Money, Mission, and Ministry: Grace Pomroy on Church Sustainability

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
>> Loren Richmond (00:07):
Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast, your
source for insights and ideas on how to lead your church in
the 21st century. At the Future Christian
Podcast, we talk to pastors, authors,
and other faith leaders for helpful advice and practical
wisdom to help you and your community of faith
walk boldly into the future. Whether

(00:27):
you're a pastor, church leader, or a passionate member
of your faith community, this podcast is
designed to challenge, inspire, and equip
you with the tools you need for impactful ministry.
And now for a little bit about the guest for this episode.

>> Martha Tatarnic (00:44):
Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. Today,
Loren Richmond Jr. Is in conversation with
Grace Duddy Pomeroy. Grace is the
director of the Stewardship Leaders Program at
Luther Seminary. She's a lay
millennial stewardship leader, speaker, and financial
educator based in Allen Washing.

(01:04):
She is the co author of the stewardship book,
Embracing how to put stewardship at,
uh, the heart of your congregation's life, as
well as author of the free 2013
ELCA Stewardship Resource, stewards
of God's Love. Her latest book,
Funding A Pathway to more
sustainable models for Ministry, was just

(01:27):
released September 2024.
Grace is also a consultant with
Relevant, a, uh, charitable organization
that lovingly preserves, restores, and
repurposes underutilized churches
into community hubs and affordable housing.
A reminder. Before we start today's conversation,

(01:48):
please take a moment to subscribe to the podcast,
leave a review, and share Future Christian with
a friend. Connect with Loren, Martha and
Future Christian on Instagram. Shoot
us an email at laurensonate, uh,
mediapro.com with
comments, questions, or ideas for future
episodes. We appreciate your voice

(02:10):
in how we faithfully discern the future of
the church.

>> Loren (02:22):
Hello and welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. I am Loren
Richmond Jr. And I am pleased to be welcoming today
Grace Study Pomeroy. Uh, hello and welcome to the
show.

>> Grace Duddy Pomeroy (02:31):
Thanks so much for having me, Loren. It's great to be here.

>> Loren (02:34):
Yeah. Looking forward to having this conversation. Is there anything
else you want listeners to know about you?

No, I feel like the bio is enough. I really like to let my
work speak for itself.

>> Loren (02:44):
Well, tell me this, I guess since we even discussed it, what part of the
country are you coming from today?

Yeah, that's often where people get a bit confused because I work
remotely for a couple different organizations in different parts of the
country. So I live out on the Olympic Peninsula in
Washington. So I'm near Olympic national park, about an hour
away in a tiny little town called
Allen, Washington, right on Puget Sound.
Um, and it's so small that I think sometimes we

(03:09):
begin to wonder, especially here in the springtime, if there are more
seals than people living in this area.

>> Loren (03:15):
Wow. That's great. That's great. Well,
uh, glad for great Internet, I guess, then.
Right?

Absolutely.

>> Loren (03:24):
Well, uh, share, if you would, kind of about your faith journey, what
that looked like in the past and what that looks like today.

Yeah. I was so excited to answer this question with you because
I've had, um, a bit of a mixed faith journey. Been
a part of a variety of different denominations. I grew up in the
Assemblies of God and really valued, uh, the
Pentecostal tradition. Um, but coming of age,
began to have a lot of questions. And in the church that
I was a part of, there were some adult lay leaders

(03:50):
that when I came to them with some of these questions about
the faith and particularly about the Bible, because I'd always been so
interested in the text, uh, they told me that it
wasn't right for me to ask those questions.
Um, and just getting that door slammed in my face
as someone who was intellectually curious, um,
was really hard for me, especially because this congregation
had really lifted me up as a leader from a

(04:13):
young age, inviting me to pray, inviting me to give
sermons even when I was a youth. And so having
this door slammed in my face caused me to ask a lot of questions.
Um, and I actually ended up in the Lutheran Church because I went to
St. Olaf College. Um, I went there because
I saw that they were interested in
intellectual pursuits about religion. Uh, they also had a

(04:33):
great music program. I had been singing in a choir. And so I went
over there and I promised and vowed that I would never become a
Lutheran. That's what I told all of my friends in college. That would
never, ever happen. But what I found,
uh, through generous relationships and through working at a
Bible camp, was that that tradition
allowed me to ask questions, um, that I was
allowed to sit in the question as long as I wanted to. And in

(04:56):
fact, we encouraged others, and particularly campers that
I was working with, to really dive into those questions
together, um, not to look for the easy answers.
Lutherans are a both and people. And that really
appealed to me. And so over the course of about,
I don't know, nearly a decade, kind of began
to befriend and then slowly kind of become a part of the

(05:17):
Lutheran Church. But that was through many different
other denominations to get there. So I'm very grateful
for the rich gift of different denominational
experiences, Baptist Church and others that really
led me to the place I am today, um, and
grateful to hang out with Lutherans while That's available to
me.

>> Loren (05:35):
Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Thanks for sharing all that.
What has been a spiritual practice that's been meaningful for you and,
you know, if you're willing to share, is there anything that you
remember from your youth in the semblance of God
that still is meaningful for you, perhaps?

Oh, yes. For me, Bible reading has
always been the most meaningful spiritual practice.
Um, in my youth I was very into it. I was
committed to reading three chapters of the Bible every single
day. And I was extremely regimented about
it. Um, I would feel very guilty if I
ever missed. Um, one of the beautiful things in my
coming of age and adult experience of the faith has been just

(06:11):
to hold that a bit more loosely, to know that
sometimes when you're reading scripture in the morning, one
verse is enough to dwell in. Sometimes
you need a full passage, sometimes you need three chapters. It really
depends on where you are. Um, and giving myself permission
and freedom to enjoy the text for what it is.
Lately I've been reading the Bible in the message

(06:31):
paraphrase, um, because I found when I read it in
the niv, I heard scripture, uh,
and sermons from my past. When I read it in the
nrsv, I heard my seminary professors in
my head and I wanted to just listen to
the text. Um, so reading Eugene Peterson's
message paraphrase has allowed me to see it in new ways and
even to read passages I've known for so long and not

(06:53):
even recognize them because the language is so different. That
actually happened to me earlier this week. And one thing I've
kind of paired with that over time is also reading
poetry. So during seminary I found
reading the Bible felt too much like schoolwork.
Um, and so going into reading different, ah,
poetry, particularly about nature and God's role
in nature, was so beneficial to me. And now

(07:16):
I'm finding myself reading the Bible and
reading some poems from some unhoused women. I recently
received a book of poetry from unhoused women.
Alongside that, just, um, this beautiful
reminder not only to love God, but also to love
neighbor. Um, has really created a beautiful
spiritual practice for me.

