The Pace of Stewardship
By definition, if stewardship is not good, it is not stewardship at all. Stewardship implies responsibility over persons, places, and things and necessarily requires responsible action. The ship steward cares for his passengers. The warehouse steward cares for the things he stores. Stewards of the land care for the land. And yet our stewardship cannot be exclusive to any one of these. People affect people, places, and things. Places affect people and how they use things in those places. Things affect places and the people that use them. Stewardship cannot ignore the integrity, the togetherness that the world has with mankind. Those that risk ignoring their comprehensive responsibility over persons, places, and things, risk losing their stewardship.
Stewardship always enjoins a measure of responsibility over what has been, over what is, and over what will be. Responsibility over what has been does not blame-shift but accepts due culpability for what has been and how it has contributed to the pain or pleasure of contemporary circumstances. In stewardship, there is no comfortable avoidance of past error. If we wish to prolong our future, we must own our past. Stewardship on this level requires that we pace ourselves to consider our history.
Our stewardship over what is requires the responsible use of accessible resources. Stewardship on this level has to do with observation and requires that we moderate our pace to allow discernment of both the values and the risks of our use of knowledge, of our use of material wealth, and of our relationships. The pace of stewardship cannot ignore the finite nature of present realities.
Our stewardship over what will be has to do with foresight. If we have considered our past well, and if we have accurately discerned our contemporary situation, we ought to be able to intuit some measure of both the benefits and the dangers on the road ahead. It is our moral responsibility to guide ourselves, and others, toward these benefits and away from these dangers. Stewardship on this level requires that we pace ourselves to weigh present trends in the light of past experience for future benefits. In this effort, God has given us an objective resource, the Bible, from which we can glean guidance toward a more benevolent future.
Stewardship of Knowledge
Where the application of knowledge has become abusive, stewardship has been cast aside. Knowledge is all about discovering the purposes that God designed into nature. Ultimately, to ignore these purposes is to deny knowledge and to embrace ignorance in its place. If we have failed to evaluate the consequences of our application of knowledge (technical, medical, social, spiritual or otherwise), we have neglected to consider the heart of God evident in all creation. He has made natural systems to function with organic integrity. Denying that integrity can only invite His wrath. It is not that He delights in punishing us for wrongdoing, only that He delights in justice and His judgments are preordained against abuse and unrighteousness. In our search for knowledge, He expects us to intuit and consider His character. Where we fail in this respect, we must place the blame on a pace that has left no room for faith in God.
Stewardship of Material Wealth
There can only be a few reasons why we're not taking good care of the things in our possession. Either we're lazy, or we're too busy, or we have too many things. If we're lazy, ethically, we must choose one of two remedies. Get busy or get out of the way. If we're too busy to care for what the Lord has placed in our hands then we must recognize that our failure is nothing short of rebellion, wherein we choose the import of our own desires above the import of His. And if we have too many things, we must recognize that idolatry has already taken our hearts captive. The remedy for our lack of stewardship of material resources is the same as that for stewardship of knowledge or relationships -- we must recognize and embrace God's purpose for creation. That purpose is not to showcase God's power or wisdom, but to showcase His love. Our neglect of the material world is nothing less than a reflection of spiritual adultery wherein we've exchanged the gift of His eternal love for the pursuit of temporal pleasures.
Stewardship of Relationships
The stewardship that ought to require most of our time and effort is the stewardship of our relationships. And while it cannot be separated from our stewardship of knowledge and things, it ought to be the motivational force behind our stewardship in these other areas. If our attention to things causes a lack of attention in the area of relationships, then we may need to simplify our lifestyles. Likewise, if our attention to the acquiring of knowledge robs us of time with our loved ones, we ought to consider how to dethrone knowledge and reprioritize our lives to make more room for relationships. Neglect of material stewardship and neglect of the stewardship of knowledge will always have adverse affects on our relationships. But, conversely, and perhaps more significantly, so will the neglect of relationships have an adverse affect on the motives that drive our use of things and knowledge. There is a balance here that cannot be overlooked.
The key to responsible stewardship rests in our pace of life. Every aspect of our lives must have the appropriate time allocated to it to allow for responsible stewardship in every other area. Any system that drives us beyond our ability to deliberate our pace is essentially flawed. We become victims of the time and circumstance that we fail to master and we fail to master the time and circumstance that we have failed to deliberate over in the light of God's Word and character. If we are bewildered about God's character and His purpose for our lives, then we are unable to steward the reins of our own destiny. Under such circumstances, more often than not, choices are made for us that do not reflect God's loving concern or His design for our lives.
Most often, it is not with malice that men make these decisions for us, but with ambition. In search of their dreams, other men often see only half of the stewardship equation -- the half that seems to benefit them. What they fail to realize is that their lack of stewardship over relationships will also eventually rob them of those blessings resident in the dreams of other men. Only the return to a neighborly pace more considerate of a comprehensive stewardship will grant us the insight to pursue and embrace our dreams with integrity. The pace of stewardship is the pace of God's love for humanity and of man's love for God and for his fellow man. It is a walking, working, worshiping, thinking, praying, porch-sitting pace.
Michael Hennen
Friday, March 13, 2009
