The Napkin Math That Tells You If Your Church Can Make It

Money is where hope meets math. You can love your people deeply, preach faithfully, and still lie awake wondering whether the offering will cover the lights this month. If that is you, take a breath. The numbers are kinder than you fear, and the rules of thumb are simple enough to scratch out on the back of an envelope.

Here is the encouraging part: the median U.S. congregation runs on about $120,000 of income against $108,000 of expenses, and 56% finish the year in surplus. Under-100 ministry is sustainable more often than pastors assume. The margin is thin, yes, but it is real. Let's walk through the math and the systems that keep a small church standing.

Start with the napkin math

The single most useful number you own is this: expect roughly $20 per attender per week, counting the kids. Multiply your weekly attendance by $20 and you have a quick sanity check on what your church should be bringing in.

Then locate yourself on the median-by-size table. Churches of 1 to 50 run about $65,000 a year. Churches of 51 to 100 run about $150,000. If your income badly trails the $20-per-head rule, the problem is usually giving culture, not poverty. That is a discipleship issue more than a finance one, and it is fixable.

A full-time pastor becomes realistically viable around 80 to 90 adults, or about $30,000-plus in income. Below that, plan to stay bivocational without apology. As the old planting wisdom goes, the resources are in the harvest. One planter drew no salary at all for five years. Map a path from bivocational to part-time to full-time tied to attendance milestones, not to hope. (Our milestones can help you see where you stand.)

Build two budgets, on purpose

Keep a separate start-up budget and operating budget, and build margin deliberately by raising income, setting goals, and limiting expenses. Margin does not happen by accident. You create it on purpose.

When you build the operating budget, benchmark your expense split against the typical pattern: staff 44%, buildings 26%, program 11%, mission 13%. If buildings are eating more than about 26% of your budget, that is your growth governor. Notice too that 85% of church income comes from donations, so your whole plan rests on generosity that has been patiently cultivated.

Save toward a reserve

Giving dips. Furnaces die. Pastors transition. Build toward two to three months of operating expenses in reserve as a cushion for the lean stretches. Once that reserve is funded, you can begin a capital fund for future facility and equipment needs. A reserve is not a lack of faith. It is stewardship that lets you lead from peace instead of panic.

Set up the pastor's pay correctly from day one

The day you pay anyone, set it up right. Ordained ministers can designate part of their salary as a tax-excluded housing allowance, but the board must designate it in advance and in writing, it must be used for housing, and it is capped at fair rental value. Miss the timing and you lose the benefit.

Also budget for the full self-employment tax. Ministers pay the entire 15.3%, not the split an ordinary employee pays. That is a real line item, so plan for it. Classify the pastor as an employee, not a contractor, and get a church-savvy CPA to help you set it up the first time. It is worth the small cost.

Stand up financial controls

Nothing destroys a small church's credibility faster than financial mismanagement, or even the appearance of it. Good controls protect the church from theft and protect individuals from accusation. Nobody should have unchecked access to money.

Put these in place:

Dual signatures on checks over a threshold (a common example is $500 to $1,000).

Monthly bank-statement review by someone other than the bookkeeper.

Board approval over a set threshold.

An annual outside review as you grow.

For the offering itself, always have two unrelated people count together, complete and sign a count sheet, and deposit within one or two days. Then reconcile against your giving records.

Keep simple books and set up online giving

A spreadsheet is fine to start. Track all income by source, all expenses by category, and every individual donation for year-end statements. Tools like QuickBooks, Aplos, or Breeze work as you scale.

Then set up a reputable online-giving platform (Tithe.ly, Pushpay, or Subsplash) with automatic recording and recurring options. Online giving tends to add around $300 per person per year, which is real money for a small church. (The promotion and teaching of giving is its own work; this is just the plumbing.)

Expect per-capita giving to dip as you grow

This one surprises pastors, so hear it now: faster-growing churches show lower per-capita giving, $1,336 versus $2,092 in stagnant churches. That is not a crisis. New attenders simply have not yet been discipled into generosity. Total dollars still rise with attendance. A church averaging 180 brings in more than twice the dollars of one averaging 100. So when growth comes and the per-head number dips, do not panic. Keep discipling, and watch the total climb.

What to do next

Do the math, write two budgets, fund a reserve, set up pay correctly, and put controls in place. None of this requires a finance degree. It requires honesty and a few simple habits repeated faithfully.

Your challenge this week

Take five minutes and run the napkin math: multiply last weekend's attendance (kids included) by $20, then compare it to your actual weekly giving. Write down the gap. That single number tells you whether your next conversation is about budget or about culture.