Church Borrowing

In 1976 my Church borrowed $100,000 (one hundred thousand)
to build a new Auditorium. In the next 30 years (the time of
the note) my personal tithe to that church was $100,000.
So God was good to me.

My Step father (well, that happened later, Dad died in '76)
was always against borrowing money. Of course, he was
a Trustee and I was on the Nominating Committe

It turned out NOT to be a bad investment.
In fact, we paid it off in ten years, saving 20 years
of interest.

60% of the people in the church now weren't even
born then.
90% of the people in the church now (including all the
60% above) weren't even in the church then.

A Jesus magnet can be a profitable
investment. (The profit is in souls, the investment is
in money.) What is the $ worth of a soul these days?
If the Lord taries, souls will be won to the Kingdom of God.
If the Lord Comes - somebody else is
gonna get burned. Either way -- if the Lord wants to use
a loan to spread His kingdom -- let it be. Amen :thumbs:

 

I don't think Scripture forbids church borrowing. Given the cost of capital construction, you may not be able to pay cash for everything. However, the church should approach long term debt very cautiously, because church finances can be fragile.

It's very hard for churches to be underwritten for a mortgage. There are tons of issues to manuever around.

Here's a question that comes up a lot: what about the issue of some members of a church personall guaranteeing the debt of a church? For example, let's say a church wants to borrow $100,000. Let's say the church cannot get the financing. So 5 men go to the local bank and get loans of 20K each for the church. What about this? (I've seen this happen a lot)

 

Rick Warren started Saddleback with his Master Card!

 

He can probably start a few hundred more with his card now

 

The caution to approach financing a church is wise counsel.

I know of a church where they still owe $175,000 on their existing building...but they've been considering financing more, in order to build a new, bigger sanctuary.

Credit is not a good thing.

 

So you paid for the building...

[TomVols]Let's say the church cannot get the financing. So 5 men go to the local bank and get loans of 20K each for the church. What about this? (I've seen this happen a lot)[/quote]

I've seen this also but I've also seen bitter feelings because of this. These 5 men could believe it is "their" Church or when things don't go their way etc...

Unfortunately most Churches don't have the means to self sustain so they must borrow. Being able to repay what you borrow is certainly a blessing from on high.

 

If Christians gave to their church as God has given to them, money would be no object when He leads to construction.

My wife & I looked at our directory and estimated the income of the church as a whole & what the budget would (could) be IF everyone tithed.

Don't remember the exact figures, but at the time our annual budget was in the ball park ot 1.2 million; had all tithed, the budget could have been 2.4 mil +-.

Granted we did not know the income of every family, but we have many professionals (Atty, Dr, etc) so we feel that our AVERAGE family income estimate was reasonable, if not on the low side.

Anyway, accurate or not, the point is that the money is there if God calls for an expenditure, OR He will supply by some other means.

I think the main point is to be sure that it's God leading to "bigger & better", and not an attitude of pride at "our wonderful outreach programs that we have so ingenously implimented"!!

 

LeBuik: //So you paid for the building... //

OR 100 months of Electric bills for the Church Building.
OR 2 years of Pastor's Salary.
Actually I just gave my tithe to my church
like I'm lead by God to do and the Church
(of which I'm a member /yes, I was on the
Stewardship Committie a few years) invested
the money in it's various ministries.

 

Even if everyone in our Church tithed we wouldn't have no where close to that operating budget. We still owe about $120K on a building worth about $800K.

Why do we believe GOD can't bless his people via a bank or mortgage company? Was their a page missing from my Bible?

 

I agree that if everyone did tithe (and the numbers say the avg Christian gives only about 3-4% of his income) churches could afford to do a whole lot more. A whole lot of churches could support their pastor. But LeBuick is also right. Some churches are not filled with doctors and lawyers. Capital construction costs are so high now that few churches have the ability to pay cash without using credit/mortgage.

 

Even if individual church members are fairly well off, costs can be very, very high. Our construction costs (due to local building codes) are much higher than the norm. Note: the church is less than a mile from the ocean, so having hurricane-strength buildings is required (no aluminum siding here). In addition, just the land costs are very high as well.