FINANCE AND LAW

Empty Plates, Empty Hearts?

Practical ways to help your congregation discover the joy of giving

Bruce Anderson

One might discern from his comment that Lederman never helped raise funds for a church. That's true especially to day—when churches all over America are dealing with the maddening effects of a cultural and theological move away from stewardship.

Giving in the Church
At a time when consumer demand for church amenities, programs, and fancy gizmos continues to rise, the giving base to support all that has been dropping since 1956. Across the country, building projects are straining church budgets, mission programs are being cancelled, and staff pay raises are tabled for future consideration. Until stewardship is reestablished as a fundamental element of Christian theology and life, these negative trends will only continue.

Some churches don't appear to have money problems. Their buildings multiply over night, their numerous staff people are well-compensated, and their shiny vans adorned with the church logo are visible all over town.

This sort of prosperity can be misleading. It illustrates two assumptions about church finances:

1. If a church has money problems, it must be financially dysfunctional.

2. If a church has plenty of money, it's not financially dysfunctional.

Both of those assumptions are myths. In reality, from a stewardship perspective, many, if not most, churches that appear prosperous are no different than the poorest churches. In the typical church today, 25 percent of the congregation gives 90 percent of the weekly offering. Within that group, the top 5 percent gives 50 percent of the church's income, and the remaining 20 percent gives the other 40 percent.

That means a whopping 70 percent of the typical congregation contributes only 5 percent of the incoming dollars. In simple terms, nearly three-quarters of American church attenders drop about a buck a week in the offering plate.

Viewed from a pure business perspective, these numbers might give rise to a simple but hopeful challenge: By persuading the bottom group of contributors to give only half of what the next higher group (the 20 percent of the top givers) gives, one can double a church's revenue base.

Viewed from a spiritual perspective, however, these numbers indicate that the great majority of people who worship on Sundays are missing out on the most important elements of spiritual surrender, reliance on God, and genuine worship.

Why People Don't Give
There was a time when sacrificial giving was a cornerstone of the Christian life, even during the Great Depression and other times of widespread financial distress. Yet today, when employment is at an all-time high and our nation is experiencing unprecedented prosperity, the average churchgoer only gives about 2 percent of his or her income to the church.

Several key cultural and economic factors account for this decline in giving. Some of them:

• Excessive consumer debt. In 1996, consumer debt exceeded the trillion-dollar mark. The bankruptcy rate was the highest in history. In America's rabid consumer culture of persuasive advertising and easy credit, two in comes have become a necessity in the average family. Even then, people are tapped out before they can give to their church. In essence, by the time the offering plate passes their way, people must wave it away because they have already served the god of consumerism and excess spending.

• Generational shift. The mantle of power and influence has passed from the penny-pinching, money-hoarding generation that lived through the Great Depression to the instant-gratification Baby Boomer and GenX crowd. Where as the older generation was taught to worship with one's giving, today's generation views a tithe as whatever is left after paying one's bills to be given to the church to pay its bills.

• Lack of financial training. To day, very few money-management skills are taught in homes, churches, schools, or seminaries. Many people don't understand the basics of financial management, such as establishing and living within a budget or balancing a checkbook, much less the biblical perspective on what to do with one's money. Many church members have been indoctrinated into a payment-for-services-rendered mind set rather than understanding tithing as an act of worship.

• Failure to plan for the future. Many church members will one day surrender more of their income in one day to the Internal Revenue Service through estate taxes than they will have given to the Kingdom of God throughout their lives. Yet, given the immediacy of financial demands, many churches view future endowment dollars as meaningless or not worth the effort of courting. Few have come to grips with a concept that universities, foundations, and nonprofits have long ago embraced: that it is essential to attract assets from instruments like wills, life insurance, appreciated assets, estate-tax liabilities, and charitable bequeaths.

Goals of Giving
In light of these dominant trends, the question remains: How does one motivate a congregation to worship with its whole heart, including its willingness to give? Seven goals to keep in mind when educating people about the true meaning of stewardship:

1. Focus on how giving to the church will help people find true joy in their financial, spiritual, and worship life rather than telling them what they need to give in order to help keep the church going.

2. Teach people how to live with God's money instead of how to give their money. Encourage living within a budget and buying only what they have money for. Tell them to put away the credit cards except for emergencies. If the Israelites had had MasterCard, they never would have depended on manna.

3. Meet church members where they are in their giving habits and help them toward where they need to go. I've heard some churches welcome visitors to church the first week by telling them about God's life-changing message of acceptance and forgiveness. By the second week, visitors are being welcomed to the "Ten Percent Club." By week three, they're getting sermons on how wicked they are if they don't pay their debts. A little more grace and compassion can go a long way with people who are in the throes of financial struggles.

4. Teach people how to be financially healthy. Instead of providing a consolidation loan to people with money problems, which is often the first step toward bankruptcy, churches can help people learn money-handling skills through budget-planning seminars or one-on-one counseling with a financial planner.

5. Model financial stewardship in church and home. Pastors who have money problems of their own are understandably reluctant to address financial is sues. The best teachers are people who live what they teach.

6. Train church staff and lay leadership to model financial stewardship in their personal and professional lives.

7. Communicate a strong vision for the church, which fosters a sense of ownership and provides a reason to give to the church. It is essential for people to understand why it is important to give to the local church before sharing one's resources with a parachurch ministry.

Stewardship Training Tips
These goals can be attained only through a proactive approach to stewardship development. Although surveys of unchurched people often pinpoint money solicitation by churches as a big turnoff, it is essential to integrate stewardship training into sermons.

Before scheduling financial education classes at church, be sure to train staff and lay leaders in Christian financial concepts, then hold them accountable. Discipleship programs are also a useful tool for helping people make the transition from the world's spendthrift ways to God's plan for financial accountability. Stewardship topics should be knit into marriage-education classes, youth events, Sunday school, and Bible studies. In addition, a formalized plan for planned giving should be instituted.

Stewardship training is a lot of work for overworked pastors and staffers. However, proper conduct of one's financial life is an undeniable building block of a fully-functioning spiritual life. If people—including pastors and church staffers—can make the transition from a give-to-pay-the-bills mindset to an it-all-belongs-to-God mindset, God's blessing will be poured out on his church that will expand it far beyond buildings and vans.

Bruce Anderson is president of Donné Corporation, a national church consulting and development firm.

Helpful Resources

Copyright © 2000 by the author or Christianity Today International/Your Church Magazine. Click here for reprint information on Your Church.
March/April 2000, Vol. 46, No. 2, Page 52

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