest conference centre in the borough. We’re using part of the funds to put in hi-tech AV equipment and renovating the kitchen and loos to make them accessible.”
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Photo credit: Robin Stott.
Partnering with Stewardship means that we can finally realise all our hopes and dreams for our work in Lewisham. Tab has been breaking records with their new building. “Once we’d made it safe, we offered four public open days where everyone was invited in to have a look round. We got around 1,200 people in which was a great way for us to meet with our community. People would be getting off the bus and see crowds and come in to have a look before they went home for tea. No-one else in the borough’s ever done that. We also broke a local government record. The council told us that never in their whole history had they had so many letters of support for a planning application, mostly from non-churchgoers. Partnering with Stewardship means that we can finally realise all our hopes and dreams for our work in Lewisham.” Rowena Bent heads up the youth department and has been a member of Tab since she was three. “There have been a lot of cuts to youth services in Lewisham – we try to fill the gap. Having High Street Tab up and running 12
will make us more visible and accessible to the kids. When the new building is ready, we’re aiming to run homework clubs, more mentoring, and provide a safe and welcoming space in the centre of the borough.” Pre-Covid, Rowena and team offered cooking classes, bowling and cinema trips on alternate Fridays, as well as self-defence training. “Our vision is to empower our young people to have more confidence in themselves and feel able to explore new things. One of my volunteers wrote a mentoring programme which we want to roll out more extensively when we move into High Street Tab.” Without the support of the loan from Stewardship, the youth team would be struggling to offer all the opportunities young people in the borough need. Location is one issue, as is space. “Our current building isn’t near any of the schools and is quite hard
to find. Plus, it looks like a church, which puts a lot of young people off. High Street Tab is close to two primaries, a Sixth Form college and an academy. Pastor Mike has done assemblies at them all and we’re wellconnected. With the new building, the sky will be the limit. One of my favourite things about the plans for the new church is the community café which is the first thing you see when you walk in. The kids can have study groups, have a drink and hang out with their friends, and feel that they’re in a safe, welcoming space. All the cafes in Lewisham are shut by 8pm so this one will change the face of the High Street.” For Rowena, the new building is the next step in her vision of helping local young people to get to know God on their terms. “They may not come to Christ at Tab, but we’ll know that we’ve sowed some kind of stability and love into their lives.”
Together, Pastor Michael and this thriving church community have a bold vision of a transformed Lewisham. From the original Tab Church, located in a draughty Scout hall to the reimagining of a Victorian Temperance Hall on Lewisham High Street, it’s been quite a journey. While we know that the loan from Stewardship will help them to open the doors and start using the building sooner, we also know that the same dedication, commitment and generosity that Tab church show to their neighbours will see them create a remarkable space for mission and ministry for generations to come.
Tab Church Lewisham 2034 9462
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A picture of health The impact of Covid-19 on the nation’s mental health has been well documented. Less well known have been the ways the Church has responded to help meet the need. 14
Sharing joy at a Kintsugi Hope Wellbeing Group event.
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round eighteen months ago it was rare for Aimee to complete a full week at her primary school. She was anxious, cried every day and was filled with fear at the thought of going to school. A year later a joyful Aimee skips across the playground to meet her friends. “My anxieties are now 100% better. I used to be at 0% and now I’ve shot up to 100%, somehow!” Just six months ago Paul* was battling suicidal thoughts and was off work as his chronic depression meant he couldn’t fulfil the demands of his job. Today he’s back at work, rebuilding his life and smiling again. While it’s definitely ‘okay not to be okay’ Aimee and Paul would agree it’s much better to ‘be okay’. And, for both of them, it was targeted input from Transforming Lives for Good (TLG) and Kintsugi Hope – two charities focussing
on improving mental health and wellbeing – that made the difference. In September 2020 Paul started a 12-week Kintsugi Hope Wellbeing Group run by his local church. By week nine he felt well enough to return to work. Aimee’s turnaround is a direct result of her weekly sessions with Ntombi, her TLG Early Intervention Coach. Using a range of strategies and coaching resources, Ntombi was able to talk to Aimee about her struggles, helping her to rebuild her confidence and regain her childhood. Just a few years ago many of those living with poor mental health felt compelled to hide their condition. Thankfully the stigma is lifting; mental health is centre stage and many feel able to talk openly about it. This can only be for the good, but it has meant that the extent of the problem – and its underfunding – are in the spotlight.
