For the past decade a group of people have gathered each year for prayer, worship, dialogue, and fellowship around Scripture’s claims that followers of Jesus are to live as faithful stewards of all of life. The participants have included non-profit leaders, pastors, educators, businesspeople, fundraising professionals, and board members. Called the Steward Summit, this annual event has incubated papers, articles, blogs, and books all focused on our calling to the life of the obedient steward set free to fully live for Christ.
In 2020, the Steward Summit participants felt led by God to create a seminal document that articulated the Biblical teaching on the calling of the faithful steward. Over the past 18 months, four writing teams created a draft of the document, which was then critiqued by a group of twenty outside reviewers. The final product is the Steward Manifesto.
It is the prayer of all those involved that this document will be used by God through the power of the Holy Spirit to call God’s people in the US to embrace our identity as God’s stewards, to experience the freedom and joy of that calling, and to become more faithful witnesses to the redeeming power of the Gospel in our generation. We pray for nothing less than the revival of the church and a fresh proclamation of the good news to our increasingly dark and broken world.
We invite you to engage this document with prayer and an open spirit and see what God might be calling you to do to embrace your own journey more fully as a faithful steward. To God be the glory
We believe at the root of the issues of our culture has been a dramatic shift in how we think about the nature and value of the human person.
September 9, 2021. To followers of Jesus, our brothers and sisters in Christ in America.
Two-thousand years ago, Jesus proclaimed the coming of the Kingdom of God. He gathered followers and sent them to share the good news of this Kingdom to the world. As followers of Jesus, we are called to proclaim the gospel in our day and to live by the values of the Kingdom of God as a witness to our generation.
The authority to proclaim God's Kingdom and the power to live by Kingdom values comes solely from our identity as redeemed children of God created in God’s image. When we bear that image faithfully, God works in and through us to reach a broken world. This image does not belong to us, it is a gift breathed into us in creation and re-established for us on the cross of Christ. Therefore, it is God's most precious gift to us. Because it is a gift of grace, we are stewards of this image as followers of Jesus.
Throughout history God has used times of crisis and chaos to get the attention of His people. When we have listened, He has transformed human failure and futility into fertile moments of deep reflection that have brought God’s people back to Him in profound ways. When we have not, we’ve ended up in exile. We are presenting this Steward Manifesto believing that we are living in just such a time.
We believe at the root of the issues of our culture has been a dramatic shift in how we think about the nature and value of the human person. This Steward Manifesto is a call to our brothers and sisters to reclaim our calling to be stewards of this identity, an identity that is being attacked, confused and distorted. The signs of this loss of identity are everywhere.
These are just a few of the indicators that we have abdicated our role as followers of Jesus and our responsibility to be proclaimers of the good news of the coming of the Kingdom of God in all of its fulness. The problem is not with our programs, our techniques, our strategies or our theology. We have lost our way because we have lost sight of our true identity. Or perhaps, we have lost our way because we have allowed a host of counterfeit identities to lure us away. We are trying to serve two masters, God and ourselves, and living as owners instead of stewards.
This Steward Manifesto is not a call for us to return to a golden age of the past, or toward some utopian vision of a self-actualized future. This is a call for us as followers of Jesus to find our way back onto the narrow road where Jesus is waiting, like the father of the prodigal son, for us who have squandered our inheritance to come to our senses and return.
Following Jesus in our day and in this culture will look nothing like it did in the past. For us to faithfully follow our Lord into the world will require us to steward our identity through a passionate return to the kind of complete surrender that leads to freedom and the peace of God that passes all understanding.
Only as stewards can we embrace the radical solutions God has planned for these days. Only by giving up control, trusting the Holy Spirit, living in moment-by-moment obedience, surrendering the outcomes and waiting on God will true revival come. And such revival will take us to a new place, not recover an old one.
This call to steward our identity in Christ provides a lens through which followers of Jesus can view and respond to the pressing social, ethical and cultural issues of our day. Our prayer is for this Steward Manifesto to provide the followers of Jesus with a solidly biblical frame through which to consider their faith journey in light of these pressing issues.
What might that look like?
This is a glimpse of the vision for what we pray God will manifest in our lives through the Steward Manifesto.
Laying the Foundation
The Steward Manifesto is built on the biblical teaching that in creation God’s gift of relationship was given to us to steward faithfully under His guiding hand. As bearers of the image of God, we were perfectly designed to live as stewards through the four relationships that mark our core meaning and purpose; our relationship to God, Self, Neighbor and the Creation. God the Creator and Sustainer of life was the sole Lord, the one true owner of all creation.
