The Pastor's Guide to Fund-Raising Success
Step-by-Step Details That Will Improve Your Church's Donor Program

By Rev. Dr. Dorsey E. Levell and Wayne E. Groner

Per capita giving is often used as a measurement of church support. It is found by dividing the amount of annual contributions by the total number of members. The issue for your church should not be per capita giving alone, which is just one way of measuring effective giving. The issue should be whether there are sufficient contributions, annually and otherwise, to achieve the vision and mission your members have embraced. 

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The annual fund

You should use the annual fund to cover current operations of the church--local, state and national. Gifts to the annual fund are usually small and from members' current assets. They are often made weekly or monthly. They come from regular offerings, special offerings, targeted gifts, direct mail, special events and pulpit appeals. Many churches raise their annual funds through some form of every-member campaign, usually by pledge to be fulfilled before the end of the calendar year. Some denominations publish step-by-step annual fund guidelines designed for their local churches. Some churches use non-denominational guidelines available at bookstores.

Not all churches implement a full plan of asking every member to give every year. Some church leaders take shortcuts, thinking: "Our annual fund campaign this year was very successful and it was a lot of hard work. Now that our members know what is expected of them, they will continue to give every year without being asked. After all, we are engaged in the Lord's work and our members know that it takes money to get the job done." The result is that annual giving begins to decline. After three or four or five years, church leaders decide they had better do another annual campaign.

Such interruptions not only weaken ministries and individual response opportunities, they add to the challenges of helping persons understand the importance of ongoing and increased giving to the church, in good times and in bad times.

Weekly offerings. Weekly offerings provide opportunities for people to give at their many different financial levels and levels of understanding. Weekly offerings should enable and encourage regular giving. Too often, though, the offertory part of a worship service is perfunctory and non-worshipful, even to the point of subtly discouraging some people from giving.

"Your presentation requires prayerful consideration and serious thought if you are to successfully lead people into the presence of their creator through the commitment of a part of themselves to God," according to stewardship leaders Len Young and Ken Schnell. "It should be designed to motivate and challenge the congregation to give in the spirit of love even as God has so abundantly given love to each of us."

Young's and Schnell's do's regarding the offertory:

• Several days before the service, ask one or two persons to prepare testimonies of blessings and successes to be given at the offertory.
• Engage people in conversation at the pulpit regarding their testimonies, again with prior knowledge and adequate time for preparation.
• Use special music by the choir, a soloist or an ensemble before of after the offertory, not just during it.
• Ask the congregation to stand and ask members to give a brief testimony to a person next to them.
• Invite the congregation to come to the front and place offerings into a decorated container, such as a decorated basket.
• Distribute pencils and three-by-five file cards and ask the congregation to write a one-sentence statement of stewardship commitment. The statement does not have to be financial. Ask all to come to the front and place gifts and cards into the container.
• Have more than one person pray over the offering. Use people of different ages, from children to senior citizens. Prayers from these different perspectives bring richness and completeness to the offertory worship.
• Select people to stand at their pews and read short scriptures, poems or other materials related to the offertory. If your service is in a large sanctuary, you may need to provide microphones.

Weekly offerings alone may get some of the bills paid, but they leave no margins for creating and sustaining longer-term programs of ministry. Dependence on weekly offerings can result in crises that focus on meeting the budget rather than vision and mission.

Special appeals. A special appeal is an excellent way to support budgeted ministries and additional ministry opportunities that come up throughout the year. Special appeals should be planned as part of your programs and scheduled on the calendar. Gifts from special appeals can send children to camp, fund a mission trip, buy personal items for nursing home residents or shut-ins, support housing and meals for the poor, provide college scholarships or do just about anything your members desire. Special appeals are opportunities to suggest memorials and tributes. They communicate directly to the needs of members, who can respond: "I want to do that."