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Mental health problems account for 23% of the burden of disease in the UK, but spending on mental health services consumes only 11% of the NHS budget.
In 2019 Amina J Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, wrote in her report Mental Health for All that ‘less than 1% of government budgets are spent on mental health’. In the UK the King’s Fund reported: ‘Mental health problems account for 23% of the burden of disease in the UK, but spending on mental health services consumes only 11% of the NHS budget.’ It was the increasing need and mismatch of government resources that led Tim Morfin, founder and Chief Executive of Transforming Lives for Good (TLG) and Patrick Regan OBE, founder and Chief Executive of Kintsugi Hope, to create Christ-centred resources and solutions to the burgeoning need. TLG, founded in 1998, supports some of the UK’s most vulnerable children and young people while Kintsugi Hope, founded in 2017, runs its Wellbeing Groups for both adults and young people who feel overwhelmed with life. Kintsugi is the Japanese technique for repairing broken pottery with a seam of gold – the repair makes the original article more beautiful, enhancing, not hiding the broken part.
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Patrick Regan
Tim Morfin
Tim and Patrick broadly agree on the causes of, and solutions to the current mental health crisis. Patrick says: “A supporting and loving community are key to good mental health; social isolation and loneliness can be killers.”
A supporting and loving community are key to good mental health.
Tim expands: “For many children, difficulties at home can be a fundamental challenge… we know that a stable and loving home life is God’s intention for us and we know that when that is not there it has a major impact on wellbeing. “Add into that mix a host of secondary factors; things like social media with its portrayal of a level of perfection that is unreal … can soon lead to high levels of anxiety, particularly for young people who are still trying to find their points of reference in the world.”
Local churches – offering their buildings, people, resources and love – are at the heart of both organisations. TLG’s 250 partner churches supported 6,135 children and young people in the past 12 months, while Kintsugi Hope’s 200 partner churches have produced 600 group leaders who have run 160 groups that have delivered life-changing help to 1,280 people. The impact of dedicated care and expert support cannot be underestimated. As Tim says: “Anything that creates connection will have a positive impact on emotional health and wellbeing.” This was certainly Troy’s experience. Troy, in his mid-teens, lives in West London. When one of his school friends died in the Grenfell Tower fire, he struggled with anger, nightmares and sleepless nights. He needed someone to listen to and help him – but instead found himself excluded from school. Luckily, he was referred to TLG West London
where he found “that they actually wanted me to do better in life” and provided a space where he could make mistakes and yet still be supported. Troy has now returned to his mainstream school. “He’s transformed, engaging, confident,” says James, the centre’s deputy manager. “He’s better able to manage the horrors he has faced.” Mental health issues don’t exist in a vacuum and both Patrick and Tim would like to see changes in government policy. Patrick talks of “poverty as both a symptom and a cause” of mental ill-health, and calls for more funding for mental health services. Tim speaks about the need for a rethink of educational policy – with less emphasis on grades and more on meeting the emotional and physical needs of young people. “Children need to be settled to learn, to know they are loved and cared for,” Tim says. “At a very practical level, hungry children can’t learn. These things should be the first thoughts of government policy, not afterthoughts.”
Hard at work at a TLG Education Centre.
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Boxes of Hope; delivering essential food supplies.
At the beginning of 2020 Kintsugi Hope had 40 church partners. Since the first lockdown they’ve signed up a new church partner almost every day, and today partner with more than 200 churches. TLG reports similar growth, with 300 churches signing up to join Boxes of Hope, its programme to deliver essential food supplies to families of children in receipt of free school meals.
We can’t offer what the mental health professionals can, and we shouldn’t try. But, working with churches and Christians, we can offer love, acceptance, community and support.
