Video Transcript: Finances & Stewardship

Finances & Stewardship 

Opening

Bruce:
All right, we’re back on session 11, and we’re going to talk a little bit more about the financial piece of deacon.

Abigail:
And again, depending on what role deacon functions in your church, in your context, this might become really, really relevant to you. So we wanted to talk a little bit about that. So stewardship. You know, I think that one of the things—and we have so many courses, actually, on this kind of series of handling money well—money is something that actually is talked about a lot, a lot, a lot in the Bible, because it is something that comes up in all areas of life, and it is something that is important, and a deacon is going to know how to be someone who stewards money well.

Bruce:
Yeah. So you’ll note this first section—going to be able to—handing financial obligations and some best practices for dealing with those situations. Yeah, as Abby said, what the Bible says: Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. If you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? When I preach stewardship—that’s to people individually—that’s one of the things: How much can God trust you? Have you been faithful? Have you been—

Abigail:
—good steward of what you’ve been given? Verse there: In the same way, deacons are to be worthy of respect, sincere, not indulging much wine, and not pursuing dishonest gain. Now we focused a lot on this verse at the beginning, and we did talk about this, but again, that focus on not pursuing dishonest gain. You know, there is such a temptation for those who are in leadership and maybe have access to even other people’s money—in this case, that’s been donated and given—and a deacon needs to be one who is not pursuing dishonest gain financially, particularly as we’re talking in this—

Bruce:
—yeah, for sure, yes. And you should know that if you are a deacon, you may come into those situations where you have opportunity—that wouldn’t take much to—yeah, take money. Hate to say it, but this is the area, you know, if there are things that get churches in trouble, this is high on the list, high on the list. You know, I had one man in one of my churches who said he wanted to be a responsible steward, and so he would bring his tithe to me every month—he was on disability—and he would hand me cash. And I thought, “I could walk out of here with that cash, sure.” But—so I would always go to the administrator right away, and I said, “This is what I got.” You know, put it in—put it in a fund; call that our Charlie Fund—the guy’s name was Charlie. And it was interesting, because we always had to give it back to him at the end of the month, because he’d always run short of money. But the fact was, I had this opportunity, and right awayI’ve got to bring somebody else into it, to know that—no board here, right? But—

Abigail:
—it brings up the point how easy—you know, if you find yourself in the position where someone’s paying you that cash, or you’re in charge—you know, it’s so important that you have that integrity and that stewardship.

Bruce:
Yeah, faithfulness in small responsibility leads to larger ones, builds trust, supports the church’s mission—this, you’re right, right into this. As deacons, you best know it—so understanding financial obligations for deacons is likely going to be, right? So—

Abigail:
—a lot of times there is going to be, for deacons, that they are going to be managing the church budgets and expenses, to some extent overseeing those funds—especially for that community outreach, the benevolence. Again, what we’ve been talking about—this role of deacon being: how can you support what’s needed inside your church and outside your church walls? And you’re going to need funds to do those things. So again, that’s going to keep coming up. And supporting the church projects through the financial planning and appropriate allocation. And that’s why we talked so much about the decision making—a lot of times decision making is going to happen here in this area of financial decisions.

Best Practices for Financial Management

Bruce:
So—so what are some best practices for financial management? Things that you should be aware of as you think of managing finances within your church—accountability—

Abigail:
—you know, even those internal controls put in place where it’s like, you know, this idea of having two people who are going to be on this role together to keep each other accountable for making a decision or handling certain benevolent funds or things like that. You know, that is such a key practice—making sure that accountability is built in.

Bruce:
My first church—small, little church. And when I got there, the question is, what are people doing with money, right? And so there’s an offering every week that was taken—we passed plates down the pews, and people put in their money. And then I found out that one family—one of the deacons—would put all that money that was given that morning in a bag and take it home, and he and his wife would count it on the dining room table.

Abigail:
What—? Right? Like—there’s a huge possibility for accountability to be lacking.

Bruce:
We had to stop that. But at first they felt offended. I said, “Look, this puts you—”

Abigail:
—right. That’s another key thing—it’s like, even if your heart’s completely right and nobody might be questioning you, but the bottom line is, it protects the person who has been given the accountability as well from—yeah—false accusations—being, right.

Bruce:
So transparency—

Abigail:
—and I think that’s where, again, if you come into a situation and you see maybe there’s something where accountability is lacking, or something seems off, you need to have that transparency—even though, again, in that situation we just talked about, you had to be transparent with him and say, “This could look really bad.” You know, and it’s hard sometimes to be transparent, but it’s so important again in this area of finances.

Bruce:
And this is what people outside the church will be looking for. They want to see that—are you open about it? Are there regular reports to the congregation that show how much came in, how much went out, and where did it go? You know—that you’re not hiding financial information. Yeah—

Abigail:
—how much did the church get in—that you’re important enough being told to the congregation. And again, that integrity, which is just so important: it’s doing the right thing, no matter the cost to—maybe you personally or somebody else. That’s making sure that this—this money—is being, again, being stewarded in a way with integrity. Yeah.

