By Teri Ong In Part One of this essay, I introduced the “Planned Giving Toolkit,” a new program recently rolled out Regular Baptist Ministries. It is being promoted as a means for revitalizing church ministries by getting people excited (or should I say “energized”?) about tithing on their retirement plans and/or net worth so that God will have enough money in ten years for the spread of the Gospel. Evidently, the prospect of millions of dollars coming in as the troublesome (a.k.a. “change resistant”) oldsters go out, is enough to make any congregation jump for joy as they envision having […]

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By Teri Ong Church revitalization ministries are intent on getting churches down to business– the business of getting people in their doors and money in their financial accounts. Some Revitalizers base their theories and their work on the model (or variations of it) propounded in the book To Dream Again. The writer charts the life cycle of the average church through to its ultimate death. In order to put off the inevitable, churches need to have “vitality” and “sustainability.” Those are code words for “people” and “money” by his own admission. Having a lot of people around provides a social […]

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