The Debt-Free Church: Experiencing Financial Freedom While Growing Your Ministry [Paperback]

Jim Burgess (Author), Jeff Berg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 12, 1996

What's a church to do when its needs are apparent, but its funds are not? Authors Jeff Berg and Jim Burgess examine both the tragedies that occur when a church borrows money and the blessings that result when a church is debt-free. See how your church can be a vital, energetic and growing ministry while staying debt-free!

Product Details

• Paperback: 125 pages
• Publisher: Moody Publishers (March 12, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802422861
• ISBN-13: 978-0802422866
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #30,924 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Ministry & Church Leadership > Church Administration
  • #78 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Ministry & Church Leadership > Ministry

More About the Author

Jeff Berg was born in 1954 in Rockford, Illinois, into a Swedish-American family, the oldest of three sons. Jeff grew up and graduated high school in Belvidere, Illinois; after which he moved to Greenville, South Carolina in 1971. There he attended college and met his wife, Janet, whom he married in 1975. Starting in 1979, Jeff worked as a technical and marketing writer for a variety of major technology-focused corporations before publishing his first book in 1996: The Debt-Free Church (co-authored with his friend Jim Burgess). Since then he has continued working as an award-winning marketing communications specialist in banking technology, and has written numerous articles for national banking, mortgage, and lending-related publications and trade journals. Jeff is currently working on his first novel, a piece of historical fiction set in the Ottoman Turk empire of the late 1400s.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must for Pastors, Elders, Deacons, and Bldg Committees, January 10, 2001

By 

Alan "Roomba Fan" (Cleveland, OH USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Debt-Free Church: Experiencing Financial Freedom While Growing Your Ministry (Paperback)

A great resource to prayerfully read through when your church is considering whether to borrow or not. The authors address common rationales for borrowing and address each one scripturally and pragmatically. Our western culture embraces financing for everything. This book will challenge our cultural default position of getting loans for church buildings and activities.

Bottomlines: (1) Borrowing is not a sin, but it is risky, (2) the Bible only warns AGAINST borrowing and debt, never advocates it, and (3) God gets all the glory when we trust Him to provide in His time.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must Read For Churches Considering Debt, April 24, 2001

By 

David Skidmore (Saginaw, MI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Debt-Free Church: Experiencing Financial Freedom While Growing Your Ministry (Paperback)

This book does a marvelous job of laying out the Biblical cautions toward debt and encourages ministries to trust God for ALL their needs. All this without coming off as condescending to those ministries that have already chosen to use debt.

You can tell the authors desire to help ministries seek God's will.

Very well written!

5.0 out of 5 stars Avoiding debt, March 4, 2009

By 

P. Rice (Georgia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Debt-Free Church: Experiencing Financial Freedom While Growing Your Ministry (Paperback)

I strongly recommend reading this book before considering a church building project and going into debt.