Stewardship: Share Magazine Issue 31 - If Google Did Church

the stewardship magazine | issue 31

If Google did Church If Google did Church If Google did the dishes If Google did religion If Google did read my emails

transforming generosity

I’m feeling Godly >>

Attention Chaeris:ties and Church

give.net now includes regular giving Provide your supporters with a smooth and simple donation experience, without incurring the cost and hassle of establishing your own Direct Debit processes.

100% secure Mobile optimised No set-up cost or monthly charges Automatic Gift Aid claims (where applicable) Anonymous giving option Track giving for multiple projects Full & detailed reporting No specialist knowledge needed to set up and all giving is processed by Stewardship’s quick and efficient Giving Services Team.

www.give.net Or contact Stewardship’s Giving Services Team on 020 8502 8560 to find out more.

About us We are Stewardship, a charity that effectively releases resources to support individuals, charities and organisations worldwide. Our mission is to enable you to live and give generously, advancing God’s Kingdom.

We believe that generosity is transformational, for the giver and for the receiver. Our work inspires and supports a generous resourcing community, with transformational results.

We are delighted to partner with you in your journey of generosity.

Contact us 1 Lamb’s Passage, London EC1Y 8AB 020 8502 5600 enquiries@stewardship.org.uk 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

T

he story of the woman at the well is a remarkable one.

Jacob’s Well was a vital source of water, and a busy centre of community life where local news, information and gossip would be exchanged. But when John 4 introduces it – at noon, when the sun was at its highest and the heat of the day the most oppressive – Jacob’s Well was typically quiet.

The Samaritan woman, however, chose the oppressive heat of the sun at noon over the oppressive stares, alienation and abuse of her neighbours. Jesus chose the heat because the woman, who was nameless to us, was known to Him before she was formed in her mother’s womb. She was precious to him and he loved her.

The rules of society were clear. Jews did not speak to Samaritans, men did not speak to women when their husbands weren’t present and respectable men and women did not speak with women who led an unwholesome life. Furthermore, the very act of drinking from her cup would have made Him ceremonially unclean. This, to all observers, was a conversation that should never have taken place.

But Jesus was unconcerned about cultural expectations. He was concerned for the woman who had broken all the rules.

And in His own way, He’d broken them too.

Across the UK people are reimagining the way the church engages with her neighbours. Old ideas are being questioned.

New ways of relating are being explored.

Our vision at Stewardship is that the world would encounter Jesus through the generosity of His church. That ‘encounter’ – a casual but unexpected moment of meeting – is increasingly happening in the most unusual of places – and in the heat of the day.

It is my prayer that you find within these pages something that inspires you too.

Michael O’Neill, CEO Stewardship

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News in brief Living on

THE HELP ELESS HOM

LEGACY LEAVE? CHRISTIAN LEGACY WEEK

EDU F CAT GEN UTUR E ER E ATI ON S

S H A RE I

CREATE A

BE

Faith action audits The Cinnamon Network launched a ground-breaking initiative this year with its faith action audits, designed to map the impact and value of social action delivered by churches and faith groups in their communities. Over fifty regions throughout the UK took part, producing some staggering results:

LOCAL FAITH GROUPS...

MOBILISE 2 MILLION VOLUNTEERS

GIVE OVER 288 MILLION VOLUNTEER HOURS

MOBILISE 125,000 PAID STAFF AND

COLLECTIVELY GIVE OVER £3 BILLION WORTH OF SOCIAL SUPPORT.

Speaking at the launch event in May, Justin Welby quoted Einstein, saying: “It is extraordinary what can be achieved by people who don’t care whether they get the credit for it or not.”

Find out more at: cinnamonnetwork.co.uk 4

AS DE

MONDAY 19TH – 25TH OCTOBER 2015

UTURE ER F TT

H S CHE

SP R GOS EAD T PE HE L

WHAT

UR

A group of charities are partnering to raise awareness of leaving gifts in wills amongst the Christian community. The Bible Society, CMS, Care for the Family, TLG, Scripture Union, Livability and Stewardship are working together to highlight this issue and to help people ensure that their values live on after they are gone. Christian Legacy Week runs from 19th-25th October.

Visit christianlegacy.org.uk for free church resources, guides to leaving a legacy or to find out more about the campaign.

PLA NT C

Features 6 T E BES AK R OW M OU T N Y IF G

Stewardship in action: C3 Cambridge

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If Google did Church: Carl Beech, Messy Church and Who Let the Dads Out?

