What Does $347k Per Baptism Mean?
I recently read an article that talked about the cost of each baptism (or Christian conversion) to be $347,000. I can’t make this stuff up. Basically it says that for all the money Christian organizations and churches bring in, about $347k is spent on each baptism.
Now certainly the value of eternal life for a person doesn’t have a dollar amount, so I’m not trying to argue from that standpoint. But, that dollar figure just blows me away.
I first read about this a few weeks ago and even now I still can’t wrap my head around how much money that is. Even if the number is wrong and it is closer to $100,000 per baptism, that is still an overwhelming number that doesn’t make much sense.
Here are a couple thoughts the come to mind:
- When Christians give money to churches and organizations are they giving to disciple believers or to reach unbelievers? Obviously the answer is both, but what is the ultimate goal? I wonder about that. For me personally, I give to reach the lost.
- A number like $347,000 per baptism screams inefficiency. I come from a business background so I tend to think of being efficient with money, so this one stuck out like a sore thumb. In the business world, a lot of people would get fired for this kind of inefficiency.
- We must be wasting a lot of money on pointless things.
- We need 100x more transparency in our churches. It is the congregation that is giving the money. Our congregations need to see things like this so that their money will be driven to the things that matter. Churches need to see the “rubber meets the road” kind of numbers like this. How effective is the money that is given?
- For those who criticize the people who say we need to re-think how “church” is done in today’s world, seeing numbers like this should make them shut up a little.
What does $347k a baptism mean to you?
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Tyler Braun.
That is the purpose of our church annual business meeting. It is all listed and accompanied by a dollar amount. That is transparency. Can’t force a person to come to the meeting to read it and discuss it though. One has to accept the open invitation.
In no way was anything I wrote directed towards Sunset.
$347K is a 2000 square foot house on a 7000 square foot lot in a nice neighborhood, with all closing costs and fees.
$347K is 17,500 pizzas, or roughly, 1 pizza per day for the next 48 years.
$347K is the salaries for 7 full-time employees, before benefits, at $50K/year, each.
$347K is more than you will spend on buying automobiles your entire life (especially if you are a bicycle rider).
$347K is enough money to send 2 people through OHSU’s certified nurse/midwife program, with left over money for graduation presents.
I think you can’t make a blanket statement like that, as all churches aren’t alike. Apples and oranges. There are churches that pay their senior pastor more than my church’s entire budget is.
It would be an interesting exercise, though, to break these numbers down by demographic. To be fair, let’s not go by attendance, but by annual budget. Put them in catagories: Less than $100k, 100k-250k, 250k-500k, 500k-1M, 1M+. How about a bug church like Northpoint (and I’m not picking on them, it’s just an example, and their financials are on their website) with a 35M budget. (that boggles the mind, BTW)
I’ll bet you’ll find that economies of scale work in reverse. If a 100k church baptizes just one person a month, then Northpoint would have to baptize 350 per month to be “as efficient.” Now, it would be cool if they baptize 4200 people a year! I don’t know if they do or not.
I would imagine smaller churches are more fiscally efficient because they have to be. They have to “make do” with a sub-par sound system, no stage lights, a free website, volunteer staff and locking up the copy paper. They have to really look at what they can do, and look at what gives them the most “bang for the buck” so to speak.
Does that make them better stewards? Whose to say? But a smaller church also spends a larger percentage of its budget on non-ministry items as well, probably. Equipment, utilities, insurance, etc…
It’s easy to just throw a number out there.
*I’m going to post this comment on the original article as well, and see if I get a response.
BTW, Northpoint is a “big” church, not a “bug” church!!
Just do like John The Bap did. Down by the river.
Makes me think that we (American Christianity) are doing something wrong. It feels like when Jesus talked about the Pharisees traveling all over the world just to make one convert. Perhaps our money could be better spent on mission to third world countries…
I agree that there is a lot of lumping together in this number but it also means that there are some that are way over $347K per baptism. It seems like we have missed the mark.
[...] May 14, 2009 by zoelavie What Does $347k Per Baptism Mean? « man.of.depravity [...]
I work as a bookkeeper for a mid-sized church. We work really hard to be as efficient with our resources as we can. I read this and can’t help but wonder if it is the church leadership that isn’t being efficient and using their resources wisely, or if it is the people of the church that are not sharing the love of God. I also work with the youth in our church, and we can plan an event geared for them to bring their friends and do all the “right things” as a leadership team, but if the students in our youth group don’t tell their friends about it and bring them, the event doesn’t work. My point is, I read this and my first thought was not that we need to become better stewards with our money (all though this is still needed), but that we need to start telling more people about Jesus.
The figure of $374k per baptism…
North America is a heavily evangelized region of the world. Evangelization of other parts of the world is quite cost effective, not only in general living expenses of those doing ministry there, but also the fields white with harvest. In fact, if you were to factor in international baptisms which were a direct result of missionary effort from North America (a much harder figure to compute, by the way) it might come out to be far less.
I think I’ll write a check to a missionary…
I should probably tell this to those people from my past who gave me TREMENDOUS grief of being baptized by sprinkling (we’re talking mental manipulation, ‘you’re not our friend unless you’ve been dunked’ kinda manipulation…Dunked? what am I, a donut?)
Guess how much money we were saving in using less water.
Yes, I’m a Christian- with lots of issues with some other Christians and their illogical and self righteous ways…other than that I’m not as snippy…really!
So……….are you saying that God isn’t working enough on his responsibility to bring me unto salvation. We preach the true gospel message every week. Baptisms is not a measure of our faithfulness to money, but to God…Grow UP!!