Church finance

Laura M. Norvell

"With mainline religious organizations in decline, many church leaders experience a similar decline in support for mission work. This paper asserts that the church can find new donors for their charitable mission work by looking beyond church membership, and in this way can expand its vision for what the kingdom of God can look like in its community. The author interviewed generous people unaffiliated with Christian congregations and shared the insights from these interviews with local church leaders, who then imagined how to connect new people to mission work. As a result of the shared insight, church leaders expressed an expanded vision of whom they could involve in mission projects. In the process, they also expanded their own understanding of and commitment to generosity." -- Leaf [2].

Bradley Scott Stagg D.Min.

This doctoral research project studied the impact of introducing a for-profit subsidiary to a local nonprofit congregation. The study reveals congregational leaders experienced emancipatory feelings of hope and spiritual agency when utilizing the innovation tool of a business Miniplan. Liberating congregations from the oppression of financial scarcity freed church leaders to consider new ways to address increasing costs, particularly deferred maintenance of aging buildings. This project used Participating Action Research as its research orientation, since it is ideal for business and church research. All participants reported significant spiritual growth in stewardship; emancipatory feelings of hope; and generalizability for the larger church.

William L Carlton

The local mainline church on the corner is experiencing a declining membership and a shrinking budget. Many are approaching the fifty-year lifecycle of their facilities. How can six, seven, or eight times the annual budget be raised for needed new construction and renovations? This thesis explores the planning necessary for a successful major capital campaign program seeking to raise two million dollars or greater. Strategic planning and best fundraising practices are explored. More importantly being explored is the spiritual transformation that must take place in making these efforst a "rational" act.

Andre Maurice Rogers

This dissertation's focus explores the funding of African-American church plants within the South Carolina Southern Baptist Convention. The primary research question is, "How does external SCSBC funding affect the success and health of African-American church plants?" The research was grounded on work done in fields of study related to the subjects of church planting, church health, and church funding. The scope of this research was limited to the African-American church plants of the SCSBC in the last decade. The principal beneficiaries of this work are church planters who are either initiating their first work or are experienced and planting again.

Mark A Brown

This project sought to determine whether Christian multi-tenant nonprofit centers benefit from sharing resources as compared to independently housed ministries. The focus was on whether or not there is a functional use of resources for Christian nonprofit ministries involved in the case studies. The hypotheses stated that the Christian multi-tenant nonprofit center format will be found to foster opportunities for cooperation. Five other hypotheses focused on savings in rent, operations, and technology, and whether marketing and donation revenue increased. A questionnaire revealed that the hypotheses are true in certain situations, but there are different perspectives in understanding those results.

B David Mobile

This case study set out to discover effective principles of church planting churches in the upper midwestern United States. Five hypotheses guided this study: people from the mother church leave to plant the new church; church planters have a relationship with the mother church before starting a new church; daughter churches are planted locally in relation to the mother church; daughter churches are financially supported by the mother church for a period of time; and the people from the daughter church fully support the church planter. The hypotheses were supported by the literature and case study. As a result of these case studies, seven principles surfaced. The first principle is finding the "right" person. Without the "right" person, the rest of the principles do not matter. Principle number two is assessment, which verifies that he, is indeed the "right" person for the job. Principle number three is the five percent rule: every new church that is planted will give five percent of its offerings to an escrow account for a minimum of three years. This is where the money comes from to plant new churches. Principle number four is partnering for the purpose of sharing resources. Principle number five is that a church plant becomes a fully functional church on its launch day, which allows the bookkeeping systems of the church to include paying the salary of the church planter from day one. Principle number six is raising support, which takes the pressure off the church planter to raise his full salary. Principle seven is networking, which makes partnering easier and contributes to the nonfinancial support of the planters. It is hoped that these principles will work to make a difference in the way churches are started and that they will be tested in different places by other networks of churches that desire to create movements of church planting churches.

John W Bryson

The author researched the Fellowship Associates' church planting residency in Little Rock, Arkansas. The hypothesis of this study is as follows: "Fellowship Associates' residency program effectively provided holistic training for church planters." The focus of the study was on the selection of church planters, the training of church planters, and the support of church planters. The method of research was interviews with alumni of the program. The outcomes confirmed the hypothesis that Fellowship Associates is effectively providing holistic training for church planters.

Barbara L Fullerton

This author analyzed giving in the United Church of Canada over six years in light of congregational stewardship practices. Fewer givers gave more: annual per capita giving increased 25%. Responses to 3,034 congregational surveys indicated positive correlation between increased generosity and stewardship leadership, spiritual nurture, social justice involvement, and stewardship best practices. Congregations where givers and revenue increased, with individual annual giving over {dollar}1,000, more often engaged all of these strategies. Congregations with decreasing revenue were least likely to use any of them. Using only some practices did not produce the same level of results as using all of them.

Donald G Holliday

An evaluation of the manpower, finances, space and programming resources of Oakwood Community Church in regards to the purpose of the church and to identify misallocated resources so they can be reallocated.

B Justin Allen

The author believes that campus ministries will have to start raising their own funds outside of the apportionment formula in the United Methodist Church or they will soon die. He surveyed numerous campus ministers, did some case studies, and did independent research into budgets. The author found that some ministries lost one hundred percent of their funding in the blink of an eye while others were thriving. He came to the conclusion that it is already too late for some ministries that have had to close their doors, but others have the chance to survive if they act now.