Many times bookkeeping at a church falls on the pastor, a member of the support staff, or a volunteer who is not passionate about accounting, but who does it for the good of the church.

Most pastors are not wired for accounting…

They are wired for building relationships, teaching God’s Word, and casting vision!

What would happen at your church if you were able to take the time you spend on bookkeeping each week and spend it working toward your church’s vision and mission?

I served as a youth pastor for eight years and then as an executive pastor at a church I helped plant in Baltimore.  Planting and growing a church is a huge undertaking, and finances are an important part.  As a youth pastor, I was responsible for creating a budget, but it wasn’t my strength, and keeping track of it was tedious.

My wife Theresa is a CPA, and she considered handling our books, but what she really wanted to do was disciple women.  She simply did not have time to do both.

We wanted to effectively use the passions and resources God had given us to reach our community.  So we decided to hire Dime, an accounting firm that specializes in churches, to take over the management of our church finances.  Our time spent on church bookkeeping quickly shifted from 8-to-10 hours per week to five minutes per week.  And we saved money!

How did spending money on “outsourced church accounting” save our church money?

Getting out from under the time requirement involved with accounting freed us to spend a lot more time on the ministry we loved doing instead sitting in front of a computer looking at spreadsheets or worrying if the year-end tax receipts were accurate.  As a result, our church grew!  And as our church grew, we were able to teach more people about generosity, which gave us more financial resources to use in reaching our community for Christ and helping our people grow in faith.

The idea behind the church is to disciple people—to see people love Jesus more and be more like Jesus in daily life. Because we were able to get church accounting off of our plate, we could fulfill our purpose much more efficiently and effectively.  We were freed from thinking about church finances, and we could focus on exactly what God had called us to do.