Pastors

IT’S A 3-POCKET WORLD

Lyle E. Schaller

What church couldn’t use fresh sources of income? Churches ask their people for support; that much is assumed. But sweeping changes during the past thirty-five years have altered other basic assumptions on which most local-church financial programs are based.

One assumption begging alteration goes back to the years of the Great Depression, when it was widely, and usually correctly, thought that most people did not have much money. This stimulated the idea that it would be wise to ask people to commit to the church a portion of their future income, which led to the system of pledging.

This right-hand pocket, where people placed their income, became the source of support for both the operating and capital expenditures of the church. This system was based on the assumption that people’s needs exceeded their income, and unless they made an advance commitment to the church, that right-hand pocket might be empty before Sunday. The biblical teaching that the first tithe belonged to the Lord reinforced this system.

After World War II, the wave of church building programs gave a big boost to this system. Thousands of congregations asked their members to pledge a portion of their future income to pay for a proposed building. And church members responded.

The period from 1950 to 1970 brought a big change, however, as personal income in the United States increased at an unprecedented pace. Even allowing for inflation, the median family income in the United States rose 86 percent between 1950 and 1970. In contrast, between 1970 and 1985 that income increased only 3 percent. The fifties and sixties were an era of extraordinary prosperity!

One result was a great many people, especially those born before 1925 who had been taught a depression ethic during the 1930s, did not spend all the money in the right-hand pocket. Many people could and did give to special needs out of that excess current income.

At the same time, this increase in current income also caused many to see the need for a left-hand pocket in their trousers. This pocket was reserved for what economists call “accumulated wealth” and the rest of us refer to as savings.

In 1950, individual annual savings amounted to $13.1 billion. By 1960 this had increased slightly to $17 billion, less than the amount necessary to offset inflation. Between 1960 and 1984, however, the annual savings of individual Americans jumped from $17 billion to $156 billion, three times faster than the rate of inflation. Today that left-hand pocket contains a huge amount of accumulated wealth.

Another change has been a redefinition of the nation’s poor. In the 1950s, and even in the 1960s, the appropriate synonym for the poor was the elderly. In today’s world, Americans over 65 have an above-average level of income and a far above-average level of accumulated wealth. Most of the individual accumulated wealth in America is owned by people who have passed their fifty-fifth birthday.

This accumulation of wealth by the nation’s mature adults has, in effect, created a third pocket that provides significant income to a growing number of congregations: bequests and legacies, or what sometimes is identified as “deferred giving.” The number of bequests received by local churches has at least tripled since 1960. Every year about one congregation in ten receives a bequest from a person unknown to most or all of the current leaders.

Implications

These changes suggest a more sophisticated approach to local church finances is needed, one that takes into account several implications:

Especially in congregations with a large number of people born before 1925, many members will presently have only a moderate level of current income. They’re limited in how much they can give out of that right-hand pocket. Often, however, they retain a substantial amount of accumulated wealth and can contribute generously out of that left-hand pocket-if they are asked.

Many of these people, however, concerned they might outlive their money, contribute only modestly on an annual basis but may leave a generous bequest after their death.

Congregations that include a large number of longtime or retired farmers also need to recognize the significance of the second and third pockets. Those who began to farm in the 1930s or 1940s did not generally have high incomes; they financed their retirement years not out of savings from income but from capital accumulation. Their operation gained value, and they sold it to retire, living off the proceeds. With moderate income but substantial wealth among their members, farm churches are wise to realize those second and third pockets often are more important than the right-hand pocket.

The increased affluence of the American people has sparked a remarkable increase in the number and variety of charitable causes, including tax-supported universities, that make financial appeals to church members. And an increasing number of people are motivated by needs rather than denominational loyalty in deciding where they make their contributions. Institutional loyalties have eroded, as can be seen most clearly in the Roman Catholic Church and mainline Protestant denominations, where a decreasing proportion of the children born in the 1940s and 1950s are now affiliated with their parents’ denomination.

Churches can no longer count on the support of their people simply out of institutional loyalty. Barraged from all sides, people want to understand the need before they give.

Strategies

Should your congregation depend on that right-hand pocket’s current and future income as the base for financing your ministry and outreach? Or should you seek contributions from the other two pockets? Governing boards will need to consider this policy question. If you decide to expand your financial base, consider these possible courses of action.

The first possibility is based on the assumption that, unlike the 1930s, a great many people do not spend all their current income. The U. S. Census Bureau recently reported that older heads of households have an average of $108 in discretionary income every week. That means a large number of Americans have money available in that right-hand pocket for special appeals. The appeals will come from a variety of charitable causes including church colleges, seminaries, television evangelists, world hunger organizations, parachurch organizations, and children’s relief agencies. If the church asks members to contribute to what is perceived as a worthy cause, that discretionary income in the right-hand pocket can be an important source of charitable giving.

The twelve-hundred-member congregation of which my wife and I are members raised $126,000 in second-mile giving for missions out of that right-hand pocket in 1985. These special appeals for designated needs can be an important supplemental source of financial resources for missions, new ministries, special programs, and other needs that often are squeezed out of the regular budget. But only if people are asked. That same right-pocket income can easily drain into vans, vacations, and VCRs.

The next strategy probably will have the greatest appeal in congregations needing to pay off a mortgage or undertake a building program. Instead of relying solely on the traditional three-year capital funds appeal that calls for members to pledge out of current and future income, it might be wise to appeal to that left-hand pocket for contributions out of accumulated wealth.

Thousands of congregations have found this a realistic alternative. It is not a pledging program. Nearly all the contributions are made in cash, or the equivalent of cash, within a period of a few weeks. People give what they have accumulated-stocks, securities, property-not what they are earning. The typical one-day or one-week appeal of this kind (preceded by three or more months of careful planning and communication of the goal) usually produces an amount equivalent to: (a) from one-third to three times last year’s total contributions for all causes, or (b) $500 to $2,000 times the average attendance at Sunday morning worship. The actual amount often depends on the scale of the proposed project.

A third possibility that is being implemented by an increasing number of congregations is to schedule once or twice a year a daylong event focusing on the Christian view of death and encouraging members to remember the church in their will. This appeal to the third pocket rarely produces immediate financial benefits since, on average, people live eight years after making out their will. As part of a long-range financial program, however, when the results are seen, they can be substantial.

In a three-pocket world, the church is wise to tailor financial requests for each of the pockets. Individuals may find any one pocket empty, but they can find great satisfaction in giving from other pockets amply filled by a gracious God.

-Lyle E. Schaller

Naperville, Illinois

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

THE NEW TAX LAW: GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS FOR CLERGY

Manfred Holck, Jr., C.P.A.

In January 1986, pastor Brad Thomas took the district superintendent to dinner at Denny’s prior to a church committee meeting. He carefully noted the purpose on the receipt he kept. When he next figured his taxes, he planned to deduct the amount of the meal from his taxable income. Since the church gave him an expense allowance, Brad was not spending personal income for church business, nor would he pay income tax on what amounted to a reimbursement for expenses the church intended him to incur. Thousands of pastors have operated this way for years.

If, in January 1987, Brad ate the same meal uniter the same circumstances and followed the same accounting procedure, he might not be able to deduct any of the expenses from his taxable income.

The Tax Reform Act of 1986 has made significant changes in the way many churches should compensate their pastors and in the way many pastors will figure their taxes, beginning in 1987.

In brief, if Brad continues with business as usual, he will pay more income taxes than would otherwise be required, and that means his take-home pay will be less than it could be.

As with most regulations, the Tax Reform Act of 1986 is both good news and bad news for pastors.

Good news for homeowners

Without a doubt, Section 107 of the Internal Revenue Code has for more than sixty years provided ordained clergy with one of the greatest tax benefits available. Qualifying clergy pay no income tax on the value of the parsonage they live in, nor, if they own their own home, do they pay on any allowance they receive, to the extent it is spent to provide for that home. (However, that value or allowance is fully taxable for social security tax purposes.) Clergy are also allowed to deduct mortgage interest and property tax expenses from the taxable portion of their income, thus reducing even further their income taxes.

At least they could until IRS Revenue Ruling 83-3 sought to repeal this double benefit in 1983. Although implementation of the ruling was repeatedly delayed for pastors maintaining the same residence, all clergy expected to lose this privilege beginning in 1987.

Here’s the good news: The 1986 Tax Reform Act once again permits all home-owning clergy to itemize as a deduction the mortgage interest and real estate taxes paid on their principal residence, even though the housing allowance was used to pay for that interest and tax expense. This returns pastors’ tax conditions to the pre-1983 days, which is good news to home-owning clergy.

And there’s more good news: the law is retroactive. Thus any clergy who did not deduct interest and property taxes in 1983, 1984, or 1985 because of the now-repealed ruling, may file an amended tax return (Form 1040X) and claim a refund, although it needs to be done before April 15, 1987 for the 1983 tax year. That means clergy who bought a home during this period and were excluded from the double benefit may now recover it.

Bad news about expense allowances

Most churches intend to reimburse their pastor for professional expenses-car, books, continuing education, business meals, conventions, subscriptions, pulpit garments. They write into the budget an allowance and pay it with the pastor’s salary. The IRS considers it income, but in the past, at tax time, the pastor consulted his records, knocked these expenses off his income on the tax return, and ended up not being taxed for professional expenses.

All this is changing.

Under the new tax law, churches and pastors following this procedure will fall into an unintentionally expensive tax trap. A simple new accounting system, however, will keep the tax bite off the pastor’s professional expenses.

The new law continues to provide that any professional expense allowance is fully taxable-the same as salary-reported on the minister’s W-2, and included on Form 1040. But now, expenses are not always or completely deductible. The new law provides, first, that only 80 percent of business meals and entertainment expenses are deductible. Second, 80 percent is deductible only when itemized on Schedule A, and then only to the extent that it (along with all other unreimbursed professional expenses) exceeds 2 percent of adjusted gross income.

Who loses? Everyone who uses the old system. They end up paying taxes on the 20 percent that is not deductible and on the portion of their allowance that makes up 2 percent of adjusted gross income. Worse, if they take the standard deduction and don’t itemize, they pay taxes on the whole allowance.

For example, let’s say Brad’s business meals total $1000, his other professional expenses are $2000, and his adjusted gross income (salary plus allowances) is $20,000. Assuming Brad itemizes deductions, in 1986 he would deduct all $3000 of expenses and pay taxes on $17,000. In 1987, however, he can deduct only $800 of the meals and entertainment expenses, thus paying taxes on the other $200. Brad will also pay taxes on the first $400 of expenses, since he can deduct only what is above that 2-percent figure. So in 1987, Brad will be taxed for $17,600, that is $20,000 ($800 + $2000 – $400).

If he is in the 15-percent tax brackets Brad will thus pay $90 more taxes in 1987, taxes on what the church intended as reimbursements, not income.

Let’s say Brad is in a parsonage and has few itemized deductions. Normally, he would be wise to take the standard deduction, which for joint filers in 1987 is $3,760 ($5000 in 1988). But then he can deduct none of his professional expenses. He’ll end up paying tax on all $3,000 of expenses, or $450 in the 15-percent bracket. Obviously, Brad’s church needs to change his method of reimbursement.

Fortunately, a simple remedy exists.

Reimbursements, not allowances

Since there is no way clergy will be able to deduct all their professional expenses, even if the congregation provides generous allowances, the best way for a congregation to maximize the pastor’s pay package is to provide reimbursement, not an allowance.

The procedure is simple. Brad fills out an expense report each month, gives it to the church treasurer, and then is reimbursed for that amount. Nothing more needs to be done for tax purposes-no reporting on a W-2, no deductions on Form 1040.

Rather than continuing to pay him an allowance with his pay, his church will reserve the $3,000 as a budget line item and dole it out monthly as reimbursement for specific expenses. This system costs the church no more, and Brad receives the same amount but saves up to $450 in taxes.

