Drafting the Case Statement:
Weekly Giving Analysis

In most churches the direct giving of the church members is the largest source of income so it pays to take a close look. Headline statistics of income and expenditure, reserves and average giving levels are most helpful. But we need to look a bit deeper to understand what is going on. A quarter of the congregation may give three quarters of the direct giving. It is called skew and it is something that needs to be understood.

• The Weekly Giving and Reserves Analysis is a simple Excel spreadsheet which charts the data while preserving absolute confidentiality. Download the spreadsheet and save to disk.It is a good idea to customise the spreadsheet by inserting an image of the church. Note that this same spreadsheet is used to calculate and chart the levels of parish reserves.
• Completing the weekly giving analysis provides a step by step guide to produce the tables and accompanying charts which form the basis of discussion on the planning group.
• Click here for an illustration of how a completed Weekly Giving and Reserves Analysis might look.

Once completed the data charted by the spreadsheet will give an insight into the main source of income of the church and enable careful planning of the focus of Giving in Grace for the parish. Parishes that have done this analysis have sometimes been shocked to realise just how low are the levels of giving of some members. Equally it has been enormously encouraging to know that there is capacity in the church to address the financial need. This document effectively exposes the myth that we are giving all we can and there is no more to give.

The sample case statement illustrates how a completed analysis might look when inserted in to the case statement document.