Stewardship’s relationship with Tim and Patrick goes back years, and we were able to help both of them get their charities up and running and properly registered in their earliest days. In May 2020 both charities received grants which enabled them to respond appropriately during the pandemic. In fact, for Kintsugi Hope the grant did rather more than that, as Patrick explains: “Covid could have seen the end of us. Most of our income comes from events and associated book sales, and overnight this income stream stopped. We were wondering how we would survive – Stewardship saw our potential and backed us at a very important time.” Stewardship’s grant also had a huge impact on TLG. “I was incredibly grateful for the speed of the response,” says Tim. “The additional support from Stewardship was so prompt and enabled us to move very quickly to enable churches to respond appropriately – and fast.” And the churches have certainly responded, doing what perhaps only they can do. As Patrick says: “We can’t offer what the mental health professionals can, and we shouldn’t try. But, working with churches and Christians, we can offer love, acceptance, community and support.” Generous givers, pioneering charities and compassionate churches have united to do something remarkable this year. The lives of Aimee, Paul and Troy and thousands of others have been changed for the better. Who’s next? *name changed
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ABOUT TLG TLG aims to bring hope and a future to struggling children through three distinct programmes: its 12 church-based Education Centres where a small team of qualified teachers work with up to ten children who have been excluded from mainstream school; its Early Intervention programme where children who are struggling with anything from the effects of poverty to anxiety, family breakdown to bereavement, are matched with a coach who meets with them once a week for a year; and Make Lunch, a churchbased programme to tackle holiday hunger for kids receiving free school meals, which was temporarily replaced during the pandemic by Boxes of Hope – a doorstep delivery of groceries. tlg.org.uk
Transforming Lives for Good 2004 2094
ABOUT KINTSUGI HOPE Kintsugi Hope Wellbeing Groups offer a 12-week programme ‘for anyone who has ever felt overwhelmed by life’. Run by trained church volunteers, the programme is loosely based on Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12 Steps, but with a focus on emotional wellbeing and good mental health. Topics covered include anxiety, anger, disappointment, perfectionism, resilience and shame. Groups have run in homeless hostels, farmers’ markets, schools, businesses and charities. kintsugihope.com
Kintsugi Hope 2023 8004 19
LOOKING OUT AND LOOKING FORWARD
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In the last issue of Share we told you about our Rapid Response Fund — a lightning round of fundraising that allowed us to distribute more than £5 million to 88 charities within 100 days of the first lockdown. Yet while we were getting ready to print Share 45, something interesting, unexpected and utterly brilliant was happening to the Rapid Response Fund. It was going global. Photo credit: World Vision 2020.
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The aftermath of the Beirut port explosion
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t was all happening, appropriately enough, via video call. Only this one wasn’t the standard Monday morning all-teams affair where the greatest challenges were unmuted mics, slow upload speeds or the awkward juggle of home schooling. But make no mistake, the call was all about Covid. Those who had dialled in watched as Christians from Lebanon explained what it was like to live in a country where Covid was the latest in a long line of desperate challenges. “It is so sad to live in this country,” said Diana Ghanem, World Vision’s Lebanon Development Coordinator. “We have had crisis on top of crisis – political and civil unrest, schools closed, economic crisis as the currency devalued, unemployment. And then came Covid.”
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We have had crisis on top of crisis – political and civil unrest, schools closed, economic crisis as the currency devalued, unemployment. And then came Covid.
While wealthy countries in Europe and North America stepped in to support workers by unleashing colossal bailout programmes, Diana explained how people in Lebanon were offered little state protection against the pandemic’s economic destruction. More than fifty per cent of people found themselves dragged below the poverty line, 1 in 3 lost their jobs and 1 in 5 faced reduced salaries. For many people, hope appeared to have all but evaporated. And then came the evening of Tuesday August 4th and the explosions that ripped through the port of Beirut. For a country already facing a desperate struggle to survive, the devastation was almost overwhelming: 204 dead, 6,500 injured, $15 billion of damaged property and an estimated 300,000 people made instantly homeless. Speaking a month after the explosions, Diana summed up the mood of many in the country. “We were dealing with injury, fear of another explosion, lost homes, lost jobs, parents separated from their children, children searching for their parents. People lost hope.”
And yet Diana knew that hope was not lost. “We only rely on God right now to get out of this situation. The Church can bring hope.” Despite the scale of the challenge, Diana and the other local charity workers on the call were determined to use what little resources were available to help others. By responding to the needs surrounding them, the Church in Lebanon made up its mind to bring hope back into the shattered lives of their neighbours. For many, that hope took on very specific forms, especially after the explosions in the port. Disinfection kits, hygiene kits, food for families affected by the blast, even replacement windows and doors – these all became the tangible expressions of hope. “One family was so happy to receive a disinfectant kit,” said Diana, “because for weeks they had been unable to clean the blood from the floor.”
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development agencies including the A21 Campaign, Open Doors, Tearfund and World Vision, Stewardship helped launch the Global Rapid Response Fund. The aim was simple: to remind generous Christians at home of the continued need to support brothers and sisters overseas.
