Should a Pastor Know What Church Members Give?
Every time I teach a stewardship workshop or class, this question invariably comes up: “Should a pastor have access to contribution records?” In some congregations,…
Browsing: Finances
Articles
Models for Budget Building
Churches use a variety of budget building models. No one model or combination of models is right for every church. What approach might best fit…
Quarterly Financial Statements Enhance Giving
Every year churches are required to send out an end-of-year giving statement for IRS purposes. Instead of doing it only once a year, consider doing…
Online Giving Connects Ministry and Mission
Nearly three years ago our church began offering online giving through our website. We added a PayPal button and were curious to see how church…
Electronic Giving: A Matter of Vision, Not Just Convenience
In 2011, Pleasant Hope Baptist Church was experiencing a financial crunch. In addition to the turbulence associated with the national economic recession, our discomfort was…
Keys to Effective Financial Ministry
Not surprisingly, church consultant Clif Christopher’s new book, Rich Church, Poor Church: Keys to Effective Financial Ministry (Abingdon Press, 2012), makes many of the same points…
Will the Mainline Denominations Get It Right?
“We can either have a hard decade or a bad century.” New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman used these stark words to describe the…
Remaining Fruitful in the Midst of a Financial Reset
I think the American Church is undergoing a reset. America is getting older; and the Church is even older. For a generation, expenditures have increased…
Denominations Face Major Reset
Most congregations know the financial squeeze of recent years from the economic recession. What is more striking is that the financial downturn for denominations is…
Do Endowments Help or Hurt?
Some churches have endowments in which the principal is invested, with the earnings made available to support the work of the congregation. One pastor said…
