Should the Church Borrow

The topic of church borrowing comes up at strategic times of growth and change. The Bible is clear on what the path should be...don't borrow.

Below are links to Bible Studies on my website in support of this teaching.

Ten Reasons Your Church Should Be Debt Free

We often talk about personal and farming financial matters on our blog.

Here is a topic for your church to consider for 2016.

If your pastors and elders aren't encouraging agressive debt reduction. Please talk to them about searching scripture on this and pray about becoming debt free.

The list below will give you 10 reasons to be debt free.

God Bless America Isn't Just a Song

One of my favorite songs is "God Bless America"

Here is why...

How to Be Rich

Andy Stanley has written a book with the title "How to be Rich" based on 1 Timothy 6:17 where it says, "Command those who are rich in this present world..."

I hadn't read the book yet but I got to thinking that compared to many people we are rich in this present world.

Did you know that if you make $48,000 a year, you are in the top 1% of the wage earners in the world.  The average income in Olmstead county is $62,000 per year. I'll bet you didn't even know that most of you are a "one percenter".

What difference does this make. Here are three reasons this is important...

Contentment

Contentment is one of the most powerful finanical principles in our lives. If we have learned to be content, it will be easier to understand and accept our position as the manager of what we have been given. This doesn't mean we need to be hands off on money issues. Contentment helps us focus on our goals for money and to resist temptation to overspend or borrow.

Here are four signs of discontentment...

The Purpose of Generosity

From Abel to Malachi in the Old Testament and from Matthew to Revelation in the New Testament Scripture talks about generosity.

When the pastor preaches about giving or the church offers a class like Financial Peace University, the assumption is often that God is after your hard-earned cash. But scripture teaches the exact opposite of this. In reality, God owns it all and it is a bit presumptuous to assume that he needs our money at all. 

If the purpose of generosity isn't because God needs our money. Why does God ask us to be generous?

God's Solution - Elisha and the Widow's Oil - Lesson 4

In our last lesson about Elisha and the Widow's Oil we saw that a widow was in distress because of a debt, and she reached out to the church for help.We looked at her situation and the main points to consider for us today:

1. She does not have any close family and so she comes to Elisha as her pastor and in the role of kindsman redeemer. Leviticus 25 describes this process.
2. Her husband was a Godly man, "one of the sons of the prophets" part of Elisha's team. Bad things can happen to godly people.
3. The young couple had gotten into debt, perhaps student loans to tide them over until he could get a job as a prophet, or a home loan that was underwater. 
4. The seriousness of debt hits home. The children are to be sold to pay the debt obligation.
5. The young husband did not have adequate life insurance or an emergency fund to care for his young family.
6. Elisha asks the widow to identify her need. 
7. Elisha asks what resources she has inside the house. He asked her to make a simple budget. 
8. Elisha asks the widow to go outside the house for part of the solution. Seems like an odd request. Go get some empty containers from your neighbors
9. She is responsible for both the searching the house for resources and for going outside the house to find vessels. 

In this lesson, let's look at  how God provides for the widow.

Elisha's Identifies the Need - Elisha and the Widow's Oil - Lesson 3

In our last lesson about Elisha and the Widow's Oil we saw that a widow was in distress because of a debt and reached out to the church for help.We looked at her situation and the main points to consider for us today:

1. She does not have any close family and so she comes to Elisha as her pastor and in the role of kindsman redeemer. Leviticus 25 describes this process.
2. Her husband was a Godly man "one of the sons of the prophets" part of Elisha's team. Bad things can happen to godly people.
3. The young couple had gotten into debt, perhaps student loans to tide them over until he could get a job as a prophet or a home loan that was underwater. 
4. The seriousness of debt hits home, the children are to be sold to pay the debt obligation.
5. The young husband did not have adequate life insurance or an emergency fund to care for his young family.

In this lesson let's look at  how Elisha handles the situation.

Debt In the Old Testament - Elisha and the Widows OIl - Lesson 2

The cultural parallels to young people today who are deeply in debt are stark and startling in the story of Elisha and a young widow in 2 Kings 4:1-7. Debt is as old as history itself and legally has had serious consequences, including enslavement of the debtor. The young widow's husband was in seminary in Elisha's "school of the prophets" he was under Elisha's authority and was Elisha's "servant or apprentice". She does not have any close family and comes to Elisha her pastor and as a stand-in for the role of "kinsman redeemer". He is not obligated legally in this role but he has a moral obligation as the young man's mentor and calls on God to help.

