Budget Communication Samples

Celebrate the Win

It’s important to celebrate ministry accomplishments in your budget communication, which, of course, are only possible through the faithful giving of God’s people. Here’s a quick example:

God has been faithful, and we are grateful for you and your faithfulness. What’s happened this year? Take a look at how our TOGETHER vision is making a difference…

TOGETHER We Worship—Casey Harold was called as our new Global Worship Pastor in June and we’re now worshiping together in a renovated West Monroe Worship Room!
TOGETHER We Equip—Over 150 people are being impacted with D-Groups and over 60 adult LIFE Groups are building community each week. Chris Burton was called as our new Global Children’s Minister in September and our Student Ministry is bursting at the seams!
TOGETHER We Reach—Your gospel conversations led to 125 baptisms over the last year and your generous giving allowed the church to give $421,545.12 for Great Commission missions impact and reboot international mission trips!
TOGETHER We Multiply—Our Calhoun Campus is now averaging 181 each week! Your church is multiplying itself with 5 church plants and 12 Northeast Louisiana pastors participating in our church revitalization coaching group.

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Budget Summaries

Budget Ballot

Budget Presentation

One potential challenge in church budget messaging is the negative inference some may take away from increasing personnel, facility and administrative costs. Initially, these expenses rose incrementally in the low-inflation environment from 1980 onward, but post-2020 inflationary pressures have resulted in larger increases across a range of typical church expense categories. Consider just a few of these growing costs:

Personnel – Inflationary pressures and a smaller pool of qualified candidates is pushing personnel costs higher. In addition, health insurance rates have seen large year-over-year increases.
Facilities – Many aging church facilities require increased maintenance. These expenses may take the form of renovations and repurposed facility upgrades, but much of it will involve basic systems and infrastructure like HVAC systems, heating, cooling, fire safety, roofing, elevators, doors and windows, and much more.
Administration – Property and liability insurance rates have increased dramatically.
Debt – Interest rates have edged higher increasing debt service expenses.

The result of these growing costs is an expense chart that looks something like this:

Vision Alignment

It’s always important to present the full expenses associated with each line item, and every budget presentation MUST include this information. But it’s also helpful to illustrate the church budget information in missional and vision-aligned terms. By placing all the elements for a ministry in one category, you present its true cost. After all, ministry expenses can’t be deployed without the staff team to lead it.

One recent example of this approach is a budget presentation around the four elements of a church’s vision. Each area—Worship, Equip, Reach and Multiply—includes the personnel expenses and ministry costs associated with that part of the church’s vision. Here’s a new chart of the same expenses presented through the lens of this TOGETHER Vision:

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