The call – as well as the four other webinars hosted throughout August and September – had an agenda. Stewardship has always existed to support generosity, but we know that encouragement must always be accompanied by the truth. And last summer the truth was that while there was much to be celebrated about the way that many churches, charities and communities had responded to the Covid-sparked needs on their doorsteps, giving to projects overseas had dropped right at the time when it was needed most. In the midst of our own crisis, there was a risk of the UK turning in on itself, forgetting the needs of our brothers and sisters beyond our borders. In partnership with international funders, a global network of local Christian charities, as well as leading Christian relief and
The aim was simple: to remind generous Christians at home of the continued need to support brothers and sisters overseas. 24
As summer 2020 started to fade, a series of webinars introduced people to other places where church and charities were struggling against monumental challenges. We heard from workers in Nigeria where Boko Haram were continuing their persecution of Christians, India where our brothers and sisters battled crushing poverty, as well as countries throughout Latin America where the pandemic made children even more vulnerable to abuse and trafficking. The agenda of the Global Rapid Response Fund was clear: to open eyes, break hearts and remind generous people of the importance of their continued, strategic giving.
And the result? The funding returned. The fall in giving stopped. Christians living thousands of miles away allowed their hearts to be stirred and opened so that the work of frontline Christian workers in the areas of the most desperate need was able to thrive again. The global Christian family united and got to work, just like it’s supposed to.
To watch all the GRRF videos visit the Stewardship YouTube channel. bit.ly/2MZb0QK
Your Neighbour Like many of the best stories, the Global Rapid Response Fund is part of a trilogy. Having first raised millions for UK churches and charities, and then ensured the continued funding of overseas partners, it is the next instalment that is set to be truly impressive. “What comes next is going to be the big one,” says CEO Stewart McCulloch. “We believe that the Church is playing a vital part in this nation’s recovery – but that role needs to scale up and to help that become a reality we’re joining with all of the major denominations to get behind a new initiative that positions the Church as ‘Your Neighbour’. That precious neighbour that creates a sense of community in times of need” The concept is simple. Your Neighbour aims to resource, inspire, encourage and equip local churches to rise to the challenge of meeting the needs of their communities. Whether through debt counselling or employment training, emotional support in a time of crisis or the invitation to join a supportive, inclusive community, Your Neighbour exists to see the Church becoming the very best type of neighbour
possible – offering life-changing love and support to the community around it. “The government is focusing all its resources on the crisis and the funds of the Church have dropped significantly, but the needs of communities have skyrocketed,” says Stewart. “We’re facing a health crisis, an economic crisis and a massive mental health crisis on top. The Church is stepping forward at scale. Thriving churches that reach out can heal and revive our vibrant communities, offering hope and help to people in need. Together the Church can bring hope, healing and a better world than we had before.” Find out more about Your Neighbour at yourneighbour.org
Your Neighbour 2029 9060
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GIVING AT THE END OF THE TAX YEAR One of the many benefits of giving with Stewardship is the ease with which all your gifts can be boosted with Gift Aid, or maximised through other tax efficiencies. Taking advantage of this opportunity means those you support get more. It also means paying close attention to when the tax year ends. What if I can’t make my gift in time? If you miss the deadline, don’t panic! You can make a donation on or after Tuesday 6 April 2021 and ask HMRC to treat this donation as made in 2020-2021 for Gift Aid purposes. A ‘carry back’ can be requested through your tax return or (if you don’t file a tax return) on form P810. There’s just one catch – you cannot submit or amend a carry back claim after filing your tax return.
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What if I’m a higher/additional rate taxpayer? c If you’ve signed a Gift Aid declaration, we
will reclaim basic rate Gift Aid (equivalent to 25p per £1) on any donation you make to Stewardship. c If you’re a higher/additional rate taxpayer,
you can reclaim the extra relief (equivalent to a further 25p/31.25p per £1) personally through your tax return. You can also claim relief for any qualifying gifts of property or shares which you have made to Stewardship. c If you pay tax under PAYE and have set up
regular giving to Stewardship, you might like to ask HMRC to adjust your PAYE code to take account of your regular giving, so that you receive the additional relief spread through the year and not as a lump sum.