But what about car expenses? Most pastors own their own cars and use them for both business and pleasure. Specific cost reimbursement for costs of the pastor’s car used on church business is easy for gasoline, oil, and repairs, but what about replacement (depreciation)? One solution is a specific centsper-mile allowance. If such an allowance is 21 cents or less per mile, nothing is reported on the employee’s tax return. However, 21 cents may not cover the costs of operating that car, and any larger cents-permile allowance is taxable.

Another solution is for the congregation to provide and pay all the expenses of a church-owned or leased automobile. It sometimes can be done without costing the congregation anything more than would be paid for reimbursement.

Miscellaneous provisions

Social security (self-employment tax for clergy) costs continue to rise. Nonordained church employees will pay 7.15 percent of salary for FICA social security taxes in 1987 (7.51 percent in 1988). All employers, including churches that have not received an exemption, will contribute an additional 7.15 percent employer tax in 1987.

Churches, however, cannot pay social security tax on behalf of ordained clergy. Clergy personally pay the self-employment social security tax of 12.3 percent in 1987 (13.02 percent in 1988).

Since clergy pay so much more social security tax than do other employees, and churches contribute nothing for them, it makes sense for congregations to assist in paying this constantly rising tax. A reasonable allowance (fully taxable for the pastor) would be at least 7.15 percent in 1987 (7.51 percent in 1988). That way the congregation pays no more than it would have paid if the pastor were considered an employee.

Retirement planning remains much the same under the new tax law. Although both church pension boards and commercial insurance company annuities provide similar benefits, the church pension board can designate the entire pension as housing allowance, making it potentially excluded from taxes; the insurance company cannot make that designation, in which case annuity income is fully taxable. The new tax law generally limits contributions to a tax-sheltered annuity to $9,500 a year or 20 percent of taxable compensation, whichever is less.

Life insurance premiums paid by the congregation on up to $50,000 coverage for a group term policy are not taxable income for a pastor.

It’s a new ball game in 1987. But with some thought and the willingness to bend a little, churches can help their pastors receive all the benefits to which they’re entitled.-Manfred Holsk, Jr., C.P.A. Church Management, Inc.

Austin, Texas

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

FINANCIAL FACTS OF PASTORAL LIFE

Kevin Miller and Marshall Shelley

Forum

The church's first squabble was over finances, and ever since, pastors have wrestled with what role to take in church money matters. They are trained and called, as those early church leaders put it, for "prayer and the ministry of the word" (Acts 6), yet ensuring wise management and distribution of church funds is also essential to a church's health.

What is the pastor's role in the financial process? How close to the money should the pastor be?

To find out, LEADERSHIP editors Kevin Miller and Marshall Shelley went to Hartford, Connecticut, a center of insurance and finance, and talked with four experienced pastors:

-Stanley Allaby, who has ministered for thirty years at Black Rock Congregational Church in Fairfield, Connecticut, and serves on the boards of the National Association of Evangelicals and Sudan Interior Mission.

-Ed Hales, pastor of First Baptist Church, Portland, Maine, who served as stewardship director for the Baptist General Conference for seven years and is a member of the standards committee and board of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability.

-Roy Jacobsen, who for sixteen years has served the United Methodist Church of New Fairfield, Connecticut, which is currently in a building program.

-Manzer Wright, for ten years pastor of First Assembly of God in Brookfield, Connecticut, and who has been through three major building projects.

Leadership: Most pastors are called to preach and give pastoral care. How important is it that pastors have a "carnal knowledge" of numbers?

Ed Hales: Whether we want to or not, when we're dealing with a corporation that's expending, say, a quarter of a million dollars a year, we have to be pretty well versed in finances, unless we find other persons to handle it.

Roy Jacobsen: The gift of administration might not be the gift the minister has, but in our polity at least, one of my roles is chief administrator. I'm fortunate, however, to be in a church that has CPAs and a number of people gifted in administration, so I am able to delegate some responsibilities.

Stan Allaby: Yes, you can delegate, but the buck still stops with you.

Leadership: What did you not know about church finances when you entered the ministry that you've had to learn the hard way?

Manzer Wright: In one church I served, the treasurer was under the impression the money belonged to him. He would not even bring a report to board meetings. If I had to do it again, I would remove him immediately, even though he was one of the hardest working people in the church. It was one of the most frustrating things I've had to experience in ministry, not knowing the income or expenditures of the church.

Hales: The opposite of that was the first treasurer of my first church. He was relentlessly meticulous in detail, which was fine. But at each monthly business meeting there was a financial report, and I saw attendance at those meetings dwindle because who wanted to sit through a listing of every expenditure?

Allaby: When I took church administration in seminary, it was basically on how to deal with lay committees. I began to see the need for knowledge of management and finance, so I've been picking up American Management Association courses on the side.

Jacobsen: Experience teaches you. Our church was small and it has grown gradually, so I've been able to grow with it. At one time we had a financial secretary who would collect the offering, pour it into her pocketbook, and go home. I had to establish some procedures: dispensing stewards separate from the collecting stewards, two people on counting teams, this kind of thing.

Leadership: What are the dangers of becoming overconcerned with financial matters?

Hales: Inhibiting ministry. We need to be businesslike, but we also need to recognize that God's business has an element of faith and anticipation. There has to be balance. Otherwise we see only dollar signs and don't see there's spirit and life in all we're doing. The church is not just bricks and mortar; it's people involved in ministry.

Allaby: It's dangerous when a balanced budget or a surplus in the emergency fund becomes more important than adding a needed staff person or beginning an important new program.

Hales: One pastor I know asked his board, "Would you rather have a church with a million-dollar endowment or a million-dollar deficit?"

Everybody opted for the endowment.

He said, "I've pastored in both situations, and I'll take a deficit any day."

I think I understand what he was talking about. You can become so caught up with accumulating, having reserve funds and cushions-all of which are important-that holding on precludes outreach and expansion of ministry. If we must have a financial safety factor before we do anything, then let's take the name church off the door and call it something else.

Leadership: First Baptist Bank? (Laughter)

How do you instill a ministry mindset in people who watch the numbers?

Allaby: Partly through your sermons, reminding people that buildings and funds are always a means to an end, never an end in themselves.

Also, we try to get the nominating committee to populate the board with a balance between stewards and visionaries. I'm up front with the nominating committee and tell them we need some people who are going to take a sharp look at every penny as well as some who will think through the bigger issues of how money needs to be given away.

Leadership: What about the flip side? What are the dangers of a pastor ignoring church finances?

Hales: Let me answer with a story. When I was involved in stewardship work with our denomination, a church in the Midwest invited me to lead a stewardship-commitment Sunday, the first they'd ever held. The church was young, but had grown rapidly and had recently built a quarter-million-dollar building. These days, that would be three-quarters of a million.

Before the service, I met with the deacons in the pastor's study, and they told me what good things God had been doing there. "We've never ever had to talk about money," they said.

We prayed, they left, and then the pastor and I walked from his study to the sanctuary. The pastor put his arm around me as we walked and said, "Ed, our finances are lagging, and we are in a critical situation. Frankly, the whole future of our church depends on what happens today."

One reason churches neglect financial matters is because of those attitudes: pride says, "We don't have to talk about money" or fear reasons that if we talk about money, people will think we're looking to line our own pockets.

Time and again I've heard a board say to a pastor, "Pastor, you take care of the spiritual things; we'll handle the money." Those kind of people can cause an unhealthy neglect of finances. You end up preaching on stewardship at the worst time-when you have to. The best time, of course, is when things are moving ahead and you're doing well.

Allaby: I make a distinction between preaching about money and pleading for money. Telling the congregation we are running behind is something I hate to do and almost never do. I think I've done it three times in thirty years.

But I make no apologies for preaching on stewardship and money. I use testimonies of people who have given and been blessed. So we talk about stewardship a lot, but we do not beg and plead for specific needs. I think that gives a terrible image to the Christian church.

Jacobsen: One of our most important tasks is preaching and teaching about stewardship. Earlier in my ministry, I just didn't do it. I felt awkward about it, as if it were unspiritual. But through the wise counsel of others, I do it often now. I tell my people I tithe and I think it's important for them to tithe. It took a lot for me to overcome my reluctance, but I feel the Lord has blessed this direction.

Leadership: Is it part of your job to stimulate giving?

Allaby: Yes. I try to do it through enthusiasm, personal commitment, and information. I like the motto of one missions organization: "Full information, no solicitation."

If we have a need or we're facing a deadline, I let the people know. Right now, for example, we're trying to wrap up phase one of a building program, and we've had in the bulletin for the last three weeks, "We need fifteen thousand dollars by November 9 to dedicate phase one of our building debt free." We present that fact, but there's no begging, no pleading. Each quarter the trustees put in the bulletin a statement showing whether we're ahead of or behind budget. Giving that kind of information normally stimulates giving among people who are sincere about the Lord's work.

Jacobsen: I don't think it's my job to raise money; that's the work of the Holy Spirit. But it's my job to raise the issues with our people.

Hales: As pastor, I believe I have the responsibility to help raise money. I've seen a lot of Christian organizations go out of business because the executive director had the attitude, I don't raise money. That's like a cleaning lady who says, "I don't wash windows." Any person who's going to head up a Christian organization had better recognize the fact that he's going to have to raise money or that organization isn't going to make it. I know a pastor's role is a little different. But if a couple wants me to go with them to their attorney to sign their house over to the church in their will, as happened recently, then I'm delighted to go along and smile. Whether we want to be or not, we are development people.

Allaby: The lay people who are working hard on a program feel betrayed if the pastor doesn't give them support. Sometimes trustees have chided me, "You're not giving us the up-front support we need." Or the missions committee says, "You need to give us more emphasis here." Now, we can't respond to every squeaky wheel, but I don't want my lay people to feel betrayed by my failure to help raise needed money.

Leadership: Do you know or want to know the giving patterns of individuals in the church? Some pastors feel they need to know so appropriate pastoral care can be given in this important area of discipleship. Others say, "I don't even want to know who tithes, because it will lead me to treat people differently based on what they give." Where do you stand?

Allaby: I don't want to know. I don't trust myself. When I'm discipling someone, I talk about tithing. I ask the person to try it. But I don't ask if the person actually is or not.

One thing has been helpful, though, and as far as I can tell, nobody has resented it. Some time ago I taught on spiritual gifts and had people take tests and indicate what they thought their spiritual gifts were. I said we were going to use this information in the ministry. A number of people reported they had the gift of giving. I wrote each a letter and said, "I am delighted you have that gift. We need people with that gift, and with your permission I would like to write or call you once in a while to alert you to special needs and give you an opportunity to exercise that gift."

I have done that, and we've had some wonderful results. I always report to them what has happened, because I find people with the gift of giving like to make good investments. These people don't seem to mind my calling them. But I think people in my church would feel uncomfortable if they thought I knew what they gave.

Jacobsen: I don't think it's necessary for me to look at the giving records, although they are available.

It's important that people in leadership show their faith in active ways, but we don't say one must be a tither in order to be a leader. I think it's a matter of teaching what Scripture says about tithing. But we don't rigidly enforce it.

Wright: I'm not interested in knowing the level of members' giving; that's between them and God. But the deacon board is a different story.

My deacons are supposed to meet the standards set forth in Timothy and Titus, so I demand they tithe. I have instructed the treasurer to bring to my attention any deacon who is not paying his tithe.

When someone is nominated as a deacon, I tell him about this. If he becomes a deacon, he tells the treasurer his financial condition. Only the treasurer knows the level of each deacon's tithe, but through him I know when a deacon is not tithing.

Leadership: Have you ever had to call a deacon to account?

Wright: Once, and he started tithing again.

If these people are leaders, they need to be leading, not just in finances but in how they live. If there's sin in any area, it will influence me as pastor and the entire body.

Leadership: Ed, what's your approach?

Hales: Well, on this issue my belief and practice are two different things.

I believe that as a pastor I have the right and perhaps the responsibility to know what my people are doing in financial matters. Some years ago a member who was a manager in a grocery chain came to me and confessed he had been embezzling funds at work. He needed spiritual help. Now, is it less wrong to steal from God than to steal from your employer? I know some of our people are hindering their spiritual lives by stealing from God. So I think I have the responsibility to know.