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Let’s talk about Jesus

The click of knitting needles and the rustle of knitting patterns have been heard all year at St Mary’s Church in Barton-on-Humber, near Scunthorpe.

The parishioners are aiming to smash the current world record of 15,534 hand-knitted teddy bears in aid of Operation Christmas Child.

3 C 0 TE HA XT RI S TY

Giving without risk

NT GE D UR ELPEDE H E N

Bear with them

TE S NA NG DO AVI S

VE E GI OR M

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Legal and financial roundup

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Consultancy helpline

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Advent Wonder 5

The story of a divine appointment between Cambridge Community Church (C3) and Stewardship.

STEWARDSHIP IN ACTION:

CAMBRIDGE COMMUNITY CHURCH

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It starts with Steve and Angie Campbell – C3 leaders – finding the perfect new home for their rapidly growing church.

“We’d been meeting in a Cambridge school for 13 years,” explains Angie, “and we’d found an old church site on Coldhams Lane which was perfect. We’d saved enough money to purchase it from the Anglican church which owned it, which meant that they could extend their own church building. It was a win-win situation, with the money staying within the kingdom.”

“We wanted to get the biggest building possible on the site,” says Steve. “We had so many plans for our new city centre hub: a CAP centre, job club, food bank and luncheon club, plus a weekly toddler drop-in. We hope to partner with a local young people’s centre too.”

It was a win-win situation, with the money staying within the kingdom.

So far, so good. “Our first proposal to the council was costed at £2.5 million but was turned down. Our second application (cost £4 million) was approved.”

Chasing this new, bigger target was to be a challenge, but the planning process helped.

“There were any number of delays and hold ups, but these were opportunities to save more money towards the work.”

C3’s congregation had been tithing and giving towards the new build since 2011, yet they were still £2 million short. “We were struggling to find a loan,” says Steve. Which is where Stewardship comes in.

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“We went to a leadership networking event which Stewardship were involved in, and I sat next to Mike O’Neill,” says Steve. “I shared about our building programme and Mike asked us how it was going. We mentioned the need for a loan. Mike asked why we hadn’t approached Stewardship. I said I didn’t ask because I thought Stewardship only did loans up to a million pounds. I’ll never forget what he said – ‘if everything stacks up we might consider going higher’.”

For both Steve and Angie it was obvious that this was their ‘God moment’, as Steve explains. “The great thing about Stewardship is they understand kingdom dynamics; they understand faith. They understood that our business plan couldn’t be based on income streams. They asked us to show them that a certain percentage of the loan could be met by people’s giving. Once that was done, they said they would guarantee the loan for three years. So we went to the church and laid it out. We explained that we would need the extra support in order to get the loan.”

At this point, C3’s generosity gene really kicked in. “We were bowled over by the letters we received, by how people increased their giving in order to get us over the line and Stewardship were a huge part of that. You could never say it was a chance conversation.”

So there it is. Divine appointment. C3 are launching their new hub in October. With a new city central presence, they will be able to extend their passionately held values of grace, generosity and community spirit further out into their community.

To watch the C3 story and find out if we could make a loan to your church visit stewardship.org.uk/mortgages 8

Lending support to grow the Church Benhar Evangelical Church North Lanarkshire Benhar Evangelical Church appointed its first fulltime minister in 2011. In 2014 the church used a Stewardship mortgage of £85,000 to purchase a manse. Alisdair MacLeod, a Church Elder and Trustee involved in the project, commented, “All our needs were met tremendously efficiently. There was a great element of goodwill and trust in all our interactions, which we genuinely feel you can’t have to the same degree with a mainstream commercial bank.” Since the minister moved in, the congregation has doubled.

Chelmsford Presbyterian Church, Essex “Ultimately, it’s about people and Stewardship is helping us to reach them,” says church treasurer Hywel Mainwaring. “We couldn’t do this without Stewardship’s help.”

The great thing about Stewardship is they understand kingdom dynamics; they understand faith.

C3 Cambridge 20009455

‘This’ was Chelmsford Presbyterian Church’s annual hog roast. It was held as it has been for the last decade and a half at the home of a generous church elder and his wife, David and Ruth Ferguson.

As well as making use of all the other services for churches that Stewardship offers, CPC also recently used a mortgage to purchase a manse for the pastor – which it has been able to pay down faster than anticipated without penalty. For a busy treasurer like Mr Mainwaring, it all helps. “Stewardship has professional experts I can call on so we can ensure things run smoothly… for me it is about peace of mind.”