In Eden there was one kingdom and one King. Everything God intended for His creation was given to us as a gift of grace. In the shalom of Eden, we lived as one-kingdom people. One-kingdom people are stewards. One-kingdom people are selfless. One-kingdom people know to whom they belong. One-kingdom people are secure in their purpose and identity. One-kingdom people are free.
That is precisely where the enemy attacked. The false narrative was framed at the tree in Eden with the original lie, “You will be like God.” (Genesis 3:5) We re-enact the sin of Eden every time we try to play the lord in our life and turn God’s one-kingdom gift into a two-kingdom possession. Two-kingdom people choose control over surrender, live as owners instead of stewards, and sacrifice freedom in the pursuit of happiness through accumulation of power and possessions. As a result, two-kingdom people live in bondage.
In John 10:10 Jesus frames the issue, names the deception and proclaims the life He redeemed for each of us. “The thief comes to kill, steal and destroy, but I came that you may have life and have it to the full.” The Steward Manifesto is a call to the body of Christ to understand the demonic agenda of the enemy, name where it has become comingled with the agenda of the church and proclaim the promise of the abundant life in Jesus that is only found through complete surrender and the life of the faithful steward. Everything in all creation belongs to God. We don’t own any of it. We never did.
This is the spiritual battle of our generation, and it is a battle we are losing. We will frame the battle as our calling to live as faithful and free stewards in all four of these relationships. We will name the deceptions we have allowed to take root that rob us of the freedom we have in Christ. And we will proclaim for the body of Christ a new vision for how we might rise triumphantly through repentance and restoration that can lead to true revival.
“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” Hebrews 4:16
We were created to be faithful stewards, starting with our relationship with God. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the One who created us for this relationship. The purpose for our lives and meaning of our existence is discovered solely in a deep, intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. We experience the love and grace He has in His heart towards every single unique creation within our collective humanity. When we embrace our call to steward our relationship with God, we can experience true intimacy with Him. When we do not, we allow distractions to steal the joy of this intimacy and lure us into a two-kingdom life where we try to serve two masters. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As stewards we embrace the truth that God’s heart is rooted in a love so lavish that He sent His own Son for the purpose of redeeming our lives, forgiving our sin, and drawing us close to himself. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
As image bearers of God through Jesus Christ, we were created for a whole, meaningful relationship with God through our identity in Christ. We are called to steward this relationship, and therefore:
But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of Him everywhere. 2 Corinthians 2:1
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, that person is a new creation: The old has gone, the new is here!” 2 Corinthians 5:17
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with our self. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created us for it. As living beings created by God, we declare the uniqueness, value and worth of every man and woman as an image bearer of their Creator. Because we are made in the image of God, we are objects of His love and stewards of the life He gives us. We are defined as humans by our identity in God as His stewards. When we embrace our identity as God’s stewards, it touches every aspect of our lives, especially our understanding of who we are. When we believe we own and control our identity we allow false narratives to shape who we are. We live in bondage and as a result we buy into the lie that lures us into a two-kingdom life and try to serve two masters. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
In direct contradiction to these false narratives, we embrace our core identity as being God’s stewards. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
As image bearers of God through Jesus Christ, we were created for whole, meaningful relationships with God through our identity in Christ. Therefore:
"For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by Him we cry, 'Abba, Father.'” Romans 8:14-1
Jesus replied, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’" Matthew 22:37-39
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with our neighbor. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created us for it. Humanity is created to live and flourish in relationship with one another. God’s Kingdom is a community - a body. Stewards are called to create community, protect their community, and care for their community. Moving out from our relationship with God and our self we embrace our relationships with everyone as precious gifts. When we are tempted to follow false narratives about the value of human life, we cannot faithfully steward those relationships. Instead, we attempt to own and control our relationships with others, buying into the lies that only divide and isolate us. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As faithful stewards we are called to pursue reconciliation through compassion and engagement, committed to treating all people as unique image-bearers of God. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
Jesus prayed that we might be one as He and the Father are one, for, “then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” We must steward this holy calling. Therefore:
"My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me." John 17:20-21
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it.” Psalm 2:1
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with creation. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created this world for us. Nowhere are the competing loyalties for our hearts more clearly seen than in our relationship with creation. Within the church we have seen a spirit of ownership and control produce a compromised message of Kingdom values mingled with worldly principles that ultimately places God’s people in bondage How we view our relationship to time, talents, finances and the earth itself has a powerful impact on our life and witness as the church of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, here, more than anywhere, we have bought the lie of the enemy that we own what only God owns and control what is His alone. As stewards, we must reject these lies with the full force of God’s truth. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As faithful stewards, we view all of life as a gift and our purpose in life is to steward it faithfully on behalf of God, the true owner. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
We must respond obediently to Scripture’s clear command to steward creation in all its forms that will bear witness to the world of the Lordship of Jesus Christ over all things. Therefore:
"Let all creation rejoice before the LORD, for He comes, He comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness." Psalm 96:13
September 9, 2021. To followers of Jesus, our brothers and sisters in Christ in America.