But my practice has been to not exert that right. I could find out, but I haven't asked for the records. So I'm grappling with this. Perhaps if I'm going to do the things I need to do as a pastor, I have to talk with my financial secretary.

I do know at least three pastors who monitor giving patterns, and it has not been a detriment.

Leadership: If you did know, would you find yourself tempted to treat some people differently because they contribute more?

Hales: Once in a pastors' conference I shared my conviction that a pastor had a responsibility to know what his people were doing. Afterward, one of the pastors grabbed the lapel of my coat and shook me. He said, "I don't think I can be trusted with that knowledge, and furthermore I don't think you can, either." (Laughter)

But I don't know anyone who's been in the pastorate very long who doesn't know some things he wishes he didn't. How do we handle that?

I was not able to sleep last night because I was trying to put out of my mind a conversation I had with a man in my congregation. Sunday I spoke on the blood of Christ being able to purge the conscience of dead works to serve the true and living God. That prompted him to come and say, "Pastor, for decades I've been carrying something I cannot live with." He proceeded to put the kind of garbage in front of me that I will never be able to erase from my mind. I cannot reveal to my wife or anyone else the story that will be with me for the rest of my life.

Now how am I going to treat that man? I have to relate to him as his pastor. I bought that when I bought into the ministry. I hope by God's grace my treatment of him will be no different than of anyone else.

So when it comes to knowing what somebody is giving, hopefully I can handle it.

Leadership: As pastors, what part do you take in setting the budget?

Jacobsen: In our polity, the finance committee receives budget requests from church committees and presents them to the administrative board. Since the administrative board sets the priorities and pares down budgets, I take an active role here. Because I'm not chairman of the board, I can be a fairly vocal cheerleader, if you will, for various causes.

A couple of years ago, for example, some board members wanted to spend more on the missions program. Others didn't. I felt missions was important, so I taught about missions in the brief teaching time before the board meeting. I spoke up in support of the increase.

Allaby: The budget makes your program possible. It's where the rubber meets the road. So that is one time of the year I really involve myself.

Once the finance committee proposed cuts that endangered staff morale. I operate on the theory that the most important thing going for me is the morale of my staff. When that gets threatened I become deeply disturbed. So I really fought against the cuts.

Leadership: What guidelines help determine your budget?

Allaby: Our goal is to have church attendance grow by at least 6 percent a year. So often we take last year's budget and add anywhere from 6 to 10 percent to give us guidelines within which to operate.

We made a major exception the year we added three staff people. We upped our budget 40 percent. That was a year of watching every penny but we kept reminding ourselves that those staff people would pay for themselves in two or three years.

Wright: We don't necessarily fix it on last year's budget. We begin with requests from the various areas of the church.

We have fifty-eight departments in the church, and every one of them is responsible for producing its own budget and generating its own funds. For example, the Sunday school raises money for its curriculum by taking offerings in the classrooms. The men's department raises its own funds for retreats.

At budget time, the department heads review the budgets for their areas, and, with the help of the finance chairman, determine whether they're realistic or not. The finance chairman then presents these to the board. By the time we see the budget, though, the fifty-eight separate budgets have been funneled into about six general areas, and we just authorize the amounts for each of those.

This way, the board and I don't have to worry through every dime. And by making each department autonomous, the department leaders are more cautious about spending money for things that aren't necessary.

Leadership: Have there been times when you did not make budget, or it looked like you wouldn't? How did you handle that situation?

Hales: It is very discouraging, obviously, when you see there may be a shortfall. Normally you have to give a directive that for a certain period there will be no expenditures except for what is needed to keep the operation going. And you look for increased revenue as well. Occasionally special appeals do it, but it's dangerous to build an ongoing program on crisis appeals.

Allaby: As important as meeting the budget is, though, there can be a deadly mentality about meeting it. People begin to panic and focus on the wrong things. I have said over and over to my trustees, "God never promised to meet our budget. He promised to meet our needs." Sometimes you may not meet your budget, but then you find your needs weren't the same as your budget.

Hales: A fellow pastor used to say, "Don't say 'We went over the top.' I was around when we made that budget, and we pulled this out and pulled that out and got it down to its lowest level. We didn't go over the top; we went over the bottom." (Laughter)

We've got to remember that the budget is only a projection of our need and an expectation of response. It's not a limitation of potential. The budget is meant to be an authorized spending guide, not a straitjacket.

Leadership: How do we ensure the financial integrity of the church?

Jacobsen: We have an audit every year and keep an audit trail of all expenditures. I make sure checking accounts are balanced monthly and reports are in. On Sunday we have two unrelated people doing the counting, and another who checks that the money is deposited on time.

I feel responsible that these kinds of practices are set up and followed. If you have a schlock operation, people aren't going to be responsive in giving.

Wright: I keep weekly contact with what's happening. Every Wednesday I get a report from my treasurer of the week's income.

Then at the monthly board meeting, we receive a report from the treasurer that is also checked by the financial chairperson as a safeguard. And at the end of the year, the entire financial statement is printed and given to every member of our church.

Hales: We require that a minimum of three people do the counting, in the same room at the same time. When the envelope is opened, the counters verify that the amount shown on the front of the envelope matches what's in it. If it doesn't, the correct figure is marked on the envelope with a felt pen. The envelope then becomes the means of recording.

There's a reason we do that. Let's say the person counting money is counting alone. The envelope says $15, but when he opens it, there are two fives. He records it as $10. Later when the statement goes to that individual, that person may say, "But I always put in fifteen." Who's there to protect the counter and say, "No, on this Sunday you forgot to put in one of the fives?" We want to protect the counter as well as the givers.

We also break the chain in as many places as possible so the persons who receive, count, and deposit the money never are permitted to spend it. And at the advice of our accountant, we no longer allow the financial secretary or the treasurer to reconcile our bank statement. That's being done by the auditing committee.

Leadership: So the treasurer writes the checks and someone else balances the account?

Hales: Right. If we don't take care of these things, we open the door to great problems. In one church I pastored, just before I arrived it came to light that the former Sunday school superintendent had been embezzling funds. The Sunday school had a separate budget, and when a new Sunday school superintendent had taken office, she sent a check to a local missions agency. The agency wrote her, saying, "Thank you for your Sunday school's gift. We hadn't expected anything like this."

The superintendent called the agency and said, "What do you mean, you hadn't expected this? We've been doing this for years."

"Oh, no," they said. "We haven't had a gift like this from your church for years."

The trustees began checking into it and hired an accountant to do a five-year study. The accountant came back and said, "There's been a defalcation of seventy-five hundred dollars over that period of time."

The church got legal advice and finally agreed to have the person confess before the congregation and repay the amount. He did, but even many years later there were still wounds over it.

Eventually we let the guy usher one Sunday night. Immediately I got a note from a lady: "As long as he is ushering, I'm not going to put any money in the offering. I love him and I'm thankful for him, but to put an offering plate in front of him is like putting a bottle in front of an alcoholic."

The church reels for years. The pastor needs to be aware of the long-range ramifications of financial misdeeds.

Allaby: We pastors can be too nice, too gullible, too trusting. We finally went to an external audit when I found out our auditing committee had gone to the treasurer's house one night, flipped the pages, and said, "Well, everything seems to be fine." We asked the external auditor for recommendations on how to tighten our procedures, and we got five typewritten pages.

Leadership: How much does your audit cost?

Allaby: Six or seven thousand dollars a year.

Leadership: Ed, when your church had the problem with embezzlement, were audits being done?

Hales: The church had been receiving audits on a regular basis for years, but when I saw the first one after my arrival, I knew something was wrong. I'm not an auditor, but I knew it was not according to generally accepted accounting standards (GAAS) or generally accepted accounting procedures (GAAP). It didn't have the proper language in the opinion statement inside the front cover. So I called the auditor and said, "This really isn't an audit, is it?"

"Well, no," she said, "it really isn't."

I said, "Would you agree that our people think this is an audit?"

"I guess they would."

The church had for years been paying an auditor for something that wasn't an audit at all. I suppose in accounting terms you would call it a review. In a true audit, usually they'll take a couple of checks, or a couple of areas, and follow them all the way through. The auditor will contact a sample of the church's contributors and say, "The records say you gave x number of dollars. Does this square with your records?"

To get the first official audit is a horrendous amount of work, because you have to price every church item. But I feel the money you spend on an audit is some of the best you will spend. I have had to stand alone and really press for an audit sometimes. The board gets a little unhappy with the insistence of the pastor, but when the church blows up over some financial problem, the one thing they remember is who was pastor at that time.

Leadership: What effect does financial integrity have upon the church?

Allaby: If you haven't got financial integrity, you haven't got a message to proclaim. It's that simple.

Wright: Shortly after I arrived at one church, my son got sick and we went to the doctor. The doctor looked at me and said, "Oh, you're pastoring First Assembly."

"Yes."

"You know, I used to give services to clergy gratis as a professional courtesy. But I stopped doing that because of your predecessor. When he was here, his child had an operation. I asked him to pay only the operating room expenses, but he left town and never paid me."

I asked him what the amount was. Then I paid him myself.

I began to find out the pastor had run up bills all over town. My wife and I started paying the bills. In fact, we even started a small business at home to generate the money to do that. By the time we left town, the church had finally regained respectability.

When financial problems arise, there's more at stake than the reputation of a particular church or denomination. People in the community aren't conscious of the difference between one church and another. They just say, "It's those Christians. They never pay their bills." The name of Christ suffers reproach.

Allaby: The pastor has a responsibility to set the example in all of this. Once in a while, I'll spend church money while on a trip or get stamps from the secretary for personal use, and I'll always reimburse the church. Once in a while some generous board member will say, "Oh, you don't need to reimburse us for that."

I say, "Oh yes, I do," because I know as pastor, I set an example that filters through the entire church.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

HANDING OUT WITHOUT BEING TAKEN IN

Scott Campbell

Several years ago I served as associate minister in a large, downtown church. One of my responsibilities was to dole out the meager social assistance funds our church had for people in need. A steady stream of persons flowed into my office with enough stories to fill several good-sized volumes.

One man claimed to be a deposed minister of public information for the government of Sierra Leone. Another brought me detailed plans for an electronics system, claiming he needed $200 for a patent fee. Still another dropped his trousers in the middle of my office to show me the prosthetic device for which he needed refills.

Amid these dramatic appeals came a number of genuine claims from persons who, for one reason or another, found themselves in desperate circumstances. My job was to distinguish legitimate needs (true stories) from professional con jobs (false stories).

This is not to say the con artists did not have their own legitimate needs as well, but when resources are scarce, it seems a good policy to help first those persons who are forthright with their stories.

Over the three years of my ministry there, I was taken more times than I care to remember, but gradually I began to discern certain identifying characteristics of the con artist’s style that helped me be more certain in my assessments. I offer them here fully aware that no list can ever replace the compassionate judgment that must enter into every decision.

Actions typical of con artists

1. Volunteering irrelevant documents such as hotel receipts, bus ticket stubs, or applications to bolster their stories and create an aura of credibility.

2. Offering an abundance of details not necessarily related to the main thrust of their stories.

3. Name dropping-seeming familiar with well-placed persons or with persons you know remotely.

4. Forgetting, or being otherwise unable to produce, a key fact, the missing link necessary to corroborate their story.

5. Inhibiting the verification of the story: “This must be dealt with in absolute confidentiality” or “Don’t say anything to this person.”

6. Partially answering questions. Attempting to shift the subject. Seeming not to hear a key question.

7. Stressing the urgency of the request, which leaves no time to verify the story: “I must have the money tonight, or it will be of no use to me.”

8. Always manipulating suggested solutions back to their terms. Usually this means they must have immediate cash; no other solution will do.

9. Attempting to produce a sense of guilt in you for doubting their honesty.

10. Appealing to your desire to play an important role in a significant story.

People legitimately in need usually exhibit few, if any, of these characteristics, while the con artist will display most of them.

There are, in addition, some precautions ministers can take to keep from falling victim to the trickster.

Methods to avoid being taken

1. Follow through. Check the story despite the pressures put on you. The honest person will do everything he or she can to help you verify the story.

