Archive - April, 2012

Oh No! It’s a Sermon on Money

April 25, 2012 in Church Fundraising, Talking About Money With Your Church with 0 Comments

The other day I read a blog post from a pastor that began by stating, “No pastor likes to talk about money, and nobody in the church wants to hear a sermon on money.” A few days before, I noticed a tweet from a pastor who claimed that he “survived” preaching on money that morning.

While we recognize that many people have abused the subject, we believe it’s time to conquer the fear of talking about money in the church. I offer these five suggestions.

Don’t apologize for talking about money. It’s not a necessary evil – it’s an important part of the discipleship process. Jesus said that people’s hearts and people’s finances were connected. So when you stand to preach on money, you’re not preaching a money sermon; you’re preaching a discipleship sermon. Never apologize for asking people to follow Jesus.
Make it normal to talk about money. People talk about money all of the time, probably EVERYDAY. It’s time for this to be a normal topic in the church as well. This means that you need to talk about spending, savings, debt, retirement, and insurance, in addition to giving.
Start talking about money EARLY. If you’re a church planter, one of the healthiest things you can do in your church is to teach on stewardship and generosity early on. In fact, talk about generosity with your core group, because what they model will happen on a larger scale. You’re not going to flip a switch and become a generous church with generous people.
Un-churched people aren’t stupid…they know it takes money to run a church. Pastors are often afraid to talk about money because we’ve all read the books showing skeptics think the church is all about money. People who don’t go to church need Jesus, but they are not dumb. They aren’t offended when they are asked to contribute, and they know it takes money to pay people and operate a facility. Don’t’ let the fact that you’re reaching skeptics keep you from talking about money.
People do want help with their finances. For too long, the church has just asked for money from people, yet offered no practical help in the process. What would happen if you helped your church WIN with their finances? Would people in your church respect you if you helped them pay cash for a vacation? Let’s want something FOR people, not just FROM them.

Let Giving Rocket help you have more money for ministry!
Click here to sign up for our 30-day trial membership for ONLY $1!

Are You a Strategic Giver?

April 23, 2012 in Online Giving In The Church, Taking Special Offerings & Church Tithing, Talking About Money With Your Church with 0 Comments

Many people like to think of giving as an act of spontaneous worship. God speaks, we’re moved, and we drop something in the offering plate. We see a need, our heart is tugged, and we offer to help. That’s how it works for a lot of people.

And while it’s true that we need to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and respond to needs as we’re led, there’s another side of the coin that’s equally important.

We need to be strategic givers.

Read Genesis 24 and you’ll find that Abraham planned ahead and sent gifts for Isaac’s future wife.

Read the Christmas story and you’ll find that that the Magi planned ahead and brought expensive gifts with incredible meaning for Jesus.

Isaiah 32:8 says generous people PLAN to do what is generous.

In other words, while we can respond to needs as they arrive, we should PLAN to give.

That’s why I love the phrase Automate the Important. If generosity is important to you, why not set it up and make it automatic? Why not do what the Bible teaches and plan ahead?

New Church Giving Statistics Revealed

April 23, 2012 in Church Fundraising with 4 Comments

Church Giving Stats Revealed

The premise of the the Church Giving Survey was to look at how churches are doing financially & what was influencing their giving. I have to say that I was surprised at the data that came back.

Here is what surprised me:

1. 86% of churches are BROKE or BEHIND budget

The study reveals only 14% of churches are ahead of budget. This is a problem. 86% of churches are just existing… Jump over to the survey page & find out why.

2. Increasing church giving isn’t difficult

The study reveals 5 key influencers on church giving. All 5 of the influencers can be implemented by any church of any size.

3. The 14% of churches ahead of budget act the same

The churches exceeding budget are different in their demographics but the same in how they operate. I didn’t think it would be like this but it was. It shocked me to see that there really is a formula you can use to increase church giving.

I’m in starbucks… Check this out:

5 Things to do on the Internet

April 18, 2012 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Surf wisely.
Get more money for ministry.
Sign up today for your $1 Trial Membership!

People Don’t GIVE Themselves Into Debt

April 16, 2012 in Uncategorized with 2 Comments

With less than 3% of Christians tithing, are believers really going into debt from digital giving?

This seems very unlikely with many churches seeing contributions decrease while consumer debt continues to increase. Have you ever heard someone say, “I’ve given my way into debt!” It’s not likely that people will increase their debt by giving money to their church via credit cards. If anything, they have spent money on themselves, increasing their debt, while never giving to the church.

Don’t buy into the lie. Digital giving does not increase personal debt.

Church Spotlight: Faith Promise in Knoxville, TN

April 11, 2012 in Online Giving In The Church with 0 Comments

Faith Promise Church began offering digital giving seven years ago to capture new givers and provide a more convenient way for people to give.

Executive Pastor Josh Whitehead said, “It started off slow with a few one-time payments. But after integration with our church management system and internal marketing, we now see over 50% of our giving come from our online giving portal and kiosks.”

