Simple yet radical plan to save the Community of Christ

Simple yet radical plan to save the Community of Christ:

Malachi 3:10 Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.

Community of Christ gives God a tithe (10% of income).

Proposal for First Presidency and Presiding Bishopric of C. of C.:

This is radical yet simple. I am greatly concerned about the statement from WC 2010: “20% give 80% and the average age is 69.” What does this statement tell me? If I round up the average age to 70 and go back to when this group was 20 (age to increase tithing with better jobs and higher pay), then this tells me that the last, very loyal group to this church reached “maturity” in 1960. You could make an argument that most of what we’ve done for the last 50 years has been ineffective based on this statistic. I will not make that argument, but I put it out there for consideration. I appreciated you (Prophet-President Steve Veazey) stating, “My family and I will sacrifice and give more…”, but that seemed to be missing the point. You are one of the 20%. It seems to me that the church is in desperate need for reproduction of loyal, generous, tithe-paying disciples. I can and will make the argument that we have done an ineffective job of keeping the last 4-5 generations of young adults. The declining tithing statistics bear this out.

My story: my mentor and Sunday School (S.S.) teacher (born in 60’s) is the only one left of his generation active in the church. I (1969—born in 70’s)have a couple of persons from my generations that became adult converts—were not active in S.S. when I was younger. I do not know of any young adults (born in ‘80’s) following me that are active nor of any in next generation (born in ‘90’s) still active in church (New Philadelphia). I have been to enough congregations especially here in Central MC to realize this is the rule rather than the exception

You might ask how a church gives a “tithe” to God. Good question. I do not know, but I know that what we do now (expenses, ministry, education, etc.) would not be a tithe. Saying it is would be like me keeping my tithing as my right as a minister of the Gospel. As a prophetic church and people, I do not feel this problem is insurmountable. Basically, as a concerned member and Priest, I see the writing on the wall for the “death” of this church as we know it in 5-20 years if we do not turn around these trends.

Thank you for your consideration. God, peace, blessings, and endowment be with you, your ministries, and the church! In Christ, Randall Q. Lawrence 2/23/2011