Stewardship and gifts are a key component of the discipleship path for members of Hyde Park United Methodist, who grow in faith through prayers, presence, gifts and service. 

Christ-like generosity begins not in what we do, but in what God has done in Jesus Christ. "We love," the epistle of John says, "because he first loved us and gave himself for us." We give because Jesus gave. The Christian life is a response of gratitude to God for the gifts of God's love and grace in Jesus Christ. We get connected with the generosity of God at the foot fo the cross.

Christian people are not generous because of what they have, but because of who they are as followers of the crucified and risen Jesus Christ. Christ followers find joy, not in what they hold, but in what they share. Christian generosity is modeled after nothing les than the extravagant generosity of God's love to us in Jesus Christ....

What goes around comes around. It's a circle of generosity. God's generosity to us results in gratitude which we express through our generosity, which results in gratitude which expresses itself in generosity in them until all our lives overflow with gratitude to God.

 --adapted from "reCONNECT, a workbook for personal and group study",
2008, Hyde Park United Methodist.

Learn more about stewardship and ways to give at Hyde Park United Methodist.