Money flows to the right causes.
—Wayne Pohl
Last year, for the first time in the almost two decades that I have been pastor of St. Paul’s, we had to make a 17 percent across-the-board, mid-year cut in the budget, primarily because of economic recession in the Detroit area.
But there were other reasons. Raising money is more difficult today than at any time in my twenty-five years of ministry. There are so many more toys to buy and pleasures to pursue. People want the newest technology in their homes. The percentage of our members who frequent Florida or Arizona every winter or a cabin in northern Michigan every summer weekend has increased. Such enticements divert dollars.
And there is a new mindset. Whereas our parents and grandparents believed in saving money for security, accumulating as large an inheritance as possible for their children, today, in such uncertain times, people wonder how much time they have left. Many choose to live for the moment. One bumper sticker says, “I’m spending my child’s inheritance.”
Sometimes I feel like a farmer who watches better crops growing in the fields but who also fights more vicious infestations of worms, crows, weeds, and blight. Raising congregational giving—so that ministry can expand, needs can be met, and people will be drawn to Christ—is becoming an ever greater challenge.
Here is how I respond.
Rivet Attention on the Great Commission
Seeds take root and grow best in rich, black topsoil. The richest topsoil for growing dollars for ministry is a vision for the Great Commission. If I have cast the vision clearly, if our hearts are beating for the lost, finances will follow. Money flows to the right causes. Great Commission enthusiasm, in fact, provides a growth environment for every area of the church, but especially in people’s financial stewardship.
Several years ago, as happens to most churches at one time or another, this congregation got comfortable. When leadership proposed a new and larger sanctuary, we heard objections: “We’re already the largest congregation of any denomination in the south suburbs of Detroit. We already have 1,000 people attending worship weekly. We’ve got money to hire staff and run effective programs. Why do we need more people?”
When I heard such comments, I said to myself, Pohl, you haven’t focused their attention on the mission. They don’t have the vision. Good stewardship is built on a clear understanding of the church’s purpose: we exist to reach the lost. That dream elicits dollars.
People ask, “Will you ever be satisfied?”
“No,” I reply. “We won’t be satisfied until we’ve reached the 52,500 unchurched people within a six-mile radius of our church. Until then, we will keep growing, expanding staff and facilities, and multiplying programs. Of necessity, this is a growing church.”
Without that challenge, a church eventually relaxes, as do financial commitments. I tell people if they are rankled by a challenge, by pressure to expand ministry, there are comfortable churches to attend. If they want to be a part of something special, something with a great purpose, something exciting, then a price must be paid. Significance has a cost.
Detonate Myths
Myths about church finances abound. They are like boll weevils boring into cotton balls. I have found that I need to spray pesticides on the following myths of lay people.
• No matter what I give, God will provide. After one stewardship sermon, which outlined cutbacks necessary to accommodate the budget, one of the wealthier older members of our congregation greeted me warmly at the door, grabbed my arm, and said, “Pastor, God will send someone to meet our need.” I had hoped she would be the one, but that never happened.
I’ve found the best response to those who have swallowed this myth is “Yes, the Lord will provide—through you and me and everyone in this church. If you believe what you’re saying, I want you to trust the Lord to provide for you personally as you give sacrificially to this ministry. The Lord wants to perform a miracle not only in the church’s finances but in every individual’s finances.”
We work to overcome this myth in membership classes. “It is a mystery,” I often say, “but God has limited himself to accomplishing his work, building his church and reaching the lost through us. In this church, we’re not going to beat you over the head about finances, but please know that we need you to support this church financially. Everyone does his or her part. Some churches may run on air, but we need chairs and food and utilities.”
• Normal expenses do not apply to the church. Many people act as if the church is in a different dimension. The expenses they deal with daily—utilities, food, and a roof overhead—don’t, in their minds, apply to the church or its workers. No company would shut off a church’s gas, electricity, phone, or water, they may unthinkingly conclude. No one would haul a church into court. The church staff gladly serves the Lord, with little concern about their wages.
In my annual money sermon I give people a dose of reality by reading our annual expenses: “We paid over $30,000 to Michigan Consolidated Gas Company last year. We paid over $1,000 a month to Michigan Bell and ATandT. These companies have a habit of wanting to be paid. We are not of the world, but we are in the world.”
One time after I made this speech, a member admitted, “Pastor, I never would have thought our church had to pay so much in phone bills. My phone bill is thirty dollars a month.” I explained that we have sixteen staff people and nine lines running into the building. His eyes were opened, and soon after he increased his pledge significantly.