2. Delay responding to the request until you have had time to think. Is the story plausible? Did you sense the person using any of the above tactics? Could you convince someone else of the legitimacy of the request?

3. Remember the natural tendency to want to play important parts in gripping stories. Don’t let this factor impair your judgment.

4. Vigorously pursue every alternative to giving money. Offer to arrange directly with lodging facilities for a room, or with restaurants or a grocery store for food. Be aware that con artists often try to circumvent your caution with the excuse that they need to travel somewhere, so be especially leery of giving money for travel. Bus and train tickets easily can be converted to cash.

5. If you conclude that giving money is the only possible solution, decide firmly how much you will allocate to this particular situation and do not allow yourself to be swayed from your intentions.

I am convinced that, despite the mistakes I will make, it is better to err on the side of compassion than to turn away a legitimately needy person. But I am equally persuaded that we are responsible as pastors to use our slim resources in the ways that will accomplish the greatest good. Hard-headed screening helps retain resources for those with legitimate need while curtailing the inadvertent funding of nefarious enterprises.

-Scott Campbell

East Longmeadow (Massachusetts) Methodist Church

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

LEADERSHIP BIBLIOGRAPHY: FINANCES

Donald Gerig

Donald Gerig became president of Fort Wayne (Indiana) Bible College in 1986 after years of parish ministry, most recently as pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, Illinois. From familiarity with parish and institutional finances and academic research in personal finance for pastors, he recommends:

How You Can Manage Your Money (Augsburg)

by John Warren Johnson

If I were to buy only one book on personal finances, this would be the one. Page for page, Johnson gives some of the best practical advice to be found on managing money. He deals in a down-to-earth way with housing, food and clothing, and insurance and investments. A helpful glossary of basic financial terms is included.

Your Money Matters (Bethany)

by Malcolm MacGregor and Stanley C. Baldwin

This book’s strength lies in the background principles it illuminates. MacGregor includes informative sections such as “settling the ownership question” that set up a solid context for handling one’s money.

Although some readers (including this one) will have trouble with MacGregor’s views regarding family structure that slip into the discussion, most of his help is without controversy. He concludes with advice concerning estate planning that all should consider.

Your Finances in Changing Times (Moody)

by Larry Burkett

While Burkett includes some practical suggestions in the book, they would not make up its strength. Rather, its forte is his treatment of principles that affect the way we think about money.

Burkett shares some definite ideas about our economy, credit, and other matters that will troublesome, but he includes useful observations about our need to think differently from the world when we manage our personal finances.

New Models for Financing the Local Church (Morehouse)

by Raymond B. Knudsen

This is one of the few books that deals exclusively with finances in the local church. Knudsen covers a host of issues from budget preparation to wills and bequests. He includes several thought-provoking ideas (like giving by automatic bank withdrawals) that could profitably be explored by progressive churches.

I consider this book not necessarily the solution to specific problems with

church finances, but a spark for some creative thinking about them.

Your Church Has a Fantastic Future (Regal)

by Robert Schuller

This book touches finances in a chapter called “Fund Raising Can Be Fun.” He states, “No church has a money problem, only an idea problem.” And the rest of the book presents a case for planning big and making program pay for itself.

In his characteristic way, Schuller pleads the case for dreaming, setting goals, and remaining positive. Like him or not, Schuller is a promoter, and he offers some great principles that any church can follow as it develops its own approach to stewardship.

Management for Your Church (Abingdon)

by Alvin J. Lindgren and Norman Shawchuck

Getting the Church on Target (Moody)

by Lloyd Perry

Although neither of these books is devoted exclusively to finances, both offer insightful chapters covering church budgeting, account control, and fund raising. If the books share a common fault, it is what I consider an overemphasis on broad congregational participation in the budget process.

Following the Lindgren/Shawchuck plan, for instance, would occupy an inordinate amount of congregational energy for finances alone. But that aside, these titles remain valuable resources.

Let’s Be Realistic about Your Church Budget (Judson)

by Douglas W. Johnson

Parish Planning (Abingdon)

by Lyie E. Schaller

The strength of both these books is that they place financial planning in the context of overall church planning, making the budget actually a planning document for the church. Probably neither book will be the full answer for your church, but both raise the right questions.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

STUNNED BY AN INSIDE JOB

Richard L. Bergstrom

Many churches are vulnerable to sticky fingers near church funds.

On May 19, 1986, a former staff member of Euzoa Bible Church in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, went to jail for embezzling almost $42,000 from the church over a six-year period. Below is an account of what happened. The details are actual; the experiences real. Only the staff member’s name has been changed to save further embarrassment to the family. The story is offered in the hope that this account might prevent such experiences from happening to others.

At the annual meeting of Euzoa Bible Church on October 8, 1985, our forty-two-year-old youth pastor, who had been with the church eight years, stood before the congregation and read the following confession:

I have sinned against God, my wife, my children, my family, and the body of Christ here at Euzoa.

For almost six years I have been stealing from the general offerings of this church. I have taken cash and checks and deposited them into the youth checking account. I then wrote checks for cash on that account and used the money for personal use. I have lied to many of you and have deceived you. The depth of the deception is so ingrained, I do not know the scope of the amount of my stealing. I am dependent upon the elders and their audit to know the scope of my sin.

Further, I have not filed federal or state income tax for eight years. While my wife knew of my failure to file with the IRS, I hid the extent of the shambles of our personal finances from her. She persisted in praying that I would be responsible, and from time to time attempted to confront me with questions regarding our financial affairs. But I lied to her, and she, because of her trust, accepted my lies.

I have been moved to confess my sin through the fear of God, through fear of the growing pressure and presence of the IRS, through fear of being found out. God has also used Pastor Dick, who became aware of problems in our finances and persisted in seeking to love and help me.

Mine are the sins of stealing, lying, and deceit. Those are the symptoms of a deeper sin of a lack of trusting God and a lack of inner discipline. I have asked God, my wife and family, and the board of elders for forgiveness. And I ask you to forgive me.

I have not only sinned against you but have broken the law. Since I have committed a felony against you and the people of this state by my sin, I will be meeting with the district attorney and giving a full confession of my crime.

In reading this confession I hereby resign from all pastoral positions and responsibility. I submit to the authority of the elders and to the civil authorities of this nation for God’s discipline through them.

Alan’s confession marked the anniversary of my first year of ministry at Euzoa Bible Church-and the worst tragedy of my ministerial career.

“What did I do with that letter from the church in Colorado?” I had asked my wife in May 1984.

“It’s under the bed,” she replied. One phone call led to another, and to a stop in Steamboat Springs for a brief interview while on vacation in June. We saw some tremendous obstacles to successful ministry in this independent church in a resort community. Yet within a few months, we found ourselves in a U-Haul traveling from the Pacific Northwest to northwest Colorado.

Admittedly, we had some concerns about the youth pastor, who had been open about his desire to be senior pastor. I was told, however, that Alan was a unique individual who would be able to accept whatever decision the church made. One person had mentioned in passing that Alan had some problems with his personal finances, but “nothing that important.” I was assured it had been taken care of by the church boards.

I learned later that Alan had been three months delinquent on his rent, for which he had been given a rental allowance by the church. The church’s solution had been to begin paying his rent directly to the landlord, thus “solving” the problem.

Within a month after coming to Euzoa, however, I began to sense something wrong. For the past eight years, Alan had been having his mail delivered to the church post office box. In the process of sorting it out, I couldn’t help noticing the pattern of “bad mail”-notices of late payments, intents to shut off gas and electrical service, and pink slips indicating overdrafts from the local bank.

“How can he get away with that in a town as small as Steamboat?” I asked my wife.

By the third month, I was bothered enough to raise the issue with the person who had alluded to Alan’s financial problems before I came. He assured me he would look into it further, but nothing developed.

By the sixth month, I felt a confrontation with Alan was in order. When I asked him about his personal financial situation, he seemed to struggle with what to say.

“We had a lot of unanticipated expenses following my mother-in-law’s funeral in California,” he finally replied. Indeed, they had had to drop everything to attend her funeral in California-and that just after they had vacationed there in late August. I decided to take his explanation at face value.

Nevertheless, the pattern continued. I began to document the steady stream of bad mail. But I questioned my own motives: Hadn’t Alan tried to be senior pastor? Am I trying to bring about his demise so he is not a threat to my own leadership? I began to wonder if he should get another mailbox so I wouldn’t have to confront the notices.

Perhaps most troublesome were the overdrafts. According to my experience, each of those pink slips represented a twelve-dollar expense charged against one’s account. How can he afford such neglect? I asked myself.

Then another question occurred to me, I wonder if Alan gets as many pink slips for the church’s youth fund? If he can’t manage his personal account, what about church funds? Yet, I could not challenge his integrity without damaging our relationship. The church was in the process of revising its entire accounting structure, but to this point, no one had brought the youth fund into the church’s general accounting process. When I asked about it, I was told, “Alan handles that.”

Failing to get answers through the official channels, and with Alan evasive when I tried to confront him, I decided to look for myself.

In July 1985,I opened the bank statement from the church’s youth fund. I found no notices of overdrafts, but I was perplexed. I began to make notations on a three-by-five card:

DATE FUND AMOUNT PAYEE

June Youth $300.00 Cash

May Youth $300.00 Cash

March Youth $1000.00 Cash

My index card soon couldn’t hold all the data. I gathered up as many of the checking account statements as I could find, and later, at home, I took out a legal pad and began to go through them one by one. To my amazement, I found from October 1982 to July 1985 a total of $17,792.00 in checks made out to Cash written for even amounts, and signed by Alan.

I listed my questions, including:

1. How are these accounted for?

2. Where are the receipts for auditing purposes?

3. How do funds get into this account-from young people’s fees for activities or from the church budget?

4. Do youth fees (if collected) cover all or part of the youth outings or events?

5. What percentage does the church cover?

6. Why are these checks always in round figures (youth expenses obviously aren’t)?

7. What then, was done with the change?

8. Does anybody hold the youth pastor accountable for monies spent?

I struggled long into the night with the biggest question: What do I do with the information? I knew well what such questions would mean to our relationship, whether or not there was a legitimate explanation. I knew the biblical principles for church discipline suggest individual confrontation, but based on Alan’s lack of receptivity to my inquiry into personal finances, I doubted whether another personal conversation would be fruitful.

I also knew that 1Timothy 5 said not “to entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that the others may take warning.” To bring an accusation against someone who had made his livelihood from the ministry for the last twenty years was no small matter. I decided I needed more facts.

I took my findings the next day to the chairman of our church board. He was as puzzled as I.

“What do you make of it?” I asked.

“Well, if the IRS saw this, Alan would be required to pay personal income tax on these amounts unless he has a record of how the money was spent.”

“We need to get some answers to where this money came from and how it is being spent,” I suggested, “but I’m just not certain how to go about it.”

We agreed to ask the trustees to call for an accounting of the youth fund in preparation for a possible move to handling youth ministry expenses through the church’s general accounting structure. The rationale would be that all other aspects of the church’s finances were being reviewed, so why not the youth fund?

In the meantime, I asked the church financial secretary to document deposits from the general fund into the youth account over the last year. Her findings suggested no inordinate amounts of money going into the youth fund. Where then was that money coming from?

For the next two months, the investigation was put on hold as I was consumed by an assignment to rewrite the church constitution and restructure the ministry under a single board of elders. On September 8, with a full house, the church approved the constitution with a 77 percent vote. In addition, the combined boards of the church proposed a major fund-raising program to build a new building on the three acres of land owned by the church. We planned to present the proposal at our October 8 meeting, after which the new constitution, with an elder board, would go into effect.

During September, however, Alan began getting letters from the IRS.

“Now what kind of trouble is he in?” I commented to my wife. “Not only does he fail to pay his bills, but the tax man is after him!”

“How can he possibly be considered as an elder with that kind of reputation?” she asked. Her question lodged in my soul. Indeed, I had been teaching and preaching on the matter of elders all summer. Is it possible to exclude a staff pastor from an eldership role? Our new structure would have allowed for such a scenario, but did I dare suggest such a distinction for a man, forty-two years old, with twenty years in the ministry? It would seem like a power play.