>> Loren (07:34):
Yeah, yeah. It's funny you mentioned that thing about the, uh,
reading and different translations. Something I can relate to
having grown up Baptist and the strong
affiliation with the King James Version, you know, similarly
recognized, like hearing.
For me, it's not necessarily hearing the sermons, but I go back
to that kind of interpretive framework of,

(07:56):
of like how I would have interpreted
scripture when I was reading King James
primarily. So it's interesting how, how
those things shape our minds.

For sure.

>> Loren (08:08):
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, we're here to talk today, uh, about Grace's
book funding A Pathway to
More Sustainable Models for Ministry.
And I was really intrigued, uh, when I came across this book
and excited to talk about it because I think this is such an important
conversation for churches today, especially as we think
about the. As I people. Church, uh,

(08:30):
does not seem to be a growth industry.

I love that phrase in many ways.

>> Loren (08:38):
Uh, I was just at a church in the Midwest this week.
Very old historic church, beautiful building,
huge historic campus. Uh,
but obviously I don't think in any way. And I,
I just did some research on them, looking at their pledges. There's no
way in the world their pledges could support or
sustain the building. Uh, but thankfully they had

(09:00):
several, several different
community organizations and some denominational groups using the
building that I imagine has greatly
contributed to their sustainability and
continued ministry. And thank goodness, because
I'm, as my friends know, I'm someone who loves
beautiful church buildings. And there's a Presbyterian church just
down the street, even more grand and historic and

(09:22):
beautiful, at least from the outside, if I can say that,
uh, that had closed, I think, and is likely to, I
think turn into luxury condos, which to me is a crime. But,
uh, that's another conversation. So I think these conversations are
essential, uh, about how to make churches and
church ministry more sustainable.
So, uh, I imagine you had a similar kind of like,
oh my goodness, like, tell what, what

(09:45):
was your kind of moment of like, I need to put this on paper.

Sure. So I, I actually came to
this process from the people side and less from the building
side. And the building piece has been coming to me slowly over
time. I share at the beginning of the book a, um, really
impactful moment for me in my own ministry
journey. I was actually teaching
pre retirement seminars, uh, to pastors.

(10:10):
And in one of these particular seminars there was
a gentleman who came with his father because his father mainly
spoke Spanish. So he was translating the entire pre
retirement seminar. In and of itself. He should have been paid
way more than me for that day because he was doing the real work.
But needless to say, as I got into conversation
with this person, um, I realized that

(10:30):
he was a first call pastor. So he was
in his very first job, uh, out of seminary.
And he had been put into a really interesting
situation. He was struggling to find
a call and was kind of getting a bit desperate.
And when one congregation contacted him,
uh, they said, great, you know, we'd really love for you to be here,

(10:50):
but we really need you to work 3/4 time.
But in reality what we mean by 3/4 time is actually
full time at a 3/4 salary. And he was so
desperate to take this call and I, I feel for
him because I know what that desperation feels like.
Um, um. And so he jumped right in and by the time I met him,
he was a couple months in and I could already see the

(11:11):
burnout even after a couple of months.
And I began to wonder, is there a way we
can do this work that doesn't put
all of the financial pressure onto the
shoulders of the ministry leaders who are serving that community?
Is there a different financial model that
paths that creates a pathway forward

(11:31):
for us that does not
include that type of pressure, not only for the ministry leaders but
also for the community itself? Um, and the more
I've been digging into this more work, the more critique I
have of our current financial system
in the church and how much pressure that puts on
individuals, uh, to be the only thing holding

(11:52):
up their church's budget.

>> Loren (11:53):
Yeah, yeah. Um, there's been, and
I imagine you've come across much of this,
it's bigger conversation that we probably don't have time for today
about, you know, institutionalism and
the volunteer society and how our
institutions are structured. But I think this is an important
part of that conversation. And

(12:14):
what I appreciated most, I think about when I
read your book is that it really
was, at least as I read it, uh,
you really made a strong attempt to build a
spiritual, theological, philosophical foundation
about why this is important in
some basic, again, foundational points.

(12:36):
Um, and I think one of the things that pleasantly surprised me, I'll
say most, and I don't want to discount,
I don't want to discount like sometimes we just need a real
practical, like how do we start this? But I think
in this space it's really important to
build a spiritual theological foundation
because I'm sure you've seen it as much as

(12:57):
I have, like the cart can be, get in front of the horse
and if we are not careful, like
the work of the church
can just be purely economic based, like
we're existing just to like make money or
whatever. And uh, I don't think that's what you
want. So you say in the book that spiritual practices, when you

(13:19):
surveyed pastors and other leaders doing this work, you
were surprised. Surprised. If I remember correctly, you were surprised to read that
spiritual practices were the most
commonly, uh, referenced things
as, as part of the, the process of enter.
Undergoing more,
um,
more. Excuse me, exploring more uh,

(13:40):
untraditional financing models. So talk, talk more about that if you
would.

Absolutely. I am so grateful that you asked about this, because
I do think whenever I talk about this, people want to dive
right into the practical right away. And when you do that, you miss
the entire point. I am not
interested in financial practices just
to save the institution of church. I have zero interest in
that conversation. If we were going to have a conversation about

(14:04):
how to add an extra 5 to 10% to your budget just to
add an extra 5 to 10%, we'd be having a, ah, very
different, uh, conversation today. And we'd be
looking at very different income sources. And I don't think
that conversation is faithful because what
God calls us to do is not to maintain an
institution or to maintain a building, just to maintain a building.

(14:25):
God calls us to love God and love neighbor, to
make disciples of all nations. And how we
do that is different in every single place. And
so it was fascinating to me because I, I came into this
research project. Um, I'm a math major, I'm a
finance gal. You know, I was looking for the practical
details. And even though I am a person of
faith with a spiritual life, I have to admit I had that

(14:48):
practical lens going. That's where my antenna was
focused. And again and again
and again and again, the Spirit
reminded me, this work is not about
that. Uh, and if you want to
be in creating a sustainable model for the
long term, there are spiritual
practices that are necessary to this work because the

(15:10):
mission matters so much more than the money.
And we've now seen that from, uh, a research lens
that the entire congregation needs to be on
board with the mission and how you're going to live that
out. But the details of where the money comes from
and all of the financial knits and gats, those can be handled
by another group of people. They're vitally important to this process,

(15:30):
but they're ancillary. So what we found is that
spiritual practices, including just really small
ones, were vital. So an example of this, one of the
congregations we studied, the Emory fellowship in Washington,
D.C. i mean, a congregation that is rich
with deep spiritual practices. If you want to see
an exceptional mission and vision statement, please
Google the Emory Fellowship. It's one of the best I've ever seen.

