208: Rest This Christmas: Jesus Holds Your Church Together (Not Your Year-End Numbers) | Church Finance Series (Part 6)

Laurie Graham 0:01
Hey, welcome to the Small Church Ministry Podcast, where we help volunteers and ministry leaders experience less stress, more joy, and greater impact as we share strategies that actually do work in smaller churches. I’m your host, Laurie Graham. Let’s dive in.

Laurie Graham 0:23
Hey, hey! Welcome back to the Small Church Ministry Podcast. This is the final episode in our church finance series. And if you are listening as this episode goes live, Christmas is just a few days away. I know that some people are listening—you know, excited about the holidays, wrapping up work, or finishing that one last thing before you can take a pause for maybe even a whole week off. A bunch of people are probably getting ready to spend time with family. And I also know that there are those of us who have had a really hard year, maybe ministry-wise, maybe personally. I’m one of the first to always say that Christmas is not the most wonderful time of year for a lot of people. Oftentimes, it can be a really tiring time, a reflective one.

And I also know that although this episode is getting released during Christmas week, many people are listening weeks or months from now. Because pressure doesn’t always follow a calendar and exhaustion doesn’t magically fit with seasonal changes, wherever you’re listening from today, I’m really glad you’re here—whatever you’re coming in with, whatever season you’re at, not just with the holidays, but in your life. I’m so glad you’re part of this community, and I want you to know that you’re not alone. I love this community because you also remind me that I’m not alone.

So this episode is a little bit different—might be a little bit shorter today. I’m not going to go into any heavy teaching or give another framework or a reframe or something else to pursue or start a conversation about. This episode is about kind of letting a few things land and mellow out, because a lot of small churches and a lot of people who love them are tired. And tired people don’t need a lot more instruction, do we? Sometimes we need a little permission to breathe. Sometimes we need some reflection. Sometimes it’s good just to hear somebody relieve the pressure instead of adding another expectation.

I want to talk a little bit about pressure, because we all feel it in different ways. I know this is the ending of the finance series, so we are going to wrap a little bit around this with money and finances. But there are certain times or moments when pressure that we’re just carrying on an average, normal, everyday basis feels a lot heavier than usual, and it’s not because something dramatic happened, but because we’re tired enough to finally feel it. I don’t know if you’ve done a retreat or a mission trip or even a junior high lock-in—like I’ve done many times over the years—but for me, after one of those events is over, you’ve “turned it on” for so long, and then you have a minute to breathe afterward. I often crash during those times, and there’s a sadness that comes and a pressure—not a relief, like it’s a pressure that shows up.

Sometimes something similar shows up at the end of a calendar year, or after a long season of change, or even sometimes in the quiet after a really busy stretch or a busy push in ministry. When there’s finally some space to notice how much we’ve been carrying or holding, sometimes that’s when pressure feels the heaviest, and that can happen sometimes in this season, around Christmas, after Christmas, or in the new year. So I wanted to take the time today to address it, because it’s something we have in common. Sometimes that pressure can sound like, “Did we do enough? How are we ending the year? Are we okay? What does this say about us? What happens next in our church, in our lives?” Pressure isn’t always about money, but money often has a little piece in there. And I think part of the reason for that is really simple: money is very measurable. Budgets are measurable, just like time.

Sometimes when things feel uncertain, we reach for what we can count: attendance, giving, budgets, trends in our churches. This is not because we’re shallow; it’s because uncertainty—things that we can’t measure—is often uncomfortable. In our churches, it’s normal and easier to ask, “Are the numbers okay?” because if we ask, “Are the people okay?” there’s a lot that can vary in that. What do we mean? Sometimes we need to ask, “Am I okay?” So pressure from a lot of places and in a lot of ways often can settle into numbers, and before we know it, we’re tying our worth, our faithfulness, or our hope to things that were never meant to carry that much meaning. And that’s why this episode matters, no matter when you’re listening.

As I mentioned, we’re wrapping up the finance series. If you’re just popping into this episode and you haven’t listened to the entire series, you may want to go back and catch it. It’s not just for pastors or leaders or finance people; it’s for all of us. So often in small churches, we mention numbers, and people will say, “Laurie, I know you say that numbers don’t matter…” and you know, maybe I’ve said that, but numbers do matter. I think the message I carry the most, or that I want to get out the most, is that measures aren’t an indicator of our success. Attendance metrics, finances—that’s not Kingdom success. That’s not exampled by Jesus, the Bible, or Christian history. It’s never about the numbers. But it doesn’t mean numbers don’t matter, because we live in a world that has a clock. It has time. We have budgets. It’s a part of stewardship. But I hope throughout this series, there’s been some pressure released, because even though numbers matter, they don’t need to carry the pressure that we put on them. We make them mean more than they do.

