Change Your Mindset, Motivation, and Methods to Get More Money for Your Church

by William Cowles

OK, this is a taboo subject, I know. It’s uncomfortable and doesn’t feel spiritually clean to talk about raising money in church. But churches do talk about it at least once a year, usually trying to avoid naming the beast during campaign time. And, everyone agrees that the church has to have money if it is to remain a healthy delivery vehicle for discipleship, ministry, mission, and service. When it comes to generating more money in the church, though, my experience is that most churches just don’t do it very well.

I’ve led many, many financial campaigns and raised millions of dollars in over 40 years of membership at my former church. Each time was a struggle. No matter how many clever campaign themes we tried, no matter how many high-ticket stewardship consultants we paid, each time was starting from scratch – trying to crack the code that would open members’ checkbooks. Rarely did we hit the target goal. Never did a financial leader say, “Look how much more ministry we can do this year because our members are generous.” We did the same thing over and over again and expected better results each time. In the process of failure, we circled the wagons in fear and closed ourselves to finding and trying a better model.

As a result of this timidity about money, church leaders often scrimp on their ministries to meet the ever-dwindling supply of funds, even in the face of the increasing needs in our communities. Budgets tighten. Staff shrinks. Programs are cut. Outreach is tabled. Jesus’ vision for us to feed the hungry, clothe the poor, and comfort the sorrowful is waylaid by unexpected emergencies, the cheap and easy option, and broken infrastructures. The belt tightening continues until no one can breathe in God’s life-giving Spirit.

When we build a wall around just the money we have, and try to protect it rather than invest it in places where it will multiply, we’re operating from the same old, same old broke mindset. Our only motivation is to preserve what little we can count, and not grow it in faith. Frankly, our methods for talking about the value of money to the church are two generations old. We have allowed a culture of scarcity to take over, when a culture of generosity is available to all of us with a few simple changes.

The stewardship gurus at The Rocket Company faced this problem head on in their recent blog, Infographic: The 3 “M’s” of Church Finance Leadership. In the article, they offer help to church financial leaders who are trying to get budgets unstuck. Their 3M approach has a simple brilliance to breaking through the inertia. Read their entire piece, share their clever Infographic with your leadership team, and change your:

• MINDSET: Broke Thinking Leads to Broke Churches. Churches that default to scarcity stewardship are committing to having to repeat it.
• MOTIVATION: Want Something For Your People, Not From Them. Churches that enable people to participate in generous acts don’t need annual campaigns and never have to resort to special askings or emergency appeals.
• METHODS: Use Stories that Show Life-Change. Churches that consistently talk about the good that is being done by the donations they receive never have to beg.

I pray that even one church will take The Rocket Company’s 3M model and just try it. There’s no way to lose, and lots of opportunity to win. It can’t get much easier than that. Go, now, and invest in 3M change that will grow more money so you can do more to share the harvest of God’s great church.