Bruce:
In fact, the word integrity is an interesting one, because—previous session—I talked about my ’61—my father—1961 Chevy—I had an accident with—anyway, integrity means that everything is functioning the way it’s supposed tofunction within a system; and if the system is out of balance, it begins to shake the system. And you probably know of ministries in your area—or certainly publicly—that have gotten in trouble in this area. Back in the years before—the televangelists got in great trouble. It was found out that they were living this luxurious life of private planes and air-conditioned dog houses, and things like that. Because all of a sudden it says, “Wait—this is not a place of integrity.” And so people would stop giving, and rightly so. So, yeah—integrity is important.

Budgeting & Planning

Abigail:
So—some budgeting and planning. What should people be thinking about with that? Well—

Bruce:
Effective budgeting is definitely foundational to—again, as you’re coming on as a deacon, and there’s needs you’re seeing—for them to be addressed in the best way possible, there needs to be the effective budgeting. So the priority of: what are the essential services? What are those essential outreaches? What are the missions? And again, going back to the decision making—aligning your budget planning with that effective decision making so that you, as a deacon, can really—and those that you’re serving—that can really address what is the priorities, and ensuring these resources are available for unexpected needs too—so making sure that when you’re doing this budget planning, you’re also being prudent and being ready for emergencies and things like that.

Bruce:
So let’s look at some steps for creating and managing a budget.

Abigail:
If you have last year’s budget—if you don’t, there’s lots of templates online. So let’s say you’re a startup—you know, there’s possibilities—but a lot of times as you’re a deacon, there’s going to be a last year’s budget that you can look at as a baseline and start adjusting for what are new priorities that have come on after you’ve done that decision making process.

Bruce:
Now it’s vital to realize that—okay—what has it cost? And now, what’s the ministry plan? I always looked at a budget as the ministry plan for next year. So—what are we going to be doing this coming year?

Abigail:
Okay—again, setting those clear goals, making sure that there are savings for new projects or expanding different outreach. And again—what you just said—it’s like, this is kind of our goal for the year; this is what we see; this is important. You’ve got to regularly review, because, you know, it can be really easy to think something’s going to cost something, and then it ends up costing a lot more than you thought it was going to—or maybe it kind of cost significantly less, and then you have some extra room to expand something further. So it’s important to keep reviewing this so that there’s, again, no surprises when you start getting to the end of the year and people are going, “Well, did you stay in line with the budget? Did—again, this area of outreach—did we stay with that goal?”

Bruce:
One of the things—like, the last church I served—when I came there, there was a staff that was in place. And, of course, when you’re the new guy coming on, and you’re the lead pastor, as was my title—one of the things I did was start reviewing the budget, and found out that there were three sections in the budget: the area of worship was 200% overspent; the area of small groups was 300% overspent; and women’s ministry was 400% overspent.

Abigail:
So—you’ve got to stop and go, “This is why we need to review this. Why are these—right?” But—

Bruce:
—the reality is there—nobody—nobody had been checking that along the way. Should have been addressed very soon on, with the first quarterly review, the first monthly review, to say, “Well, wait a minute—”

Abigail:
—“What—maybe adjust this and see—this is an area where we’re spending more than we expected.” Yeah—

Bruce:
—or, well, you know, “This is where the expenses are at this time of year, and so we spend more now; we’re going to be spending less.” Whatever the explanation is, there’s got to be an explanation—

Abigail:
—otherwise, adjustments.

Handling Benevolent Funds Responsibly

Bruce:
That’s always a fun one. Okay—handling benevolent funds responsibly. Now—if you’re not aware of the word benevolent—it means “to do good for,” and so these are the funds that, you know—sometimes they’re a separate budget; sometimes they’re part of the budget—but this is where deacons get involved: where there’s a need, and you can step in to help with whatever the need might be. It might be for healthcare costs; it might be for, you know, heating—that they’ve got to get new furnace, can’t afford it—but that there are funds for that, and those must be handled responsibly, right?

Abigail:
And going back to—again—the decision making, it’s like, you know you’ve got this certain fund that needs are going to come up at any given time. So how can you make sure you’re—you know, as a deacon and the deacon team are knowing, “Okay, what’s our process to make sure these funds are handled responsibly?” So—the clear guidelines—yeah, who qualifies for that? And I think that’s such an important distinction, because my definition of what might be a benevolent fund recipient might be very different than someone else I’m serving with. And addressing that and working that out as a team, and deciding—again—what does this church value and what qualifies someone to be able to be a recipient of this? Yeah—

Bruce:
—and I think it’s very important that you look not just at your own funds, but also that you have a list of agencies or ministries within the community that this person might qualify for.

