3 Things to Help You Overcome Objections to Crypto. Have you thought about how you can share your church's vision on Easter in such a way that it increases the number of people who give and the amount of money given?   Right now, you might be thinking, who thinks about the offering for East...

You Can Pass the Plate This Easter. Have you thought about how you can share your church's vision on Easter in such a way that it increases the number of people who give and the amount of money given?   Right now, you might be thinking, who thinks about the offering for East...

We Are Building THE Premiere Generosity/Stewardship Platform. There is a crisis looming for the Church today. 5,000 to 10,000 churches will close a year, researchers predict. Then according to giving experts, it is projected there will be a 50% decline in giving by the year 2050. We are fast losing churches, th...

The Three Legs of Being Fully Funded. As churches navigate through the challenges of the 21st century the ones that will survive will be the ones that understand and implement the three legs of being fully funded. Gone are the days that you can simply pass an offering plate on Sunday and...

Are You Ahead or Behind?. Halfway into the year, my question for you is, are you ahead or behind budget? Is the reason you are behind a simple giving gap or are you suffering from budget inflation? Let’s find out. Giving Gap versus Budget Inflation – Yo...

Are You Throwing Spaghetti at the Wall?. Are you throwing spaghetti against the wall, when it comes to planning for an increase in giving? When it comes to stewardship planning the approach most churches take is to try anything and everything without any idea of whether or not their st...

Giving to the Church is a Two-Sided Coin of Giving. What picture is on a quarter? Does your answer depend upon which side of the coin you are looking at, heads or tails? Two new reports on the state of giving were recently released. Consider these seemingly conflicting statements, U.S. charitable giv...

Yes, You Can Raise Money on Easter!. Yes, you can raise money on Easter! Most of our focus has been on attracting and reaching lost people on Easter. As Dr. Phil always says, “How is that working for you?” Seriously your typical audience on that day is almost exclusively you...

5 Steps to Use The Power of the Pulpit. I want to give you 5 steps to use the power of the pulpit to increase your giving! Barna says churches need to be “humble self-promoters” and there is no better place for that to occur than the pulpit. The sad truth however is that many p...

You Never Have to Recover From a Good Start. You never have to recover from a good start. My mentor, Dave Sutherland, always said that. It’s good advice. I believe the first six weeks of the year could determine the success of your financial year. As you plan for the New Year you ne...

Pearl Harbor Lessons for the Church. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, they made a colossal mistake. They bombed the wrong targets. The Church today is making the same mistake.  December 7, 1941, was our grandparent’s and great-grandparents’ eq...

You CAN Ask for Money If. The one thing I wish pastors and staff realized is that you CAN ask for money if you do it in the right way. I have to be honest with you. One of the biggest hurdles I have to overcome in helping churches increase is the staff of the church. Pastors...

The Two Major Reasons Why You Must Preach on Giving. 32 percent of American church members reported that they had heard a sermon on the relationship between faith and personal finances in that previous year. The author of that study concluded, “clergy often tiptoe around the topic of money a...

Why the Offering Must Survive. I have long contended that one of the greatest flaws of the Contemporary Church Movement was the de-valuing of the offering. In our desire to attract unbelievers many churches either stopped taking up the offering altogether or create boxes at variou...

How I Write Offering Talks. Since no one I know has written more offering talks than I have, I thought it would be good to share with you how I write offering talks. I actually got the idea for this post as I was writing, actually typing, next week’s offering talk for tho...

A Great Example of Setting Up the Offering. Americans year after year give less of their incomes to the church. Since 1968 the percentage of income given to a church has decreased from 3.11% of our incomes to 2.1%. COVID-19 will impact this percentage. At the present rate of decline by 2050 Am...

Why Your Church Needs a 2 Minute Drill. Championship teams have a plan for closing out games called the 2 Minute Drill. I am going to show you why your church needs a 2 minute drill and how to get one. How many football games are won in the last two minutes? A lot! In fact, winning t...

