Ever wondered how churches can sustain their missions in a world where the traditional offering plate falls short? The financial fabric that supports our churches is undergoing a radical makeover. This episode isn't just about recounting struggles; it's a treasure trove of inventive solutions, from the entrepreneurial spirit of minority and immigrant churches to the pioneering use of digital platforms like crowdfunding. We'll explore the rich history of church funding with Grace Pomroy of Luther Seminary. We'll learn how churches are reinventing church funding—to secure a future where faith communities not only survive but thrive.
Show Notes:
Funding Forward Program at Luther Seminary
Transforming the Offering Plate into a Spiritual Journey with Kirby Gould | Episode 172
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[0:36] Everyone. Welcome to Church in Maine. This is a podcast that is at the intersection of faith and modern life. I'm Dennis Sanders, your host. Church in Maine is a podcast that is looking for God. It's looking for God really in the midst of all the issues that we face in our world, both issues that are taking place within the church and within the largest society. And so we want to have this podcast be a forum for that, seeing where God is working in the midst of all of the confusion and uncertainty of the times. You can learn more about the podcast, listen to past episodes, and donate by checking us out. And you can do that at two places. You can go to churchandmain.org. Or you can also visit us at our Substack site, churchandmaine.substack.com. And at the Substack site, you can also see some articles that I've written there as well. Consider subscribing to the podcast, and you can do that on your favorite podcast app. You can also subscribe at the Substack site. And I would also hope that you would consider leaving a review on whatever podcast app that you use. That actually helps others find the podcasts, and it would really mean a lot to me if you did that.
[2:03] So, I have two experiences that I want to share as a pastor. The first is from probably about 10 to 15 years ago. I was associate pastor at First Christian Church in Minneapolis, and it was an interesting time in the life of that congregation. First Christian had been, like a lot of mainline Protestant denominations, a large congregation, but they had steadily lost members over the years. And they found themselves in, you know, this beautiful mid-century modern building just south of downtown that maybe at one time had hundreds that would fill it. And now you were lucky if you had maybe about a hundred in the sanctuary as a whole. And so in 2008, they sold their building to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. And they spent a few years, they were actually able to rent for a few, for about three years, and they were trying to figure out what to do. And they ended up doing something rather interesting.
[3:24] They found out that two other congregations, um.
[3:28] Salem, uh, English Lutheran church and Lyndale United Church of Christ, um, were looking to basically rehab what was, uh, kind of the older part, the sanctuary of, um, Salem Lutheran and try to make that into a place where they would share. And after a lot of talking with the other two congregations, First Christian decided to join in and they created, um, what became this new ministry center called Spring House, which is located not too far from where First Christian's old building is. And so the three have gone in together. They have created three sanctuaries that they try to rotate, usually once a quarter. And they've been able to, in many ways, share their resources. So instead of merging, what they did was that they would share certain expenses. So a lot of the office expenses, and I think that they have someone that does joint youth ministry. And the thing is, is that that has worked. That has actually helped the three three congregations that probably all by themselves could not have survived, um, be able to come together and in many ways of still be separate and in some ways thrive.
[4:57] Um, and that, um, when I left, we had moved into spring house. Uh, we had been, uh, I had been there for about a year and a half after the, the move. And, um, it is still going. Um, And I think the church is doing well for the most part. There are some rough spots, but I think it has helped them a lot. The second story is a story that is much more recent.
[5:27] When I left First Minneapolis, I then moved to become the solo pastor at First Christian of St. Paul, so the other side of the river. And so I had been there. They actually sold their building many years ago in the mid-90s, and it moved to a suburb called Matamidai, which is on the far eastern edge of the metro.
[5:52] But that move wasn't probably the best move, and they had a lot of problems, lost a lot of members. Um and in a lot of ways they the only reason kind of they were keeping on going was that they had relied on another congregation to that was sharing space that rented and um that allowed for them to continue well um i had been there then for about nine years and in 2022 that church closed so we We lost that money and we were really low on, on funds and we had some problems there. The church was not in great shape. Um, and the boiler, uh.