Abigail:
Well, that’s a good point too—like, they may not qualify, because it’d be better to refer them to a ministry versus—yes, the church could help with this need, but it would be better—

Bruce:
—balancing generosity with sustainability. You can’t spend money you don’t have. Life, okay?

Financial Transparency & Audits

Abigail:
Financial transparency—

Bruce:
—yep. Again, as you were really pointing out very clearly—make sure those regular updates are happening to the congregation. Make sure that you’re sharing what is needed—like the annual financial statements—with different members. Again, if you have a website—a lot of times again, if someone’s looking at your church, they’re going to want to see that. They’re going to see that there are annual financial statements that are accurate and correct, and that’s also why, again, we have things in place like audits and things to keep that reliability and that trust from both the congregation and, you know, everyone as a whole. Audits—

Bruce:
—can be done in a variety of ways, and I’ve done it both ways. Sometimes you’ve got people in the congregation that are qualified to do that—I mean, they’re financial planners; they are people who are involved with that practice—and to get, again, not just one, but two people looking at numbers—there’s check and balance even there. And I’ve been part of ministries that hired somebody to do this every year—that at the end of the year, somebody came in and made sure that all the recording was done correctly, all the reporting was done correctly, and so that the records are accurate, so that it could be said to the congregation, “This is what’s happening here.”

I just was listening over this past weekend to a church service where they were having some difficulties; they had dismissed their pastor, and there were some questions about the integrity of the ministry, and so they hired a law organization to come in; they hired lawyers, and one of the things—as soon as they got—was lawyers that were specialists in money and budget to look through it, so that they could say to their church, “This has not been an issue that did—”

Abigail:
—did not have to do with the decision or whatever upset or concern was—

Bruce:
—there. And so that added to the idea of trust—and “You can trust us; when you give money to us, you can trust that it’s being taken care of in the right way.”

Abigail:
And again, this is so important, as we’ve talked about. You know, so many people are having distrust towards the church—leaving the church. Again, this area of finances can be such a hot button of why people don’t trust or leave a church, and so as someone who’s maybe on a deacon team, you want to make sure that you’re encouraging the entire church—you know, we want to go above and beyond to prove trust in this area.

Bruce:
Yeah, another way—

Abigail:
—to go above and beyond goes back—even again—the person who’s taking home—they may have zero bad intent. But ultimately, now they had an opportunity where they were really the only one looking at everything that came in. So—yeah, don’t mix the personal and church finances in any way. If you see someone who, you know—let’s say—is working at a certain ministry, and maybe they might have interest in a certain type of fund towards that, you know—making sure that that person is—for their own protection and safety—just kept out of the mix of those finances. And so that also means that you need to disclose any personal interests you have, and you need to keep encouraging everyone else to disclose if there’s personal interests they have.

Bruce:
And you need church policies about that stuff. That’s just reality. Now—I had a lot of questions when I provided a service to a church—consulting kind of situation—and I received a check from that church for what I contributed to them, and the pastor’s wife had signed the check, and that immediately brought up a ton of questions: Does she have access to church funds, or did this come out of their personal account? And if she has access to church funds, that creates a conflict of interest—that is dangerous. So that was an interesting conversation after that.

Developing Financial Literacy

Abigail:
Okay—developing financial literacy skills.

Bruce:
And, you know, here also—CLI—of course we’re so passionate about just education, and so this area of going, we want to have our deacons—one of our elders, our leaders—to have financial literacy skills. So it might be a good idea that—say—you have someone who has been in accounting or been in these areas or working—can they put together a financial workshop that can take place? Or can you find some online that might be good? And of course, if there is a complex issue, yeah, it’s always a good idea to get that third-party person who you can consult on a complex issue, who maybe, again, does not have emotions involved in the situation and things like that. And of course, there’s also great books and resources you can be reading to help develop this beyond what we’re saying here. Encourage you on everything we’re teaching—read books, read more resources, and do more to keep educating yourself—

Bruce:
Right. So conclusion—

Abigail:
Yeah, you’ve got to commit to those priorities. It can be really hard. And again, you can watch this right now, and maybe you weren’t a deacon yet—you’re interested—or maybe you’re a pastor who’s looking for their deacon. You can see all this and know what the truth—but when you’re living it, you have to continually commit daily to serve these best practices. Keep at it, keep seeking that growth and maintaining that honest and open approach.

Bruce:
Again, last thought: faithful stewardship honors God, builds trust, and empowers the church to grow and serve more effectively. Yeah—so build—and look at the finance—you become a deacon: look at the finances of your churchand how they are kept, and how the records are kept, and how the—and what—look at it. And, you know, find out what the policies and practices are—and if they’re good.

Abigail:
This is important.

Bruce:
That—this is important. This is one of the reasons people don’t trust churches. So—yeah—so go and do well, and God will bless you.