7 Steps to Elevate Your Offerings. The typical church offering time is the most boring, dull, lifeless moment of worship but there are 7 steps to elevate your offerings that will change that!  The typical has unwittingly de-valued the importance of the offering. Is it any wonder...

4 Steps to Increasing End of Year Giving. I want to share with you 4 Steps to Increasing End of Year Giving, which is simple and easy to use but you have to act now! I know you are probably not ready for end of year talk but whether you like it or not it is just around the corner. Smart chur...

Use Testimonies to Improve Your Offerings. Here is my tip of the day to improve giving, use testimonies to improve your offerings. My mentor in the stewardship field, Dave Sutherland, use to say, “Nothing moves a heart like a heart that has been moved.” We used testimonies regula...

8 Key Components of Effective Offering Talks. When you learn my 8 Key Components of Effective Offering Talks, you’ll never be baffled by another offering! Here is a tip, the easiest way to increase giving at your church is through an effective offering time set up by a talk of 2 minut...

10 Things Any Pastor Can Do to Increase Generosity. The number one reason why churches do not see increases in giving is the disconnected pastor. There is a multitude of reasons why this is true. Frankly, our colleges and seminaries do a poor job of training pastors in this field. Most pastors have li...

The Difference Between Could and Will. Another study was released about the impact of COVID-19. Here is a quote, Up to 1 in 5 churches could close their doors permanently as a result of shutdowns from COVID-19 closure orders, according to David Kinnaman, president of Barna Group. While...

When Taking Up the Offering Never Apologize!. If I could give you one piece of advice as you head into this week’s offering time, it would be… When taking up the offering…Never Apologize! Before you think that you never do that, consider this. Do you ever before the offerin...

Are Tribal Temptations Guiding You?. The following post was written by my friend Dr. Jason Bunger, the Lead Pastor of Hope Church in Dayton, OH. It was originally posted at his blog site, https://hopeindayton.org/are-tribal-temptations-guiding-you/ Are Tribal Temptations Guiding Y...

A Labor Day Weekend Offering Talk. Do you have a Labor Day Weekend offering talk ready? If you are like most churches you never give the offering time much thought. I can tell everything about what the leadership of a church believes about generosity by how they approach the offering....

Lessons From the Time Joel Osteen Asked Me What to Preach On. I want to share with you a few lessons from the time Joel Osteen asked me what to preach on. I started working in the stewardship industry for John Maxwell. Our company was chosen by Joel Osteen to help him raise the $100 million dollars needed ...

5 Observations on the State of Giving. In this post, I will share with you my 5 observations on the state of giving in American churches. Trying to predict how COVID19 will impact church giving is proving to be difficult as surveys are reporting vastly different results. Let me illus...

The 500 Hundred Day Strategy. Last spring as the COVID19 pandemic continued it’s spread I advised my clients thinking about raising capital to adapt what I called, The 500 Hundred Day Strategy. Why 500 days? That puts us essentially at the fall of 2021. Let’s be...

Why I Believe the Offering is Not Dead. “We won’t be passing an offering plate for the rest of 2020.”  That was what a pastor told me recently as we were talking about the steps they were taking to open back fully. My guess is you are in the same boat.  Is this...

The 5 E’s to a Better Offering. Taking the 5 E’s to a better offering will guarantee that your giving will go up. If you keep doing the same thing your offerings will never get better. Better offerings mean more money to do more missions and ministry. These 5 E’s will h...

I Make Easy the Thing You Hate. This phrase is on the back of my business card, I Make Easy the Thing You Hate! What thing is it that you hate? Anything related to money and giving. If you were to list all the things as a pastor you hate to do talking about money would be righ...

Churches: Get Your Defense Off the Field!. The following guest post is written by Rev. Shane L. Bishop is the Sr. Pastor of Christ Church in Fairview Heights, Illinois Churches: Get Your Defense Off the Field! COVID is like a football offense we can’t get off the field and our de...