That peace of mind allows them to focus on what the church does best – reaching people. With a regular weekly attendance of sixty people to Sunday services, Chelmsford Presbyterian’s hog roast was a classic success. Having thrown open the doors to the wider church community, over 120 showed up.

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Is this the Church that Google would build?

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magine for a moment that Google had a Damascus road experience. Imagine that instead of driverless cars and voyeuristic video glasses they devoted their resources to reimagining church. Can you conceive of any scenario in which they’d leave the format untouched? And can you imagine some of the creativity and innovation they might employ to reach new members of the community?

For anyone curious about the above it turns out that it’s not such a flight of fancy after all. According to Rev Canon Chris Russell, advisor on Evangelism and Witness to the Archbishop of Canterbury, across the country today there are clear signs that churches are reimagining their role and exploring the future with all the energy and confidence of a Silicon Valley startup.

The Church is for God first, others next and us last. And when we implement that decision, there is no end to the resources that God gives to us.

“I am regularly amazed and moved by the commitment, imagination and hard work that is in evidence up and down the country in local churches,” he says. “This is seen particularly in communities who are open to the call of God. The call of God is never simply for us. It neither begins with us nor ends with us. It originates in the God of love, claiming our lives so that through us those who know nothing of His love would hear and respond.

“In neighbourhood upon neighbourhood God's people are committing to being church for others. This is not innovation, change and transformation for its own sake. But for God's sake and for those who live away from Jesus. The Church is for God first, others next and us last. And when we implement that decision, there is no end to the resources that God gives to us.”

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Is this the Church that Google would build?

Expensive toilets (and what it means to do the small things well)

C

hris Russell is not alone in his optimism.

Eight months on from having planted Redeemer King, a new church in Chesterfield, Carl Beech and his co-leader Dan Gower have seen significant growth. “We started with five couples,” says Carl, “now about 130 people turn up on a Sunday, and it’s growing most weeks with people coming to Christ on a very regular basis. We’ve baptised 12 people in the last couple of months.”

If there is a secret to the success (beyond God’s grace, love and power, that is), Carl underlines their core values: “Blessing our community, loving people, being generous.

These are strong values that are high on Jesus’ agenda. We are generous in our welcome, generous in terms of what we do in the town, generous to other churches and generous to anyone who crosses our path. If we have a visiting speaker we are generous to them too. It’s a lot of work and it’s expensive financially and in terms of time. But we want to blow people’s minds, so if we can’t do something well we don’t do it.”

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Car dealerships know how to make people feel welcome.

Their profits are at stake. But for us it’s people’s eternal destiny at stake.

As well as getting to dream up and deliver new ideas for his church, Carl also has a unique perspective on the struggles that many churches face, thanks to his role as Director of Church Planting and Church Development within the Elim movement.

“I often get called into churches that are failing to grow or shrinking. The classic thinking you see is ‘but we’ve always done it like this.’ You have to dismantle that. So while they think I’m going to come in with five ways to move people to Jesus Christ or tell them how to get a mothers and toddlers group started, instead I do a massive audit: I look at their accounts, their welcome, what’s happening in worship, their discipleship patterns.”

And he looks at their toilets too.

“I spoke to a car dealer once who told me that they spend much more per square foot on their toilets than on any other part of their dealership. Why’s that? He said that all the research has shown that people will

judge him and do a deal based on what they see of the back areas of a dealership. Car dealerships know how to make people feel welcome. Their profits are at stake. But for us it’s people’s eternal destiny at stake. Go to the average church and the toilets are smelly with old curtains and the pipes by the urinal are going rusty from splash-back. It’s disgusting. Why are we not investing more?”

It’s not just the toilets that indicate that a church might need to be re-inspired. Carl cites green crockery and instant coffee with granules floating at the top and broken custard creams. “You’d never do it at home,” he says, “but we put up with it.”

Why? “People aren’t thinking outwardly.

They’re not thinking ‘how do others perceive us?’ So they have an ‘it’ll do’ attitude.

But it’s like the broken window theory of crime reduction: if you don’t fix a broken window you get graffiti, then squatting, then muggings. So you’ve got to do church well from the smallest thing to the biggest.”

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Is this the Church that Google would build?

