NARRATIVE BUDGETS

 

            I spent a few blogs talking about year-round stewardship and different things to do each month of the year, to encourage yourself and the folks in your congregation in their generosity.

            I mentioned during the month of October, that at this point, you should have a draft of your line-item budget done.

            I also talked about working on a narrative budget. Have you used a narrative budget in your church before? Are you using one now? If you have, great job! If you haven’t, it’s not too late. I know it seems like a lot of work. First, I talk about a line-item budget, which is bad enough, and now I’m telling you to create a whole other budget.

            I don’t know about you, but most people don’t find reading line-item budgets very interesting, and, with probably very few exceptions, they don’t motivate the generosity of people. Of course, a line-item budget is necessary to be able to track giving and expenses, but it’s simply a tool that enables this work to be done.

            A narrative budget has a completely different purpose. As I said in my earlier blog, “it’s a great way to tell the story of your budget without resorting to a business-like budget that no one takes the time to read.”

            There are many ways to have a narrative budget. It can be a tri-fold, with basic information and some pie charts and pictures. It can be far more detailed in a booklet form. The very first narrative budget I ever created utilized the mission statement of the church. It had four basic parts to the narrative budget, which included worship, education, outreach and nurture. I then allocated every line of the church budget to those four categories. Some lines went 100% to only one category, some spread over two or three or all four. It was a fascinating exercise to see how the church was using its gifts to do ministry. The narrative budget then went on to tell the stories contained in those four categories. Looking back, I should have used less words and more pictures or drawings. It is pretty cumbersome.

            I encourage you to do some checking around and see ideas for narrative budgets and find a way to share the stories, the ministries, the mission that is supported by the gifts received by your church. I have found a good resource that guides a first attempt at a narrative budget, but there are a lot of resources out there.

 http://download.elca.org/ELCA%20Resource%20Repository/Giving_Thought_to_a_Narrative_Budget.pdf

            If you are interested, I also have a Power Point on narrative budgets and how they can fit into your work that I would be happy to share with you.