(15:53):
Uh, their mission, to bring a whole life to all people.
They decided to take on a project and really
discerned that this was a call from God, from them, to take
on a project of building affordable housing. And as Pastor
Joe Daniels would say, if you're building in Washington, D.C. expect
it to take a long time. If you can build in Washington D.C. you can build
anywhere. It took 11 years to complete.

(16:14):
It was a twisting journey winding all the way through.
But one of the practices they used that's so
practical and beautiful is that they
invited people to pray every single day for
this project, twice a day at 6, 6:10am
and 6:10pm so people would set their alarms every
day to pray for this. And it kept them
going through the journey, through the times when things seemed to be

(16:37):
moving forward, through the times when things seemed to be tough.
And this is a group of working class people in this
congregation. They do not have a lot of time to invest in
long winded spiritual practices. And they
pointed to us again and again that this is one of the things that
really kept them going. You could imagine their evening
meetings at church where everybody's alarm goes off and they would all
pray together. But honestly, for years

(17:00):
this was an important practice for them. And of course we saw
some other practices. People really diving into
their own money stories as they dug into the money
story of their congregation. Uh, people spending
time, uh, doing work around how to love their neighbor and
really listen to their neighbor. The spiritual practices
were vast. And I really

(17:21):
uh, followed what I believe was the lens of the Spirit to
say if this feels like a spiritual practice to this congregation, even
if you and I might not define it that way, we're going to define it that way from
a research, purpose and perspective.

>> Loren (17:32):
Yeah, that's helpful. Uh, it goes back
to something I feel like I'm seeing again and again as essential
in at least American
Christian society, that these
efforts have to be undergirded by
a, uh, rich spiritual depth or
else. Like you said, 11 years. My goodness,

(17:53):
I'm remembering a story here in my own neck of
the woods where
similarly a, uh, building was built. And it
took some 20 years of somebody
walking around this property, praying and praying and praying
and praying. And today there's a beautiful
building that has some 60, 70

(18:13):
low income housing units with more
on the way. Uh, and again,
if we were looking for quick fixes and instant
results, would never have happened without some
discipled, disciplined,
dedicated. What else do you can I use there?
Commitment, uh, to saying through it

(18:35):
it's so important. That's a great story. Yeah, yeah.
So you kind of stole my next
question there because I was asking about mission mattering more than money. I'm
curious, like, have you seen the opposite where,
what are some examples of where churches chased money,
you know, and they found that it really didn't align with their mission?

Oh, That's a great question. I don't know that anybody's asked me that
before, so I might need a second to think of some good
examples, but just to kind of, uh, go
off a bit on that topic, uh, I will
say some of my favorite folks in congregations are
the church treasurer, the church finance chair.
And sometimes good, faithful
people can fall into this trap where money

(19:17):
matters more. And often this comes
from a historical bias. For
so long in our Christian traditions, keeping the doors
open, and if you build it, they will come.
Theology was the way that we
evangelized. So in many ways, as much as
we want to critique that ideology, theology,
philosophy, I think we need to take the time to

(19:39):
realize where it comes from and to help people begin
to undo some of those ideas from the past about
it. I think where I see this come up,
um, poorly around money, I think about an
example I heard of recently of a
congregation that decided. I don't know if they
closed, but they definitely decided to sell their building. And they
decided to sell it to the highest bidder. They didn't

(20:02):
care what it was going to be used for, and really
focused on chasing the money in that situation. Now,
in their case, um, to be fair, they did decide
that much of the proceeds of that sale would be given away.
But what I'm more curious about is how do we actually
make sure the mission is aligned throughout the process.

>> Loren (20:20):
Uh-huh.

Because you could have still sold the building
in a missional way, made some money, been able to give it away,
maybe not as much, but did you really need
to have that much money stored up to give away?
And what type of legacy are you leaving, given that you
sold this to the highest bidder? Uh, now, there are some
communities where you may make a lot of money, and it may make

(20:42):
sense to go with that highest bidder. And there's a missional connection.
But I think the biggest issue for congregations that I see
is we don't know what our mission is. And when we don't know what our
mission is, when we haven't spent the time and discernment, which is
so hard, but it's
so necessary, then we're never gonna be able to make these
decisions. Cause if we're not clear on our mission, we can't make

(21:03):
these choices that need to be made.

>> Loren (21:05):
Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. Uh, how did.
Then when we're thinking about cause again,
there's not always that even clear differentiation between,
you know, is this feeding mission, is this feeding just
purely the bottom line? Sometimes practical
decisions need to be made about
to sustain our mission, we might need to

(21:25):
pursue money. How do you help
congregations or how do you advise congregations and leaders to find that
kind of sweet spot? I'm thinking, I'm sure
you've, you've worked or encountered Mark Elzin.
You have.

I remember they, yeah, they have that.

>> Loren (21:39):
Kind of helpful chart in their book or his book
of. I think it's in one of his books. Right. About
the.

Yeah, he's got it in a couple different places. His money and m Mission matrix
is one of my favorite, uh, resources to use with people.
It is brilliant. Um, but it's also very
simple. So I hope I can explain it in a way that makes sense to
the podcast viewers, which is that essentially if you think of a
table, you've got money on one side, you've got
mission on another. And what Mark would say, which I think

(22:06):
is so vital, is our goal
is not always to have,
um, the money making piece come first. Because that's what I
think. When people initially read Mark's work, when they initially read my
work and other work on this topic, they think we're only looking for money
making pieces. But in reality, our goal is to
find ways to connect with the mission. Some that cost

(22:27):
money, there will always be pieces of our ministry that cost
money. That's not a bad thing. Some that break
even. That's wonderful. And we need to find
more of those opportunities and then some that
also generate income. And our goal is to really hang out
across that line. Where things can get sticky
is on the things that are missionally neutral. And

(22:47):
what Mark would say is, even if it feels like a big money
generator, take the time. Because a lot of
things that congregations think immediately are mission neutral,
often aren't. They either can be really
missionally related if you take the extra step,
or there's some things behind it that make it not
missionally related. And if you're saying, well, that
feels like it could be different for every place,

(23:09):
you're absolutely right. You're absolutely
right. Which is so vitally important that we remember
that there's not one way forward. Which is why I get a little
frustrated sometimes when affordable housing is the immediate thing
thrown out to every single congregation. It is a vital
need in our church and world today. Love it. But
that's not the right opportunity for every place.

