Over the past several months I’ve talked with various church staff about some money issues. One interesting aspect of these conversations is how they parallel. All of them involved a variation on: (1) a church member wanting to give money to, or fund, the staff person’s ministry area, (2) the offer of a personal gift of money to the staff member in appreciation, and (3) observations or questions about how different staff persons in the same church handle these situations.
I shared with each my thoughts on these issues based on my own values and thinking:
- My rule is to “pay my own way” personally. And, any program of which I’m responsible for needs to do the same. In other words, if the money’s not in the church budget, then work on developing the budget, not “getting people to pay for it.” The first ultimately has more value to the church community since its impetus is vision and corporate value rather than need.
- It’s healthier for the church, and for church members, to work on developing the congregational program budget than it is to have individuals overfunction, rescue, or “own” a program. Ministry programs need to “belong” to the church as a whole, not to those most interested in them for individual reasons, regardless of how legitimate those reasons may be.
- I encourage giving to the church unified budget over encouraging people to give to pet projects or ministry predilections. While it often is easier to get people motivated to give to specific areas of ministry or to programs they favor, ultimately the church as a whole suffers when we encourage this kind of stance to the financial support of the congregation.
- I never accept personal monetary “gifts” from members (I’ve turned down a $6,000 gift one time, and $4,000 another). This goes back to my first rule about “paying my own way” but it also has to do with the reality that money does funny things to people and relationships. This is not to question people’s motives (which is another rule: “Never question people’s motives.”), merely a sober appreciation about the dynamics of what money represents for people, and the emotional investment they make on that representation.
- Finally, I never worry or take responsibility for how another staff member goes about this issue. I set my own standards. However, I do think there is value for the pastoral leader of the staff to help the staff members clarify the corporate values they will commit to regarding issues like these.
One person asked if they should share with church members the reasons why they dealt with monetary gifts in a certain way. I think it’s fine, and helpful, to tell people the reasons why you do these things. Because these are akin to values and principles, people will not take it personally if you educate them that you are working out of your guiding principles. I’ve always found that church members have great capacity to be graceful when they understand that our actions are informed by our convictions and principles, even when they do not agree with them.