• No matter what happens, everything will somehow work out for good. Church money shortages don’t bother some members. In their minds, that’s the way it’s supposed to be in church. Financial shortages work for good: The pastor will be more spiritual if he doesn’t know one day from the next where his salary will come from or how the church mortgage will be paid. The less secure we are financially, the more members will need to trust.
I teach that while God works for good even in poverty, he doesn’t oppose financial strength in his church. God doesn’t want pastors pleading every week for money to pay the bills. He doesn’t want the pastor’s family resenting the ministry because they struggle financially. He doesn’t want his church to have the reputation in the community of being a slow pay, or worse, a no pay. God doesn’t want churches so weighted down with financial problems that they can’t think of expanding their vision and ministry.
The stronger a church is financially, the more good it can do for God in the world, the better its reputation will be with outsiders, and the more it can help the needy. The highest good is to accomplish much for Christ.
Using the Pulpit Effectively
Preaching is the greatest tool I have to encourage people toward higher giving. By using it well, I can help people become better stewards. Here are a few guidelines I follow when preaching about money.
• Talk about money. I currently sit on a denominational council that deals with stewardship matters. I repeatedly hear pastors proudly say, “I never talk about money from the pulpit.” It is no coincidence that many of the churches they lead are financially weak.
Clearly some pastors are hesitant, at best, to talk about money from the pulpit. Stewardship, yes. Sacrifice, yes. But money? That seems too mundane and personal.
I have never thought of it that way. People need leadership, instruction, and discipleship in every dimension of the Christian life: doctrine, marriage, child raising, thought life, speech, work. Finances are no different. I give people the whole counsel of God, especially on a subject so critical that Jesus said, “You cannot serve God and money.”
In addition, if a pastor never talks about money, members won’t think giving is important. Jesus thought it important enough to talk about often, so it’s certainly appropriate for me to do likewise.
• Don’t talk about money more than twice a year. I limit myself to two money sermons a year, both during stewardship month. If I preach money more than that, I’ve noticed diminishing returns as some people get defensive, resistant.
When I do address it, I say, “If you do your job during pledge week, you will never hear another sermon during the year on money.” In my experience, people give more as a result. Knowing that they will not be hounded for money every week, they listen better when I do talk about it. They appreciate my approach: besides Christmas and Easter, the highest attended Sundays of the year often are the two Sundays I talk about money.
• Preach as if Christians want to give. Analysts of church culture commonly say, “Unchurched people tell us that one of the biggest reasons they avoid church is ‘All they talk about is money.’ ” Hearing that, it doesn’t take long for a pastor to conclude that Christians themselves, even committed members of a church, would rather not hear about money, don’t want to be challenged to give, nor want to know about the church’s needs.
While that may be true for some, my experience is that followers of Christ want to give. With the Spirit of God in their hearts, they have a predisposition to become increasingly unselfish, generous, and filled with agape love. The church is their eternal family. If we present the needs properly, believers appreciate the opportunity to give for the Lord.
One evening fifteen years ago, a young management executive in our congregation shared with me, “One of my life goals is to be the leading giver in our congregation.” At the time, he owned an average home and was on a bottom rung in a multinational corporation. Nevertheless he gave enthusiastically what he could.
Bob advanced quickly in the management positions of his corporation, and he now heads a major division. About a year ago, I told him, “Bob, thank God for your commitment, and thank God for his blessings to you and this church. This past year your dream was realized. You have become the leading contributor to this congregation.”
His motives were not selfish; our congregation does not publish what people give. His ambition was no different than the person who says, “I want to be the finest Sunday school teacher in our church.” He simply wanted to be a giver.
• Mention specific needs from the pulpit. Some feel that talking about specific projects and needs from the pulpit diminishes the motive of giving purely out of love for the Lord. I look at the epistles, however, and I see Paul collecting money for the needy in Jerusalem. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t want the bottom-line motive for people’s giving to be their love for the Lord; he is calling on them to fulfill their responsibility, to have compassion. And you can’t show compassion to needs you don’t know about.
To me, banning the mention of specific needs from the pulpit is like saying a breadwinner shouldn’t know about specific house-hold bills; he or she should earn a paycheck with a single-minded desire to show love for family. Yet, responding to specific needs is what love is all about. Like the “sheep” (of Matthew 25) who showed their love for Jesus by visiting the sick, feeding the hungry, and clothing the naked, so people in the pew today can show their love for Jesus by responding to specific needs mentioned from the pulpit.
Employ Marketing Principles
I believe God gave marketing principles for the church, not the world. Marketing principles are neither moral nor immoral in themselves. They are tools for reaching worthy goals: to make people aware of our plans, to communicate the importance of those plans, to cast a vision, to communicate a theme, to catch attention and generate interest.
