A lot longer than you think. But when I get asked this question they always mean the “public phase” of a campaign. This comes after months and sometimes years of planning. In most “public phase” campaigns, the average time is at least six months from initial planning to completion. In...
About this time every year, churches call and ask, "Is it too late to start a capital stewardship campaign?" The answer is, it depends! We joke that most of our answers are, it depends! That is because there are so many variables that go into campaign planning. As I write...
Could you run your own capital campaign? If you are staying current with the Stewardship Journal, the answer is yes! We are in the midst of a series called Giving Away the Farm, where we are giving you all the inside secrets used by stewardship consultants. Throughout the summer months...
How old is your “new” fellowship hall or your “new” children’s wing? For the typical church, putting the tag “new” in front of any building simply means it was the last structure built or renovated. For many churches, their “new” whatever was built in the last century! One of the...
In my over twenty-five years of helping churches hold capital campaigns, I have found that the majority of mistakes made happen BEFORE the campaign even starts. The goal of this paper is to help you avoid these mistakes by showing you what you need to know and do BEFORE your...
Don’t let a committee kill your dream of expanding your ministry! I cannot tell you the number of times I have talked to a pastor with a dream of expanding his ministry, only to have a committee kill that dream with questions, hesitations, and roadblocks. Committees are designed to enhance...
Welcome back to the Stewardship Journal! We pray you had a great holiday weekend last week. We are back from our break, ready to start a new series that will give you all the tools to help you raise whatever over and above money you need for buildings, renovations, and...
A year ago, I issued a stark warning to a group of Southern Baptist leaders: without immediate action, thousands of their churches could vanish by 2030. This year, the warning was tragically confirmed. In April, Lifeway Research reported that the Southern Baptist Convention lost 1,253 churches in 2022. This is...
Get the help you need for your next capital campaign for a price you can afford AND never have to leave your office or home! I wrote that line in 2015 for a program I developed called The Online Campaign. I devised an eight-part online series that would teach any...
An Open Letter to SBC Leadership In the fall of 2019, I began discussions with leaders of the Executive Committee about building a stewardship platform for SBC churches. Then Covid hit, and then controversy came, followed by resignations, and all that talk was shelved. Last April, I was invited to speak...
