The Giving Moment

How to have a successful giving moment.

Learn the principles to a successful giving moment that reflects your church’s core values and activities, leading to a more discipleship-driven return on investment and less a plea for money.

Developing your church giving philosophy.

  • What do you believe about the tithe?
  • Do you have a unified giving philosophy?
  • Are your staff and members held to the same standard?
  • Do you understand the pockets of giving?
    • Front Pocket: Your checkbook/wallet, where consistent bills go to
    • Front Pocket: Your cell phone/watch, where consistent fun goes to
    • Back Pocket: Where you give to things that have your name on it
    • Back Pocket: The “x” factor, where you give to support church unity
      • You cannot pull from the same pocket twice during a single giving moment
  • Is your giving philosophy both specific and measurable?
  • What is the language that communicates your philosophy?

What is our giving discipleship path?

  • What can we title it: “The Giving Journey”
  • What are the steps along the path?
  • Is your discipleship path and giving journey a “giving ladder”?
  • Does your path reflect behaviors over numbers, because generosity growth is the focus more than a 10% tithe.
  • Are you using behavioral words, and not amount words?

How can we repeat this over and over and over…

  • Does your strategy reflect a global strategy (Not just what gets vocalized, but what gets printed)?
  • Are we saying the same thing across the board?

Tell specific stories, using behavioral words you identified.

  • Calendar out the giving stories:
    • Are you consistently gathering spontaneous stories?
    • Are you producing quarterly and well-produced stories?
  • Are there commitment cards or giving cards for specific behaviors, as well as a general card?

Celebrate what you cultivate, with these four keys:

  1. Care about the things that you track (you measure what matters).
  2. Celebrate giving more than you discuss your needs for it (stories > asks).
  3. Generosity Dashboard (Publicly discussing finances 4x/year).
  4. Something that shows your people what is going on (#s not $).
    • Example a: First time givers
    • Example b: Total # of givers
    • Example c: Generosity to date ($)
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