I grew up in the home of a pastor. My dad pastored some great churches in rural East TN, the cream of the crop of people. The dairy farming community in which he served was full of wonderful people, but people whose livelihood depended on getting the right amount of rain, the sun to do its job and for pesky insects to stay away from their crops and keep disease away from their livestock.
After I was married, my wife and I were members of a downtown church with a budget in the millions. Everyone (including me due to peer pressure) wore a suit and tie to church on Sunday morning. The church was made up of doctors and lawyers and dentists and architects and executives.
A dozen years later, I was on staff at a blue collar, factory town in the deep suburbs of Birmingham, AL. Most of our congregation depended on the 9-5 job they have had since high school. A smaller percentage had a college degree than where I had previously been, and many of the small businesspeople were laborers like plumbers and electricians.
Finally, in my current role as an executive pastor at a pretty large church in a college town, we have, just like all the other places I’ve been, great people who work very hard. But many are young professionals that originally came to this town to attend the 12,000 student state university two miles from our church. Engineers combined with builders, nurses and school teachers make up our congregation now.
I was able to experience or help lead a capital campaign in each of those situations. I observed some and fully participated in others, but I found that they all had 3 things in common:
First, when the campaign begins and ends with earnest, humble prayer, God is pleased and will bless. In all those situations, I saw the pastor and other leaders take time to seek God and ask Him to bless their efforts. I do not believe that any of the situations I described were taken lightly or without much heavy-hearted prayer.
Second, I noticed that regardless of the makeup of the congregation, when a clear, vivid vision is cast, the church people WILL give and WILL give generously and sacrificially. I saw a very well-respected leader in that dairy farming community vote against the construction project because he was solidly against debt. I watch him humbly and respectfully champion his cause in meetings leading up to the vote. But when the church voted to build and acquire debt despite his pleading, I saw him request a leadership role in the capital campaign. I couldn’t believe it! But his love for the Lord and for his church family overrode his strong feelings about debt. I watched him work hard to be an example of humble, sacrificial giving and I watched him recruit others to play small roles in the campaign that ultimately led to more people giving and to the church paying off the debt about a decade sooner than first thought. That small country church paid off the debt early, as did each of the other examples given – all – in my opinion, because a very clear vision was cast and repeated over and over for multiple weeks and even months as different families caught the vision at different times.
”...when a clear, vivid vision is cast, the church people WILL give and WILL give generously and sacrificially.
The third and final benefit that I have experienced in all the various campaigns I have witnessed at my various home churches is this: When church members, Christ-followers, believers, are challenged to give, good things ALWAYS happen. I have witnessed AND experienced first-hand how stewardship teaching, done from a Biblical and not slick, sales-y approach, has the ability to change lives. In that 3rd example in which my wife and I experienced a capital campaign for the first time as givers, our spiritual lives grew, our marriage grew, and our financial competence grew. This impacts the church well after the capital campaign has run its course.
If you are considering a capital campaign, I encourage you to consider partnering with a consulting firm, like Impact Stewardship, that will help encourage people to give long term, help more people become invested and empower the leadership to cast a strong vision.