[6:38] You know, was, we didn't know, but at some point probably was not going to continue. And if that happened, basically it was, you know, time was not on our side. So we decided to sell, to do what a lot of churches did. And that was to sell the building, um, was able to get a good price for it and moved. Uh, we are now sharing space with, um, a Lutheran congregation in another suburb in Roseville, which I think actually has been a good move for us. And that has helped us financially. Of course, we want to, are trying to use those proceeds in ways that will be sustaining and not trying to spend that down. But it did help us financially and in a lot of ways.
[7:27] Both of those stories in many ways are are ways that churches have found, especially in these times when less people are going to church, where we were able to kind of fund both the church budget and also future mission and the mission of the church. And in some ways, those kind of ideas and several others are becoming more common Because the primary way that we have in the past used to fund church expenses has been, of course, through the offering plate. And, you know, we can do lots and have done lots of things of stewardship drives and other things to help people to consider to give more of their money to help support the mission of the church. And that is still an important aspect of ministry. Ministry, but it is becoming, churches are finding it harder and harder to just rely on that as the sole income for a church. So the question is, what do you do?
[8:38] Well, a few years ago, Grace Pomeroy put together an interesting kind of ebook called Funding Forward. And in it, she has talked about alternative ways of funding mission in local churches.
[9:02] And, you know, I've had someone on here, I had Kirby Gould on here earlier that talked about stewardship. And so I wanted to have Grace on to talk about stewardship from another perspective, especially stewardship and how do we look at things from an innovative standpoint when...
[9:26] The church offering alone is not going to cut it.
[9:31] So I am thankful and spent some time talking to Grace about her work. She is a writer, but also a financial educator. And she, as I said, she heads up and is the director of the Stewardship Leaders Program at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. soda. Um, she has helped in a lot of ways, help couples to transform, uh, their relationships and, um, by having some very open and honest conversations about money.
[10:05] Um, and she is, as I said, a certified financial education instructor. Uh, she actually works remotely while she is the head of the, of the leadership program here in St. Paul. She lives with her her husband in Gig Harbor, Washington. Um, and when she is not talking about money and believe me, she does actually talk a lot about money. Um, and I think in this point, uh, when it comes to faith, it is important to talk about money, but she's also loves to explore new cities. Um, she's trying to find a perfect sourdough, uh, recipe and other things. Um, this was really a a good conversation, and I think a hopeful conversation, especially if you are the pastor or leader of a congregation, especially in these days, trying to figure out how best to fund future ministry in your congregation.
[11:03] And this is not about getting rid of the offering plate, but it is trying to find ways of diversifying church income. So let's talk about alternative Alternative Ways to Fund Church Budgets and Mission with Grace Pomeroy.
[11:20] Music.
[11:56] Well, Grace, thank you for coming on to the podcast. I'm really interested to talk to you about how do we kind of fund our congregations going into the future? It's kind of in some ways a new era of stewardship, and what does that all mean? Oh, I couldn't agree with you more. Such a pleasure to be here, and it absolutely is a new era of stewardship. So I think one of the things I want us to start off is that, you know, you have written that for a lot of congregations, the sole source of income has been the weekly offering and that that isn't going to be enough for where we're headed. And so I guess the first question I want to ask is, you know, what societal changes have come about that has made that weekly offering not the thing that can really cover all the expenses? But also the second part of that is that it seems like where you're saying that we're kind of leading towards a newer, God is leading us in a new mission. So what is that in some ways that you're seeing as that new mission? And why is it that the model that we've been using isn't going to be sustaining that?
[13:12] For sure. I think the model is shifting a lot. And I think for so many of us in the church today, just because of the reality of how long we have been around, this is the only system that we've ever known. So for us... Offering and tithes and offerings are the only way that we've seen church be funded. And yet, when we look back through church history and we look back through biblical history, there are varieties of different ways that the church is funded. And it's, in fact, only in the last couple of centuries that this model has come about. So I think that's an important reference point for us to consider. I think also to remember that for so many of us, Our church property, our church buildings, our church budgets are all built with a different model in mind. So much of that was structured, depending on when your church was started, around the time of the baby boom. And all of the people who were coming into our congregations, all you had to do was build it and they would come. And yet we see a very different thing happening today, as you said, because of many societal changes. And so a couple of things that I would bring to the table.