Without a Plan You Will Fail. You have never faced challenges like you are facing right now and without a plan you will fail. Most churches today struggle financially due to a lack of planning! In 2012 I published a book entitled, “The Top Ten Stewardship Mistakes Chu...

Churches Are Dying, Will Yours Survive?. One sad reality of COVID19 is that churches are dying. The question for you is, will yours survive? Before COVID19 we were already seeing thousands of churches every year close their doors. Estimates range from 6,000 to 10,000 yearly. Even those tha...

When It Comes to the Offering, Be Creative. If you want to improve the amount you take up each week when it comes to the offering, be creative. For the past few years I have been the leader in writing offering talks and posts about how to improve the offering moment. It is my contention that i...

3 Goals For A Come From Behind Giving Strategy. I have 3 goals for a come from behind giving strategy and none of the three are about increasing dollars! Yet if you strive to hit these three goals you will increase the amount of money you raise. However, hitting my three goals will ...

The Ice Cube is Microwaving. The following post is written by my friend Chris Ritter the Senior Pastor of First United Methodist Church Geneseo, IL. The Ice Cube is Microwaving A global pandemic is providing an unscheduled stop-over on the road to the United Methodist disunifi...

7 Points That Reveal Your Attitude About the Offering. When I start working with a church I always begin with how they take up the offering. Why? Your attitude about receiving the offering says everything about how you view biblical stewardship. Here is a true story. During the last crisis, Th...

How the Essence of Your Message Determines Your Outcome. “The fastest path to the money.” That is a line from a marketing book I am reading, The 1-Page Marketing Plan by Allan Dib. In his Introduction he starts the first sentence of his book saying, “If I had to summarize t...

5 Keys To a Better Offering Time. I want to give you 5 keys to a better offering time. Every Friday I try to post something dedicated to some aspect of the offering. I have written more on offerings and written more offering talks than any other person I know of. Churches that have u...

Don’t Make It About You. The other day I was thinking about how to connect with churches and I thought, don’t make it about you. I had been writing materials, posts, advertising copy and emails. That is when it dawned on me. It was all about me! Buy this, dow...

The Question Joel Osteen Asked Me. The question that Joel Osteen asked me is one that many pastors ask. Before I let you know about the question let me give you a bit of background. Lakewood Church in Houston where the Osteen’s pastored was looking to move downtown into the...

You Tired?. You tired? Who isn’t? Right? Overnight you were forced to turn on a dime and recreate “church.” Have you found yourself on Monday asking, “now what?” Or perhaps, your response has been what now? To ma...

The 1 Mistake That Dooms Giving. The 1 mistake that dooms giving comes when churches say, “As we come to our time of offering today if you are a guest visiting us, please don’t feel like you have to give. The offering time is for our members.” It’s ...

What Will the Church Look Like AFTER COVID19?. I have been asking myself lately this question, What Will the Church Look Like AFTER COVID19? Right now as we are still in the midst of the virus I would have to honestly say, I don’t know. Truthfully anyone who attempts to answer thi...

Why You Need a Minister of Generosity (And Why I Am Your Best Candidate!). Let you give you the answer to why you need a Minister of Generosity by asking you this question. At the start of the COVID19 pandemic, who reached out to you, asking, “How will this impact our giving?” Did anyone think about th...

The Coach’s Round Table. Are you tired of seeing Christian leader’s views and opinions censored? I am! One of the more disappointing things I have seen in 2020 is how poorly Evangelical leaders have responded to the crisis that we are facing. What is even more disheart...

5 Key Metric's for Tracking COVID19 Giving. Here are 5 key metric’s for tracking COVID19 giving that your church needs to begin following! As the Stewardship Coach, I am always asking, “How is giving going at your church?” Down through the years, I have learned that when I a...