Digital giving provides a new, relevant way to allow your congregation to give 24-hours a day, seven days a week. Faith Promise says online giving has kept their financial staffing costs down while increasing giving. The church’s annual giving has increased by an average of 15% per year over the last three years.

We want to help your church in this area. If you would like more information on how to launch digital giving in your ministry, join Giving Rocket today.

Another Member Success Story

April 10, 2012 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

This month’s member success story was chosen specifically to prove how effective the resources, available to our members, actually are. This church saw tremendous results ONE MONTH into their membership! The key here was that they USED the resources we made available. Now they are reaping the benefits of having money to fund important ministries in their church! Check this out…

Dale Schaeffer BridgeWay Community Church, Morton, IL

From: Dale Schaeffer
Date: Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 9:32 PM
Subject: Thank you!
To: Casey Graham

“Casey,

Hey man just wanted to say thank you for what you and the team at Giving Rocket are doing.

After thinking about joining Giving Rocket several times over past month, we finally pulled the trigger at the Chicago Giving Rocket Tour stop two weeks ago. After just two Sundays I’m blown away by the results.

We were inspired on the Tour to share with our church in a giving talk where their money goes when they give. The next Sunday was the final Sunday of our fiscal year so we decided to create a 4 page Annual Report to share with everyone who attended the next Sunday. We created it on Wednesday and had it back from the printer on Friday. Then passed them out on Sunday. We took the “Where the Money Goes” giving talk and updated it for our situation and applied it to the Annual Report we’d printed. At the close of our worship experiences, before the offering, we took 4 minutes to celebrate what God had done in the past year, where their giving went, and challenged everyone to be a part of what God was going to do in the next 12 months.

We usually average around $6,500 per week in our offering. Our previous highest regular offering was $8,994. This past Sunday, with no special giving emphasis, we received $13,059.15 in un-designated giving! I think it’s safe to say, I wish we’d joined Giving Rocket months ago. The giving talks alone, with a little local creativity, are worth the price of membership.

Thanks again for what you and your team are doing!

Dale

PS…I attached the annual report that we put together so you could see how simple what we did really was….the whole thing was designed off of the giving talk outline you guys provided.”

We hope that this story gets you FIRED UP enough to take action! If you haven’t become a member yet, there’s no greater time than now to do it! For $1, one month’s time and a little effort on your part, you too can see results like this.

Dale has given us permission to share not only his story, but the annual report they handed out to the congregation. Click –> here <— to download the file.

Three Great Online Giving Pages

April 9, 2012 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Here are three great churches with great online giving pages.

Check out Church of the King. I love how they give a simple tutorial and use video to show people exactly what to do.

Saddleback Church has a great online giving portal. Notice how they give people the option of making recurring contributions or making a one-time gift.

If you expect LifeChurch.tv to have a great online giving page, you are right. This is probably my favorite giving page because it’s so clear. I love how they give users the opportunity to create an account but give quickly via PayPal. A lot of people have PayPal accounts (with “extra” money sitting in them) so this is a fantastic option. Their page also does a super job of answering questions and showing where the money goes.

Making your website donor-friendly is just one component of creating a digital giving strategy for your church. This is something we’re talking about for the next few weeks with our Giving Rocket members. Jump in now, and you can grab a ton of resources.

Your Offerings are Becoming Irrelevant

April 3, 2012 in Online Giving In The Church with 0 Comments

Can you imagine going to Wal-Mart, only to find that you were required to pay with cash or a check?

Now, think about your weekly offering time in your worship service. With attendees carrying less cash and leaving their checkbooks at home, how are they supposed to be involved in giving during the offertory song?

One way to overcome this problem is to offer digital giving solutions. Whether you launch an online giving portal or put giving kiosks in your lobby, you will begin engaging givers at a new level.

Make giving an opportunity for worship at any time via digital giving solutions.

This month at Giving Rocket, we’re focusing on helping our members create a digital giving strategy that will help beat the summer slump. Jump in now for $1.

Look What Members Get in April

April 2, 2012 in Online Giving In The Church with 1 Comment

A Giving Rocket membership isn’t a silver bullet; it’s a system that will help you have more money for ministry. It’s like a gym membership. Over time, your church will get financially healthy.

Every month, we provide coaching, resources, cut and paste communication, giving talks and more to each of our Giving Rocket members. Here’s a short sample of what members are getting this month:

• A brand new coaching video from Casey on Digital Giving
• A brand new eBook on Digital Giving – perfect to share with your team and board
• A quarterly contribution statement letter that’s ready for you to customize and send to donors
• A new and improved Automate the Important campaign

Automate the Important is a full blown digital giving initiative. It has graphics, logos, commitment cards, communication pieces, handouts, and more – all to help you intentionally communicate to your congregation about setting up recurring contributions.

This $299 resource is INCLUDED for members this month. So sign up now, and you can grab all of these resources and help your church automate their giving.