Marketing really means effective communication. Just as farmers need to use the latest agricultural technology just to keep up, so churches need to communicate effectively to keep pace with what people are used to.
During the two months we build up for stewardship month and Loyalty Sunday, we employ a host of marketing principles:
• Quality. We don’t use some leftover program. Everything is done with excellence. The loyalty committee prints their own quality stationery every year, for example, because people don’t take shabbily printed materials or presentations seriously. You can’t print flyers on an old mimeograph machine and expect today’s people to think your program is well-planned and significant. Our culture has trained people to think that way. The greater the excellence of the publicity and promotion, the greater will be the presumed value of the event.
• Repetition. People tend to think what they see the most is the most important. One announcement the week before Loyalty Sunday will not affect people. Neither do two or three announcements do the trick. To communicate the importance of something, people must hear about it weekly for at least five to six weeks. So we start advertising our Loyalty Sunday, which is in early November, the Sunday after Labor Day.
Publicity doesn’t even register until it has been seen several times; people have learned to screen out most of the barrage of advertising they receive every day. One more event at the church will be forgotten unless we fix it in their minds repeatedly.
• Personal Contact. United Airlines has a tv ad that pictures a sales meeting headed by an owner upset about losing one of his long-time customers. He thinks it signifies a bigger problem. He tells his sales force that they are going to solve the problem by returning to their former way of doing things.
He walks around the room and hands everyone an airline ticket. Instead of relying on overnight mail, telephones, and fax machines, their company will once again have personal contact with customers. When an employee asks whom he plans to see, the boss replies, “My old friend.”
Personal contact makes a difference. We incorporate the human touch into our stewardship campaign. For example, a couple of weeks before Loyalty Sunday, someone from the loyalty committee calls every family in the church, asking which worship service they will attend on Loyalty Sunday, explaining that we will have their packet of materials ready for them.
• Variety. This is an aspect of repetition. We communicate in as many forms as possible: letters, phone calls, music, testimonies, children’s sermons (which communicate more effectively with the adults than perhaps anything else), posters, skits, overhead transparencies, and banners and signs hung around the facilities. The more forms in which a message is put, the more likely it will connect.
Consider Your Timing
Someone has said that timing is everything. It certainly is for a farmer. His income for the year depends largely on whether he plants at the right time, rains fall at the right time, and fields become dry for harvest at the right time. In church, right actions at the wrong time are just as impotent as wrong actions. Here are some timing factors to take into account.
• Never spring a special pledge or offering on people. As I mentioned, we warn at least two months in advance about the pledges to be taken on Loyalty Sunday; we want people to make a prayerful, careful decision. If they do that, over the long haul, they will give more.
If we don’t forewarn people, they pledge on their emotions. When that happens, they can’t maintain their giving. Then they feel guilty, and since no one likes that, some will stop attending our church.
• Take current economics into account. Our church is not pushing for a big increase in pledges for next year. Unemployment in the area now stands at 13 percent. Furthermore, we’re raising two million dollars for a building program, and typically such a drive hurts general-fund giving.
Then again, hard times in the economy don’t always signal hardscrabble for the church. A decade ago the recession affected us oppositely; our church actually grew in numbers and finances. When hard times strike, people view their lives differently, valuing possessions less and hungering for spiritual things more, and they turn to the church for help. (Sometimes I almost wish, perversely, that the bottom would completely fall out of the economy! As it is, people hold back because they have the financial freedom to buy “toys.”)
In either case, I think carefully about what’s happening currently in the economy before leading the congregation financially.
• Move slowly in times of friction. Staff friction and church factions devastate fund raising. Finances are controversial to begin with; adding fund raising to a church fight spills kerosene on the fire. I take care of first things first: deal with the unrest and then handle the finances.
Similarly, we have found that a bad time to raise funds is when key people leave the staff. Each staff member carries the support of people concerned about that staff member’s ministry area. One year we delayed a major construction project because of such a staff change. Waiting a few years restored the sense of peace and joy necessary for members to enthusiastically support a major building-fund drive.
On our Loyalty Sunday, instead of passing plates to receive pledge cards, we ask people to walk to the front and place their pledges on the altar, just as a farmer in Old Testament times would bring the first fruits of his harvest to the temple.
The moment is powerful and symbolic. People of all sorts come forward—wealthy entrepreneurs and the blind, teenagers and those shuffling forward with a walker—all offering the fruit of their labor to the Lord. By allowing people to give in this symbolic manner, it reminds both them and us that we are not just raising a big budget or larger offerings, we are presenting ourselves to the Lord.
Copyright © 1992 by Christianity Today
