Pivot

#141: Beyond the Tithe: How Churches Can Help People Navigate Faith and Money Faithfully

Grace Pomroy shares insights about how congregations can move beyond traditional stewardship campaigns to engage people's entire financial lives.

Most churches have fallen into the trap of only discussing money during budget season or stewardship campaigns, focusing solely on what people give rather than how they live. But what if there’s a way to go beyond the tithe and help people navigate their entire financial lives through the lens of faith? Grace Pomroy, Director of the Stewardship Leaders Program at Luther Seminary, discovered this gap when she asked a room of stewardship leaders a simple question that left them speechless: “What’s one way you’ve managed money faithfully that didn’t involve giving it away?”

In this episode, Grace shares insights from her Faith and Money Learning Lab about how congregations can move beyond the tithe toward holistic financial discipleship. She reveals practical approaches for creating safe spaces where people can explore what it means to spend, save, and earn money faithfully, including spiritual practices that start with God’s love rather than shame. Whether you’re a pastor, lay leader, or someone wrestling with how faith intersects with your financial decisions, this conversation offers hope for engaging money conversations that transform lives rather than just fund budgets.

Resources Mentioned:

More From Us:

Subscribe and Review:

If you loved this episode, please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review anywhere you get your podcasts!🎙 Thanks for tuning in to the Pivot Podcast! See you next week!

Shift Ministry Models
Faith & Contemporary IssuesFaithful InnovationMinistry LeadershipMission & Evangelism

Featuring

Headshot of Grace Pomroy.

Grace Pomroy

Grace Duddy Pomroy is the Director of the Stewardship Leaders Program at Luther Seminary. She’s a lay, millennial stewardship leader, speaker, and financial educator based in Allyn, WA. She is the co-author of the stewardship book, Embracing Stewardship: How to Put Stewardship at the Heart of Your Congregation’s Life, as well as author of the free 2013 ELCA stewardship resource, “Stewards of God’s Love.” Her latest book, Funding Forward: A Pathway to More Sustainable Models for Ministry, was just released September 2024. Grace is also a consultant with Relèven, a charitable organization that lovingly preserves, restores, and repurposes under-utilized churches into community hubs and affordable housing.

Meet Your Host

  • Dwight Zscheile

    The Rev. Dr. Dwight Zscheile is vice president of innovation and professor of congregational mission and leadership at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota.

    He is the author of Embracing the Mixed Ecology (with Blair Pogue, Seabury Books, 2025), Leading Faithful Innovation: Following God into a Hopeful Future (with Michael Binder and Tessa Pinkstaff, Fortress 2023), Participating in God’s Mission: A Theological Missiology for the U.S. (with Craig Van Gelder, Eerdmans 2018), The Agile Church: Spirit-Led Innovation in an Uncertain Age (Morehouse Publishing, 2014), People of the Way: Renewing Episcopal Identity (Morehouse Publishing, 2012) and The Missional Church in Perspective: Mapping Trends and Shaping the Conversation (with Craig Van Gelder, Baker Academic 2011) and editor of Cultivating Sent Communities: Missional Spiritual Formation (Eerdmans, 2012).

    A graduate of Stanford University (BA), Yale University (MDiv) and Luther Seminary (PhD, Congregational Mission and Leadership), Dwight previously served congregations in Minnesota, Virginia and Connecticut. Dwight’s experience growing up in a secular home in California has shaped his commitment to helping the church cultivate Christian community with neighbors in today’s changing world.