Week 1(a) - Church Budget

I attend a church in Hamlet, IN called Davis Wesleyan Church. It is a small church of about 40 people. The church is located in a mostly rural community and the congregants are mostly farmers. I interviewed Pastor Aaron Cloud on Sunday, January 11th.

The following are my findings after interviewing Aaron and looking at the budget myself:

61.7% of the budget goes to the ministerial staff (including benefits)
20.7% of the budget goes to facilities (including parsonage)
10.3% of the budget goes to denominational support & missions
7.3% of the budget goes to programs

1) I was actually very surprised at the amount of money allocated toward the ministerial staff. 61.7% of a relatively small budget still isn't very much, but it is more than I was expecting. Most of that money is in the form of benefits rather than a direct salary, however. So, while the pastor seems to receive the majority of the budget, he or she never really directly sees that amount of money.

2) On the other extreme, I was surprised to see the low cost of running programs such as church education and evangelism projects. I figured that most of the cost is not very much in order to run education programs for only 40 people. The only main cost is buying literature for Sunday school classed. When you have money allocated for the Sunday School classes, and you don't have many people to spend that money on, you have to start thinking creatively. So, Davis Wesleyan purchases Sunday School literature for the congregation.

3) Finally, I observed the denominational "tax". This was a foreign concept for me, but it makes sense when I think about it. I have never been truly been apart of a denomination, and so the concept of a denomination supporting a church or vice-versa is strange to me. It make complete sense, however, to have a church support the denomination it is apart of. The "tax" seems to be about 10%, which isn't as bad as I thought it might be. So, I have no problem with this tax.