Two-thousand years ago, Jesus proclaimed the coming of the Kingdom of God. He gathered followers and sent them to share the good news of this Kingdom to the world. As followers of Jesus, we are called to proclaim the gospel in our day and to live by the values of the Kingdom of God as a witness to our generation.
The authority to proclaim God’s Kingdom and the power to live by Kingdom values comes solely from our identity as redeemed children of God created in God’s image. When we bear that image faithfully, God works in and through us to reach a broken world. This image does not belong to us, it is a gift breathed into us in creation and re-established for us on the cross of Christ. Therefore, it is God’s most precious gift to us. Because it is a gift of grace, we are stewards of this image as followers of Jesus.
Throughout history God has used times of crisis and chaos to get the attention of His people. When we have listened, He has transformed human failure and futility into fertile moments of deep reflection that have brought God’s people back to Him in profound ways. When we have not, we’ve ended up in exile. We are presenting this Steward Manifesto believing that we are living in just such a time.
We believe at the root of the issues of our culture has been a dramatic shift in how we think about the nature and value of the human person. This Steward Manifesto is a call to our brothers and sisters to reclaim our calling to be stewards of this identity, an identity that is being attacked, confused and distorted. The signs of this loss of identity are everywhere.
These are just a few of the indicators that we have abdicated our role as followers of Jesus and our responsibility to be proclaimers of the good news of the coming of the Kingdom of God in all of its fulness. The problem is not with our programs, our techniques, our strategies or our theology. We have lost our way because we have lost sight of our true identity. Or perhaps, we have lost our way because we have allowed a host of counterfeit identities to lure us away. We are trying to serve two masters, God and ourselves, and living as owners instead of stewards.
This Steward Manifesto is not a call for us to return to a golden age of the past, or toward some utopian vision of a self-actualized future. This is a call for us as followers of Jesus to find our way back onto the narrow road where Jesus is waiting, like the father of the prodigal son, for us who have squandered our inheritance to come to our senses and return.
Following Jesus in our day and in this culture will look nothing like it did in the past. For us to faithfully follow our Lord into the world will require us to steward our identity through a passionate return to the kind of complete surrender that leads to freedom and the peace of God that passes all understanding.
Only as stewards can we embrace the radical solutions God has planned for these days. Only by giving up control, trusting the Holy Spirit, living in moment-by-moment obedience, surrendering the outcomes and waiting on God will true revival come. And such revival will take us to a new place, not recover an old one.
This call to steward our identity in Christ provides a lens through which followers of Jesus can view and respond to the pressing social, ethical and cultural issues of our day. Our prayer is for this Steward Manifesto to provide the followers of Jesus with a solidly biblical frame through which to consider their faith journey in light of these pressing issues.
What might that look like?
This is a glimpse of the vision for what we pray God will manifest in our lives through the Steward Manifesto.
Laying the Foundation
The Steward Manifesto is built on the biblical teaching that in creation God’s gift of relationship was given to us to steward faithfully under His guiding hand. As bearers of the image of God, we were perfectly designed to live as stewards through the four relationships that mark our core meaning and purpose; our relationship to God, Self, Neighbor and the Creation. God the Creator and Sustainer of life was the sole Lord, the one true owner of all creation.
In Eden there was one kingdom and one King. Everything God intended for His creation was given to us as a gift of grace. In the shalom of Eden, we lived as one-kingdom people. One-kingdom people are stewards. One-kingdom people are selfless. One-kingdom people know to whom they belong. One-kingdom people are secure in their purpose and identity. One-kingdom people are free.
That is precisely where the enemy attacked. The false narrative was framed at the tree in Eden with the original lie, “You will be like God.” (Genesis 3:5) We re-enact the sin of Eden every time we try to play the lord in our life and turn God’s one-kingdom gift into a two-kingdom possession. Two-kingdom people choose control over surrender, live as owners instead of stewards, and sacrifice freedom in the pursuit of happiness through accumulation of power and possessions. As a result, two-kingdom people live in bondage.