Church is Messy (innovation gets messy in our churches)

L

ucy Moore didn’t plan on starting a movement. But she did want to do something that would fundamentally change the way her local community on the outskirts of Portsmouth experienced church. “There was a feeling that we had a responsibility to the young people of the parish to share the word of God, but we were hardly meeting any of them. The things we were doing on a Sunday, even though they felt relevant and cutting edge and so on, weren’t appealing. We didn’t have new people coming and we were haemorrhaging gently as people’s circumstances changed and they left.

“So we asked people, ‘If you were going to come to church as a family, what sort of stuff would you like to do? What day? What time?’”

The answers provided the recipe for Messy Church, a family-friendly service that uses craft, food and a whole lot of fun to bring about one of the most dramatic church growth stories of the last decade. In the eleven years since Lucy and friends decided to do something in the parish of St Wilfrid’s, there are now almost 3,000 Messy Church groups registered in twenty countries.

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Imagine your own church had grown at such a rate. How long would it have taken for someone to be talking about ‘revival’?

And there’s the rub. For some observers, Messy Church is seen as a glorified Mothers And Toddlers group. But for Lucy and the thousands that choose to get Messy from Stockport to Sydney, Birmingham to Budapest, Messy Church is far more than that.

“We always said we wouldn’t do Messy Church in order that people would start coming to the traditional Sunday church.

We wanted to be up front and say, ‘This is your church. Do it as church. Don’t see it as a stepping stone.’ It’s hard work because it’s a whole new concept, but when churches get it it’s so exciting because you take all this pressure off.

You’re doing church, making space to encounter Jesus Christ there and then. It’s more than just fun.”

If there has been opposition to the idea of viewing Messy Church as church, the resistance has not come from nonChristians. “It’s getting better now,” says Lucy, “but among some Christians there’s the feeling that ‘We do it right on a Sunday and people would come if we just did it a little better, if people knew about it or if they weren’t so bad. We’ll just keep on doing the same thing and one day they might come, but if they don’t it’s their fault, not ours.’” 

This is your church.

Do it as church.

Don’t see it as a stepping stone.

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“Messy Church turns that thinking on its head. It asks some key questions: How do people want to praise God? How do they want to meet him? What learning styles do they bring in to the equation and where are they spiritually? How can we as a church meet them there, not where we think they should be, not where we are and not where we’ve learned to worship?”

This shift in attitude and approach takes churches away from looking to maintain the status quo and steers them towards a determined attempt to listen to and serve people outside their walls. “It’s very nonauthoritarian, so for postmodern people who want to discuss, argue, think and challenge, it’s all there. It’s about exploration and discovery, not someone up the front telling you what to think.”

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The impact of this approach to church has been felt among traditional churchgoers as well as newcomers. “A lot of Messy Church leaders who have been doing it three or four years say they meet God when they’re at Messy Church more than when they’re in a pew being talked to. Instead they meet God in serving other people, in exploring theology through concrete stuff like discussion and fellowship. It’s in those conversations around craft and meal tables that they find they have space to listen, to be Christ.”

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Is this the Church that Google would build?

Generosity will cost you Who Let The Dads Out? – Giving away a movement to grow it

Al

ongside the radical shift in assumptions about who church is for and how it can best be delivered, groups like Messy Church and Redeemer King have placed generosity at the heart of their DNA. For Redeemer King this has resulted in a commitment to doing things well and leaving people feeling genuinely gladdened by the encounter. For Messy Church and the Bible Reading Fellowship (BRF – the ministry that oversees it) it has meant choosing not to charge churches to register, but making optional resources available through a standard priced book and hoping that churches that thrive with Messy Church will eventually offer financial support.

For Who Let The Dads Out? – a growing movement that supports churches reaching out to fathers and their children – a commitment to generosity has taken them one step further. They chose to give the whole movement away.

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When Mark Chester and others realised in 2003 that a lot of local fathers were not engaging with their children, he helped his church plan a one-off, dads-and-kids-only toddler group with toys, bacon butties and Saturday papers. They hoped for six sets of dads and children, but when they opened the doors 20 arrived.

“We knew then that it could not just be a one-off,” says Mark. “We started putting it on quarterly, then every other month, then monthly. Other churches began to hear and set them up and I started speaking at conferences and it developed from there.”

Having already commissioned Mark to write a series of books about Who Let The Dads Out?, the Bible Reading Fellowship agreed to take on the movement as long as Mark and the leadership team stayed involved.

