The IMMORALITY of Church Finance….
Hello all:
I’ve been pondering church finance as of late. My congregation is having money problems, as I have written before. We just had a member move out of the area, one that was a significant financial contributer.
On Sunday, our minister led the Lord’s Supper and took the collection. There was no Lord’s Supper reflection, which is not the norm for our church…but there was a lengthy reflection on giving…of a type I’ve never heard in a Church of Christ yet. Our minister spoke about how giving money can be equaled by others through their giving of time and energy. He was rebuffing a comment made by another member recently about how our worship ministry should respect the wishes of those who give the most money.
Every time I look at our bills and church finances, I see a trend. Our congregation treats people different based on how much money they give. We seem to “employ” some people who are in need of money and have a certain status, yet we take money from others. A case in point:
We employ two widows, one of whom was an elder’s wife, through our pre-school. None of the students in this pre-school attend our church, so, in essence, we take money from non-believers and give it to church members. The pre-school doesn’t break even… no matter how much a couple of members claim… they generate thousand dollar energy bills which the church ends up subsidizing to provide two “jobs” to two widows. At the same time, we rent our parsonage to another widow, a member of the church….. we take her money, along with rent subsidies that the state provides… the money she gives us in essence bankrolls the pre-school. We take money from one person is deemed “not as worthy” to give to someone else that is deemed “worthy.”
To top it off, we also receive rent from Cingular Wireless, as they have a cell-phone tower on our property. Never mind the immoral acts AT&T is involved in….we take their money and subsidize the pre-school and the church.
Our $2.5 million building is falling apart. I’m not sure if that is a good thing, or a bad thing.
-Clarke
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April 20th, 2007 at 2:43
Hi Clarke,
I feel for you. I don’t know of any easy answers to the dilemma your congregation faces.
In 2003, a crisis hit the ICOC congregations (a crisis from God IMO, resulting in many positive changes). One immediate effect was dramatic financial pressure. There were many staff layoffs, salary reductions, and other financial measures to keep the bills paid.
In Atlanta we reorganized into smaller, autonomous localized congregations. Today my congregation (about 200 adult members plus children) has a weekly contribution of around $7500 and weekly expenses closer to $5000. We have about three months’ expenses in cash reserves. But we do not own a building. We are currently renting from a school on Sundays (about $500 per service) and from another church on midweek (about the same cost). We cannot extend beyond the end of the year with the school, and the church we rent from is moving to another location. So we are nomads looking for a place to meet. But we have a reasonable financial situation.
We have one fulltime minister and one parttime youth minister. We want to add a fulltime teen minister, and probably will do so within a year.
I say all that to say this. When our financial crisis hit a few years ago, we had to decide what expenses were essential to the biblical mission of the church, and to throw off everything else. As a result, today we have a positive financial situation (along with some logistical challenges). More importantly, I think the church is as healthy as it has been in a long time, and is moving in a good direction.
April 20th, 2007 at 20:48
Ironically being Biblical in matters of giving and receiving is extremely limited. This is why many denomination including churches of Christ fabricate all sorts of what God wants from us in the idea of finance.
I would say without hesitation 95% of all church structure in the areas of finance are man made. Now having said that I don’t oppose such structure. On the contrary since Gods spirit dwells in those he chooses how one uses money is easily understood and the opposite is true with members who don’t have the spirit.
However in all honesty the giving as we know it today is nowhere found in the Bible. Too leaders and Elders have usurped a power that is anti relational and anti spiritual. What would Jesus do? Oops Lets leave that one out of the picture obviously God wants professional preachers and ministers at a wage no else has and with arrogant men lording over like seething managers.
What spiritual value is there in hiring or firing someone what does it prove, what in the world does it mean? Even further building ownership and maintenance and incorporation and tax exemption ,come on, I know from a modernist point of view we call this A NECESSARY EVIL! Nice theology.
April 22nd, 2007 at 6:35
Oh wait. Yes, I have. I’m sorry, but I just don’t have it in me right now to type it all out again. Besides, it was just ramblings anyway. You didn’t want to hear me go on and on about this, right?
April 22nd, 2007 at 8:30
Sure, let’s here it!
April 25th, 2007 at 19:40
“We employ two widows, one of whom was an elder’s wife, through our pre-school. None of the students in this pre-school attend our church, so, in essence, we take money from non-believers and give it to church members.”
I had to re-read that sentence a few times to finally figure out what you were saying. My question is this: why do you have a pre-school to begin with? What does a pre-school have to do with the church? I don’t see how providing mothers too busy for their own children with somewhere to dump them is part of the work of the church. Maybe the financial situation of your church would make more sense if your church knew what a church is supposed to be doing, and babysitting 2-year old kids for money aint it.
April 26th, 2007 at 10:10
I can think of a reason to have a pre-school: to serve the community, especially single moms. At the same time, you put that asset (the building) to work. If they’re losing money, they probably are not going after the two-income crowd here. It seems harsh to accuse a woman just trying to feed her family of being “too busy for her own children.”
On a different tangent, several in my congregation would like to purchase a building. We currently rent and have rented the same location for several years. But folks have a couple of reasons:
Some place to call “our own.”
Perception of legitimacy. (Insert “Israel wants a King!” here)
Frankly, I’m agin’ it, but I’m not the only member here. Many congregations do put their buildings to good use loving their neighbors by serving their community.
Regarding that cell tower: I’d rather you guys take their money and put it to good use than someone else. What you’re actually doing with the money is a separate issue and I think it helps to keep it separate from whether or not to take the money in the first place. It’s not a case of “do they get a tower in this area?” but a case of “who is going to take their money and what are they going to do with it?”
A very smart guy once wrote, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.” Another even smarter guy wrote, “You cannot serve both God and money.”
April 26th, 2007 at 18:52
Why would you be against buying a building but not renting? Renting is essentially throwing money away (in comparison to buying), isn’t it?
April 27th, 2007 at 10:21
jk: It would seem so, but our rent is significantly less than a mortgage would be plus you have to spend that down payment on the building plus remember that it’s not like a home in that you’re not getting to write off the interest on that mortgage.
Right now, if I had my druthers, our congregation would hire a young adult to work as an evangelist on the campus of our large local university and perhaps do some mentoring with some of our teens.
April 29th, 2007 at 6:15
I am not sure that the way we give through the church will ever be corruption free. A pile of money always causes corruption. I don’t recall any collective giving in the bible other than to spread the word. I believe the personal charity should come from indiviguals christians loving their neighbors
May 23rd, 2007 at 21:30
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