[14:16] One is just decreases in church attendance. I don't want to talk too much at length about that, but decreases in church attendance are a big part of this equation. There is a link between how often people are engaging in congregational life, whether that is in person or online, and how much they are giving. There is a link there. Similarly, we're seeing trends that those who tend to be a part of an older demographic tend to go to church more frequently than those in a younger demographic who all consider themselves Christian. So it's an important piece to bring to the table too. And similarly, when a lot of these churches were built and this particular system was put in place, really it was church as the main place that you would give in order to do God's work in the world. There weren't as many nonprofits. There weren't as many other mutual aid or other opportunities that were out there. This was the main place where your giving would go. And now there's a lot of great places. So if I want to be able to tackle hunger in the community where I am in Washington state, There's actually a lot of different places where I would give money to, not just to my, So you were talking earlier, before we kind of go into the newer models that you have talked about, what are some of the old models that were around, you know, centuries ago that we have forgotten?
[15:36] Absolutely. Government support was a big model that I think we often want to brush past in the church today. And in fact, it was even around in the U.S. for quite a while. If you look back into history, it was something that really surprised me because I had assumed that there was never government support. And in fact, there was government support, particularly from individual states, for quite a while. Beyond that, if we look back at the biblical example, it's easy for us to pull up those examples of tithing because they were emphasized as we move from government support into this new system. And yet there are so many ways that the church was supported. There was gifts of land. There were wealthy patrons. There was government support. There were people who were bringing their possessions together and sharing them in common. There were bivocational, co-vocational ministers who were doing other jobs in addition to their role as evangelisms and teachers. And so it's exciting to see the ways that all of these things can come together without one being better than the other, but rather kind of a full ecosystem of how we can make God's work in the world possible, how we can join God's work in the world in really unique ways. Hmm. Yeah, I think one of the things that I am reminded of and something that I'm practicing, but I remember seeing it growing up, is that I'm bivocational myself. So I am pastoring a church, but also work as a communications manager for another congregation. congregation.
[17:03] But I also grew up in Michigan, and especially in Eastern Michigan. And it was very common with a lot of the, especially as I was growing up in the black church, that a lot of African American ministers.
[17:19] I worked and lived in the eastern part of Michigan, so it's a lot of auto plants. A lot of them worked for General Motors or Ford or Chrysler or what have you. Sometimes they had full-time jobs, but then they also worked on their off hours at the church. I think you're correct, especially in that one model. There are others that they're not necessarily old. It's kind of reviving something that was lost or maybe not always noticed in the past.
[17:49] I couldn't agree with you more, Dennis. And I think for those of us in white, more privileged churches, we have so much to learn from people who have often had to deal with this problem since the very beginning. It's been amazing to get to hear the stories of Black and Latino and immigrant congregations, as well as congregations who are serving entrepreneurs, congregations who are serving students where tithes and offerings would never have been enough. And now they're really getting to come to the forefront and teach us where for so long, many of these communities were often shunned because they didn't have a choice but to find other income sources. And they were seen as less than because of that, which is so shameful. It's a shameful piece of the church history. And I'm grateful that we can begin to lift up those stories in new ways. So besides bivocational ministry, what are some of the other options that are out there? And some of those, I said, it sounds like we are kind of recovering, but it's also some that are very new as we've kind of moved into this digital age as well.