>> Loren (23:28):
Right? Yeah, that's a good point. And
it speaks to the importance, as you
say, I think again and again in the book of listening and
discernment. I'm reminded too, I can't remember the
quote. Perhaps you can tell me who said this. It's
somebody famous. And I'm kicking myself that I can't remember who it is.
But,
um, I think it was like a

(23:49):
covey who was like, there cannot be mission without
margin. And I feel like
that's something churches don't really
get.

No. Uh, and yet Covid taught us that.
Covid taught us that. I mean, so many
congregations learned through Covid
that if you don't have any type of margin, it's
going to be challenging. And I really would
encourage congregations to consider that. I've heard
seen a lot of churches begin to put together a sort of emergency

(24:19):
fund, whether that's in the form of an endowment that you could
grab from if you needed to, and you need to make sure your endowment
restrictions allow you to do that. Don't just make that up.
Um, or having some savings that are set aside is so,
so vital. And especially in a season of ministry where you're
pursuing new income sources, it is very rare
that that transition happens quickly. So you need to give

(24:40):
yourself the bandwidth. Uh, think about it like starting
a new business. You know, that you would need to have some money set
aside to, uh, help fund you as that business came up to speed.
And it's the same as we're switching to a new model of ministry
with our finances.

>> Loren (24:53):
Yeah. And again, I, I guess again, I'm going to keep beating this
drum, because I think you do. In the book, listening and discernment is so
essential because if not, we're just either chasing after money.
Right. Or we're going to get into something that's not.
It is, again, as Elson would say, is like
anti. It's against our mission.
And that's, uh, that's the worst for sure.

It really is. And I think I see too many congregations trying to
copy and paste.

>> Loren (25:15):
Right.

They really love the ideas of what other people are doing in your
community, but you don't need. Need 10
food pantries on the same block. They just
don't. I mean, unless your community really does need that, in which case, please
pursue it. But, like, ultimately likely not the case.
And I think we were looking for quick fixes
rather than doing the scary work. It is really

(25:36):
scary to go out and talk to neighbors. I get
that it can feel really daunting to sit
and discern mission and not have any idea what God
is going to say to you about what God wants to do next with your congregation
and know that it may go in a different direction than you could imagine.
That faithful risk taking is so
important. Um, and these simple

(25:57):
practices which we try to include in the book of Dwelling in the
Word as a community, of going on prayer walks
in your community. I try to include specific questions that you can
ask to neighbors so that you know what to say. There's kind
of a script prepared for you and there's certainly a lot of great
resources out there outside of my book on that
topic. Um, but I would encourage you,
don't try to shortcut it. And if you are the church

(26:19):
treasurer type that's listening to this, awesome, love that
for you, this can be your moment
to introduce that part of the conversation. Maybe you're not the
one who leads it, but the fact that you've brought it up, people
are going to listen because they don't expect that from you.

>> Loren (26:33):
Yeah, yeah. And again, we'll
keep repeating this too, like you're a math person.
You're not someone who's just going to pretend
numbers don't matter.

Not at all.

>> Loren (26:44):
You know, so she's a math person, folks. Uh, she
understands the importance of, uh,
keeping records and understanding true cost. So
let's start to transition this a little bit to the practical.
But I think this kind of question or
topic really gets to that because it's an important step
of how do we, how do you, how have you

(27:05):
seen churches, have you coached
churches to grieve the past to
and celebrate while also making space for the new? Because I
think what can always happen is, and I think you
say this in the book, right? We can see the past,
we can label the past as bad or some effort in the past
is bad and think, well, these new efforts, this is the

(27:26):
good, uh, which again really is going to rub some
folks the wrong way if they've been in the church a long time. I
think I've made that mistake at some point in my career.
Uh, what have you seen do. Do well there?

Oh, I'm so glad you brought this up. This has been
my absolute favorite, most life giving part of
this work. As I've been working with the book, now that it's been
published with different groups, this
is so necessary. And the great news
is for most pastors, this is right in your wheelhouse.
Yeah, this is right in the sweet spot of your wheelhouse.
So one of the things that I like to do with congregations around

(28:01):
this, if you'll permit some examples, is I really
like to dwell in a text that most
congregation members probably have known ever seen or if they
have seen it. It's been a while I really like to dwell
in Ezra 3. Um, this is a
passage that one of my colleagues at Luther Seminary, who's one of our Old
Testament professors, Cameron Howard, brought up to, uh, us
around lessons in innovation. And one of

(28:24):
the beautiful things here is you see this temple
being rebuilt and you hear the
weeping for joy and the weeping
for the past all happening at the same time.
And what I like to imagine is that there are some
people who are doing both.

>> Loren (28:40):
Yeah.

So what I often remind congregations is you don't have
to finish your grieving process before the hope can begin.
Huh? We have permission to feel both feelings at the
same time and to change in the middle of a meeting
how we feel. That's totally okay. We can go back
and forth. And one of the activities I like to use is one
that faith lead has developed around longings and losses.

(29:02):
So encouraging people to spend some
time lamenting things from the past that they have lost.
But one of the most important questions in it that I really,
really love is I think, question number three and the four
questions, which is, what is something from the
past that was good, good
that you might need to let go of to create space for the

(29:24):
new future? Uh, and this
is where I have found the most powerful moments happen.
I still remember a group that I was working with in Washington last
year where we did this activity. I invited everyone to write
it on a post it note. And then everybody
lifted them up. Sounds a bit cheesy, but go with me. And we
said a prayer over them. We gave thanks
to God for these amazing, beautiful things,

(29:47):
for these Bible studies, these spaces in
our congregation that had been so important to
us and been such a source of spiritual growth,
while also saying, we're gonna let these go for
a time and we're creating space
for what's to come. Because if we have too much on our plate,
there's no space, um, for the growth.

(30:08):
Um, and it doesn't mean we're letting go of good for the
better. It just means we're letting go for.
Of what was good to create what's good in
this season. And both things can still be good. We can
celebrate those things of the past without letting them rule over
us.

