Humble people working with humble people, for God's Kingdom

“Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.“
Philippians 2:3-4 (ESV)

We’ve all had them at times – those teachable moments when we learned something we didn’t know which ended up being beneficial.

This happens to me almost daily as I ask questions and am curious. Life is kind of like a classroom, if you think about it – because there is way more knowledge out there than we could possibly absorb in a lifetime. We each have our pieces of it that we can use and share.

Skills, gifts and what we don’t know

In whatever we are doing, we try to do our best as unto the Lord and, in doing so, we can become pretty good at our areas of expertise. Yet, if we are honest, we have to admit that there is a lot more that we don’t know.

Here’s a simple example – there are maintenance items that need to be done on my car to help it last longer and provide good service. I know this is true, but I am busy working with our team and with churches, spending time with my family, friends and my own church. I just want my car to work and don’t take much time thinking about how to keep it working.

Someone in our office knows a lot more about this than me and advised me to have my timing belt changed to avoid a catastrophic failure of my engine. I had the work done and now have peace of mind when I am on the road, no matter the distance I am traveling.

By asking questions and listening, I learned something important from someone who knows more than me on a subject. I stopped and considered, gathered information, took action and it was a win.

Humble servants of Kingdom expansion

In humility, let’s now jump to churches and financial matters. With almost 19 years’ experience at CIF, I could probably write a book on this subject, and many in our office could contribute important chapters to it.

We love to serve, sharing our knowledge with churches, answering their questions, analyzing their financial information, making suggestions and more. This helps move our Kingdom expansion mission forward, which, quite frankly can only happen through the churches and ministries we serve. It’s what we do, and who we are as an organization.

But what if a church we are serving doesn’t want to hear us at CIF? What if they feel they know better and want to go down a different path – making choices that we would recommend against, things that would hurt their ministry and even jeopardize their church’s long-term health?

There’s often a balance between the direction a church wants to go, walking by faith and the facts in front of them. I get it.

As Christians in the U.S., we place a high value on freedom and we do our best to remain respectful even when we disagree. Church leaders and individuals are free to make up their own minds.

Our job is to give an honest opinion, based on facts and our experience. We are happy to discuss our findings in detail and answer more questions on a video call.

But for now, a church may decide to part ways with us. We wish them the best, because we truly want the best for them.

Following Christ’s example

Reading on from the verses above, we learn that Jesus is our example and that we are all here to willingly and even joyfully serve others in our work. Can we achieve this in every interaction, in every instance? No.

As we humbly consider church finance details, please know that our goal and practice is to partner well with churches and ministries. We will be open and honest, and our solutions are faith-based, grounded in facts and best practices we have developed over decades.

Banks and other for-profit institutions will almost always put profit first. We put Kingdom expansion first. It’s a major fundamental difference.

As always, thank you for your interest in CIF. We look forward to many more years of ministry and we give God the glory as we partner together.