Customer Reviews

How to Increase Giving in Your Church

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was looking for advice on how to improve a stewardship program, but what I found was book that paves a path for building a dynamic congregation joyously returning time, treasures, and talents on which God's work is resourced to spread the Good News and change lives. CAUTION:If you don't want to get excited about stewardship -- stay away from this book.

Barna again does an excellent job of taking research and statistics and interpreting them in such a way that church leaders benefit. The benefit received here however, is not a stewardship plan but stewardship principles. The wording of the title isn't indicative of the content of the book.

If you want to learn more about what groups of people give to churches today, why they give, and to what causes they give, then this book will serve you well. If you're looking for a stewardship program to implement in your congregation however, you will be disappointed. This work is very good -- it just needs a different title.

As Chair of a Stewardship Committee that is looking to raise $1.1M in a bad economy and with a lot of recent turmoil at our Church, this book was a gift for me! Best book I've read on stewardship. Barna takes a business approach to why people give, and backs it up with studies done on why and how people give or don't give. He takes the data and formulates straight-forward recommendations and guidance that really challenge accepted approaches and inspired me from the first chapter. Very easy to read with lots of headings and pull-quotes. I'm amazed that he has never updated this book with new studies as some of them are now 15 years old, but perhaps the study results are constant. I purchased copies for our minister and everyone on our Committee and highly recommend it to anyone raising money in a religious setting, but especially in a mainline church in the 21st century.

I think George Barna would probably not recommend this book any longer considering his current view of the Institutional Church system. Please read my review of his book Revolution (2005).