When the third letter arrived from the IRS in as many weeks, I knew I had to have some answers. I called Alan to see if I could come to his home. The events of the next few days were to read like Sergeant Friday’s entries in a Dragnet episode.

Wednesday, October 2: “Alan, I’ve noticed for some time that you’ve been in financial difficulty. And now you’re getting notices from the IRS. Are you in trouble?”

Icy silence.

“Alan, I merely want to know how we can help you. If you’re in deep trouble financially, we need to be aware of that.”

He was quiet. Then he told me he had gotten behind in paying his taxes a few years back but that he had sought advice from a lawyer in the community and was working on getting it straightened out. I asked for permission to get a progress report from the lawyer. He said no.

My confidence in Alan’s trustworthiness and willingness to make himself accountable to the church had deteriorated.

Friday, October 4: I met with the chairman of my board for an update on the youth fund investigation, and he informed me he had passed the matter on to the trustees, as we had decided in July. He did not know what the current status of the investigation was. I told him about the recent IRS letters.

Saturday, October 5, 5 P.M.: My concern was building as we approached the annual meeting and the appointment of elders. I talked with one of the financial officers of the church, and for the first time, he saw the hard evidence. He said, regarding the IRS situation, that “Alan could work out his personal financial situation without it impacting his relationship to the church.”

What about the youth fund questions? With two years of documentation on a yellow legal pad in front of him, he said, “Alan would never do anything wrong. And anyway, that’s past, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Let’s not overreact.”

I left feeling all alone. I couldn’t understand why no one else sensed the magnitude of the information I possessed. But I couldn’t stop now.

Saturday, October 5, 7:30 P.M.: After a nervous birthday dinner for my wife, I met with two deacons in the back room of the parsonage and spilled out my concerns. By this time, I was convinced the circle of awareness had to be expanded. For the first time, the term embezzlement was suggested by one of the men. They determined that the rest of the deacon board had to be brought into the discussion. A meeting was scheduled for Sunday, immediately after the service.

Sunday, October 6, 11 A.M.: The bell in the church tower rang out over Steamboat Springs as it had for the past ninety-four years. I had Alan open the service with the call to worship-Isaiah 55:6-12. “Seek the Lord while he may be found; call upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and he will have compassion on him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.”

What Alan did not realize at the time was that my wife had prayerfully selected the passage in hopes that God would use it to bring Alan to a point of confession. He seemed emotionally gripped during the reading, barely able to make it through the passage.

Sunday, October 6, 12:30 P.M.: The deacons met in closed session after morning worship to hear the report from the two men with whom I had spent Saturday evening. I did not attend. I greeted people as they left the church, but kept fearing the consequences if my suspicions were wrong.

Sunday, October 6, 4 P.M.: At the request of the deacons, I asked Alan to be present at a meeting immediately following the evening service. He hesitantly said he would come.

Sunday, October 6, 7:30 P.M.: We stood waiting for the arrival of one deacon. Alan seemed nervous. I tried to console him-“It’s going to be okay. We just want to talk with you.”

He said softly, “I’m about to do the second most difficult thing in my life: to meet with you all. And then I’m going to do the first most difficult thing: to meet with my family.”

Ten minutes later, as we continued to wait for the latecomer, Alan was at the end of his emotional endurance. “Can we get started, fellows?” he asked.

Just then our missing board member arrived. We sat down to begin the meeting, and Alan immediately assumed the floor and proceeded to spill the guilt of six years of stealing directly out of the church offering plates.

One by one around the table, our heads were lowered into our hands. We had called the meeting to ask Alan about his personal financial problems. We weren’t prepared for what we had to hear. We silently prayed for mercy.

We agreed to meet the next night to determine our response.

Monday, October 7: The board of deacons met for the last time. The next day, they would be called “elders.” Little did they know when they agreed to serve that they would be tried by fire so soon in their new office.

We mapped out how this information would be shared with the congregation. We determined to hold the annual meeting as scheduled, followed by a public reading of confession by Alan. His resignation would then be voted on by the congregation.

Tuesday, October 8: Alan read his confession at the annual meeting of Euzoa Bible Church.

Before proceeding with the rest of the story, perhaps it would be helpful to analyze the painful lessons we learned about church finances.

The Holes in the System

We thought the church’s financial accountability systems were adequate. After all, the church was careful to insure that separate parties were required to (1) record funds and report receipts and balances monthly (the financial secretary), (2) authorize payment (the trustee board), and (3) write checks (the treasurer). Great pains were taken to reconcile any differences in the records. Written warrants were required for all checks. Any checks for more than $1,000 required two signatures.

But some large holes remained in the financial structures of our church. These holes, I’ve discovered in recent conversations with other pastors, often exist in other churches’ systems, too.

The holes exposed at Euzoa were:

1. The church held two morning services, and the offerings from the first service would be collected and placed in the room behind the pulpit, uncounted and unattended. The offering room, though just off the platform, had a rear entrance, to which Alan had access.

Following the second services the offerings would then be counted and placed in a deposit bag and left in the night depository at the bank. The next morning the financial secretary would go to the bank and record the receipts.

2. Even if we had counted the first service offering immediately, our system would still have had a hole. The Sunday counting procedure included only the cash. It was assumed that checks were not vulnerable, but they were, since they could be “officially” endorsed into a bogus account.

3. The church did not issue annual receipts for giving, unless requested by the individual. It was assumed the canceled checks were all the receipt necessary.

4. The church allowed individual ministry funds to exist in the church’s name with no required accounting and no auditing, in this case, for eight years.

5. The church allowed an employee to have sole authority to write checks against a corporate fund.

Though gaping, these are not the only holes that exist within the accounting structures of many churches. One substantial hole many churches suffer is to allow one individual to bag up the day’s receipts and take them home to count and record. The practice remains in many congregations because challenging such procedures seems an affront to the individual’s integrity. The irony, however, is that only those who have something to hide should be disturbed by such changes in financial procedures. If financial reforms are met with resistance, it may be an indication the changes are even more sorely needed.

Using and Abusing the System

With the opportunity before him, Alan employed the following procedure to divert church funds for his own needs:

1. In addition to the “Euzoa Youth Fund,” Alan set up a separate account for the “Euzoa Youth Fellowship Fund.” Thus there were two youth funds in the church’s name-one for legitimate youth funds and activities, and another through which church offerings could be laundered.

2. He would take checks directly out of the offering plates between services or during the second service. I remembered many Sundays seeing Alan leave during the middle of a service and return later on. At the time, I assumed he was checking on the nursery or children’s church-not an unusual procedure for a youth pastor.

3. He would then stamp the checks on the back EUZOA BIBLE CHURCH-FOR DEPOSIT ONLY, blocking out the general account number and depositing them in the Youth Fellowship Fund. Individuals would thus receive their canceled checks with Euzoa Bible Church clearly stamped on the back. Because no annual giving receipts were provided, no one suspected the funds were not going to the designated accounts.

4. Having deposited the funds into the bogus youth account, Alan was then free to write checks with no questions asked.

5. When questions were asked from time to time by the trustees, Alan was able to provide a clean accounting of the “official” Euzoa Youth Fund.

Our experience reveals one glaring weakness many churches face: namely, that if an individual can access checks, and can set up a separate account in the name of the church, it is then within that person’s reach to divert church funds. Of course, cash can be pocketed without the fuss.

Our situation was complicated by the fact that a fund existed in the name of the church that the church did not even know about. This was made easier by the fact that we are situated in a smaller community where things may be more informal than in a larger city. Someone in a position of trust, such as a minister, is often able to convince bank personnel to override policies.

I was troubled enough about the matter to ask two local bank officials about it. “Do you mean, if I came into your bank off the street and asked to open a checking account in a corporate name, you would do that without a letter of authorization from the corporation?” Their response:

1. A corporate account initially requires a form to be filled out and placed on file with the bank. It provides “the authorization of a corporation to maintain a deposit account.” In some cases, a single document may authorize a host of accounts under one umbrella, all supposedly on record with the bank. In other cases, a bank may require an authorization letter for every account opened under that corporate name.

2. It is the responsibility of the corporation to provide the bank with a list, updated annually, of persons authorized to sign checks on corporate accounts. If it fails to do this, former employees or corporate officers may be able to continue to write checks against corporate accounts without any indication of wrongdoing.

3. Any new accounts opened under the corporation’s name ought to have a signed letter of authorization before that account is opened by the bank. However, it is conceivable that the same person opening the account could be authorized to sign such a form-or could easily forge the signature of a corporate officer without raising undue suspicions.

That means anyone, potentially, could go into a bank and open an account in the name of the church.

Then, any check not immediately recorded and secured is vulnerable. Specific examples of such points of vulnerability would be:

-A member is handed a check to put in the offering plate from a parishioner who was not able to be in the service.

-A secretary receives checks in the mail from absent or out-of-town donors.

-A counter is left alone with church funds.

-An usher “lifts” checks from the offering on the way to the counting room.

In one church, an ingenious usher slid bills out of the top offering plate and stashed them in a bottom plate as he went to the counting room. Then, as he returned the “empty” plates to the storage cupboard, he would recover the bills.

These scenarios are not offered to create a climate of suspicion in churches, but to point out that financial irresponsibility can take many guises.

How We Closed the Holes

As a result of the crisis, several steps we took, which would have been difficult otherwise, were made easier. But I’m convinced they are worth taking even without such a precipitating event, since they help churches insure their financial integrity.

First, we began to place the filled offering plates on the table in front of the church for all to see. In many churches, an immediate counting in a secured room is more practical and just as effective. In our case, we felt a public demonstration of our accountability was in order.

Second, a new schedule of counters was drawn up. Two individuals were required to be present at all times when offerings are handled and counted. Two signatures are required on the counters’ sheet.

Third, two copies of the counting sheet are completely filled out and signed by the counters. One is included in the bank deposit bag for the financial secretary, and one is given to the pastor.

Fourth, all separate church checking accounts (women’s fellowship, benevolence fund) were brought under the general accounting structure of the church. We now require them to be balanced monthly by the church treasurer. A better option may be to have no separate checking accounts, but to have all funds handled through a central account. Often because of the confidential nature of the benevolence fund, this is a fund that may be open to abuse.

Fifth, as of January 1, 1986, we began issuing annual receipts for giving to all contributors.

Sixth, all local charge accounts that would not include individual receipts along with their monthly invoices were closed. It became impossible to monitor charge accounts that did not provide this service. We suspected that abuses had taken place with the church’s grocery store account.

Seventh, all ministry heads or program leaders were made accountable for the expenditures within their budget areas. They are required to sign all requests for payments before the finance committee receives them. The effect is to give responsibility for monitoring the budget back to the program chairpersons. Though cumbersome at times, we chose this as an alternative to a single purchasing agent or an advance purchase order system.

A Matter of Trust

The above measures may seem extreme. They were not for us. A sacred trust had been violated. Confidence needed to be restored.

For the first months following the public disclosure, no one, including myself, wanted to be seen holding the money or left alone in a room with it. We were almost paranoid about someone suspecting us of wrongdoing. The extreme measures were taken not only to restore confidence in the system, but to assure people involved in handling church finances that they were beyond suspicion.

As a result of aggressive reform and complete openness before our church body, the level of stewardship did not decline, but rather increased after the embezzlement problem had been cleared up.

Too often churches, because they are communities of faith built upon trust, place opportunities for temptation in front of their members or their ministers. No system is beyond abuse, but responsible stewardship demands church finances be handled with absolute integrity.

Epilogue

On October 8, 1985, following Alan’s confession, the congregation voted to accept his resignation but not to press charges against him for his crimes.

On October 10, officers of the church reported the crime to the Colorado district attorney’s office, their legal obligation as fiduciaries of corporate accounts (Sec. 18-8-115 of the Colorado Criminal Code: “Duty to report a crime-liability for disclosure”).