[18:56] For sure. The sky is the limit when it comes to these. When I did my research with over 100 congregations to hear their stories, I had thought they would all fit neatly into certain categories. And in fact, we were amazed when we had the other income source option at the varieties of things that I would never have considered. Things like a Patreon subscription for the pastor's podcast, things like a roller skating rink, just things that I would never think of, or selling tickets tickets for a theater production that was hosted in the congregation. There were varieties of ideas there, but some of the most prominent that we're seeing fall into these categories. Space rental is always far and away the top option. And while space rental is something that we have used for a long time, it's in many ways something that we're recovering and reframing. Because for many congregations, space rental has meant that I put out a little signpost on our website, usually in a hidden corner where people don't know where to find to say that our fellowship hall is available for a $100 donation. And then they wonder why it's not a successful income source. Well, most people can't find it. $100 doesn't nearly cover even the maintenance costs and staffing costs of renting out that space. So it's always going to be a financial loss, or at least usually going to be a financial loss. So space rental is a key piece. Selling property can often be a key piece.
[20:17] Grants outside of denominational or judicatory bodies. Most congregations don't realize that there are actually a lot of grants available that faith-based groups can apply for. Forming nonprofits. That one has been used for a very long time, but it's exciting to see that grow in new ways. Starting social enterprises, which are businesses for good. That's a piece of the puzzle. Crowdfunding has been used. And one that I really like that isn't often emphasized is the idea of impact investing. And what would it look like to to connect congregations who have a lot of assets. I think about a conversation I had with a synod leader the other day of a small congregation that had over a million dollars in their endowment and had no idea how to use it. And yet there are so many places and congregations nearby that have beautiful missions that they feel called to live into and no money with which to do it. What would it look like to connect those two places with their differing assets that they they have to be able to share with one another, one with the mission and one with the money, not creating some sort of a hierarchical relationship, but really more of a partnership and connection.
[21:26] So I wanted to lift up a few of those. One of them is grants. And I think because normally with grants, as you said earlier, most churches don't think that they can apply for those, or they only think of them in the context of their judicatory. So what are some examples of how churches have used grants to help budget for certain ministries?
[21:54] Yes, I think the biggest thing to know with grants is that they tend to be used best as startup funds. So sometimes I'll find congregations believe that grants are this kind of mysterious pot of gold, Lucky Charms as pot of gold out there that's going to fund their ministry. And that's just not the case. Like you said, it's got to be used for specific projects. But a couple of things that I have seen in the area of grants, one is particularly if you have a historic building and you're looking to make repairs, there's often grant funding, whether that's government funding or specific foundation or nonprofit funding that might be available to you to do some of that deferred maintenance work that people don't often take advantage of. So that's a good option to take a look at. Another option to be aware of are even smaller things. So for instance, in the circles that I'm a part of, a lot of people tend to be Thrivant members and Thrivant has action grants for $250 that you can be able to apply for very very easily. It's the easiest grant application I've ever seen, to be honest. And I know of youth ministers that have a specific lineup. They know the 50 or so people in their congregation who are Thrivant members, and they divide up all of their little projects for the year into specific tasks and have those Thrivant members go on and ask for action grants for those specific items. Because you technically can't use more than one action grant for more than one project, but if you're strategic about it and you know when to ask and what to ask for, it can make a really big difference.
[23:19] It's amazing to see. So even on the small side and the large side, there's some big differences. And of course, if you're looking into housing, especially affordable housing, there are a lot of different credits that are available to you through city government. And it's funny to see how I feel like most churches have been really nervous to work with their government officials because they thought, who would want to work with a church? you know, were faith-based. And in fact, many of the congregations I worked with found great success in partnering with them and gained access to foundations they didn't know were there and tax credits they didn't know existed. And these city officials were excited to see the space being used in this way.
[24:00] So another one that I found fascinating was crowdfunding. And how has that been used to help churches in funding their mission?
