When it plateaus — or even declines — it’s hard to consistently do the ministry God is calling you to do, let alone expand your ministry efforts.

If that’s the situation your church is in, creating a stewardship plan for your church is important. Before you get started though, we have a new free guide to introduce you to three cautions that can derail your efforts before they start.

In Increasing your Offertory: Ignite giving out of gratitude, you’ll learn:

• How to customize your stewardship plan to maximize your results.
• How to begin to develop a culture of generosity in your midst.
• How to engage a risk-free, experienced team of consultants to help.

Unlock Future Growth with a Strategic Plan that Works

You’ve likely heard the old adage, “A failure to plan is planning to fail.” For churches in today’s complex ministry environment, it’s especially true.

But if you’re like most church leaders, developing a strategic plan can be overwhelming. You already have a lot on your plate.

At ACST, we want to help. We’ve developed a FREE short guide to help you think through how to create an effective strategic plan in your church’s ministry context. In Church Strategic Plans: Why You Need One & How to Build One, we lay out:

• The costs of not having a strategic plan for your church.
• The components of a great strategic plan.
• How to put together the right team to create an effective plan.

This summer is coming quickly. Are you looking for ways to make this year’s summer the best one yet?  With many kids living in families where both parents work, summer experiences at your church are a great way to serve both kids and families. 

• Learn how to get ready for the experience.
• Get tools you can share with your volunteers.
• Find hints to help you run your event(s).
• Discover follow-up that works

Every church and every family can’t afford to send their kids to faraway and costly summer camps. Many can’t afford to send their kids to daycares or put them in after school programs. Churches can serve their families and communities by providing families a safe, cost effective, and local summer experience for their children.

Planning, running, and following up a VBS takes intentional thought and effort. A good plan and process will make your event better, effective, more fun, impactful, and give your church the long lasting benefits your church deserves.  

Your church will see an influx of visitors this Easter. Use these tips to ensure you keep them coming back. A well-thought-out plan gives your church the best opportunity to leverage Easter into sustainable growth.

This free resource will cover:

• Preparing for your Big Day
• Making your Big Day Special
• Easter Follow-Up That Works
• Customizable Outreach Templates
• And More!

Get access to simple tools that your church can start using today to connect people to your church and help them follow Jesus better.

Few things in ministry are more nuanced than talking about money with your church. 

People hold varying views, opinions, and even resentment related to the church, and money all have an effect on how your teaching and requests around giving will be received. And yet…

Mastering the money talk is essential to growing a vibrant, well-funded ministry. 

We want your ministry to be blessed with abundance, and we want your people to develop a heart of generosity that permeates and improves every area of their lives. That’s why we’ve created this free guide, to help you talk about money at your church in a way that will be fruitful. 

In this guide, you’ll discover how to: 

• Cast a compelling vision that motivates people to give
• Connect the dots between giving and life transformation
• Make it too convenient for people not to give
• And grow giving at your church! 

You can grow your church’s giving program through four simple habits. A small investment of a daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly habit will cultivate your members’ generosity. These habits help demonstrate to them how their giving to the church changes lives.

In this article, learn the four key habits that will put your stewardship program on a healthy course.

Givers who know how the church’s mission is funded are passionate about how their gifts advance the Kingdom. Building a broad, thriving stewardship culture amongst your congregation begins with education and transparency.

In this article, learn how to provide givers the tools they need to understand how their gifts fuel the church’s mission.  Meet the needs of new members (and those new to the faith) with basics tailored just for them. 

Grow and sustain a healthy and celebratory culture of giving through this stewardship model grounded in donor education.

One of the most important questions your church can ask about its community is, “Do we reflect the people we’re trying to reach?”

Sometimes your church is trying to engage a group of people no one else is reaching, so you don’t look anything like those you want to reach. But most of the time, it’s easier to reach people with whom you share common traits.

No matter what size your church is, it’s tough to see for yourself how closely you match the community. Our new free guide Comparing Your Church Congregation to Your Community provides step-by-step instructions on how to compare your congregation to your community and see how you stack up.

In this new guide, you’ll learn:

• How to define the boundaries of your community in a way that makes sense for your specific situation.
• A simple approach to plotting your congregation on a map so you can clearly see where your church family lives.
• How to create a report that shows you how your church compares to the community in key demographic metrics.

Discovering how your church compares to the community is an important step to healthy growth.

Download this free guide to find out how you can begin this process immediately.

Don’t launch a capital campaign without thinking through the sustaining elements: your campaign’s infrastructure.

This article provides the key tools you’ll need to plan for your campaign’s leadership, volunteer structure, communications and events.

The last quarter of the year is when most ministry organizations see a big upswing in donations. Many donors consider making significant contributions in the last weeks of the calendar year. These decisions can be driven by their passions and interests and by the realities of tax benefits.

In this article, you’ll learn four steps that will help your church make the most of year-end giving – and beyond.