On December 24, Alan was charged with thirteen counts of felony theft (1979-1985) and two counts of misdemeanor theft (1977-1978). Each felony charge represented a period of six months in which more than $200 but less than $10,000 was stolen. Each carried a possible jail sentence of one to eight years in the state correctional system, and a maximum fine of $500,000.

On April 1, 1986, Alan pleaded guilty to four counts of class IV felony theft.

On May 19, Alan was sentenced to thirty days in the Routt County Jail and four years of supervised probation. As required by the courts, but not by Euzoa Bible Church, he will be making restitution of $41,857.35 of stolen church funds.

Alan remains in the community and in the church as a member under the discipline of the elder board. He has willingly complied with the conditions set forth by the elders for restoration to fellowship, though not leadership at this time.

QUESTIONS WORTH ASKING

When evaluating church financial structures, these questions, as Euzoa Bible Church learned the hard way, need to be raised.

Do we count and record offerings immediately after they are received?

Are offerings always stored in a secure or well-supervised area?

Do we make sure that offerings are never handled by only one person before they are counted and recorded?

Do we issue annual receipts for giving?

Do all church accounts fall under the general accounting and auditing structure of the church?

Are all persons authorized and able to write checks against church funds held responsible through an accounting-auditing system?

Do we make sure the same person is not involved in more than one of the financial procedures of the church (collecting the funds, counting them, recording the giving, authorizing expenditures, writing the checks, auditing the accounts)?

Do we provide the bank with annual updates of persons authorized to sign checks against any account associated with the church?

Unless you can give a firm yes to all of these questions, you may have a hole in your church financial structure through which you could be losing hundreds or perhaps thousands of dollars.

– Richard L. Bergstrom is pastor of Euzoa Bible Church in Steamboat Springs, Colorado.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

WHAT IT TAKES TO STAY DOWNTOWN

Joel R. Hempel

In the changing kaleidoscope of the inner city, a church must take on new hues.

Trying to function like a suburban congregation in downtown Cincinnati was not working for Prince of Peace Lutheran Church. We realized that unless we became a neighborhood church, the prognosis was certain death. We were attracting few new people. The membership was growing older, and the leadership was getting tired. We might survive another five years at best.

To survive, we began to realize, we could not be a suburban congregation whose only identity with the inner city was that we happened to meet in a downtown building. Major changes had to be made.

By God’s grace, Prince of Peace now is growing slowly into an inner-city church. The principles that guided our change were revealed through the processes of prayer, listening to the neighborhood, and what I call graced luck: accepting the fact that when we stumble onto something that works, it is because God’s Spirit guides and nurtures our attempts.

Ministering to All Kinds

The first principle directing our change was inclusiveness. In the inner city, diversity is the norm. We could not stay homogeneous. We knew eventually the white middle class would become the minority in our congregation. Two-parent families would become the exception.

Our transition to inclusiveness mainly just happened as we struggled to discover how best to serve our neighborhood. For example, Prince of Peace, through a staff member, became the representative payee for thirty people who cannot manage their own finances, many of whom are mentally, emotionally, or socially retarded. When these people started making themselves at home in our midst, we could either bar them or accept them. We chose the latter.

Later came the decision to no longer try to remake the inner-city people into traditional, middle-class Lutherans who dressed like us, worshiped like us, and enjoyed our music. Some of our leaders began dressing casually for worship, and we made the service more informal. We sought the advice of neighborhood attenders, and they were bold enough to point out changes that made us more inviting.

During our midweek fellowship, you’ll now see people of all races, single-parent families, the mentally ill, low-income and rich folks alike. This weekly supper and worship service mixes the homeless and indigent with those who have solid, middle-class incomes. They wait in the same food line, sit at the same tables, and pray to the same God for his blessing on the meal they all receive free.

The Church as Family

Similarly, we have come to embrace the idea that we are family. Many people come to the church out of a broken or abusive home environment, so we seek to offer the healthy components of a biological family: support, nurture, education, confrontation, recreation, and freedom to be oneself.

This family atmosphere didn’t happen until we in leadership decided to work on the little things: calling people by name when seeing them on the street, greeting people warmly (often with an embrace), giving people opportunities to help with some task or ministry, praising people and expressing appreciation at every occasion, carefully challenging people when they are doing something harmful, being generous with the church resources and personal resources, respecting people’s culture and tradition by inviting their input for worship. These and similar expressions of interest let folks know we welcome their presence and value their participation.

We found that, at least initially, new members from our low-income neighborhood likely would bring to our family more needs than resources. For instance, many people wanted to be a part of our family but were not ready to commit themselves to membership. One woman became involved with us when her children were first enrolled with our nursery school and she began attending the weekly fellowship. When a crisis developed in her family, she sought counseling from our pastoral counseling service. When she needed food, we gave her emergency assistance.

After being a part of the family for years, she eventually decided to receive additional Christian instruction in the Christian faith and become a member. Why? After experiencing the church’s commitment to her, she finally was ready to return that commitment and give more of herself to others.

Our worship, where everyone comes together, is the “showing off” place for the cultures and races of our family. The worship committee strives to arrange that, over a month’s time, all members of the family can feel at home in worship, singing their kind of songs, seeing their kind of folk in leadership, and participating in a mode of worship that reflects their tradition. Both members and nonmembers, children and adults, read Scripture and lead prayer.

With two white, male pastors, it was decided that a black and, ideally, female pianist from the Baptist tradition was needed. We found her, and our worship hasn’t been the same since.

As might be expected, we met some initial resistance as we changed from a rather formal and liturgical form of worship to a more open, spontaneous, and inclusive form. When the ideas for a more nontraditional service were first introduced to the congregation, we heard comments like: “Why do we have to give up being who we are?” and “We need to teach these people how to worship.”

This was painful. Thankfully God kept us moving slowly and respectfully, but we also decided not to be overwhelmed by people’s natural reluctance and fears. Through our music, the variety of people up front, and the language we use, our worship now demonstrates our openness to different kinds of people.

People Need Help

When people discover a church that will help them with physical and financial needs, they tend to be more open about their emotional and spiritual needs. Therefore, a third principle is assistance. We make money, food, clothing, and transportation available to people who need them.

This means we have to raise thousands of dollars every year and give it freely as a symbol of God’s grace. A man’s father dies in southeastern Kentucky; money is given for his travel expenses. A woman cashed in some food stamps at the beginning of the school year to buy clothing for her children and ran out of food by the middle of the month; food, money, and a referral to another helping agency were given.

Of course we sometimes have to say no when money runs short or the wisdom of experience tells us we are being conned. Many times our wisdom fails us, and we’re conned anyway. But we’d rather err on the side of generosity.

Our low-income neighbors have been good models, helping us all to risk greater openness ourselves, and in so doing, we have received care, too. At moments when I feel hurt or upset about something, seldom is it long before someone from the community notices and says, “Pastor Joel, you look down.” When I acknowledge it, the brief encounter often ends with me receiving an embrace.

Besides providing material assistance, our congregation has also raised a prophetic voice in our community to assist our lower-income neighbors. When a friend of the congregation was facing eviction from her apartment because the landlord wanted to destroy her building to create parking, we felt compelled to confront the process. Our friend and her neighbors, who had been responsible tenants for years, would have been forced into less-adequate housing. A city ordinance requires a public hearing and city council decision before any structurally sound building can be razed, so various church members spoke out at the council hearing. This time the tenants’ rights were respected.

We become involved because we’ve seen that when people are kicked out of their homes, or treated unjustly in other ways, their self-image is knocked a little lower, confirming their feelings of not being valued. And it is exceedingly difficult for people with low self-image to believe God loves them just as they are.

So at times, members of the congregation and staff have argued concerns before city council. Some have joined task forces and committees. At other times, we have even marched to demonstrate our concern. Though clear victories are seldom won, some headway is made in slowing the forces of injustice. In addition, just standing together for a cause contributes to healthy pride and Christian bonding.

Learning to Beg, Borrow, and Appeal

Every inner-city church must learn to beg, borrow, and appeal. After all, personnel is limited. The facilities are in desperate need of repair. Materials and machinery for running programs are not readily available. There is little money, and the new members from the low-income neighborhood need their meager incomes to get by. We entertain no choice but to ask for help.

Our methods are many. We sell crafts. We make requests to be included in the budgets of sister congregations. We stuff contribution envelopes into a quarterly newsletter. We seek sponsors for nursery school children. We stock our thrift shop with clothing retrieved from rummage sale leftovers. Government surplus food is purchased. We recruit groups from other congregations to prepare and serve meals at the Wednesday fellowship. Any grants from foundations and service organizations we can wrangle are gratefully received. Also, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod has been approached repeatedly, and it has generously responded.

One anxiety-producing (and faith-stimulating) aspect of inner-city fund raising for me is my responsibility for finding my own income. It drains the creative energy I would rather invest in people and ministry development. But there just isn’t enough money in our church to pay all the staff members. So we raise our own support.

Frankly, I am better at asking for financial assistance for others than for myself. At first, I had to work through feelings. Aren’t I worthy of a salary? And in asking for money, I was afraid of rejection. With time and practice, though, I developed more self-confidence by necessity.

What remains, however, is the tension of asking for income for myself, knowing the poor are always with us-and in greater need. I’m not foolish; I know my family and I cannot do without an adequate income. Yet my very proximity to the vast suffering around me accentuates the disparity. Most helpful has been the assistance that caring people, generally lay professionals and business people, have provided by working to raise my support for me.

If it’s difficult for an individual to ask for help, so it is for our church. The fact that other churches and businesses sometimes get tired of seeing us with our hand out does not make it any easier. But this is a humbling and necessary aspect of inner-city ministry.

Involving Everyone

We try to involve everyone in the Prince of Peace family in ministry. This is a challenge, but because the opportunities for ministry are so plentiful, it’s necessary.

When people come through our membership instruction classes, we emphasize stewardship of time and energy. We consider involvement in ministry not only a response to ministry needs; it also provides an occasion to give and not just receive. People’s self-image builds when their contributions are appreciated.

At the Wednesday fellowship, for example, teams of people prepare and serve meals. Others assist in leading worship. Still others create art pieces to decorate our worship area. Then there are those who volunteer to help in our second-hand store, answer the phone, stuff envelopes, clean the church, or serve as officers and elders.

We are as yet undecided about paying workers to do various jobs. Volunteer work is a way of paying back the church and even strengthens sagging self-image. On the other hand, a few dollars can mean a lot to some of our people. Our informal policy is to pay a small amount-sometimes no more than lunch-for short-term jobs, but keep on a volunteer basis ongoing ministries like Sunday school and our thrift shop. And we offer our workers major portions of appreciation.

Besides the regular appreciation (which cannot be overdone), the staff officially recognizes workers through an annual Congregation Appreciation Day. Following a special worship service, the staff serves a meal and offers a personal thank you to each member of the congregation. In addition, every fourth Sunday we highlight one of our ministries in our worship service, giving the workers and their ministry deserved recognition.

The majority of our workers and leaders are always women. That’s because, in our setting, the preponderance of families are headed by women. This was one more area where we had to wrestle with how to translate our theology and practice into our context. We concluded that for our neighborhood, it is not only pragmatic but pleasing to God for women to serve as officers and in key staff positions.

The Necessity of Fun

The longer we minister in the city, the clearer it becomes that if we expect people to participate in worship, meetings, and learning experiences, fun and entertainment must be part of them. The stress and pain in people’s lives are lightened with laughter, play, food, and fellowship. And we have found that people from different economic classes and educational backgrounds meet more equally when at play or in less formal settings. Our Saints and Sinners co-rec softball team and our monthly summer picnics are examples of coming together for play. But we try to interject fun into other, typically more serious, church activities.

A while back we noticed most of the low-income members were not staying for the voters’ meetings on Sundays after church. The church business proved too boring for some. Others felt overwhelmed by financial reports and official proceedings. Still others felt excluded from the decision-making process. So we created an advisory council to supplement the quarterly voters’ assemblies, as a way to relax the setting and mood for doing church business. This advisory council is composed of neighborhood representatives, elected officers, and staff. They meet quarterly on Saturdays in a retreat format. We provide supervision of children, a meal, and snacks. Together we worship, carry on light conversation – and conduct a business meeting. The turnout has been excellent. People feel included and able to express themselves more openly. No Robert’s Rules dictate the process.

