I’m always drawn to books on leadership because I feel the need for any counsel I can get in that area. When I saw that Sandy Grant was going to do a series of articles over at the Sola Panel on Zac Veron’s Leadership on the Front Foot, I was excited. This book is designed to give practical leadership advice to pastors and others who work in local church ministry.

Since I’m so interested in this topic and don’t have ready access to the book here in America, I went over to the Youthworks website where I was able to read a sample chapter that dealt with electronic giving. Electronic giving enables folks to set up an automatic withdrawal from their bank account that goes directly to the account of their church. It seems like a good and handy thing since so many people now bank and pay their bills online, but this is a trend that has concerned me for some time. I wondered what counsel Veron would offer. I was very disappointed.

What I found in that one chapter was the kind of pragmatism that harms the church. Does electronic giving work? Evidently it does. It worked at Veron’s church, but it takes away a vital dimension of our worship. Giving our offering or alms is an act of corporate worship (Acts 2:42; 1 Cor. 16:1-4).[1] Apostolic example provides us with clear warrant. If we believe this, then shouldn’t we take the offering during our corporate worship services? If we can worship by giving online, can we worship by listening to sermons online and eliminate the need to show up at our local church on Sunday morning? That would be convenient and possibly increase the “attendance” at our “services,” but I don’t know any preacher who wants to go that route.

Veron also believes electronic giving will make it easier to invite visitors to church. If no offering is taken, they won’t be uncomfortable having the plate pass in front of them. But that is also problematic. The old Southern Presbyterians used to say that taking the offering was one way God uses to wean us from our covetousness. If people are unwilling to give, the offering plate may become a means of conviction. The fact that their wallet stays in their pocket or purse may be used by God to show them where their priorities lie.

We should not go out of our way to make people feel uncomfortable. In some churches, visitors are asked not to give to the offering so that they will realize the church is not after their money. That’s not a bad idea. A few words of explanation can go a long way at clearing up misunderstandings. But if taking an offering as an act of worship makes visitors uncomfortable, they will just have to be uncomfortable. Perhaps if visitors saw God’s people giving generously, emptying their wallets into the plate, they would fall down and say, “Surely God is in this place.”

Paul was unwilling to accept remuneration in some of the places he preached (see, for example, 1 Cor. 9:12ff; 1 Thess. 2:9), and some may find in this example a reason not to require public offerings. But doesn’t the context show us that this was Paul’s practice in new mission areas? No one should go to evangelize any people group and demand money from them. The unsaved are not responsible to support missions (3 John 7). But once a church is established with preaching and the other means of grace, it’s time to start taking an offering.

Once you set up electronic giving with your bank, you can forget about it. Never again will you have to ask, “Did I remember my check book?” “Do I have the right offering envelope?” With a few clicks of the mouse, you can eliminate the need to think about giving at all. And that’s the problem. If we give as a part of our weekly, corporate worship, we have the opportunity to remember who God is and just how dependent we are upon him. Weekly, corporate giving brings us face to face with our needs and the necessity of trusting the Lord to supply. It also gives us the opportunity to thank him for all he has given us and to acknowledge that every dime in every account belongs to him, not just the percentage we’re putting in the plate.

Electronic giving is a pragmatic idea the church can do without, in spite of Zac Veron’s enthusiastic endorsement. Not only is it not a good idea, it may end up being spiritually harmful. Surely we can be inconvenienced to write a check once a week.

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[1] “When Martin Bucer (1491—1551) in his Grund und Ursach of 1524 tried to summarize what should be included in the service of worship, he appealed to the text of Acts 2:42, ‘And they continued in the teaching and fellowship of the Apostles, in the breaking of bread and the prayers.’ As Bucer understood this, the service of worship which aspired to follow the apostolic example should include preaching and teaching, the giving of alms, the celebration of communion and the service of prayer. Perhaps most of this would seem self-evident except for the second of the four pasts, the giving of alms. Bucer’s approach to the Greek text of the book of Acts, if a bit original, was certainly sound enough. The Greek word in question is koinonia which can mean communion or fellowship or very practically the sharing of material goods with those who are in need. We can leave aside the question of whether Bucer’s translation was completely appropriate. His sense of liturgical balance was impeccable. The giving of alms should always be regarded as one of the constituent elements of Christian worship.” Hughes Oliphant Old, Worship that is Reformed According to Scripture (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1984), 149.

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