I want to share a post that popped up in our Facebook community within the last couple of weeks. Sarah has been listening to the finance series, and please listen to what she said. She posted: “Laurie, I’ve learned so much from your church finance series. I am ‘just a volunteer,'” and she put quotation marks around “just a volunteer.” “So I really didn’t think it applied to me, but I am so glad I listened. What resonated most for me is that Jesus is alive in my congregation, and He is holding His church together.” She mentioned a little bit about the differentiation that I made in Episode 203 about the nonprofit versus the church—these two entities, these two integrated pieces that make up our churches. And she went on to say that it was such a welcome mindset shift, and she can’t wait to share it with others. When I read this post, I sat with it for a minute because, especially coming from a volunteer, that matters so much to me. Volunteers often carry pressure in a very quiet way. They are not the ones setting the budget; they’re often not the ones making the big decisions; but they’re showing up and they care.

Oftentimes, congregation members, even those without an official role, will be quietly wondering, “Is this enough? Does this even matter?” And when finances feel tense in a church, many people in the congregation—not just the finance team or the pastor—absorb the tension without sometimes even being invited in to understand it. So when Sarah said, “My one takeaway is Jesus is alive here, and He’s holding our church together,” that tells me that something landed at the right level—not necessarily instruction, not more responsibility, but reassurance, maybe some relief, maybe trust. And honestly, that’s one of the things I hoped that this series would offer: not more pressure, not more “to-dos”—we all have a lot of those—but just a steadier place to stand. You know, talking about pressure, one of the hardest things about ministry pressure that I’ve seen and that I’ve experienced is how subtly it settles in. It’s not like somebody hands us a big ball of pressure and says, “Here, take this pressure,” and we just start carrying it.

Laurie Graham 10:21
No, it’s just with a “yes”—it’s with an invitation. We take on a responsibility, and we feel responsible for the outcome. Oftentimes, many of us are carrying expectations that we didn’t really agree to, or didn’t know we were agreeing to, or questions that we don’t have answers for. Because we care, we keep going. Over time, that pressure or that weight starts to feel really normal—like it’s supposed to be there—which, I’m going to say, it’s not. But that extra pressure starts to feel really normal until we are exhausted.

We’re actually going to talk about burnout in a couple of episodes in January, so hang on to that. If you’re feeling exhausted today, it’s not failure. This is what happens when we love something very deeply, when maybe we step a little bit outside of our boundaries and pour in. It’s really tricky in church spaces because, oftentimes, when we carry more, we get praised. This is when burnout becomes like a badge of honor. We don’t usually get affirmed for resting, do we? Hey, let’s celebrate that somebody took time off!

We often get affirmed, and affirm others, for pushing through, for being dependable, for being the one who always shows up. Eventually, as this kind of culture keeps going, letting go or taking a break can start to feel irresponsible or even unfaithful. But can I remind you that Jesus never equated exhaustion with obedience? Jesus knew his limits. He withdrew; he rested. He didn’t rush to prove that things were working. When we skip over these parts of Jesus’s life, we end up carrying so much in His name, so to speak, that we’re actually not supposed to be holding. And this is where Christmas helps, and why Christmas is part of the finance series—not just as a season, but as a reminder.

Remember that Jesus did not enter the world through success, momentum, or even visible impact. He didn’t arrive with numbers to point to or results to defend. Jesus entered our world quietly, ordinarily, without any proof that anything was “working.” This story, this truth, reminds us that God’s work has never lined up neatly with any sort of expected metrics. The Church has always been held together by Jesus, not by our performance. Being present doesn’t produce quick results. And by the way, that’s what Jesus came for: presence. Presence doesn’t produce quick results. It doesn’t give us charts. It doesn’t always make us feel productive.