Not that the idea is new. Scripture indicates the early Christian congregations generally mixed business and pleasure: “Day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people” (Acts 2:46-47).

A Variety of Nurture

Mixing new people from the neighborhood with our faithful stalwarts created a tension: How do we meet everybody’s needs? Our people newer to Christianity required more of “the milk of the Word,” nurture in their basic Christian faith. We met their needs with most of our resources until we came to the painful awakening that we were not attending to those more mature Christians who needed “the meat of the Word.” Our old regulars were starving.

When these folks, our leadership, began showing signs of burnout, we decided experiences and classes were needed to care for them as well.

So we began a “spiritual companioning group” that brought people together for structured spiritual discussion and prayer. In these groups, the ability to be introspective and reflective of life experiences was required. To these groups come few low-income members. For many, the pressures of survival distract from time for introspection. Perhaps spiritual development that requires an ability to go on the “inner journey” is a luxury of those who are more privileged.

But we have learned to accept that because people are in different stages of spiritual development, not everyone will be interested in the same learning experience. Likes and needs lead people to exclude themselves from some activities. Being family does not mean we all have to be together all of the time.

Our church, like all churches seeking to be God’s people, is not consistently faithful to these principles. Workers get tired. Promises are broken. Plans falter. Sometimes people are inconsiderate or too critical of the very ones we seek to include, and people get hurt. Still others fail to follow through with commitments. When needed ministries never get off the ground for lack of money and personnel, we sometimes begin to wonder if God is still in charge.

Yet our experience has shown us that a dying downtown congregation can survive, even thrive, if it is willing to become a true inner-city church. The necessary changes, like surgery, take time and cause pain, but on the other side lies a prognosis of many more years of life and vigorous service.

Joel R. Hempel is community pastor of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church and director of Inner City Clinical Pastoral Education, Inc., in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

FROM THE OFFICE OF THE PUBLISHER

Paul D. Robbins

Currently, I’m reading a fascinating Book-of-the-Month Club offering entitled The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. The author, a poetically gifted neurologist, discusses a series of case studies from the patients’ point of view. The first study describes an exceptionally talented music professor who suffers from visual agnosia, a neurological disorder that inhibits one’s ability to process whole images.

For example, while the professor identified and remembered specific details about someone’s face-an unusual nose, mustache, or beard-he drew a complete blank when shown a picture of his brother, mother, or wife. While in the neurologist’s office, he confused his wife with an adjacent hall tree and tried to lift her head from her body, thinking it was his hat. As he scanned a large National Geographic photo, his eyes would dart from one detail to another, picking up tiny features but never processing the scene as a whole.

The author, Oliver Sacks, says, “He never entered into relation with the pictures a whole . . . he had no sense of landscape or scene.”

Dr. Sacks’s statement about never relating to “the picture as a whole” has stimulated a lot of thought about spiritual agnosia. I reexamined my perspective on the church and the ministry.

Like you, I’ve been in a reflective mood while closing out the 1986 ministry year and pondering what might lie ahead. I’m painfully aware that my spiritual eyes, like the professor’s physical eyes, oft dart from detail to detail, focusing on the specific, while failing to see what should be the obvious whole.

During this self-examination I compared snatches of recent conversations with a devotional reading in Ezekiel. My responses to these conversations clearly indicated to me that I was focusing on random details rather than understanding, absorbing, and responding on the basis of the whole picture. Here is a brief log of what I heard versus what I was reading:

Heard: “Well, what did you think of Sunday’s sermon? He seemed like a nice enough person, but he doesn’t have it in the pulpit. When is the Search Committee going to start showing us some candidates worth considering? It’s been almost a year since Pastor left, and we can’t wait much longer. We’re losing ground; I fear for the future.”

Read: “I was carried away by the spirit of the Lord to a valley full of old, dry bones that were scattered everywhere across the ground.”

Heard: “I don’t see how we can make the church budget this year. We’re too far behind. That’s twice in the last three years we’ve missed our goal, and I’ve always suspected fancy accounting the third year. You know, with the new tax laws, we’d be smart to think of more realistic goals. Better to cut back now than face the embarrassment of cutting back six months from now.”

Read: “He led me around among them, and then said to me, ‘Son of dust, can these bones become people again?’ I replied, ‘Lord, you alone know the answer to that.’ “

Heard: “I’m very tired of this kind of denominational pressure. If they want to call the shots, then they ought to send someone in here to deal with the problems. I’m to the place where I don’t care what they think. Let the chips fall where they may.”

Read: “Then he told me to speak to the bones and say: ‘O dry bones, listen to the words of God, for the Lord God says, “See! I am going to make you live and breathe again.” ‘ “

Heard: “Generally speaking, I am encouraged, but I think I’ve brought things about as far as I can. Let’s face it, it’s probably wise to move on while I’m ahead. Better to leave too soon than to stay too long. My wife thinks I need a change and the church needs a change, so we’ll probably start looking around.”

Read: “So I spoke these words from God, just as he told me to; and suddenly there was a rattling noise from all across the valley, and the bones of each body came together and attached to each other as they used to be. Then as I watched, the muscles and flesh formed over the bones, and skin covered them.”

Heard: “Do you know that J_ is in the hospital? I’m not sure what’s going on. He’s not the same person since the divorce. His new wife is very lovely, but I can tell he isn’t happy. He desperately wants back into the ministry, but I don’t think he knows how to go about it.”

Read: “Then he told me to call to the wind and say, ‘The Lord God says, “Come from the four winds, O Spirit, and breathe upon these slain bodies that they may live again.” ‘ So I spoke . . . and the bodies began breathing; they lived, and stood up-a very great army.”

My conclusions? I am seriously afflicted with spiritual agnosia. Quickly I grasp and identify what is weak, flawed, and failing-the dry bones-but I grope to see the living, the breathing, the invincible army of God. Like Elisha’s servant, I can imagine it and even fantasize about it. But actually see it? Risk everything upon it? That’s another matter. And as the well-worn phrase proclaims, perspective is everything.

Christ said, “I will build my church, and the powers of hell shall not prevail against it.” That’s the whole picture. And for 1987, I am resolved to try to engage the whole. I pray for the breath of the Spirit to breathe into my dry bones the life and vitality that will help me faithfully serve my calling and colleagues.

Paul D. Robbins is executive vice-president of Christianity Today, Inc.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

Pastors

MINISTRY TO DEEP-POCKET DONORS

Michael R. Tucker

Big money doesn’t have to mean big problems.

All churches experience the mixed blessing of big givers. In some churches, the person may own the local parts store, or twelve hundred acres of wheat; in others, the person may be vice president of an oil company. In some churches, a person wields power by donating thousands; in others, it may be millions. The amounts vary. The dynamics do not.

How do you treat those who contribute more than others? Michael Tucker, who pastors a church that came into being through large donations, discusses the peculiar factors.

Bethany Community Church exploded into existence. Four families, during the summer of 1977, decided there was a need for a church in this part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. One family donated ten acres of land, and in 120 days the church opened.

That Sunday a full-time pastor welcomed worshipers to a six-hundred-seat sanctuary, educational rooms, fellowship areas, a nursery, offices, and a gym-in all, twenty-nine thousand square feet of buildings linked by manicured lawns and flower beds. In the next 120 days, four more full-time pastors were added to the staff.

Obviously, this is not a normal church-planting scenario. The church is not affiliated with any denomination, so it’s evident some of those founding families and others who have followed have deep pockets.

In the past five years the church has paid cash for two additional classroom buildings and added six and a half acres. It is now building another educational building and a two-thousand-seat worship center.

So much for the good news; now for the bad.

One of the founding families fought the first pastor for control. Both left the church after an unpleasant battle, and the church bled.

But through that painful experience, Bethany learned some important lessons about ministry to and with big givers.

Power Structures

Some people frown at any hint of power structures in the church, but power structures exist in any group of people-including God’s people, including God’s people who are spiritual.

Power is not inherently evil; it’s simply the ability to cause or prevent change. Anyone who wants to accomplish something in a church is wise to recognize this fundamental reality. Some matters cannot be birthed or buried unless certain people in the congregation nod in assent. Their wrinkled nose and slight movement of the head from side to side will kill any project.

How is power gained in a church? Usually, through service and sacrificial giving. For most people, this means not necessarily money, but time, energy, and sweat. Most leaders in a congregation have set up chairs, endured committee meetings, cleaned bathrooms, helped out on work days, car-pooled kids to camp, and vacuumed potato chips from their carpets after youth parties. They have worked hard; they have tenure. For this reason they hold power. That is the way it is, and that is the way it should be. Leadership comes through servanthood.

Fortunately, most people who enjoy a position of power do so legitimately. In addition to their service, they’ve shown a mature understanding of God’s Word and they exhibit the fruit of the Spirit. Their service does not replace, but demonstrates, their spiritual qualifications. The mature church will not allow anyone to hold power who is not a spiritual person.

What about the big giver? Does he or she have any rights to the throne room? Again, power comes by a natural process, through service. The big giver serves by giving money, and gains power just as those who have given time, energy, and sweat do.

But that’s the wrinkle. Big givers may not always be able to demonstrate their commitment and servanthood at church work days. Their schedules may prevent that. Writing a check appears less of a sacrifice than hauling kids to camp, particularly when the person has so much more than others. But usually the sacrifice is not less, only different.

I’m convinced that if the big giver is a spiritual person who does not seek to control because of the size of his gift but gives with the right motives and attitudes, he or she certainly is entitled to a place of respect and status in the church. The criterion is the same for the persons who give money (which represents time and energy) as for those who give time and energy directly. Provided they exhibit spiritual maturity, they are entitled to hold power.

Giving big gifts alone does not warrant power in the church; neither does performing many needed jobs. But each type of service, when accompanied by the appropriate spiritual qualifications, does entitle one to power. Simply put, the big giver, though his or her serving may be in a different form, must be treated the same way as everyone else in the congregation.

Some churches actually discriminate against big givers because they fear they’ll take control. I’ve known pastors who resented the big givers in their church who heavily supported parachurch organizations-“He’s not part of our team”-despite the fact the church also received substantial support. But if a member with a gift of teaching leads a Bible study for another group, these pastors don’t have any problem with that. So I try to be careful not to misunderstand or ignore the big giver simply because he or she has potential to hold power.

Special Needs

We all agree in principle that the big giver should be treated like anyone else in the congregation. But I’ve also learned that big givers need personal attention, personal recruitment.

That sounds like it contradicts the principle of equal treatment. Actually, it complements it.

When there is a need for a fifth-grade Sunday school teacher, youth sponsor, or usher, the church leaders pray about it, advertise in the Sunday bulletin, and possibly announce the need during a church service or adult class. If a qualified person doesn’t quickly volunteer, those responsible for the position then approach people personally and ask them to consider serving. No one has heartburn about recruiting those who have certain spiritual gifts and can meet the needs of the church by exercising those gifts.

When the church has a financial need, leaders go through some of the same motions-prayer and announcements. If the need is still not met, the pastor or another leader may mail a letter to the congregation. The pastor may preach about the matter. But some church leaders who approve of contacting potential teachers for teaching opportunities somehow feel it’s improper to contact potential givers to meet a financial need. Just as some of the best teachers wait until they’re asked to serve, some givers will not give unless they are personally contacted. We do not accuse the teacher of pride or suggest he or she is a prima donna, yet we often feel that way about givers who wait for a personal invitation to give.

When we began our present building project, I contacted a member who owns a construction subcontracting business and has considerable resources. He has never attempted to control any part of the church’s ministry. I told him what the building committee was thinking and asked his advice about the project. He was pleased that I sought his advice, and he graciously gave some good counsel.

He then volunteered to give one hundred thousand dollars to the project. In addition, he promised to donate his firm’s labor and materials for a part of the work, which amounted to another fifty thousand. He had heard about the building, attended the meetings where we discussed and voted on it, read the literature we sent to his home, but he still needed to be recruited personally before he got involved.