How do I get the giving information I need for my tax return? As part of completing your tax return, you will be asked whether you have made any charitable gifts. If you organise all your giving through your Stewardship account, you can easily check the total amount you’ve given over the tax year, rather than having to keep track of different donations. If you’ve migrated to the new-look giving account: 1. F rom the main menu, select View transactions. 2. S elect the tab labelled Gift Aid. 3. In the drop down filter, select the relevant tax year.
If you’re still using the classic giving account: 1. Click on Reports in the menu bar 2. On the reports home page, click on Summary statement 3. Y our account will automatically show the latest annual giving statement. Customise your report by manually selecting from the on-screen options.
Are you a church/charity treasurer? Why not help your donors by providing a summary of any gifts they made between 6 April 2020 and 5 April 2021, together with any Gift Aid you reclaimed. You could take this opportunity to thank your donors, explain what impact their donations have had and perhaps update them on your current financial situation.
Rachel Steeden Rachel Steeden is our in-house legal advisor, working with the Philanthropy Services Team to serve Christians making large charitable gifts.
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Ask Steve
Professional advice for churches and charities
resources. Compensating for deficiencies in character may not be quite so straightforward. For more, please read our free briefing paper What to look for in a trustee.
We are a small church wanting to add to our trustee body. What sort of person should we look for? Step 1 – Make sure the person is eligible. There are basic eligibility criteria set out by the Charity Commission for all trustees and your own governing documents may also have requirements that must be fulfilled. Step 2 – Look for someone that has a heart and passion for what you are seeking to achieve. The attitude with which the trustee body approaches its work can range from amazingly liberating to frustratingly stifling. Step 3 – Consider the character of the prospective trustee. Some character traits you might want to see displayed may include: a good awareness of spiritual issues; prayerful; a team player; someone with a ‘can do’ attitude; a good listener and a plain speaker; a pragmatic decision maker; humility, integrity etc. Step 4 – Where possible, match the ‘gaps’ in the existing trustee body with the skills of the prospective trustee. What skill set, perhaps from employment experience, will the prospective trustee bring? We have set out the steps in this order, because technical help (sometimes at a cost) can be obtained from external existing 28
During the Covid pandemic we have seen our reserves dwindle. Some of the trustees would like to earmark some of our reserves for specific projects to make sure that they do not get depleted. Is this a good idea? Designated (earmarked) funds are unrestricted funds set aside by an organisation’s trustees for a particular future purpose. They do not carry the same legal weight as restricted funds but the money is set aside until either spent, or the trustees wish to remove the designation. Designated funds can be set up to fund projects, initiatives or ministries or are sometimes used to accumulate money for the replacement of assets (e.g. PA system). Designating funds has the advantage that everyone within the organisation is aware of what the funds are being held for and although the designation can be removed, the process of doing so requires a conscious decision. This means that those funds are not inadvertently used up for other purposes.
Designating funds does not mean that you are required to hold them in a separate bank account, but a practical disadvantage is that each designated fund has to be accounted for separately and depending upon the accounting system that you use, this is not always straightforward. Typically ‘off-theshelf’ accounting packages, particularly those designed specifically for the charity sector, tend to handle fund accounting better than ‘home grown’ Excel packages. Regardless of whether you produce annual accounts on an accruals basis or not, we suggest that module 2 of the Charity SORP should be essential reading for any organisation wishing to make use of designated or restricted funds.
struggling to open bank accounts; finding it increasingly difficult to make payments to certain countries; and even in one or two cases of banks closing down charity accounts altogether. Whilst some experiences are better than others, these problems are not confined to any particular banking group and, so far as we are aware, are not always resolved by the financial ombudsman. However, the banking sector is not limited to the High Street banks and there are certain banks whose primary focus is the charity rather than the commercial sector. Our experience suggests that these banks often have a better understanding of the challenges faced by charities. In any case, trustees may want to consider working with two different banking groups to reduce the risk if one chooses to take sudden and possibly irreversible action.
Our working relationship with our High Street bank is starting to cause us a few issues. Are we alone in this? Although providing little comfort, this is an issue that we are becoming more widely aware of. We have experience of charities
Subscribe to Stewardship’s consultancy helpline service, visit stewardship.org.uk/ consultancy Subscriptions for churches and charities start from as little as £50 per year. If you have a question you would like addressed in a future edition of Share, please write to us at editor@stewardship.org.uk
If choosing a new bank, it is important to undertake due diligence to make sure that the bank meets your charity’s requirements and that funds deposited will be secure. For example, banking groups that are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) provide a level of protection for balances up to £85,000.