In John 10:10 Jesus frames the issue, names the deception and proclaims the life He redeemed for each of us. “The thief comes to kill, steal and destroy, but I came that you may have life and have it to the full.” The Steward Manifesto is a call to the body of Christ to understand the demonic agenda of the enemy, name where it has become comingled with the agenda of the church and proclaim the promise of the abundant life in Jesus that is only found through complete surrender and the life of the faithful steward. Everything in all creation belongs to God. We don’t own any of it. We never did.
This is the spiritual battle of our generation, and it is a battle we are losing. We will frame the battle as our calling to live as faithful and free stewards in all four of these relationships. We will name the deceptions we have allowed to take root that rob us of the freedom we have in Christ. And we will proclaim for the body of Christ a new vision for how we might rise triumphantly through repentance and restoration that can lead to true revival.
“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” Hebrews 4:16
We were created to be faithful stewards, starting with our relationship with God. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the One who created us for this relationship. The purpose for our lives and meaning of our existence is discovered solely in a deep, intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. We experience the love and grace He has in His heart towards every single unique creation within our collective humanity. When we embrace our call to steward our relationship with God, we can experience true intimacy with Him. When we do not, we allow distractions to steal the joy of this intimacy and lure us into a two-kingdom life where we try to serve two masters. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As stewards we embrace the truth that God’s heart is rooted in a love so lavish that He sent His own Son for the purpose of redeeming our lives, forgiving our sin, and drawing us close to himself. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
As image bearers of God through Jesus Christ, we were created for a whole, meaningful relationship with God through our identity in Christ. We are called to steward this relationship, and therefore:
But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of Him everywhere. 2 Corinthians 2:1
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, that person is a new creation: The old has gone, the new is here!” 2 Corinthians 5:17
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with our self. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created us for it. As living beings created by God, we declare the uniqueness, value and worth of every man and woman as an image bearer of their Creator. Because we are made in the image of God, we are objects of His love and stewards of the life He gives us. We are defined as humans by our identity in God as His stewards. When we embrace our identity as God’s stewards, it touches every aspect of our lives, especially our understanding of who we are. When we believe we own and control our identity we allow false narratives to shape who we are. We live in bondage and as a result we buy into the lie that lures us into a two-kingdom life and try to serve two masters. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
In direct contradiction to these false narratives, we embrace our core identity as being God’s stewards. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
As image bearers of God through Jesus Christ, we were created for whole, meaningful relationships with God through our identity in Christ. Therefore:
“For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by Him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’” Romans 8:14-1
Jesus replied, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Matthew 22:37-39
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with our neighbor. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created us for it. Humanity is created to live and flourish in relationship with one another. God’s Kingdom is a community – a body. Stewards are called to create community, protect their community, and care for their community. Moving out from our relationship with God and our self we embrace our relationships with everyone as precious gifts. When we are tempted to follow false narratives about the value of human life, we cannot faithfully steward those relationships. Instead, we attempt to own and control our relationships with others, buying into the lies that only divide and isolate us. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As faithful stewards we are called to pursue reconciliation through compassion and engagement, committed to treating all people as unique image-bearers of God. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
Jesus prayed that we might be one as He and the Father are one, for, “then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” We must steward this holy calling. Therefore:
“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” John 17:20-21
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it.” Psalm 2:1
We were created to be faithful stewards, including our relationship with creation. We do not own this relationship but steward it on behalf of the one who created this world for us. Nowhere are the competing loyalties for our hearts more clearly seen than in our relationship with creation. Within the church we have seen a spirit of ownership and control produce a compromised message of Kingdom values mingled with worldly principles that ultimately places God’s people in bondage How we view our relationship to time, talents, finances and the earth itself has a powerful impact on our life and witness as the church of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, here, more than anywhere, we have bought the lie of the enemy that we own what only God owns and control what is His alone. As stewards, we must reject these lies with the full force of God’s truth. Therefore:
Proclaiming the Truth
As faithful stewards, we view all of life as a gift and our purpose in life is to steward it faithfully on behalf of God, the true owner. Therefore:
Our Call to the Body of Christ
We must respond obediently to Scripture’s clear command to steward creation in all its forms that will bear witness to the world of the Lordship of Jesus Christ over all things. Therefore:
“Let all creation rejoice before the LORD, for He comes, He comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness.” Psalm 96:13
We add our signature to this Steward Manifesto as an indication of our support for its overall message and in solidarity with the prayer that God may use it to advance His kingdom, revive His people and bring a fresh proclamation of the Good News of His redemption, reconciliation and hope to all people, starting with the body of Christ.
Become equipped and inspired for this journey of the faithful steward.
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