I Think This Should be a HUGE Scandal...
In this video I talk about a church fundraising consultancy called Generis, a firm that helps churches and other nonprofits maximize their giving. Protestia published an article on it this week, and I linked that article in the video description so you can do the research yourself. This whole video is my opinion, but I believe what I found should be a scandal. Under the umbrella of this company there is a service that, from what I understand, lets a church hand over the giving records of its people so a third party can search out how much wealth they have, so the church can target them to give more.
Let me start with the Bible. James 2:1 says, "My brethren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons." James goes on to describe a man with a gold ring and goodly apparel being given the good seat while the poor man is told to stand there or sit under the footstool. The local church should not show partiality based on who has more money than others. The ground is level at the foot of the cross. A man with a fortune does not have a soul worth any more than a poor man who has nothing. Every ministry has donors. I have people who support and back me, and I appreciate them, but we cannot play the game of partiality.
The Protestia article shows how these big megachurch campaigns come prepackaged with the same format and the same giving cards. According to the article, Josh Howerton's Lakepointe Church uses a commitment card for its Into the Breach campaign that has you write down what you would ordinarily give, add what you could give on top of that, multiply by two, and then list other assets like stock or property you could give. I don't know what they are doing with that information. Generis also offers what it calls a Generosity Calculator, where a church enters its address, weekly attendance, and annual giving to get an estimate of how much more it could be bringing in. I believe we are making a business out of church.
The part that really bothers me is what Generis calls wealth screening. On its own website, the firm describes having a church upload detailed exports from its donor database, including names, residential addresses, dates of birth, marital status, gender, and three to five years of giving history. That data goes to its third party processor, DonorSearch, and the results come back to a consultant who helps the church work them into its fundraising strategy. DonorSearch advertises tools to estimate a prospect's net worth, real estate, stock holdings, business ties, and even political campaign contributions. In other words, give us your data and we will find out who in that crowd has the money. I said in the video that I hope I have completely misunderstood this, and if so I will apologize. But if churches are really doing this, I believe you need to run from any church that does.
This is exactly what the Bible warned would come. 2 Peter 2:1-3 says, "But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not." The false teachers of the last days will be popular, because many shall follow their pernicious ways. Through covetousness they make merchandise of God's people. When everything a church does is driven by money, that is a huge problem.
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