Stephen Mathews Stephen heads up the Stewardship consultancy helpline team, a specialist service offering expert knowledge to churches and charities.
Visit stewardship.org.uk/briefing for links to all the briefing papers mentioned 29
WHY I
GIVE Emily Kendall
Stewardship Giving Services Customer Support
What causes are you particularly passionate about supporting, and why? When I was growing up we’d occasionally have guest speakers come to church. The founder of Hope for Justice, an organisation dedicated to rescuing victims of modern-day slavery, was one of them. My heart broke at the stories I was hearing and it sparked a desire to help bring hope to the hopeless. After Uni I embarked on a six-month Discipleship Training School at YWAM Kona, with outreach in India and Nepal. It was life-changing, and frankly, life-saving. It sparked a true passion and urgency in me that everyone needed to know this same gospel. I had found my purpose: to know Jesus, and make him known. My favourite causes therefore? Anything or anyone that seeks to make Jesus known. Whether it’s through helping people in need and leading them to Christ, friends involved in Christian ministry, supporting training and evangelism efforts, charities and churches that get Bibles into people’s hands and equip them to know and love Jesus – there are so many amazing ways the gospel is going out.
We all need rescuing from the judgement we face because no one is immune.
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One of my favourite Bible verses is Romans 1:16 – “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” In other words, it is the words of Jesus and his offer of life through believing in him that has the power to save. Salvation is the greatest gift anyone can receive and so sharing this gospel with those that are yet to hear and believe should drive our generosity. What excites me about this is that we have the chance as Christians to not only reach into a person’s physical need, but to see a life transformed and saved for eternity. And I suppose, whether you’re a high-flying city worker blazing up the career ladder, or you’re in what feels like a bottomless pit of desperation, struggling from pay cheque to pay cheque, we all need the wonderful hope that Jesus has to offer. We all need rescuing from the judgement we face because no one is immune. Sin, and the rejection of God, is truly one of the only things every single human being has in common, but mercifully we have been given the antidote. The vaccine of all vaccines.
Who or what has been the biggest influence on your giving? I’ve heard some great talks on giving over the past few years, but mostly, seeing my church in action has been so inspiring. The time and care that is given to ensure that the gospel continues to faithfully go out is so great. From the lunchtime talks that are held for Christians to be encouraged, and for non-Christians to hear the gospel themselves, to the way the church family look out for one another and meet each other’s needs practically, I’ve definitely learnt a lot about being more sacrificial with my time and finances for these important efforts.
Something else that had a big influence on me was a film night that I went to, hosted by the charity Gospel Patrons. It was held at the Tate and we were shown a number of short films about their work. Some of the organisations on show are actually recipients of Stewardship, so that was super cool to see. This idea of financially partnering with people in ministry to aid the gospel going out isn’t a new one – there are examples in Scripture and amazing stories through church history, like the cloth merchant who generously gave 500 years ago and now we have the English translation of the Bible. Amazing.
What’s the hardest thing about giving? It’s so tempting to store up things for ourselves. But remembering that everything we have is from the Lord is key and it’s important to be whole-hearted in our approach, just like the woman with the alabaster jar. Giving will often feel like we’re sacrificing comfort and it does go against our human desires, so that can make it especially tricky, but what a privilege to be involved in the mission of Jesus and to be part of the gospel going out through generous Christians.
And the easiest thing? Not to plug, but my Stewardship account has genuinely transformed the way I give and has enabled me to be so much more organised and generous. Having money going into my giving account each month means I can’t hoard it for myself! Seeing the impact of these donations and the possibilities of a life changed is priceless. Having a right perspective and good biblical understanding of giving makes it so much easier to loosen our grip and giving becomes really exciting. It really is more blessed to give than to receive.
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Tax Effective Giving For Dual Tax Payers
If you have tax liabilities both in the US and in the UK, and want to make a difference to the causes close to your heart, Stewardship America enables you to give with the benefit of tax reliefs in both countries.
THE BENEFIT S TAX EFFECTIVE
SIMPLE
FLEXIBLE
Your giving can be eligible for both UK Gift Aid and for a deduction from your US taxable income.
A single place for all your giving in support of churches and charities in the UK, US and around the world.
Fund your account with cash, shares or proceeds from investments. We’ll process them all for you.
stewardship.org.uk/america
america@stewardship.org.uk
020 8418 8896