[24:12] So I think when you have a project that really sits at that nexus between church and community, that's where crowdfunding can be so helpful. If you're just trying to do a repair to your congregation building that really only impacts those inside of it, I wouldn't necessarily suggest doing a crowdfunding campaign because all the people in the room are going to be the ones who give to it. But when you've got that connection point, things can be really, really valuable. You have to have a clear sense of the mission and be able to tell the story well in ways that those outside of your congregation can understand. And we as church people often struggle with that quite a bit. We want to tell the story with insider language from our perspective. We want to highlight the things that we care about. And really what you have to do with crowdfunding is do it the opposite way. Really frame it from the community's standpoint and then share it as much as possible. I think many times, kind of like grants, we have this viewpoint that crowdfunding is going to bring in, as long as we put it up on the right page, it's going to bring in donations from all over the world. And sometimes things go viral and that does happen. in, but we are not making any promises there. It's really the way we tell the story and the amount of people who share it that really can create the impact. And the cool thing is crowdfunding campaigns can actually create perpetual donors for you, particularly if this is a program that might need donations into the future. It's a great way to build your donor list with people outside of your congregation.
[25:36] Now, I would encourage congregations not to make this transactional. Just because someone gives to your crowdfunding campaign does not mean they want to be immediately on your church email list or come to church on Sunday morning, they likely were drawn in by something that you shared. And this can be a means of sharing the gospel, but it's a long relational journey. But that does lead into something related to that, because I think if you do things like that type of ministry, there is that hope that, well, this will get more people to join the church.
[26:10] But I think I've done some reading from your writing that That's not always the case, but you still can see the church grow, but just not in the way that you would expect. Would you be able to kind of expand a little bit more on that? Absolutely. This has been something that really surprised me, that almost every time that I go out and talk about this, someone will say, okay, great, we want to rent out our church's space because every single person who becomes a renter will then become a member of our congregation. Or they might say, I was chatting with someone the other day who said, you know, our church preschool is not meeting our goals. I said, well, tell me more. What are your goals? They said, well, really, we're hoping our church preschool just becomes a feeder line for our Sunday school. And I'm like, well, is that realistic? Is that really what the preschool is designed to do?
[27:02] Is there something more that's behind it? And so a story I often like to share is from one of the congregations that I interviewed in Gulf Shores, Alabama. They have this amazing project where they decided to open up their building to do affordable, rentable office space to people in their community. And their initial assumption, again, was that all of those people using the office space would come to the congregation. And that has not been the case. However, they have been surprised to see that people in the community who've heard the story that they were using their building for affordable office space and creating this community space all throughout the week have been inspired to come to their congregation. So it's actually the word of mouth, the stories in the community and the lift up of that church's reputation or the rebranding, so to speak, that has brought new people into the church. So it's definitely a little more circuitous process. And I would say, too, in an age where so many people believe the church does more harm than good, the fact that we can be a place where people say there's good work happening there is already a beginning seed for evangelism.
[28:11] And that kind of relates to another topic there, and that's the telling of story or telling of a church's story you know have in your studies have you kind and and surveying and everything have you learned how churches have been able to maybe improve or be better to tell their story um in a way that's not just insiderish but but can also reach out into the larger community.
[28:41] Yeah, that's a great question. And storytelling is such a tricky thing. But I'm curious about if there are ways for us to begin talking with others in our community, to share pieces of our church's story and to get their feedback. But even beyond that, to ask them what they believe that this church is about, people who've never been connected with us, and see what story exists out there. And that might help us to reframe our own stories as we begin to have those conversations. But I would say that oftentimes churches unintentionally use a lot of singular I language or church language and not a lot of we language for the community or focusing on the things that the community cares about. It's a lot of insider language for those who are inside, know the lingo, and know why we care about this. And we're pretty in love with our own history, which sometimes our communities care about and oftentimes our communities don't care about, especially if they're people who haven't always been there. They may not care that you were started 70 years ago by a group of Swedish immigrants. They may care more about what your connection is to the community today.
[29:50] One of the options that you've talked about is one that at least I've personally gone through actually somewhat twice. And that is the selling of property. The congregation that I served two years ago, we sold our property and moved. Um, so we're now sharing space with, um, a Lutheran congregation. And so, um, of course, when you sell property that, that does bring some income. And so I'm kind of curious of how that has helped congregations. Um, because I think that can, there's also a concern that that could hinder congregations. if people don't necessarily want to or feel that they don't need to give anymore because the church has all these resources.
