ANNUAL
CAMPAIGNS
I’ve talked about three important
factors for donors, two important ideas about money, and the need to talk about
money throughout the year.
In reading an article the other day,
it contained a perspective, written by Rev. Dr. Susan Buckson, which talked about
how important it was to talk for her to about money in the church she served at
least once each month, and citing studies that “rank money among the top five
struggles facing individuals, couples, and families.”[1]
I want to repeat something I’ve said
before, and that’s “no church has money problems; problems with money are
simply a symptom of a true problem.” When I’ve made that statement before, I
often have gotten push back, because of course, churches have money problems.
Some churches can’t make payroll, or can’t have full-time staff, or aren’t able
to pay ministry shares in full, etc. etc.
I think something “positive” that
came out of COVID, was that problems that churches had, but had been able to
ignore, suddenly came to the forefront and were no longer able to be ignored.
Money, in these situations, often functioned as a giant neon finger that
pointed to an issue or issues at the church. Thing is, those issues had been
there awhile, but had either been ignored, or just didn’t have importance
placed upon them.
Now, fewer people coming to church, decreased
giving, increased technology costs, increased utilities and other expenses! It
all comes together in a vicious circle, and a church starts crying about
financial problems.
Thing is, we generally find it more
comfortably to ask for money once a year, calling it a stewardship campaign,
and we don’t talk about the spiritual side of generosity.
So, again, I’m repeating: let’s talk
about generosity, not money! Generosity is part of being a disciple, and if we
ignore it, so our folks ignore it, then our disciples aren’t maturing in their
discipleship! Our discipleship pathways aren’t going to be effective, and we’ll
suffer “money problems” and people don’t have good relationships with their own
money, because who’s going to talk to them about it?
It should be us!
Please
feel free to contact me at (315) 427-3668 or susanranous@unyumc.org if you’d like to talk
about mission and money in your local church. I have some great ideas to help
you understand where you are and were you’re going, and how to help your folks
discuss and embrace generosity!
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