But presence is what forms people. If we’re honest, a lot of the pressure we feel comes from trying to make presence prove itself. Like, “I want to prove that I was here. I want to prove that I made a difference.” There’s a lot of pressure with that. We even try to justify rest, or we try to explain when things are calm, or we try to justify that trust is still “responsible.” Can we just slow down and let Christmas remind us that God was not in a hurry to prove anything? Just the fact of how Jesus came into the world should remind us that God was never in a hurry to prove anything. God chose slowness. He chose a way that was not what people expected for the Messiah entering the world. God chose this. He chose slowness. He chose time. God chose relationship.

And if that’s how God entered the world, maybe we don’t need to feel frantic right now either. Maybe we don’t have to panic over our church finances, or over whether the church at large is going downhill in our society. Maybe our faithfulness doesn’t need to prove anything. You know, I think being faithful doesn’t always look impressive. In fact, I would honestly say it usually doesn’t. I think faithfulness looks like staying grounded when other people around us are really anxious. I think faithfulness looks like refusing to panic—being the calm one. I think faithfulness can often look like letting unanswered questions just exist for a while, not being in a hurry. I think faithfulness can look very much like choosing to rest when things feel really urgent—literally in the midst of things feeling urgent.

And this is not neglect; this is trust. Trust doesn’t mean that we don’t care, but trust means we let God do what He does, and we carry what He gave us to carry, which is not everything. So here’s a question that you don’t need to answer out loud, but it still might be worth mulling over a little bit: Is there something you are carrying right now? Some weight that is on you that maybe nobody even explicitly asked you to carry? Or a weight that’s on you—something you’re carrying—that you know it’s not right for you to have? Something in your gut knows that it’s pulling you down or pulling you under, and you can’t stand healthy with this weight or this responsibility.

And let’s just be clear: this is not because you’re weak. It’s not because you’re failing. It’s actually because you care. What would it feel like—that one thing that’s weighing really heavy—what would it feel like, even temporarily, to just loosen your grip on that? Just think about what it would feel like to loosen your grip. You don’t have to let it go. You don’t have to quit it. You don’t have to decide anything today. But notice it, because sometimes noticing can be the beginning of rest or the beginning of a plan to make a change—to do something different.

Laurie Graham 18:36
No matter where you’re listening from or when you are listening, I want to toss this out to you as a reminder of the Christmas story, because it was so exampled in the way that Jesus came and how He lived on this planet. We do not have to solve what’s next right now. We do not have to clarify anything before we rest. We don’t have to justify taking a break. We are allowed to enjoy the people that are in front of us. We are allowed to notice what is good around us. We are allowed to sit back and let God do what only He can do.

And this permission is not just for December. As I mentioned, this isn’t just about the Christmas season, but Christmas is a reminder any time of the year. This permission applies in January, February, March—at any time that you feel an inordinate pressure or weight, whether it’s just a whisper that’s starting or something that is pulling you down. Again, this could be church finances, it could be your ministry role, or it could be things that are happening personally in your life. But we are allowed to let God do what only He can do. We are allowed to enjoy the people in front of us and the good around us. We’re allowed to rest. We’re allowed to take time before making a decision about what’s next. This is where we’re landing in this finance series: not with everything tied up neatly with a bow, but with maybe a little different perspective, a little different kind of clarity, some conversations to have, and a little more room and space for health around the discussions that happen within your church.

Next week is our final episode of the year, and what we’re going to do is zoom out a bit. I am so excited to share with you the conversations that mattered the most in our community in 2025—the episodes and the posts that people shared, reacted to, pushed back on, kept coming back to, and sometimes argued over. I’m going to be sharing the top episodes and the most shared conversations. I’ll be sharing which ones surprised me the most, and I’m going to guess a couple are going to surprise you as well. But more than that, and more importantly, what I’m really excited to talk about is what those responses revealed about the pressure small churches are under right now and the courage that’s popping up everywhere.

Before we wrap up today, I just want to leave you with this: Jesus delights in you. He’s not asking you to work harder, do more, or push through one last thing. He’s not hovering with a checklist. He’s walking with you. He’s walking with me—not driving us, not pushing us, not pulling us, not berating us. He’s walking with us. This is what Emmanuel means: God with us. God with us—not God measuring us, not God pushing us, but God with us. We are not here to save the church, financially or otherwise. Jesus has that covered. What we’re here for, what He’s inviting us into, is walking with Him faithfully and honestly, with the easy yoke, not carrying more than we were ever meant to carry. Love you tons. Thanks for being part of our community. Can’t wait to pop in again next week. Until then, be a light.