The Adams Tithe
Episcopal News Service. June 9, 1988 [88128]
Barbara Weaver, Diocese of Southern Ohio
DAYTON, Ohio (DPS, June 9) -- Betty Adams, a parishioner of St. Andrew's, was tired and not feeling very well on Jan. 30, 1988. About 6:45 p.m. she realized she had not yet bought her lottery ticket for the Saturday drawing of Ohio's Super Lotto. She mustered up enough energy to go to a neighborhood store, buy her ticket, and come back home to crawl into bed and watch television. When the winning numbers were announced, she couldn't believe it.
She had won $9 million.
Later that night, Adams called the Rev. Douglas Taylor-Weiss, rector of St. Andrew's, to tell him she would be tithing 10 percent of her gross winnings -- $45,000 a year for 20 years -- to St. Andrew's.
Her decision to tithe any lottery winnings was made about a year ago. Adams was on the St. Andrew's search committee and had gone to Milwaukee to get to know the Rev. Edward Curtis, who is now serving at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland. His sermon that Sunday was on stewardship.
"No one had ever explained stewardship to me the way he did," Adams said. "He said that everything we get is from God and that, when we tithe, we are only giving a little bit back to God. I had never really understood tithing until then.
"At the time I was working three part-time jobs and hardly making ends meet. But I realized I was spending more on lottery tickets each week than I was giving to the church. I decided that the least I could do was to turn that around, to put more in church than the lottery," she said.
The search for a new rector of St. Andrew's ended with Taylor-Weiss. Shortly after his arrival at St. Andrew's, Adams told him about her experience in Milwaukee.
"I said, 'Doug, if I ever win the lottery, ten percent will come off the top for St. Andrew's.'"
When Adams won the $9 million, even she had trouble believing it was true. She said she checked the numbers over and over and that, when she told her three children and Taylor-Weiss, their initial response was, "You're kidding!"
But Adams wasn't kidding. Her life has certainly not been easy. She has raised three children by herself, and for several years she was on welfare while she struggled to educate herself. For 16 years she and her children lived in a housing project.
"It was a rough place to live," she said, "but I was very strict, and I taught them to make their own decisions. By the time they were 16, they were fully responsible young people, making good decisions. I told them that they have to deal with life as it is, not as it should be," she said.
Through determination and hard work, Adams managed to give all three of her children a college education. Her youngest child graduated in December shortly before she won the lottery.
"My children are my best friends," she said. "Now I can give them things I never could before."
Adams has not placed any restrictions on how St. Andrew's spends her gift to the church.
With the first $45,000 check now in the bank, the St. Andrew's vestry is following an extensive process that will ensure the money is handled wisely, Taylor-Weiss said.
"We are working with the Gospel according to Luke, particularly chapters 12 and 13", he said. "When we started, we called the fund, 'The Lottery Money'. Then we changed the name to 'The Adams Tithe'. Now it's called the 'Mustard Seed Fund'. We hope that gives some insight into how we are trying to focus ourselves," he said.
Taylor-Weiss explained that the process includes four phases. First, the vestry will ask itself: "what does Christ want St. Andrew's to be?" The fully-developed response to this question should be completed by the end of May.
During the second phase, the vestry will ask: "where is Christ's heart and how can St. Andrew's be there?" This question is based upon the scripture, "For where your treasure is, their will your heart be also" (Luke 12:34). Decisions on how the money will be spent -- percentages for local mission, diocesan mission, building maintenance, basic church operation -- will be made by August.
"The future is not ours" and "How can we be ready for the Master's coming?" will be addressed during phase three. Decisions about endowments and other ways to plan for the future will be made during the fall.
Phase four will involve making all the technical arrangements, such as legal documents. These arrangements should be completed by Jan. 16, 1989, when a new vestry is elected.
"It's a great responsibility for our vestry to set this up," Taylor-Weiss said.
The rector and vestry are grateful for advice and encouragement given by the diocesan stewardship commission, one of whose members now is Betty Adam's daughter, Kendall Childs.
Senior Warden Bill Wilbert explained, "this is an educational process for the whole church. We can use this as an example of how we as individuals and as a church approach tithing. We must do a lot of introspection.
"We must ask ourselves, 'How are we going to be stewards of this aspect of Christ's work,'" Wilbert said.