“That was in 2012, and since then we’ve grown. We have 189 churches registered, three in New Zealand and one in Australia.

I gave up my job and now work three days a week for the ministry.”

If a child becomes a Christian there’s a 3.5% chance the family will follow. If a mother comes to faith that figure rises to 17%. But if a dad becomes a Christian there’s a 93% chance that the rest of the family will too.

Before long, Who Let The Dads Out? was a fledgling movement, with a leadership team, some early funding and growing evidence that local churches were keen to join in. By 2010, however, they were struggling.

“The funding ran out and we had £2.82 in our bank account. For 18 months the balance remained the same – just £2.82. We are a local church and local community is priority, so running a national movement was tough. Someone shared a picture that we’d become pot bound and that we needed to be planted in open ground. So even though we were custodians of a growing movement, we knew we needed to give it away. It’s quite hard when you’ve started something.”

Though they both sit within the BRF family, Who Let The Dads Out? differs from Messy Church, offering churches a chance for outreach to hard-to-reach dads rather than a fresh model of intergenerational church.

“We’re a first step in getting to know the fathers,” says Mark. “If a child becomes a Christian there’s a 3.5% chance the family will follow. If a mother comes to faith that figure rises to 17%. But if a dad becomes a Christian there’s a 93% chance that the rest of the family will too.” 

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Like Messy Church and Redeemer King, Who Let The Dads Out? can identify the challenges facing churches that hope to successfully reimagine their role. For Mark, The Wizard Of Oz offers perfect metaphors.



“Churches can be like the tin man; they need to find a new heart for working with fathers, and we try to help them with that.

Then there’s the lion; churches need to find the courage to do something about it all. We’re all scared of failure, and it is frightening wondering if anyone will turn up, or what we’ll say if they do. But we have to get over that. And then there’s the scarecrow. We need a brain, the knowledge that will allow us to plan something that will work. So we’re here to give churches support and encouragement, with regional reps on hand to help out.”

What if ...?

What would Google do if it got a hold of the Church? Perhaps the question’s a red herring after all.

Perhaps we don’t need to be in awe of the brand. Perhaps there’s enough generosity, compassion, courage and innovation on display within the Church to be able to lead us into a brighter, bolder future.

We hope so. And we believe it too.

Hope 20094061

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C h ur c h Messy Church and Who Let The Dads Out? C/O Bible Reading Fellowship 20032376

Let’s

talk

about

The Talking Jesus research – available at talkingjesus.org – shows that practising Christians are talking to people about Jesus:

66%

Jesus

HAVE HAD A CONVERSATION WITH A NONCHRISTIAN ABOUT JESUS IN THE PAST MONTH

And Millennial Christians – 18 to 34-year-olds – are talking about Jesus the most often.

What do people outside of our churches know about Jesus? Do they know someone who actively follows Jesus? Have they ever had a conversation about Jesus?

Knowing the answers to questions like these could really help us share the most amazing message: the love of God for all of us through Jesus.

So HOPE, the Church of England and the Evangelical Alliance, backed by Church leaders of all denominations, commissioned the Barna Group research company to ask people living in England.

Here is what they said...

60%

THOUGHT HE WAS A REAL HISTORICAL PERSON

43%

SAID THEY BELIEVED HE ROSE FROM THE DEAD

21% 30% THINK HE IS GOD WHILE...

THINK HE IS A SPIRITUAL LEADER OR PROPHET

Most non-Christians (67%) say they know a practising Christian and that person is most likely to be a friend (40%) or family member (34%). They think of the Christians they know as ‘friendly’, ‘caring’ and ‘good humoured’ and more than half (58%) of those who know a Christian had had a conversation with them about their faith in Jesus.

And what do they think about Jesus after the conversation?

1 IN 5

ARE OPEN TO KNOWING AND EXPERIENCING MORE ABOUT HIM HOPE’s Executive Director Roy Crowne says, “This research is game changing! It gives the Church the measure of our task in evangelism. Let’s use this unique piece of research to help us make sure everyone in England gets to hear that Jesus actually lived and walked on earth. Let’s help everyone understand what the resurrection means for them personally. And let’s help people grasp that, yes, he was a great leader but he claimed he was really God! Let’s talk Jesus!”

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4 M1 CA IS LL SE S D

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Doesn’t it feel good to give? Whether it’s dropping an envelope into the offering, loose change into a collection tin, buying cakes at a school bake sale or clicking on someone’s giving page and rejoicing as you see them, sweaty and triumphant, at the end of their half marathon, giving is good. Generosity is transformational. Isn’t it what we followers of Jesus are meant to do, gladly and cheerfully?