[30:40] Oh you bring up such an important point this is such a tricky topic and it's not just around property sale if you have a a rental if you have a social enterprise this often happens where people assume they always assume you're making way more money on the venture than you're actually making so just go in with that assumption people in the pews will think we're covered that's just the way they're going to think about it so it's really really important to be transparent and to say this is how much we actually made from the sale, and this is where that money is going. And even if the money is going to be set aside in a savings account, talking specifically about how that money might drip out over time. And if at all possible, particularly with those more ongoing income sources, sale obviously is a one-time piece, telling people the specific line items that they can go towards, if your budget allows for that. So for instance, I think about a church in downtown Minneapolis that has part of their property as a parking lot. It's used during the week for people to park there. And it's easy for people to think, well, this is a really popular space. We're earning enough money there. But what if that money from that parking lot, which again, it's not as much as people think, but was just going towards property maintenance?
[31:53] Because that's the piece of the property, that's the piece of the church's budget that's being used there and i particularly suggest that it go towards a not so sexy part of your budget so for instance if you know that people in your congregation are really excited about youth ministry even if you have a social enterprise that's dedicated to youth ministry.
[32:13] Don't put all that money into the youth ministry budget because if that's where people are really excited to give and they think that piece is already covered for those people who really give to specific causes that is going to detract from their giving. So finding those ways to make a really clear connection to say, this is something that this particular enterprise is using can be a really helpful thing moving forward.
[32:35] So kind of related to, let's say, if someone wanted to give to a certain ministry and all of that, is one of the things about the way that we have been doing things, and that is focusing mostly on that offering, is kind of the importance of stewardship and the importance of discipleship. And of course, what we're talking here is not necessarily trying to move us away from that. It's just obviously saying, here are other options besides just putting all your eggs in this one basket. it. But how do we, is there a way that you can, with some of these newer roles, incorporate that into discipleship, further discipleship for people, so that it's not just income, but it is also part of our, of expressing values, of expressing what it means to be a follower of Jesus and the like? Yeah.
[33:33] I think if you would have asked me that question before completing this research project, I probably would have said, maybe, if you had pressed me for an honest answer. But after completing this project, I can say absolutely yes. Something that shocked me with our interview congregations, we ended up interviewing 12 congregations from our survey data set, just to go deeper with them, was that the most prominent theme that came out throughout those interviews was spiritual practices. practices. Spiritual practices are what allowed these congregations to complete that work, and spiritual practices are what sustained this work over time. And it became not just an ancillary part of it, but really central to what's going on. So I'd love to share just two quick stories of how that shows up. One, I think of a congregation that I interviewed in Washington, D.C., the Emory Fellowship, and they did something that seems really seemingly small that made an enormous difference. They were doing a pretty big building project. It took them 11 years to make this building project happen. So this is a long time, a long time, right? Well, as the pastor would say, they were in Washington, D.C. There's a lot more rules and regulations around buildings.
[34:44] But needless to say, what they said to their congregation is, we would like you to pray every day for this building project. And in fact, we want you to do that at 6.10 a.m. and 6.10 p.m. Every day because their address is 6100. And that became something that held this congregation together over years. And in fact, they would sit together for evening meetings at the church and everyone's alarms, their phone and watch alarms would go off at 610 and then they would all pray together just for one minute. But that one minute of prayer kept everyone focused on the fact that this was God's work, not our work, and that God would lead us through what was coming next.
[35:23] And then another example comes from the other coast, from the Table United Methodist Church in Sacramento, California. And they did some really amazing work with some social enterprises for youth ministry. They developed a social enterprise called The Table Farm, where they go out with youth and with other people from the congregation and community to farm this piece of land. And then they give away many of their farm proceeds to the local food bank. And then they also sell some of that through subscriptions to help fund this particular enterprise. And then Table Bread is about baking bread together. And for them, they realized that they needed to do youth ministry differently. People didn't want to show up for a traditional youth ministry in the same way they did before. But this idea of coming together to farm and bake bread and to work with your hands while also connecting with one another was a great way to dispel loneliness among the youth in their community and to connect them more broadly to their neighborhood by giving some of this produce and bread away. But the spiritual practice came in because they had been using this Wesleyan table practice where they would sit together at these tables and to ask one another week after week after week, how are you staying in love with God? And those particular questions of that table practice and these kitchen tables, that's what they call that in their community, where they meet for 90 minutes a week. Often many of them were happening out at the farm so that people could farm together. And then also have these particular spiritual practices.
