[“Church Without…” is a series of think-pieces designed to slowly deconstruct what we think is essential to having church and to call attention to the hidden barriers we’ve erected between ourselves and the Great Commission.]
“If God wants it done, He’ll fund it.”
I think I heard a variation of that line from Shane Claiborne, but I can’t remember. The maxim still rings true, especially when we consider so much abuse that takes place in the church in the name of fundraising.
So many ask for so much money, and so very often, they ask the Church. In the local church context, this can happen in a lot of different ways as there is always summers camps, kids’ missionary projects, youth missionary projects, church missionary projects, and random benevolence requests.
These are all fine and worthy causes, but what often happens is that the same groups come to the same group–the congregation–for money. What results is not “fundraising” but “fund reallocation” as people begin to take from their tithe, which supports the church, in order to support other causes. That is not a great plan, long-term.
What if we took some missionaries, the ones who provide direct humanitarian support, and set them up with a Kickstarter or Indiegogo-style fundraising platform? There are people who would never give to “spreading the gospel” who would love to give to building schools and installing wells.
For projects like summer camp or for church improvement projects, such as purchasing a new roof or a new furnace, a more traditional fundraising approach could be used. For years, my church has raised money for missions, of our youth, and our building fund by selling homemade ice cream at our town carnival. Each year, we’d bring in a couple thousand dollars. It wasn’t a lot, especially when you consider how many volunteer hours went into the whole thing. Of course, when you stop asking your people for so much money, you may just find that they’re happy to give you some time instead.
The last set of projects, then, the gospel-oriented missions projects are the only ones left in the hands of the local church, and this is where we learn the value of “offerings,” of giving over and above our tithe as a way of worship to God. This is where we can take “faith promises,” wherein we prayerfully we pledge to give money to a missions project “as God supplies the funds.”
All in all, there isn’t anything revolutionary in what I’ve just said about fundraising, but I feel that it’s important to go over these basic elements again, especially as social media keeps a never-ending stream of financial needs before our eyes at all times. Donor fatigue is a real thing. We’d better prepare ourselves for it.
[Photos via Samuel Zeller and Allef Vinicius on Unsplash]
Chris says
Do you find that asking for people’s time is easy than asking for their money? I remember my dad continued to be involved in Youth ministry for much longer than he wanted as no one else would step up, and even in my fairly small church where most people are very active, I still baulk when I heard there’s something extra this week (admittedly this may change a bit with my new job and more time not at work or planning).
I’ve heard several preachers talking about how hard it is for modern Christians to give up their time, maybe this is a small sample and not generally reflective but I wonder if some people would more happily give twice as much to the church as long as they don’t have any further commitments.
Phil Schneider says
I’m sure both issues are at play. The root is selfishness.
The issue I was writing to resolve was the issue of multiple fundraisers within churches and the growing tide of “donor fatigue.” People, to me, are becoming more and more charitable, but less and less consistent about tithing all while having a ton of other places to donate. It’s an issue that has to be address to keep the Church stable into the 21st century.