But… there’s often a ‘but’. What happens when you give to charity and then start receiving unsolicited emails and phone calls?

Heart-rending stories of need flutter out of the letters you open every morning. You might end up owning lots of free pens with the names of charities emblazoned on them, but how does it make you feel to be asked repeatedly to keep on giving? Do you feel guilty for not responding? A bit mean? Do you feel that you should really search your heart and give more? If that’s the case, you’re not alone.

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One of the saddest stories of the year was that of 92-year-old Olive Cooke. A life-long charitable giver and volunteer, she seemingly took her own life after being bombarded with appeals and letters from various charities.

Early reports suggested that the pressure she experienced from the charities that she supported were to blame for her death, though her family have subsequently refuted the claims.

The evidence is mounting that totally unacceptable practices are taking place at fundraisers.

This is immoral.

In May this year, BBC’s The One Show ran a story about the issues raised by Olive Cooke’s death. The next month, the show provided a pro forma letter on their webpage, available to download free, for viewers to send to charities to have their details removed from their mailing list and to stop contacting them via any medium. It touched a chord with the British public. By the end of June, it had been downloaded over 30,000 times, and that total is rising steadily as we go to print.

In July, the government stepped in, tipped off by an undercover reporter from the Daily Mail who worked at a London-based call centre who make calls on behalf of 40 UK charities.

She discovered that elderly dementia sufferers, people who have stopped their payments to a charity and many elderly and vulnerable individuals are being cold-called and hounded to make donations. As more unsavoury details on tactics used by cold-callers emerged, the fundraising agency GoGen, which was at the heart of the story, ceased trading.

The letter is intended to be a short-term measure while UK charities consider their position, but it does have teeth. If a charity ignores the request to stop using personal data for direct marketing, an individual can make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Minister for Civil Society Rob Wilson said: “The evidence is mounting that totally unacceptable practices are taking place at fundraisers. This is immoral.” Bernard Jenkin, the Tory chairman of the Commons public administration committee, added: “The Daily Mail is right to expose this, and I will be asking my committee to look into it.”

There have been some signs of change already – Save The Children has announced that it will end the practice of cold-calling. However, it’s a hot topic and one which isn’t going to go away.

In the meantime, though, what about generosity? How can we give to the charities of our choice without exposing ourselves to a battery of unwanted phone calls (always at tea time it seems), letters and emails? Is it even possible to be a cheerful giver without becoming a less than cheerful recipient of unsolicited correspondence?

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The Stewardship giving account gives users complete freedom.

Of course, a giving account is one way to keep all your details completely private from charities and away from public records. While most of you reading this article will be account holders already, you may not be aware that the account can be used in this way. It makes you – to all intents and purposes – invisible to any organisation, charitable or otherwise, who may wish to get hold of your personal data. Spam calls simply won’t happen.

The Stewardship giving account gives users complete freedom to adjust giving and add new donations without speaking with the charity first, even when cancelling a donation. You could support twenty charities through your account and not one of them would be given any of your personal details.

Do you know a friend who is being bombarded?

Why not tell them about us and point them to stewardship.org.uk

The benefits of such anonymity are clear. Donors can give without fearing the ‘but…’ that so often follows. In the light of the tragic story of Olive Cooke, it’s good to know that generosity can blossom without the fear of intrusive and unsolicited contact.

Do charities bombard you with requests for donations?

Is it a necessary evil? Visit stewardship.org.uk/olive to share your views and for links to The One Show template letter and more.

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Legal & financial Kevin Russell provides an overview of Stewardship’s informative Briefing Paper on Legacy Giving

Visit stewardship.org.uk/share31 for more information, plus full links

Making legacies pay dividends If I said that, by adding a modest gift to charity in your Will or amending the Will of someone who has recently died, to include a charitable gift, you could secure tax relief of 145%, would you believe me? Our Briefing Paper “Where there’s a Will, there’s a way” gives an example that secures increased legacies to both charity and family beneficiaries.

Our Paper covers some neat tax planning, and more besides!

Legacy giving to charities in the UK is currently worth £2bn per annum. This is projected to increase to £5bn by 2040 purely as a result of increased wealth, rather than growth in legacy giving. This represents huge untapped potential for churches and charities.