[36:50] And that pastor, Matt Smith, would say that it was those table practices that really allowed these social enterprises to emerge and to grow and to keep their focus.
[37:02] So how do you think that these practices and different ways of funding ministry are changing congregations? And it looks like you've shared a few already, But how do you think that they can change a congregation, especially, let's just say one that's always just worrying about the budget, but has now is trying this new way of doing ministry and of doing stewardship? What impact does it make on the people? Yeah.
[37:33] It's funny. I think it makes way more of an impact on the people inside of the congregation than it even does for those outside of it. And it's making a big impact for those outside of it. Don't get me wrong. But it's interesting to watch. We interviewed one site that was in the middle of making this transition. I wanted to make sure we interviewed someone who didn't have this sparkly story, but was really in the grit of being in the middle. And that's where they were. And it was fascinating to see they had just hired their first part-time pastor. It was technically their second, but their first part-time pastor really was working full-time. So this is their first time really having a part-time pastor.
[38:08] And this part-time pastor was teaching them a lot about how to step into ministry roles, how to be lay leaders who weren't just serving on committees, but were actually leading pieces of worship. And to see the ways that they lit up, the ways they realized that this ministry wasn't just about them being attenders or kind of sidelined participants, depends that they needed to be on the dance floor, so to speak, and leading these ministries in new ways was so exciting to see. I watched one of the people that I had the chance to interview, she was creating new partnerships with the school. So she was getting outside of her comfort zone, having conversations with the local school district that they often had kind of an adversarial relationship with in the past to create new inroads for relationship. And another person had challenged herself to say, I am going to lead Messy Church. I think it was maybe once a month that she led Messy Church with these kids. And she loved that experience. It was something that was really allowing her faith to come alive in a new way. And I think that's what I continue to see, is that these new income sources, while we may end up going there because of financial need, it's actually our faith that grows more than our finances. So where do you see funding heading in the future?
[39:27] Basically, I think that this is, you're showing some things of where it's going, but let's look down 20 years down the road. What are things that are we not even thinking of right now that might be other ways of sustaining ministry?
[39:46] That is such a great question and one that I haven't thought a lot about. So I'm going to give you an off-the-cuff response. I love this. 20 years from now. So what's reminding me, and the first thing coming to mind for me is something that a friend showed to me recently called the two loops model. And it's used in a variety of different places. is, but if we think about it for the church, too often we assume that kind of one system will rise and it will do well, and then it will decline and it will die, and then the new system will emerge. But in fact, what the two loops model shows is that the new emerging piece and the older dying piece often intersect with one another. And we don't often think about that. So how does that older model become compost, so to speak, for that newer model that's emerging, that's happening at the same time. And we saw this in our research as well, that there was a lot of death and resurrection. A closure of one congregation led to the start of a brand new congregation. The congregation that was dying sold its land to a congregation that was then able to turn that into long-term homeless housing. There's so many different ways where those two interplay with each other. And I wonder, and maybe this is just in the next five to 10 years, what it would be like for us to actually go into congregations and think about how do we become good compost for what comes next.
[41:07] Rather than holding so tightly to who we are and what we are, how do we become compost for what's next? I think that's going to be a really generative question. I think it allows us to gain a little more freedom, especially when we have a million-dollar endowment or even less financially to steward. We can ask different questions rather than just saying we're going to run out the clock on what we have. How do we want to create space for what's coming next and and become a part of it. But as far as financial structure goes, what I imagine more than anything is that when I sit down with my seminary students today, most of the budgets that we look at for congregations don't even have an income line on them because there's only one income source. So why even have an income line?
