As much as the church is a place of worship, running it needs money. There have been so many cases of mismanagement of church finances that raises the question of whether people are doing this in the right manner. There are some very common mistakes that are made when managing church finances. The following are some of the most common mistakes that churches make and some solutions to church financing problems.
Lacking vision is one common mistake leaders make as one can go nowhere without a vision; there ought to be a vision to have a mission. In this aspect, churches should be managed as a business whereby there are financial plans and a laid out plan that is agreed by the congregation in order to have the support from every member in pushing these goals forward and realizing them.
Churches also make the mistake of working without a margin. The margin between the revenue and the expenditure must be reasonable enough. It is impossible to have a successful management if the developments envisioned by these churches depends solely in the Sunday offerings. They must make an extra effort to get other sources of income.
Previously, there have been cases where churches fail to ask for financial boost from the congregation for the fear of misinterpretation that may put off some members. This is because of the many instances where churches have been accused for using religion as a cover up to steal and fleece its congregation. Even so, true believers are reasonable and therefore would want what is good for the church which is why they will not have a problem contributing as long as it serves for the good of everyone.
In order to make this convincing and have a congregation that is willing to make these contributions every time there is need to, the management should make an effort to at least reveal to the congregation the fruits of their labor and in this case the evidence of where their funds have been spent on, accounting every single coin; this ensure that their morale to contribute is not destroyed.
To encourage people to contribute, the leaders need to avoid making too many financial asks. In some churches, the congregation is asked to contribute towards too many projects at a particular time and this leads to a breach of trust. With time, people become less motivated to contribute and this leads to less income. The leaders must therefore ask for help only for the things that are essential.
Some of the mistakes made by the management are the same ones made by the normal businesses. For instance, they acquire debt that is too much too handle. This leads to a situation where all the revenue goes into the payment of the debts therefore stagnating the development; as a result, apart from being disappointed, people begin to lose faith with the leadership as they might feel somewhat fleeced even if the mismanagement was not intentional.
The best way to go about handling churches finances is handling them like one would do for a business; for this, the people chosen in the committee to handle finances should be qualified in this field in order to ensure they are competent enough to account every single expenditure and can make decisive decisions in handling these finances.
Lacking vision is one common mistake leaders make as one can go nowhere without a vision; there ought to be a vision to have a mission. In this aspect, churches should be managed as a business whereby there are financial plans and a laid out plan that is agreed by the congregation in order to have the support from every member in pushing these goals forward and realizing them.
Churches also make the mistake of working without a margin. The margin between the revenue and the expenditure must be reasonable enough. It is impossible to have a successful management if the developments envisioned by these churches depends solely in the Sunday offerings. They must make an extra effort to get other sources of income.
Previously, there have been cases where churches fail to ask for financial boost from the congregation for the fear of misinterpretation that may put off some members. This is because of the many instances where churches have been accused for using religion as a cover up to steal and fleece its congregation. Even so, true believers are reasonable and therefore would want what is good for the church which is why they will not have a problem contributing as long as it serves for the good of everyone.
In order to make this convincing and have a congregation that is willing to make these contributions every time there is need to, the management should make an effort to at least reveal to the congregation the fruits of their labor and in this case the evidence of where their funds have been spent on, accounting every single coin; this ensure that their morale to contribute is not destroyed.
To encourage people to contribute, the leaders need to avoid making too many financial asks. In some churches, the congregation is asked to contribute towards too many projects at a particular time and this leads to a breach of trust. With time, people become less motivated to contribute and this leads to less income. The leaders must therefore ask for help only for the things that are essential.
Some of the mistakes made by the management are the same ones made by the normal businesses. For instance, they acquire debt that is too much too handle. This leads to a situation where all the revenue goes into the payment of the debts therefore stagnating the development; as a result, apart from being disappointed, people begin to lose faith with the leadership as they might feel somewhat fleeced even if the mismanagement was not intentional.
The best way to go about handling churches finances is handling them like one would do for a business; for this, the people chosen in the committee to handle finances should be qualified in this field in order to ensure they are competent enough to account every single expenditure and can make decisive decisions in handling these finances.
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