Biblical and ethical considerations

Drawing up a Will

When considering legacies, our first responsibility is to provide for our family. It is not ‘to be remembered’, or endow our favourite Christian cause. Just one, fairly stark, Biblical reminder of this truth is found in 1 Tim 5:8 “Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”

Drawing up a Will is best left to the professionals – challenges to the validity of Wills have increased 700% over five years!

Equally, we are exhorted not to “store up treasures on earth” (Matt 6:19-21).

So legacy giving is not an alternative to a lifetime of generosity. And yet, legacy gifts may be the biggest single act of generosity that many of us will be a part of. Careful thought is needed in order to discharge our God-given responsibilities.

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To be legally valid, the Will must be correctly signed and witnessed. All witnesses need to be present, together, at the time of signing and none of them can be a beneficiary.

Also, it is easy to be ambiguous. For example, “I give X to my children” is unclear. Does it apply both to one’s children born before, and after, the Will is written?

Lawyers are trained to avoid ambiguities.

And make your Will in good time. If there are questions over mental capability, a Will could be challenged. Once someone has lost their mental faculties, it is too late!

Changing a Will A Will is a legal document. It cannot be changed without going through the correct legal processes.

Usually, this is achieved by a further legal document known as a ‘codicil’.

One way to simplify things a little is to make a single charitable gift into a Stewardship Legacy Account, together with an Expression of Wishes detailing the various causes that you wish to benefit. Done correctly, you can then change those wishes easily with us, and as frequently as you wish, without incurring additional solicitors’ fees.

Bear in mind that if one marries or remarries, a previous Will may become invalid. Separation and divorce can also lead to legal complications.

Tax considerations The net value of one’s assets at death (known as the ‘estate’) attracts Inheritance Tax at a rate of 40% above a certain threshold. ‘Assets’ include everything, including your home if you own one. Tax can therefore be a significant burden.

Gifts to UK charities in a Will reduce the amount of tax otherwise payable. Further, if the charitable gifts exceed 10%, then the rate of Inheritance Tax payable on the rest of the estate is reduced to 36%. It is this combination of charity exemption and reducing the tax rate that potentially gives rise to effective tax relief of more than 100%.

Kevin Russell, Technical Director

Our Briefing Paper goes into a far more detailed explanation of Inheritance Tax and explains that it is possible to legitimately change the terms of a Will after death, if all of the affected beneficiaries agree. This can potentially improve the tax position from beyond the grave!

Practical considerations It is important to keep your Will under review – we suggest every five years. Things change in life.

Marriage, birth of children and changing priorities are just some of the factors that should be taken into account. And it is never too early to make a Will. The unexpected can happen at any time of life!

Resources Visit stewardship.org.uk/legacies for more information on legacy resources Stewardship Briefing Paper: Where there’s a Will, there’s a way bit.ly/1foEMY4 Stewardship Legacy Giving Account stewardship.org.uk/giving/legacies LCF Find a Christian Lawyer lawcf.org/lawyer-search Christian Legacy Week runs from 19th-25th October. Visit christianlegacy.org.uk for more information and free resources for you or your Church.

@KevnRussell

Missing Kevin’s legal updates for churches and charities? For the latest news and updates from Kevin on all things legal and financial, subscribe to our free Sharpen emails at stewardship.org.uk/sharpen or visit the stewardship blog at stewardship.org.uk/blog 27

Ask Steve…

Professional advice for churches and charities Stephen Mathews heads up the Stewardship consultancy helpline team, a specialist service offering expert knowledge to churches and charities.

Visit stewardship.org.uk/blog for links to all the briefing papers mentioned

Q: Our church operates a café which is overseen by its own committee.

As a church trustee can I leave them to get on with it?

As is so often the case…“that depends”. Here that depends largely on the way that the café and the church are constituted. In short, if the cafe is constituted as a separate legal entity operating in its own right, then broadly speaking the answer is yes. If, however, the café operates from within the church charity, then the answer is most definitely no.

Churches involved in a variety of projects will often appoint teams of people to run the dayto-day operations of individual projects. Whilst trustees are able to delegate operational responsibility in this way, what they can’t do is to delegate legal and governance responsibility. So as a trustee of a church operating a café from within the church charity, final governance responsibility rests with you rather than the committee running the café. Its finances will also form part of the church’s accounts.

Even where the café operates as a separate charity, if it carries the same name as the church or is understood by the community to be a part of the church, then maintaining a watching brief is still advisable.

