Church Financial Policies

GRACE CHURCH

 FINANCIAL POLICIES

We believe the way a church handles itself in the financial arena is a reflection of integrity in every area. The Elders, therefore, have established the following policies to guide us in the years ahead:

1. Grace Church belongs to God. It is not a monument to one man or even to this present generation that serves through its various ministries. We are all merely fellow servants in the work of the kingdom.
2. In the last ten years the Lord has apparently chosen to bless our congregation both numerically and financially. Nevertheless, He gives and sometimes takes away. If He ever closes the door to this work, we will accept His leading and yield the outcome to Him. Until then, we will devote every ounce of energy to the task at hand.
3. We can discern the Lord’s will regarding the continuation of our church through the support He sends (or doesn’t send) from His people. Therefore, as the overseers of this church, our obligation is to make known to you our needs. We commit ourselves, however, to do so in a Christlike manner and with the greatest sensitivity to those who are visiting our church. We will never resort to what we consider to be disrespectful and dishonorable methods of fund raising, even when the needs are serious.
4. It is our belief that as you consider your giving, your first obligation is to the local church, in our case, Grace Church. After this has been met, you should prayerfully consider where God would lead you to give...including “parachurch” ministries that support and defend the same values we do.
5. We will not operate this ministry at a deficit. Although from time to time it is necessary to borrow funds for large capital expenditures.
6. We consider the contributions we receive to be “blood money”–given by families who have sacrificed to make their gifts possible. Our obligation is to spend that money conservatively and wisely in continuing the ministry.
7. We will carefully record each contribution and provide you with a regular update of your giving to assist you in your planned giving and tax preparations.
8. When we make a purchase, we will pay the invoice within 30 days, if possible. We do not intend to use the vendor’s money.
9. We will not try to raise more money than we need.
10. We will never sell or rent our mailing list to those wishing to use the names and addresses of our supporters.
11. We will strive to handle money given to Grace Church in a responsible manner.

 To summarize, we will remember always that Jesus Christ is our possessor and our dispossessor.
He ordained and blessed this ministry. It belongs entirely to Him.

BUDGET

God has given us a great vision for a 21st Century church. As you read through our goals you will see they are consistent with our vision. We can’t accomplish everything all at once, but with God’s help we can achieve a little bit every year and begin to see our vision become reality.  Without question, to accomplish our goals will require money. This is the purpose behind our budget. Our vision determines our goals...our goals determine our budget.

For example, if you look at the whole budget, you will find money designated for several evangelistic events throughout the year.  Our budget reflects that we are serious about reaching souls.

Our Operating Budget includes two funds: the Ministry Fund and the Building Fund.

The Ministry Fund is the amount we will have budgeted for our missionaries and to operate our church and its various ministries. This would include areas like worship, education, facility maintenance, staff salaries, and general operations. This is where your tithe goes when you give on a weekly basis.

The Building Fund represents money we intend to apply towards our building debt. 

Be A Barnabas

Read: Acts 4:46-5:11

He was the kind of man you would want with you if you had to travel into a hostile land. His name was Barnabas. Most of us know him as the apostle Paul’s missionary companion on Paul’s trip to Galatia.

Before Barnabas became a missionary, however, he was known in the early church as a generous giver. Acts 4:36 tells us he had sold a field and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet.

In the very next sentence, however, the Bible introduces us to another man named Ananias. Ironically, their stories are very similar. Like Barnabas, Ananias sold a piece of property. Like Barnabas, he brought the proceeds of the sale and placed the money at the apostles’ feet. Unlike Barnabas, however, Ananias and his wife Sapphira decided to hold back a portion of the money.

When confronted about this sin, they both lied about their actions. In a word, they “committed the sin unto death” by lying to the Holy Spirit. In short order God struck both of them dead as an example to the other believers in the early church.

There is an interesting lesson in this story. The root of their sin was not greed or even lying, but it was pride. It is interesting how the Scripture tells of Barnabas’s example of giving with the proper motives and then immediately a similar example of giving with improper motives.

Can’t you see Ananias and Sapphira observing Barnabas’s gift and the attention he received and desiring the same attention for themselves? After all, they could have given only a portion of the proceeds from their land and still benefited the church and honored God. Instead they wanted others (including Peter) to think they had surrendered it “all to Jesus.” They wanted to be honored.

The next time you place your gift in the offering plate, check your motives. Are you being a Barnabas and giving from you heart to honor God, or are you being an Ananias and trying to honor yourself? Be a Barnabas.

The Scars Of Battle

Perhaps you read with mixed emotions yesterday’s “Memo From Hell.” It’s an illustration–of course–but there is more truth to that memo than many of us would like to admit.

In previous week’s we have looked at “Why We Exist” and revisited our purpose and vision. We have examined the importance of prayer to God’s church and offered some concrete examples to help us build a “House of Prayer.”