Recently the church needed a van. We prayed about and publicized the need, but nothing happened. I then called two people and asked if they would be interested in helping. Both had heard and read about the need for a van, but neither had given toward it. Although I put no pressure on either person, in ten minutes of phone conversations I had the fifteen thousand dollars we needed for that used van.

Big givers should be treated like everyone else, which may mean they need to be recruited personally to use their resources in the ministry.

Parachurch groups, which have a stewardship department, planned-giving representatives, or development directors, live by the rule: “People don’t give because no one asks.” So they ask. But the church, which spiritually feeds that big giver, changes his children’s diapers in the nursery, gives guidance to his teenager, offers him fellowship with other Christians, and takes meals to his home when he has his gall bladder removed, often goes without the benefit of that person’s resources because no one asks.

The Secret Side of Giving

A third principle is that giving usually should not be a highly visible ministry. The song leader, usher, teacher, and preacher have gifts that push them into the spotlight. That is the nature of their gifts. But each one has an obligation to move the congregation’s eyes from him or her to the Lord. If people exit the church on Sunday and whisper to each other, “Isn’t he a marvelous preacher?” he is not. We preachers have done our work well only when they exclaim, “Isn’t Jesus wonderful!”

It’s difficult for a big giver to stand in the spotlight and give God the glory for his ability to make a large donation-certainly harder than for the preacher to give God glory through the sermon. It can be done, and in some cases should be done as a model of cheerful and godly generosity, but it is difficult to do well.

My only personal experience with this came after we hired a consulting firm to help our church raise funds. Midway through the four-month program, the consultant wanted us to have four people give public testimonies on four consecutive Sunday mornings. These people would tell not only why they were backing the project but how much they were committing. My back stiffened a bit. Then he said, “I feel the first testimony ought to come from the pastor.”

I gulped. But after considerable prayer, discussion, and searching Scripture about the matter, our leaders concluded it could be done appropriately. With humility and in the power of the Holy Spirit, such a presentation need not be a source of sin that elevates people and causes pride or envy.

I gave my testimony and told how much I was committing to the project. The three others followed, and I believe the net effect was encouraging to the church. Afterward, some people thanked me for my courage, because they knew how I struggled to say those things. But no one complimented me for giving, and for that I’m glad.

Sometimes people compliment me for a sermon I preach. That is not a source of embarrassment to me, and (to the best of my understanding) it does not cause me undue pride. But if someone had thanked me for giving to the building project, I would have been embarrassed. My feelings reminded me that giving is not usually a ministry that should receive public attention or applause.

Discipleship without Indebtedness

It’s easy for us to be intimidated by the high and mighty. Wealthy people sometimes seem so secure, confident, and self-contained. In difficult situations we may be tempted not to confront them for fear of alienating them, but we need to remember they need what we offer. They need the same discipling we give to others.

A few years ago I learned that a wealthy man in our church was cheating on his wife. That day I went to his office and confronted him about his sin. He vowed to turn from the illicit relationship and restore his walk with Christ.

Sadly, he did not, and his wife soon discovered the truth. I invested dozens of hours in counseling them. For several months not a day went by that I was not heavily involved in that case. One Saturday evening their college-aged son called me and explained through tears that his parents were having another shouting match. He asked me to come to their home.

I asked if there was physical violence. He said no. I advised him to ask his parents if they wanted my help; if so, I would gladly come. Within two minutes the wife called and calmly announced, “I just shot my husband.”

I rushed to their home and spent the rest of the night attempting to keep the wife out of jail while trying to keep current on the husband’s condition. He lived, and their marriage survived, but the price was high for many of us who tried to help.

During the crisis in that marriage, I made sure no one asked that multimillionaire for anything for our church. I wanted this family to know our ministry is not for sale. Money cannot buy the meal we serve. We gave to them because we love them, not because they could give to us.

It’s important to disciple the big givers, but when we do, to make sure they don’t feel they have to pay for our services. Wealthy people who get on the lists with charities and parachurch groups often grow weary of being exploited. A millionaire told me recently he has decided not to meet with any more Christians who “just want to get to know you better.” The fact is, most of these folks really don’t want to get to know him. They want financial support.

Some wealthy Christians I know get more than a dozen telephone calls each month from people who want to reach into their wallets, and very few of those who ask for support make any attempt to minister to these wealthy people. The local church is called both to give these people an opportunity to minister to others and to minister to them-without obligating them.

Accountable Generosity

As strange as it sounds, however, even generosity needs to be held accountable. For their own good, big givers need to learn to give without attaching strings. It is usually best for a gift to be given to the church or group without demands on exactly how it is to be spent. Giving that comes with strings isn’t a gift; it’s a purchase. Gifts are given away-without demands on the recipient.

Certainly there are times when people give to special projects, and they want their money to be spent on that project. That is natural and lawful. The contributor should have the freedom to make suggestions but not to impose his or her will on the group. He can give to the building fund, but that does not entitle him to decide on all the building details. She can pay for the painting to be placed in the foyer, but others should have a voice about the selection of the artist and frame. He can purchase a computer for the church, but others should have the freedom to select the appropriate hardware and software.

This most often becomes a problem when a person wants to donate a decorator item, something that will be displayed in the church. A couple of times I’ve seen that a proposed gift would be controversial, so I’ve talked with the donors. In both cases there was no problem; they readily accepted that decorations, since they are publicly displayed and enjoyed, are best selected by public taste.

The principle of holding generosity accountable does not imply, however, that a gift cannot be offered within specific boundaries. Take, for example, the practice of some big givers to offer “matching gifts.” This condition for a gift holds merit because it usually motivates the group to do the hard work of fund raising without depending on only a few. It may be that Mr. Deep Pockets could fund the whole project without denting his stack of CDs, but that might be harmful for the church’s spiritual growth. All members need to grow through financial sacrifice.

So I see no problem with donors setting certain conditions under which they will give-as long as they understand the church has the freedom to kindly refuse the gift, without offending the donor, if it doesn’t feel comfortable with the restrictions.

A few years ago Harley was a school teacher living on a modest income. Then he began his own business and rapidly became quite wealthy. Through his children he became interested in a mission project in another country. Now he gives five thousand dollars each month to help several churches and pastors in this impoverished Third World country. That kind of contribution could be used to control decisions in those ministries, but from his humble background and consistent walk with the Lord, Harley has learned to give without strings. He has established a board of directors to allocate the money and make decisions about future investments in the ministries in that country.

Joining Forces

Perhaps the biggest problem from having deep-pocket donors is that people who cannot give as much feel unnecessary and stop giving. At Bethany, however, we’ve found that with these principles, big givers and little givers can gladly join forces-without little givers feeling insignificant.

We’ve tried hard to create a climate where both big givers and little givers can offer themselves and their means to God’s service. The key is not equal gifts but equal sacrifice.

One of the four public testimonies I mentioned earlier was given by an elder who is a school teacher. As part of his testimony, he told the amount he would be giving to the building project. The figure was literally one-tenth of that donated by one of the other individuals who gave a testimony. Yet afterward, this elder told me he felt no intimidation or discredit.

To me, that was a sign of true spiritual victory. I was as glad to receive that word as I was to receive any hefty pledge.

Michael R. Tucker is pastor of Bethany Community Church in Tempe, Arizona.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

North American Scene from December 12, 1986

MEDIA

A Controversial Film

With his new feature-length film, Wired to Kill, Christian author and filmmaker Franky Schaeffer has ventured into the secular arena. The science-fiction movie has been shown in two test markets and will soon be distributed nationwide.

Because of its violence and implied theme of revenge, Wired to Kill will likely raise a few eyebrows among Christians. Set in the future, the film revolves around a Christian family living in a society in which law and order has disintegrated. The family is regularly victimized by a brutal motorcycle gang. Finally, the teenage son realizes the authorities are powerless and decides to take things into his own hands. With his girlfriend’s help, the boy rigs up a number of remote-control devices intended to shoot or bomb the gang out of existence.

Paul McGuire, executive producer of Wired to Kill, said the film’s message—that an individual can stand up and make a difference—is both Christian and important. “After all,” he said, “the Christian message is whatever is true.”

However, Terry Lindvall, film professor at CBN University in Virginia Beach, Virginia, said the movie’s “might-makes-right” message “owes more to Nietzsche than to Jesus.” Lindvall also called the film’s scripting “poor” and its continuity “sloppy.”

PORNOGRAPHY

Reaction to a Lawsuit

In an open letter, Christian author and psychologist James Dobson has criticized the government’s handling of a lawsuit filed against him and the other members of the recently disbanded Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography.

In the suit, Playboy magazine objected to a letter authorized by the pornography commission and sent in February to retail outlets selling Playboy and similar magazines. Many stores eventually removed Playboy and other magazines from their shelves.

According to Dobson, the letter was sent to give retail outlets a chance to respond to testimony presented to the commission, not to encourage stores to stop selling certain magazines. In July, a federal judge ordered the commission to retract the letter; damages are now being negotiated.

Dobson says U.S. Justice Department lawyers have been too conciliatory in their settlement discussions with attorneys from Playboy. According to Dobson, Playboy has requested that the commissioners sign a letter stating, among other things, that Playboy is not pornographic.

Regarding the current discussions with Playboy, Dobson said the only kind of statement he would sign is one clarifying that Playboy was “beyond the scope of the [pornography] commission’s assignment.” Anything else, he said, would constitute an endorsement of Playboy.

AIDS

Teach Your Children

U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop has released a report calling for sex education—beginning in early elementary school and reinforced in the home—to help America’s youth avoid Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

“This epidemic has already claimed the lives of almost 15,000 Americans, and that figure is expected to increase 12-fold by the end of 1991 Koop said. “It is estimated that 1.5 million people are now infected with the AIDS virus.”

The 36-page report describes the disease, explains how it spreads, and calls for comprehensive education efforts to prevent children and adults from exposing themselves to the virus. “School education on AIDS must be reinforced at home,” Koop said. “The role of parents as teachers—both in word and in deed—cannot be overestimated.”

AIDS is spread primarily through sexual contact and by injecting illicit drugs through contaminated needles. The report suggests abstinence from sex and drug abuse as the best way for students to avoid AIDS. For adults, the report recommends sexual monogamy and avoiding illegal drugs. “The most certain way to avoid getting the AIDS virus … is for individuals to avoid promiscuous sexual practices, to maintain mutually faithful monogamous sexual relationships and to avoid injecting illicit drugs,” the report states.

PEOPLE AND EVENTS

Briefly Noted

Accepted: Into membership by the National Council of Churches (NCC), the rapidly growing Korean Presbyterian Church in America. Since its formation in 1976, the Los Angeles-based denomination has grown from 100 congregations and 12,000 members to 180 congregations and 20,000 members. The NCC Governing Board also granted observer status to the Islamic Society of North America, an umbrella organization of Muslims in the United States.

Approved: By officials at the Minnesota State Reformatory, an inmate’s request to be visited by a witch. Reformatory superintendent William McRae initially denied a request by Robert Edwards to have a witch conduct a “purification ceremony” at the St. Cloud prison. But a staff member of the state attorney general’s office later told corrections officials that the denial violated Edwards’s constitutional right to freedom of worship.

Awarded: By a Florida jury, $175,000 in damages to a regular customer of a St. Petersburg bar who was hit by a car after leaving the bar. Mark Hastings testified that he had 8 to 10 drinks at Jerry’s Lounge before he left the bar and was struck by a car. He argued that the bartender knew he was an alcoholic and should not have served him. Under a 1980 Florida law, a bar that “knowingly serves a person habitually addicted to alcohol” can be held liable for any resulting injuries.

Confirmed: By the U.S. Senate, President Reagan’s appointment of Frank Shakespeare, Jr., as the new U.S. ambassador to the Vatican. He replaces William A. Wilson, who resigned the post in May. The Senate approved Shakespeare’s appointment despite protests that naming an ambassador to the Vatican violates the First Amendment by giving preferential treatment to a single religious group. The U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to review a case challenging Reagan’s decision to establish diplomatic relations with the Vatican.

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