Discipleship Ministries is excited to announce the launch of a new course for local church leaders: Creating a Narrative Budget – The Story Behind the Numbers.
The new course is written and hosted by the Rev. Dr. Ken Sloane, Director of Stewardship & Generosity, who introduces the course and sets up each of the sessions in videos. Ken also serves as instructor for the course, interacting with participants through their responses to questions throughout the course, and answering questions that might arise.
Along with the course content, students will download a Narrative Budget Workbook in versions that will open in either Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets. With the workbook, participants will enter their local church’s budget (and a few other bits of information), and the workbook will organize those line items into broad ministry areas – a key tool in presenting a narrative budget!
Through eight self-paced sessions, participants will learn generosity theory as well as the practical nuts and bolts of constructing a narrative budget, including:
- What moves people to give?
- Different roles for line-item & narrative budgets
- Naming your buckets (ministry areas)
- Fitting apportionments/mission shares into ministry areas
- Choosing a format for sharing your narrative budget
- Tips for designing an attractive and effective narrative budget
This course is offered at no cost thanks to your church’s generous support of the World Service Fund. For those interested in earning CEU credits, there is a version of the course that offers 0.5 CEUs at completion is available for $25.