>> Loren (30:23):
Yeah, that's a great, that's a great point. So
often I, um, think
of church spaces so often as being. Whether
it's a church space or something tangible,
tactile, can so
often be. Have great memories and important
m. Memories, important ministry attached to those.

(30:44):
Uh, and it's real hard for someone
who's, who made a
donation or whose parent was involved
to just. And I think it's so important for the
grieving process. Uh, and I
guess we could say otherwise, like, in so many instances, like a
building just getting sold and demolished. Like, that's not good for,

(31:05):
um. That's not good for memories either. So this is a more
perhaps faithful way and a meaningful way.
I want to jump to your. What you call
your rocket ship model, because I think this is really
applicable here. So in the
latter end of the book, you kind of talk about
six practices that came up most

(31:26):
consistently in your interviews. And if it's okay, I'll
just read them here.
Um, you talk about openness to change, generosity,
focus on mission, lay leadership, pastoral
leadership, and, uh, partnerships or
community relationships. And as you lay these out and kind of
quantify the data, you know that, interestingly enough,

(31:47):
it kind of looks like a rocket ship. And again, as I understand,
like, you make the point that with these
principles in place, you can really become.
Your idea can take off. Uh, so talk more just about
how you've seen this kind of take
off and grow for congregations.

Absolutely. So in my experience, when I
was working with congregations around this, prior to the research project,
this is where they got stuck. Ideation is never
an issue for most congregations that I talk to. They've got
tons of ideas, not always grounded in the community, but
they've got tons of ideas, which is beautiful and
faithful and lovely. Let's live into it.

(32:25):
But once those ideas begin to become a part of the
broader conversation, once we start putting them into action, once
we start hitting some roadblocks, that's where people were getting
stuck.
And so we wanted to talk to 12 congregations who
had done this work successfully. Again, I'm using that
term loosely, um, and they would agree that that's a
loose term, but successfully from a missional and financial

(32:45):
perspective, to see what they learned. And we were so
excited to see the practices that came up. I
was most excited to see that partnerships and community relationships
was the foundation of this work. Churches often
assume that they have to do this work by
themselves.

>> Loren (33:00):
Yeah.

And in my experience, um, I am not a
psychologist or a counselor, but I would say a lot of this comes
from a feeling of failure on the church's part.
They think it's an issue that they need to fix before no one else
notices. Um, and it's
so challenging when we. When we stay inside of
our enclave. And it's really not something we're

(33:21):
able to do if we just stay inside of our own space. And
it's Funny to me, so many congregations, when I have this
conversation in a kind of a senate or a denominational
setting, it's amazing to me how many congregations right down the
street from one another don't realize that they're engaging in the
same conversation because there's so much shame and embarrassment.

>> Loren (33:38):
Yeah.

So I encourage these partnerships and community relationships. And in
our experience, um, these partners came from really
unexpected places. I think about one of our
congregations we studied in Fort Worth, Texas, where
the landlord was a key partner, and this landlord was not
a person of faith, but this landlord actually
decided to give some
additional rental space to this congregation, who was already renting

(34:01):
space from them for free because of the
particular piece that they were doing. And I think about
in other situations where a congregation was looking
to expand their childcare ministry. And it
turned out that government partners, of all people, were the people
who really helped to set the table. And I'll never
forget, uh, listening to this story from this
congregation in Chicago. They were so nervous to

(34:24):
go sit with these government leaders. They had their whole talk
prepared. They go and sit down, start their
conversation, and two minutes in, the person sitting
across the table says, wait, you're talking about Concordia
Ministries? My daughter has been a part of your
childcare center for years. I know your mission,
and I'm ready to jump in. Which I think
underscores a couple of things. One,

(34:46):
God is here. God is up to something in this space, and
we have to listen for what the Spirit is doing. But I think
beyond that, there may be partners already in your
midst that are completely untapped.

>> Loren (34:57):
Yeah.

And this person didn't even know that they had been connected
to the community. So next time, maybe do the research.
But also, like, this is so. This is so exciting to
see.
Something else we really enjoyed was seeing that lay leadership and
pastoral leadership came up the same number of times. Too many
pastors I know think they need to be a superhero. I need
an MBA to do this work. And while there are Certainly pastors with

(35:18):
MBAs who do this work incredibly well, there are also
a lot of lay leaders in your communities that have gifts that
they would love to use. Um, speaking as a lay leader
myself, I think too often, and we get tapped in
one particular way or we're invited to one particular
way of engaging in the church, and our other gifts
languish because nobody asks. Um, so this
is a really great opportunity to partner and to ask for

(35:41):
help. How empowering to have the pastoral leader
say, I'd really love your assistance with this. Like, I'm
not so good with the numbers. Can you help us run the numbers and see if this
really makes sense? And I think they'd have a lot of energy
around it. And as I said before, focus on
mission really mattered. And then generosity. People think
that starting a new funding model means generosity in the

(36:01):
offering plate goes away. And that was the last thing that we
saw. Um, generosity from unexpected quarters showed up
everywhere.

>> Loren (36:08):
Yeah.

Um, and just finally kind of the openness to change
right there at the top of the rocket. This is the piece that, at least for my
fellow Lutherans, gives us heart palpitations.
Um, remember, it's about openness. You may not
be open to completely getting rid of your building.
That's a lot. But might you be open to using
your kitchen differently one day a week? Might

(36:29):
you be open to having something happen
outside of your sanctuary, even if you're not using that sanctuary
space? Might you be open to having food trucks in your
parking lot? Look for that one
small opening and then lean
in. Because I find that once people try it once
in a small way, they're more open to the rest of the

(36:49):
things to come.

>> Loren (36:51):
Yeah, yeah. And I think this process is so important because
like you said in that ideation stage, without
some of that critical buy in or
critical mass, I don't know how to say it differently. Like
these ideas can so quickly fall flat,
folks then get discouraged. And that kind of
reinforces this resistance to, uh, trying

(37:12):
something new, trying something again.
Well, well, again, I want to bring this even
more practically speaking because you and I were kind of joking about
this before we started recording.
Um, let's talk real nuts and bolts here because
I think one of the things that I was so thankful to read in the
book and uh, something that I've seen
in my ministry is folks don't

(37:35):
often understand the true costs of things.
And I think I see this most often in
folks not understanding the true
costs of renting. So
again, like, we don't want to like, be
the church to be a profit center, to use a real businessy word.
Right. We're not looking to like to necessarily make money.