This week it’s time to lay the challenge before us: do we really want to be a church that is effectively making a difference in the world, or do we want to join the vast majority of American churches on the road to self-service and inward preoccupation?

Author and Pastor Bill Hull makes the challenge clear:

Today, the evangelical church exists to serve the evangelical Christian. But if our mission is to reach the world, we must begin to think about the unchurched, those outside Christ. We must focus on those who have not yet found their needs met in what the church has to offer. The only way to save evangelicalism from the junkyard of irrelevancy is to put mission first and ourselves second. When this happens, the needs of both the unreached and the evangelical will be met. (Can We Save the Evangelical Church by Bill Hull, p. 7.)

And what’s our mission? Our Lord gave us our mission as He was about to ascend into heaven: "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age" (Matt. 28:19-20).

Howard Snyder drew the line even more harshly: “It is hard to escape the conclusion that today one of the greatest roadblocks to the gospel of Jesus Christ is the institutional church” (Hull, p. 7).

What would draw these men to make such accusations? Consider a startling statistic: in today’s church, one hundred adults and one year are required to introduce 1.7 people to Christ. In short, we are losing the battle. Yes, Evangelical churches have grown in terms of numbers, but as a percentage of total population, they have declined.

Let’s bring this home. How does this apply to Grace Church? How involved in actively ministering to other people are you? Do you see a need and fill it, or do you see a need and write it on your care card for someone else to take care of?

Ask the Lord to search your heart and reveal to you how you can improve both your service and your sacrifice for His kingdom.

From 1995.

Memo From Hell

TO:        All Rulers, Authorities, Powers of the Dark, & Spiritual Forces of Evil

FROM:        Lucifer

DATE:        2132 Apollyon 65 Satanic Years

RE:        Local Church Ministry

It has come to my attention that effective ministry in the local church can be greatly diminished by diverting the attention of the believers away from stewardship and focusing their attention on trivial matters. Henceforth, you are ordered to begin implementing immediately the following directives concerning local church ministry in your targeted churches:

1. Frustrate and discourage both pastors and congregations with endless meetings and arguments over finances.
2. Influence the believers to focus on their own needs instead of on the needs of others.
3. Sow bitterness and resentment between the believers along economic lines.
4. Sow mistrust in the hearts of the believers towards their leaders and all those in authority over them concerning financial matters.
5. Sow contempt in the hearts of the leadership for the believers under their care.
6. Use the endless complaining of the weak to weaken the resolve of the strong.
7. Do everything within your power to remove prayer from all ministry-related activities.
8. Do everything within your power to move the church away from Biblical standards; persuade the leadership to rely on their own wisdom and knowledge (This is where my influence is greatest!).
9. Reward all acts of self-centeredness and pride with worldly success.

These directives are to be carried out without exception. Do not waste time on ministries that are dead, dying, or on the decline. Orders will follow identifying your targeted church with a complete analysis of its strengths and weaknesses.

This is a battle we cannot afford to lose. The effectiveness of the modern local church must be stopped. A strong financial base is critical to all that a church tries to do. Destroy that financial base.

NOTE: For further reading see Ephesians 6:10-20

How To Pray For Missions

Read: Ephesians 6:18-20At the present time, God has chosen to use our church as a sending church. We thank Him and praise Him for the trust He has placed in us. But a church that supports its missionaries does more than send a support check each month–a missions church covers its missionaries in prayer. This is an essential part of the responsibility God has given us. Listed below are several suggestions to help you be a better intercessor on behalf of our missionaries:1.        The Mission Field        A.        Local/National Government. Pray that they will not be resistant to Christianity, and will allow evangelizing and conversions.        B.        Unsaved Nationals. Pray that they will become dissatisfied with their present form of worship and that God will prepare the “soil” of the heart. Pray that God will keep Satan from blinding them to the truth.        C.        Saved Nationals. Pray that they will be willing to openly profess their faith in Christ and to face whatever opposition may come. Also, pray that God will raise up godly men to provide strong leadership for the Christian community.2.        The Missionaries        A.        A Prayer Covering at Home. Pray that God will raise up members from our church to form a strong prayer covering for the missionaries. At Grace, we call these groups Harvest Teams.        B.        Their Relationship with God. Pray that the missionaries would be persons after God’s own heart and that their relationship with God will remain strong and always growing.        C.        Good Health. Ask God to give the missionaries strength and the ability to withstand the pressures of living on the front lines of the “battle,” as well as a healthy emotional outlook.        D.        Sufficient Finances. Pray that God will supply their needs according to His riches.3.        The Husband and Wife Team        A.        Strong Relationships. Pray that each member will be loving, unselfish, respectful, understanding, honoring, and cooperative.        B.        Good Education. Pray that God will provide a good education for the children and give wisdom to know when and where they need to go away for further schooling.The above suggestions should place you on the road to becoming a great intercessor on behalf of our missionaries.