Israel had a revolutionary set of laws, given by God, about debt that were a much more civil approach than the oppressive laws of the countries around them. Let's take a look...

Provision - Elisha and the Widow's Oil - Lesson 1

I have been doing some study on one of my favorite topics generosity and the provision of a loving God. I was reminded of the story back in 2 Kings 4:1-7. The story is about Elisha and the widow's oil.

It says...

A Servant's Heart

Service is at the core of our farm and business philosophy.

Service permeates all that we do.

It gets a little personal, but here is our top ten list of how we serve:

The Role of Preaching in the Financial Health of the Church - Lesson 11

Jesus taught about money in sixteen of the thirty-eight parables. One out of ten verses in the gospels deal directly with the subject of money. Over 1000 verses in the Bible are about money and possession (only 500 verses deal with prayer). It is very important that the senior teaching staff of the church teach periodically from the pulpit on the subject of money in an intentional, straight forward, unapologetic way with no compromises for what scripture says about generosity and giving.

These are strong statements but just in case it wasn't clear...

Hope & Encouragement on Church Giving - Lesson 10

Are you discouraged by the current state of your congregational finances? Maybe giving in your congregation seems to be below average or maybe you have a large church debt; this would not be unusual as church giving since the 2009 recession has not been this low since the great depression.

But there is great hope, for example:

Thoughts on Financial Principles for Church Leaders - Lesson 9

Biblical principles on financial management are a great treasure of wisdom for the church. These principles are very counter cultural. This was true of most of what Jesus taught both in his day and in ours. It is so normal in our culture to use debt in our everyday lives that we need to renew our minds in this area.

Prior to borrowing money for a church building project the church pastors and leaders should embark on a journey of discovery.

Generosity is a Process - Lesson 8

 Generosity is a process, we have seen some very clear steps for believers on the journey to supernatural generosity in Exodus 35 & 36. If we continue our journey, we find that the next principle is that over the top generosity doesn't just happen over night. Exodus says the people, both men and women, brought "freewill offerings" every morning.

What can we glean from this?

God Provides the Resources - Lesson 7

In our last post we concluded from the examples of scripture that:

1) Personally we should not borrow,
2) We should not pledge our resources to the debt of another
3) By implication the Church should not borrow either.
4) We need to train believers in Biblical financial principles.
5) What are the benefits to the church.
6) Thinking generously
7) The spirit of generosity

In our study of Exodus we saw that the Israelites were very generous. How could a group of slaves be this generous?

The Spirit of Generosity - Lesson 6

In our past five posts on this subject we learned.

1) Personally we should not borrow,
2) We should not pledge our resources to the debt of another
3) By implication the Church should not borrow either.
4) We need to train believers in Biblical financial principles.
5) The benefits to the church when we train believers in Biblical financial principles
6) We need to renew our minds by "thinking generously"

But is this enough, are we finally at the end of our journey? Read on...

Thinking Generously - Lesson 5

In our past five posts on this subject we learned.

1) Personally we should not borrow,
2) We should not pledge our resources to the debt of another
3) By implication the Church should not borrow either.
4) We need to train believers in Biblical financial principles.
5) The benefits to the church when we train believers in Biblical financial principles?


So what Biblical principles do we see that helps believers to be generous?

How Biblical Financial Training Benefits the Church - Lesson 4

In our last several posts we concluded from the examples of scripture that:

1) Personally we should not borrow,
2) We should not pledge our resources to the debt of another
3) By implication the Church should not borrow either.
4) We need to train believers in Biblical financial principles.

But what are the benefits to  the church when they train believers in Biblical financial principles?

Getting Believers Out of Debt - Lesson 3

In this series of posts we have asked the questions "Should the church borrow?" In our last post we concluded from the examples of scripture that:

1) Personally we should not borrow,
2) We should not pledge our resources to the debt of another
3) By implication the Church should not borrow either.

So if God says don't borrow and don't pledge, what are we to do to aggressively pursue the work of God's kingdom. We looked to Exodus 35:21 and 36:3-7.

The first principle we found in these passages was that, we need to get the believer out of bondage to debt. So what path can the believers take to find freedom from debt?