(37:55):
But what have you seen?
Because like, to me, that's something that I bang my head against the wall
again and again when I see churches, like, we're
gonna give, you know, a giveaway space for $50
for, you know, for an entire night. And I think like, like
that's not even covering like the water and the
toilet paper, for instance.

Exactly. That's the first thing that I would say.
So your mission is Going to help you figure out how you want
to charge money for the space. But regardless
of what you do in terms of charging money, not
charging money, you have to know how
much it costs. And believe me, your
church treasurer, your property team, your finance

(38:34):
team has been waiting to run these numbers.
So please put them to work. They will be excited about
that. There are so many different costs to
renting out a space. I'm going to name a couple, but there are going to be so
many that I miss. Like you mentioned, there's water, there's
toilet paper. There is the cost of cleaning a
space which people don't think about. There's the wear and tear of the
space that people don't care about.

>> Loren (38:55):
Don't think about it.

There's the staffing cost, because often
you need to have somebody there to open and close the
doors. There's a security risk. You may need to add
additional security features. Sometimes there's permitting
that you need to have. If you're going to have somebody come in and use your kitchen
for a commercial purpose, might need to have some
upgrades done to that kitchen. The list goes on
and on and on and on. And one of my favorite

(39:19):
resources I've seen to help total that up,
um, is rooted goods, resource, how to rent. Well,
um, very much worth the money.
Absolutely fantastic. Goes through the details step
by step. And please, please, please, if you are not a finance
person, this is a great time to bring in your
finance, uh, person in your community because they will enjoy

(39:40):
running through these numbers. Especially if you have somebody who,
more on the banking, um, or real estate
side, um, they will have some really interesting perspective to
bring and encourage them to think of all of the
costs that you might not be considering. And then once you
know what that cost is, that's when you can begin
to have a conversation.

>> Loren (39:59):
Yeah.

I certainly know of congregations who say, you know what?
We know for our community, our mission is to give
away space, but we know what the cost is.

>> Loren (40:08):
Uh-huh.

That's a ministry that we include in our budget. Budget.

>> Loren (40:10):
Yes.

Cool. That's great. There are other places that say, you
know, our mission is to offer below market rent.
And there are plenty of places that I know of that do a sliding
scale. Um, I think about a congregation I know of in
Seattle that I love, and their sanctuary space is
used on Wednesdays for a neighbor who does tai
chi. And that's a very different price point than when
it's used for a wedding, than when it's used for a concert,

(40:34):
and that's okay. And the cool thing about their model is
they're not secretive about it.

>> Loren (40:38):
It.

Every single person who comes through their doors knows
there's a sliding scale. They know that they may be
offsetting someone else's rent, and they
appreciate being part of that economic model. They actually
talk about it as kind of a faithful economic
model. And I think it's beautiful to see how that
works. But if you don't know what the cost is, you have no

(40:58):
idea. I also want to say,
um, a common
misconception that I see is people say, well, what about
AA groups, for instance?

>> Loren (41:08):
Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

And what they don't remember or don't know is
that actually an AA group, part of their
particular process is that they need to
pay for the spaces they use.

>> Loren (41:20):
Uh-huh.

Now, I'm not saying they're paying a lot, but they need to pay something.
And so actually, by taking away that opportunity to
pay for that space, you're actually taking away a
piece of their healing process. Us.

>> Loren (41:32):
Yeah.

And that's. That's true with other things as well. We value
the things that we pay for. And when you allow certain
organizations to come through not understanding
the cost of renting out that space, they're going to treat the
space differently when they have some money
invested in that process. And again, your mission,
your community, will determine what that charge might look like.

(41:54):
But please, please, please understand the costs.

>> Loren (41:56):
Yeah, I'm thinking of one church or
had a congregation conversation with one of their leaders.
They're renting a community garden.
But the guy who was talking to, I think, was the treasurer.
And he was like, we're paying more for water
than they're giving us in rent, you know, because it
was a big garden. Something else I was thinking about, too, when

(42:16):
comparing just the cost of rent. I know I had this conversation
with a pastor in my area when he asked me, like, hey, what
should I be charging this church renting
from my church? And I said, hey, look, uh, at
that time, I was doing church in a
public school, and I was like, look, this is what the public
schools are charging me for four hours a Sunday. And

(42:37):
it includes costs of staffing,
cleaning, et cetera, et cetera, utilities.
So I said, hey, you're not even charging a quarter of that.
Maybe you could bump it up a little bit, and then just tell
the. The. The other congregation, like, hey, with this
additional funds, like, I'm going to be able to improve this. Improve
the. The cleaning or what have you. What have you.

Yeah. And I think that's so vitally important. And I think people assume it's an
either or. Either we're going to charge full market rent or
nothing, right? And there's a huge chasm
in the middle. And if you don't know the data of
market rent in your community, which, by the way, Google can be
your friend, at least for an initial blush at what
that number might be, you're doing yourself a

(43:18):
disservice. I think, about a congregation, um, that
I heard about from a student who was renting out to a
preschool. And they were paying. The preschool
was paying less per month in that community than I paid
for my first apartment. And I was like,
how is this possible? Um, I was just
laughable. And I couldn't believe that they had

(43:38):
never done that process to understand the cost or to
understand what rents look like in their area. And again, you don't
need to charge full market rent, but if you don't have
that piece of the data, that piece of the
puzzle, you can't make a solid decision.

>> Loren (43:52):
So let's. And we're kind of running long on time, so hopefully
you're okay.
But I think this leads into the social
entrepreneurship model.
Um, and I think one of the
key points in social entrepreneurship that can
be a, ah, challenge is like, this.
Not.

(44:13):
How do I say this? Like you just said, like, not accounting
for true costs. It kind of goes back to this previous conversation
of like, if something can't really be done at
a fair cost, or how, uh, am I,
you know, not sure how to say this this way? Like,
then maybe it shouldn't be done. Does that make sense? Because, um, I'm thinking like,
do you remember, like, when I was studying this years

(44:33):
ago, there was like a, a story out of Harvard
or Stanford Review, whatever, about like, this
nonprofit who made this, like, salad dressing. Do
you remember reading the story?

And it was like, I don't.