[41:50] It's pretty amazing, but you'd be shocked how many times there's legitimately no income line available. Yeah, not good financial practice. this. Problem on financial, I mean, on all like accounting problems there. Oh, 100%. I'm with you. I'm with you. But I would love to see something a little more dynamic and something that's more free-flowing. I think as churches, we love the idea of getting into one pattern that we can stick with for the next century. And I'm curious if what we're being called to do in this moment is actually being more agile to say, maybe in this season for five five to 10 years, this income source really makes sense. To have table farm and table bread the way that it is makes sense for us. Knowing that in the next 10 years, that may die, but it'll create compost for the thing that comes after that. And it could be a social enterprise, it could be a building sale. And instead of holding so tightly to one source, thinking about how we can hold a bunch of different income sources loosely. It sounds a bit scary, but I do think that's where where we're being called next.
[42:52] Well, but I think the whole sense of compost is kind of helpful because it's saying that there is, well, there is a future and that we are opening ourselves up for that future, which is a little bit different from, as you said, kind of holding on and in some cases, sometimes then just kind of dying on the vine.
[43:16] Kind of preparing the ground for for a future future ministry in some way and people will remember you i was amazed at how in this dying and rising of the stories we heard in our interview processes how often these congregation leaders unprompted mentioned the congregation that came before they mentioned that this church closed and because that church closed we were able to do this And that is still a part of their memory. And even though I think about one congregation in Seattle where the church closed in some pretty terrible circumstances, there were some situation of fraud. They had to close, I believe, fairly quickly. It was so, so sad. However, that compost was still rich. They had a beautiful building that they were then able to give to the Senate who could then repurpose it for this new ministry that's doing an entirely different thing than what that original church was doing. And yet they are still a part of it. They're still a key part of what's going on there. And I think that's often our fear in letting go of whether it's a building or something else, is that what we did was for naught, that it won't be remembered, that there's no fruit that's passing forth to the next generation. And in fact, there is so much richness in what we are giving away, not just financially. Our stories go with it. Our history goes with it. And those are the things that become the fruit for whatever God is doing next there.
[44:45] So if people want to know more, they are stimulated by this conversation, where can they go? Because I know that you have actually some things that are coming up that people may want to take a part of.
[44:58] Absolutely. So I would encourage you to go to faithlead.org. That is the segment of Luther Seminary that I work for. And we have amazing digital resources and courses and community that you can check out there. And I would encourage you to dive in. Our whole goal is to help prepare people for the hopeful future that God is calling us to live into. So I hope you'll check out all those resources. And if you go to stewardship, faithlead.org slash stewardship, that's where you You can find specifically my resources. We have a free ebook, so you can check that out there. We also have an online course that's available at a pretty reasonable price if you want to work through this. And similarly, I have a book coming out on this topic through Fortress Press later on this year in September. I believe it's the date we're shooting for at this point. And you can find that now on Amazon or at Fortress Press' site to preorder. It's also called Funding Forward. All right. Right. Well, Grace, thank you so much for taking the time to chat. And I think that this has been a helpful conversation for a lot of churches as they're trying to figure out what in the world they're going to be doing with all the changes in society. So this has been helpful, and thank you for taking the time. It was such a privilege. Thank you. All right.
[46:15] Music.
[46:49] Well, I hope that you enjoyed that conversation and thank you so much for joining in. I will definitely have some links, including links to Grace's website and some other resources that might help you in looking about stewardship from very different, from an alternative perspective. So that's it for this episode of Church in Maine. and remember to rate and review this episode on your favorite podcast app. That really does help others find this podcast. I do hope that if you have listened to this, that you'll pass it along to people who might be interested. And then also, please consider donating. There is a link in the show notes. This helps for me to produce more episodes and to continue to put out good content. So again, that's it for this episode of Church of Maine. I'm Dennis Sanders, your host. Thank you again for listening. Take care, Godspeed, and I will see you very soon.
[47:51] Music.
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