You can use creative ways for members to respond to special appeals. That is what one church did when it discovered rotting gutters and soffits--the result of a design flaw--in a relatively new building. One beautiful Sunday morning while the congregation was singing, the pastor led them outside--still singing--to view the damage and then back into the sanctuary. The pastor asked for a special offering and the next Sunday, he announced that more than enough had been contributed. Givers' names were listed in the church bulletin without the amounts each gave. The pastor did all the right things: he demonstrated the need for support, asked appropriately and recognized and thanked quickly. The givers came away feeling, "I'm glad I did that."

Another pastor was similarly creative. His church needed a van to transport youth and pick up non-driving senior citizens. The pastor found a good used van, parked it in front of the church and told the story. Gifts came in so quickly that one elderly lady was upset because she did not have time to contribute before the van was purchased. The pastor assured her she could give a tank of gas periodically as her share in "our bus."

A variation on special appeals is the targeted gift. Targeted gifts are usually asked of a handful of individuals in private rather than of the entire membership from the pulpit or by mail. In the examples of the damaged building and of the van, the pastors could have asked several persons or families for funding. They chose to invite all of the members to help.

Offering envelopes. If your church has pew racks for offering envelopes, be sure someone is assigned to keep the racks filled with envelopes and pencils. Include reply envelopes so members can take them home and return them when they have a need to give. In the upper-right corner of the reply envelopes, print the following words inside a small box: "Thank you for your extra gift of postage."

If you provide dated offering envelopes, mail them to families monthly rather than yearly or rather than having families pick them up at the church. Mail only the next month's supply during the last week of the month. Include a receipt and thank-you letter from the pastor for their last gift, and a reply envelope. The pastor's letter may be used to explain special financial needs, to ask for gifts and to report on successful ministries. This gives you 12 opportunities to show appreciation to contributors and to keep families updated on church activities and finances. This is especially helpful for families who may not attend regularly. Include a reply envelope with every thank-you letter and you will be pleased at the number of gifts you receive by return mail.

Mailings. Every mailing that goes out from the church should have a giving opportunity. Listing such opportunities enables members to meet their needs to give. List three to five items that vary in cost. At Christmas time, you may want to list a dozen or more items. Mention memorials and tributes. Always include a reply envelope.

You can easily mark your reply envelopes to track mail appeals by holding a stack of the envelopes in one hand and marking the edges with a felt-tipped pen. Different colors of ink represent different types of appeals or dates. Only the office staff will ever see it. This is an inexpensive and easy way to track your bounce-back envelopes. Many times you will find envelopes coming back for different purposes than they were sent, even months later. These persons saved the envelopes to give to meet their needs.

Another use of mail is mailing directly to your entire membership for a specific gift appeal. Small churches can do this with volunteers. Large churches should consider engaging a company that specializes in direct mail services.

Special events. Special events are an important part of many churches' social and financial programs. Chili suppers, pie making, basketball games, bazaars and even trips to the Holy Land can be fund-raisers. These activities are highly social and meet members' needs to be together for a common cause. Special events are done best by church departments or age groups with the funds raised earmarked for activities in those departments or by those groups. Funds also could be directed toward a needful church project. As with weekly offerings or any other method of fund-raising, do not depend on special events to secure all of the money needed for your annual operations.

Challenge gifts. If your church needs $10,000, ask a member or family to give at least $5,000. The challenge is best if it is a named leadership gift, but it can be anonymous. Challenge gifts are an excellent way to raise a lot of money quickly. There is a caveat. Challenge gifts give a big boost to your projects, but they tend to be one-time boosts and often cannot be repeated in following years, even with a different challenge giver. The most effective plan for your annual fund is to secure sustainable gifts year after year.

The Rev. Dr. Dorsey E. Levell served for 31 years as founding executive director of the Council of Churches of the Ozarks, which operates 15 human services programs, has a paid staff of 120 and more than 1,000 volunteers, and an annual budget of $12 million. Wayne E. Groner is a Certified Fund Raising Executive and executive director of the Labette Community College Foundation and Alumni Association in Parsons, Kansas. Both authors are ordained ministers. Footnotes were omitted.