>> Loren (44:44):
But keep telling, it was something like, you know, they, they made this
salad dressing for their nonprofit, and they're like, oh, we made this for
$3.50 a bottle or something. Like, this is a
great deal. Like, this is cheaper than you can buy on the shelves. And then
someone went back and like, realized, like, this is actually costing them
like $90 a bottle or something. Just stupid, ridiculous like
that. Uh, so when churches think about,
like, can we do a social entrepreneurship

(45:06):
or something to bring in some additional revenue, how do you advise
churches to be like, hey, look, the, the actual cost, like,
you can't do this, uh, if a preschool or,
uh, something can't, like, Pay
what it's going to cost to maintain even their space. For
instance, like, how do you say, like, hey, this is a good idea, but
maybe something you shouldn't pursue.

Yes. That's why I think it's so, so important in the ideation
process to consider a variety of ideas, a variety of different
scenarios, and to really listen deeply in your community. I
think about one of the congregations we studied in Gulf
Shores, Alabama, and two of the ideas that emerged as
they were listening was childcare and also
was new entrepreneurship spaces. And,

(45:46):
and they, of course, like any church,
leaned into childcare because that sounds really fun. And
they did the math. And it just didn't. It just didn't
math for that particular community. Again, I'm not saying that doesn't
math in general, but just for them, it didn't. And so they
decided to lean into helping small business owners in
their community. And it actually was really deeply

(46:06):
rooted in their mission. And it's been exciting to see. Now a
couple of years later, they've got all these spaces rented
out in their congregation, and now one of
the people that they're going to be renting to one of these small businesses
is actually a daycare center. Um,
so it all kind of came back around for them later.
But if they had just leaned into childcare because

(46:27):
it felt like the idea they wanted to pursue
and it felt like what a church should be doing, which I
think is always the enemy, um, it wouldn't have made
sense. It wouldn't have made sense long term. And so that's where I
think, coming back to the discernment process, the listening
process really, really matters. Where I see a
sweet spot for Congreg is when you've got an

(46:47):
underutilized asset, it doesn't always have to be your space.
It can be an underutilized staff asset, a lay, a leader
asset, whatever it might end up being. And then
what is the community doing and what is God's mission up to?
That's where those sweet spots emerge. I would
also say with that social enterprise example, what
I often see is congregations want to meet a

(47:08):
community need without also looking out at other
partners in their community. So, yeah, I'm going to sell my salad
dressing at 350. Uh, but what does that mean for
other salad dressings that are out there at $5?
I see this with churches who want to start cafes and there's a
cafe down the street that they're now taking away business from.
What does that mean in your neighborhood?
Just because they are a Starbucks or another Name brand

(47:30):
doesn't mean that you should be taking away business from them.
So how do you have an open conversation about what's needed in
the community and partnering with neighbors who are already
doing this work because God is already up to
something in your community. Um, and don't rush into
starting a social enterprise just because it sounds like the fun, cool new
thing we have to make sure it pencil out on paper.

>> Loren (47:51):
Let me ask one more question here before we take a break related to this
question. I think sometimes churches can
be resistant for obvious reasons. Like there's some
complications to pursuing like
renting a church or renting a church space, for instance, to a
purely business model. But uh, and there's
obviously some, what is ubit the term unrelated business income

(48:11):
tax expenses. Like I was at a
church where they, they did that and had dealt with that.
Um, so talk a little bit about how like that's not
necessarily a for sure like hard brick wall
obstacle, even if like it's not directly mission
related. But again, going back to like Elson's point, like it's not
off mission.

No, not at all. And Loren, I'm excited to
see that we got 46 minutes into this conversation before
taxes were brought up. That's a record. It's wonderful. I love
this. Um, so what I would say about that is
taxes often become a first point of tension. People
get really panicky about losing their
501c3 stat. I can't say I have
any idea where that's actually coming from.

(48:53):
Um, it's very, very rare to lose a
501c3 status. Um, and I actually
can't say personally that I've connected with any
congregation where that's been the case. There are a lot of
other hurdles before you would get to that point.
I think where things can get tricky actually is not
with taxes, um, but is actually with working with

(49:13):
city and local government around zone. That tends to be the
bigger challenge. So if you're thinking about a space
oriented idea, what I always say is you
want to get in touch with a local attorney, an accountant as
soon as you can. Somebody from outside of your community
right in the midst of the ideation process is a great time
to bring them in because they're going to be able to say to you, great, you want to
rent out your space. Here are five different things that you might

(49:36):
do that might help reduce that tax liability
or potentially eliminate that tax liability, depending on how
you decide to go forward. And guess what, if you have
to pay some taxes, it's going to be okay.
And in fact, that's just part of the numbers that you pencil
out. So you might know, yeah, we're going to have to pay some
unrelated business tax. And so as we're considering what we want to
charge for rent, we're going to account for that idea. That's going to be

(49:59):
included in our budget from now on. Um, it really
is not the end of the world.

>> Loren (50:04):
Yeah, yeah. Thank you for saying that, because I feel like I've had these
conversations where people just, like, freak out, be like, oh, tax, taxes,
unrelated business income taxes, like, yeah, yeah, it's fine. It's a
thing people do that.
Uh, not a deal breaker,
but it speaks to the importance of your rocket ship, of doing your
due diligence. Before you get into these conversations,
uh, make sure you're giving a true cost of rent, because

(50:26):
like you said, you want to do some legwork with a lawyer, perhaps, or
accountant to make sure all your I's are
dotted and your T's are crossed. Well,
with taxes. That's the most fun thing about this
conversation. Right. Well, let's leave it there and take a
break. Uh, the book is funding a
Pathway to More Sustainable Models for Ministry.
Highly recommend it.

(50:47):
Um, let's take a break and come back with some closing questions.
We are back with Grace Duddy Pomeroy, and thank you
so much for this conversation. I, uh, hope it's helpful for
our listeners. So, some closing questions. We always
tell folks you can take as seriously or not as you'd like to.
I feel like I should ask these

(51:10):
from a financial point of view.
Um, but if you're
Pope for a day, and again, think of it,
you can imagine yourself as the literal Pope. Um,
you could imagine yourself as the ruler of
Christendom and be as seriously or as
nice as you'd like to. But I'm just curious, if you had

(51:31):
some authority for a day, what would
you like to do with that day?

That's a great question. I also have to say that I am
so glad I am not the Pope. I
really love my position as a lay
leader in the church. It gives me a lot of flexibility.
And when it comes to church administration, being in the
peanut gallery is so much fun. So no, thanks
is probably what I would say first. But if I were forced

(51:57):
into it, I would just encourage more time in listening
and discerning. Less doing things and
more time listening and discerning.

>> Loren (52:06):
Good. Uh, a theologian or
historical Christian figure you'd want to meet or bring back to life.

