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I am a church girl. I was born raised and given my very first job to serve in the church . My parents both were in ministry before I was born and decided to pastor a church well before I or my brothers were born. If we don’t know anything we know about church. My parents took a small salary from church a little over $50 a week . Which in the early 1980’s still wasn’t enough to take care of a family . My Dad was already employed and is still employed at the same company . Eventually my mother became a stylist . We grew up pretty comfortable in the 1980’s and 1990’s.
My father’s message never changed , along his journey in ministry he has always preached an ever increasing faith message . But life increases you , you move from level to level . That is a normal cycle of life. We moved from an apartment to a house , from a three bedroom to a four bedroom and from a 4 bedroom to a 5 bedroom. Nothing changed but his job title and status. And eventually that $50 a month that he received from the church had dwindled to $0.
And then the 2000’s hit and the internet became popular. So did the prosperity movement . Well the prosperity movement was not something that was new to us … we had heard this message from way back when he was making that $50 a week as a Pastor. Yet as my father grew in his company the message of prosperity was attached to his life. And we didn’t mind , as a matter of fact we still don’t mind. But here lately there has been so much propaganda about Pastor’staking tithes to live off and I felt it my need and position to address such. Remember my first job was to serve in the church, I became the executive administrator for our church . It was my duty to answer the phones , book our pastors for ministry, do the television shows and lastly I had to file the weekly offering. I collected the envelopes after they were empty and filed them . I can assure you with my knowledge of what people actually give in the offering it would not be enough for me to purchase my rover and pay it off. With what people give there is no way we could buy a house or pay a mortgage. Church finance is cyclical . One Sunday its up and one Sunday its down and forget the mid week services. This is why we have fundraisers and many services. And just think if you don’t decide to give there is someone else that has decided not to give too. We work directly off donations and faith that there is someone that is willing to sow their money for kingdom work. And if you are a new church chances are their is no money saved, there is no stash of hidden money set aside for the pastor to take a trip to Mexico.
Churches are charged lights per square footage , they are charged gas per square footage, churches are also charged a different commercial fee for cable or internet. There are big expenses that go into larger churches, not just lights water and gas but you also have to have regular things like envelopes, paper towels, toilet paper , light bulbs . And we are also are prepared to hosts weddings and funerals all free. And when someone needs their light bills paid or rent to be caught up we are that person they call . But no one complains about that . We have to pay musicians and sometimes praise and worship singers , however unless your Dad is not the pastor you will probably get paid to be the administrator. We are the first to be judged when someone child is bullied or killed but when we invited them to church they denied the offer.
Each summer we give an open invitation for youth events and camps. They come to those for the free back to school supplies , we invite them back to Wednesday night church events and they come twice …yet we are to be blamed for situations that we have reached out to help with . The church is blamed for not going outside the four walls but no one is ever blamed for not wanting to attend. Now who’s wrong me for offering you the gospel or you not receiving it .
I may write a book on this subject. I digress
Going to Church on Wednesday and still
loving Life
Tesha
