Psalm 35:27 *Let them shout for joy, and be glad, that favour my righteous cause: yea, let them say continually, Let the LORD be magnified, which hath pleasure in the prosperity of his servant*
*THE EXCESSES* (d)
When I started ministry, the counsel of two people taught me to be accountable in ministry. In the beginning, we had no record for income and expenditure. Then, my belief was that since we did not mismanage money, we are good to go. Truly, we could defend that with God but not with men because humans deal with written records.
On one occasion when I visited Asaba, Pastor Tony asked about how I was handling the ministry's finance. When I told him we don't keep records because we are faithful with money, he gave me a short but powerful school of ministry seminar in the area of accountability in finance. That was where my change began.
The second person who contributed to my knowledge in this area early in ministry was Pastor Temi Ola. He said, "the nature of your ministry requires partnership, auditing your account and presenting it may attract international partnership"( paraphrase). That counsel was prophetic.
Truly, since we started auditing our account, through it, we have attracted a few international partnership and we trust God for more of it in days to come. This leads us to the next excess.
*4#. Lack of accountability*
Romans 14:12 NKJV
[12] *So then each of us shall give account of himself to God*
One big issue among some ministers today is accountability in finances. They are the alpha et omega of their ministry finances. No record keeping, no auditing, no presentation of account to stakeholders in the church. This is a very wrong way to do ministry.
Some do not even separate their personal account from church's. Everything goes into the account of the set man.This is not right. This way, there won't be proper accountability because everything will be muddled up.
One of the things I keep emphasizing to my associates is accountability in finances. There is no room for "I forgot change". Everything must be on record. I am of the opinion that you must have a system that keeps record of finances and present it to relevant stakeholders not the general public.
In our ministry, we present a yearly audited statement of account to our financial partners only. This is because they are stakeholders who contributed to our mission outreaches and day-to-day operations. We owe them accountability. There are churches that do same to their members. My local church is an example.
Every minister of the Gospel must realize that they are accountable to God first and then to God's people in the stewardship of God's money. There is a tendency to feel church money is your money. That's a wrong mentality.
The moment you realize you are only a steward of whatever comes into your ministry, accountability will not be an issue. If you are sent on errand by your church, give account of how you spent the money.
Father, I receive the grace to be accountable in Jesus name.