From the Stewardship Journal Team

In this edition of the Stewardship Journal, just days before Thanksgiving, we want to explore how gratitude and thankfulness can help you lay a foundation for a culture of gratitude that leads to increased generosity.

“It is impossible to create a culture of generosity without, at the same time, creating a culture of gratitude.” That is the first sentence of Mark Brooks,’ The Stewardship Coach, column entitled The Importance of Gratitude. Mark shares why thanking your donors is an important role for a pastor and how it helps increase stewardship.

Our Bonus Section follows up on this theme in a post entitled, Key Pointers for Expressing Gratitude. You will learn practical ways that you can express thankfulness and gratitude to your donors. Find the pointers that best fit you, your culture, and your church, and start your ministry of gratefulness.

The Power of Saying Thank You is our final post in this edition. Here is a stunning statistic from the post, “Research has shown that first-time donors who receive a personal thank-you within 48 hours are four times more likely to give again. Yes, thanking in 48 hours equals a 400 percent improvement in renewal rates.” That is the power of saying thank you, and this post will give you practical ideas on how you can build out a gratitude strategy for your church.

There is no Stewardship Journal next Monday as our team will be celebrating Thanksgiving. All of us who work on the Stewardship Journal thank you from the bottom of our hearts for reading our posts. We exist to help you create a culture of generosity based on biblical stewardship principles. We look forward to our next edition of the Journal, which will be released on December 4^th. Have a blessed and Happy Thanksgiving!

In Jesus name!