The relationship, real or otherwise, can mean that issues arising in the café are overlaid onto the church. With this type of set-up, trustees will want to ensure that operating values and standards in one don’t give problems to the other.

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Q: We have just started using the FRSSE SORP for our financial reporting and now understand this is to be withdrawn.

Is this true and what does it mean?

Q: One of our Pastors has asked that when she attends a week-long conference in the Lake District whether the church will pay for her spouse to attend too. Will this be taxed?

When the new charity SORPs were recently introduced most charities had a choice to make. To opt for the relatively calm waters of the FRSSE SORP which required little change to reporting, or to opt to report under the more onerous FRS102 SORP knowing that the FRSSE was itself under review.

This is one of those areas where lack of clarity can be a problem. If the spouse is attending the conference so they are better equipped for their own role in the church, this would normally have no tax implications. It is the same as paying for any other volunteer to attend.

That review is now complete and has resulted in the proposal that the FRSSE is withdrawn and no longer available for financial years beginning on or after 1 January 2016. Without an FRSSE, the charities SORP committee had to decide on an appropriate response.

Whilst its consultation remains open until mid-September, the direction of travel appears clear. All charities using accruals accounting will be required to report using the FRS102 SORP, but with only “larger” charities (currently proposed as gross income exceeding £500,000) having to produce a cash flow statement as a mandatory requirement. As previously this income threshold was linked to that for charities requiring an audit, this is in essence a reduction for charities registered in England and Wales where the audit income threshold is now £1m.

It appears that for some charities, the financial reporting “waters” are getting a little choppier. For some of the implications of what this might mean for your church or charity, please take a look at the blog entitled ‘The End of FRSSE – what does it mean for me?’

If, however, the spouse is attending simply because she would like him to (e.g. to enjoy a short holiday after the conference) then paying for him to attend is effectively ‘blessing the pastor’ rather than achieving the charity’s objective. As such, it’s a taxable ‘benefit in kind’.

For more potential tax pitfalls see our briefing paper entitled ‘Tax Pitfalls for New Churches – how to avoid the common problems’.

A further issue for consideration is whether the expenditure is valid as being for charitable purposes. For a broader discussion of this, please see our blog entitled ‘Blessing the family of God – that’s ok isn’t it?’

Two great ways for treasurers to stay on top: 1. Grab a FREE place on our quarterly conference calls for church treasurers, for important news, updates and advice from around the sector. Visit stewardship.org.uk/events to book.

2. Subscribe to Stewardship’s consultancy helpline service – visit stewardship.org.uk/consultancy Subscriptions for churches & 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

Stephen Mathews, Head of Accountancy and Consultancy Services.

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ENTER THE WONDER OF ADVENT

We all know that the Magi journeyed for many months and Mary and Joseph set off on foot to Bethlehem. But what about Gabriel’s, Zechariah’s and Elizabeth’s journey? Advent Wonder takes a fresh look at how these journeys of generosity and faith weave together to create the most familiar, but the most thrilling story on earth.

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#adventwonder Through a series of short emails sent twice weekly, Advent Wonder brings fresh insight, provides quiet space in the busyness of our own Advent preparations, and helps us to reflect on our own journeys of faith and generosity.

In its third year, Advent Wonder is a beautiful, original devotional series that will carry you through the busy weeks of December and reconnect you with the heart of the Christmas story.

Sign up by 30th November to receive 10 short emails which will be sent on Mondays and Fridays.

Register now at stewardship.org.uk/advent

PLUS FREE sermon resources are also available to download and use in your church.

A series of four sermons provides in-depth analysis, stories, quotes and flexible clear layouts. Each sermon is accompanied with support materials such as poems, prayers, videos and PowerPoint slides.

5!

OR 201 NEW F Resources for families By popular demand we have created an Advent Wonder Activity Pack for families. Included in the pack is an Advent Activity Chart with seasonal generous actions for all the family as well as brief all-age reflections.

“ The emails were beautifully written and engaging, not too long to make time to read them, but long enough to have impact, stop me in my tracks, and consider the Wonder.”

“ I used it in Bible studies and sermons, it cut across the ‘niceness’ and took on a vulnerable honesty that was in my language so was able to tweak and change a bit here and there and add a few hundred words.

They were really good discussion starters.”

“ Really well written, thought provoking, contemporary – excellently done! Helped me amidst the busy-ness in the run up to Christmas to stop and reflect. Well done!

Thank you!”

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