I struggled a bit with this question because I feel like my
answers are too generic. My first, of course,
idea was I would love, um, love to
have a conversation or really actually just listen to a
sermon live by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. That would
have been incredible. Um, his sermons have been so important
to me. But honestly, as I thought about it more,
I wanted to twist the question a bit. Uh,

(52:36):
I was chatting with a group last night of clergy and lay
leaders, and we were dwelling in the Zacchaeus story. And
I think I'd really love to have a conversation with Zacchaeus.

>> Loren (52:45):
Interesting.

I would love to sit with him to hear what that
transformational experience was like for him, to hear how his
life changed after that moment. Um,
and we're both finance people, so I think we would have gotten along very well.

>> Loren (52:57):
Right? Yeah. That's good. That's good.
Um, what do you think history will remember from our current
time and place?

Yeah, I was
reflecting on how
when we look back at the past, the more recent
American church past, so I think about
the time not too long ago, uh, when
we had to shift from being dependent on being government
supported in the church to actually being supported by tithes and
auxiliary. And funny enough, we don't remember

(53:26):
their fear and their panic around that moment,
but we do remember the new model that they set forth for
us. And I hope that that's what history remembers
here. Um, that there was some trepidation in
the midst of change because it gives people in the future permission
to feel that fear as well. But that we charted
a new pathway forward, uh, that we

(53:47):
leaned in to the biblical text,
to spiritual practices, and allowed that guide the way,
uh, to what we created next. And I think people remember more
about what we created and less about the decline, which is what
we seem to be so obsessed with talking about.

>> Loren (54:01):
Yeah, that's a good, That's a good point.
Um, what are your hopes for the future of Christianity?

Oh, um, my hopes for the future of Christianity
are wide. Um, I think the
gospel has so much prevalence
today. It is. Is so meaningful
and necessary in this moment
to bring hope, to bring grace, to bring mercy.
And I would love to see us focus more on

(54:28):
that than on
the details of decline, on the
differences that we have in our communities, but really to
lean into the power of the gospel and to the transformative
experiences. I had a conversation last night with some lay leaders and
clergy leaders from different denominational traditions about
how they had experienced God. And those are the types

(54:48):
of conversations I want to spend more time in.

>> Loren (54:51):
Absolutely. Yeah. I love that.
Okay. I'M going to throw one at you here because
you're a finance person. I feel like I got to ask this.
What is one thing you would tell churches,
again, in the financial realm to stop doing, like,
immediately? And one thing you tell them to start
doing.

Oh, yeah. Yes.

>> Loren (55:11):
So, and it can be like, you know,
stop using QuickBooks and start using this platform or,
you know, something like that. Even simple.

Oh, I might not even go down that far of details. But one of
the things that churches do that particularly annoys me
is what I have, um, sometimes referred
to as, uh, death by a thousand cuts. Budgeting,
where we tend to just make tiny little cuts to
every single area of our budget, hoping that
that eventually brings us back into the rest.

(55:40):
Back into the black again. Sorry, Back into the black.

>> Loren (55:43):
Yes.

Uh, that doesn't make any sense.

>> Loren (55:46):
Yeah.

When we are in a point of being in the red,
I think that's where we need to have some really clear discernment
conversations. And so what I would encourage
congregations to do when they see these things
emerge is understand, why are
we in the red in this moment? Why do we see a deficit
emerging? Because there could be a variety of reasons. Maybe there was
a death in the congregation of a big donor. Maybe there

(56:08):
was a boost in our utility bills that we didn't expect.
Inflation is a real thing. Get to know the reasons and
symptoms behind it. Don't assume that that year is a fluke,
which I often see congregations do.
Spend the time and then say, what does this
mean for us? What broader changes might we need
to make? If we assume that this trend will continue,

(56:29):
then let's make decisions with five years ahead in mind
and not just make something happen for this year.
That kind of, um, allows us to hedge our background bets.
Um, and I think that's where congregations get themselves in trouble.

>> Loren (56:41):
Yeah, that's good. One thing then, to start doing.

Yeah, so I think to start doing. I would, I would take that different
approach in the process. But I think the biggest thing I would encourage
congregations to start doing is if you are seeing this decline
in income, take it seriously that first year
that it happens. Oftentimes I see that
attendance trends, um, will
be ahead of our finance trends. So

(57:05):
when you start losing different members of the congregation, your
finances won't follow for a couple of years. So when you do see
that pop up, um, that is the
time, uh, to begin having this conversation, if not
sooner, because guess what? Creating a more sustainable model for
ministry isn't just for those who are desperate. It's for
everyone. So that's what I would encourage people to do.

>> Loren (57:25):
Yeah, it's interesting. We need to wrap it up here. But it is interesting how
giving really has become a lag
metric, especially during
COVID Like, there was so much obsession about income,
and income and giving really were, were strong
during COVID as people kind of like,
I don't know, dug in and said, hey, we're really going to commit

(57:46):
to something we believe in.

Yes.

>> Loren (57:48):
Um, it's fascinating. Well, thanks for, thanks for,
thanks for going there with me. Uh, how can folks connect with
you?

Yeah, the best way to connect with me is on Faith
Lead. So you can find me@, uh,
faithlead.org FundingForward is where you
can find all of the different research. You can find a
free chapter of my book. So if you're interested and you want to just feel it out
before you buy, I totally understand. We also have an
ebook of the research project that has a lot of

(58:15):
our key findings. And what I have found is for the church
treasurer folks that are a little skeptical, um,
this can be a great perspective for them
because hearing stories will only go so far. They want to see
the data. And it's free, so please check it out.
Um, and then I would also encourage, I do some side,
uh, work right now for an organization called

(58:35):
Renlevin that is really passionate about helping
congregations, uh, transform their spaces into community
hubs and affordable housing. So if that's something that you're interested
in, please check out relevance work@relevan.org
awesome.

>> Loren (58:47):
Awesome.
Well, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate the conversation.
Always leave folks with a word of peace. So may God's
peace be with you.

Thank you.

>> Loren Richmond (59:04):
Thanks for joining us on the Future Christian Podcast.
The Future Christian Podcast is produced by by Resonate
Media. We love to hear from our listeners with
questions, comments and ideas for future
episodes. Visit our
website@future-christian.com and
find the Connect with us form at the bottom of the
page to get in touch with Martha or Loren.

(59:25):
But before you go, do us a favor. Subscribe to
the POD to leave a review. It really helps us get
this out to more people. Thanks and go in
peace.

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