church accounting

With spring upon us, most have long-since forgotten our New Year’s resolutions. The start of spring—or tax season—somehow motivates us to tend to the housekeeping projects we’ve neglected. Sure, this can take the shape of some church office and building improvements.

Every church needs a tool for tracking its finances.  There are many accounting software packages to choose from and a subset of those are specifically geared towards churches or nonprofit organizations.  This review highlights the functionality of ShelbyNext Financials, part of the Ministry Brands family of products.  Churches can leverage the integration between FellowshipOne or Elexio and ShelbyNext Financials for a complete ChMS and accounting suite.

ACS Technologies ranks high in the church management systems market, also called ChMS. With decades of service to the local church, they're trusted by many. Now, ACS Technologies brings us Realm, a web-based church management system for helping churches manage administration, accounting, and community in one place.

Churches build community and support their mission through a wide range of programs: fundraisers, community work, study groups and more. Behind the scenes, however, keeping these programs running requires staying on top of a tedious expense management process.

Church leaders have the weighty responsibility of managing funds on behalf of the congregation. Whether church finances are handled by a board of directors, a staff accountant or a volunteer, the expense management process can be complicated and time-consuming.

Tim Goetz has always been good with numbers. Growing up in California’s Central Valley, he would end up getting an accounting degree from nearby Fresno State. Afterwards, he worked for a little over two years as a financial statement auditor at Deloitte and Touché, becoming the Fresno, CA office’s internal control specialist. In early 2007, Goetz felt pulled in another direction and he went to work at one of Fresno’s largest churches, The Well, as an Executive Pastor. He quickly realized something big was missing in all of the big accounting programs — something they all couldn’t do that churches needed them to do. That something was fund accounting.

Maybe this year, you are making some resolutions and commitments that are all new—really stretching yourself and your church. Or maybe you are making the same resolutions you made last year but failed to accomplish. If you fall into the latter category, you aren’t alone.

When it comes to church accounting solutions the options available are astounding. Some integrate with church management systems and have incredible power. Others function as stand alone programs that focus on accounting alone. For small churches, or those utilizing volunteers, its easy to get overwhelmed.