The One Fund: What Happens When Giving Starts With Mission?

Frank Bealer: Hey, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Next Sunday podcast. We were getting ready a few moments ago, and my eyes are watering because I was laughing so hard. Jim told me something about sports I had never heard before. I’m trying to compose myself as we get ready for a serious conversation after all the tomfoolery and shenanigans. Is that what it is, Jim?

Jim Sheppard: It wasn’t supposed to be. I said something candid that you had never heard before, and all of a sudden you started laughing. It was funny. I’ll tell you all offline.

Frank: That’ll be a blooper. We should do Next Sunday blooper reels.

Jim: Are people okay with two-hour blooper reels? There’s more blooper than content.

Frank: What you don’t know about the Next Sunday podcast is that more ends up on the cutting room floor than in the content you hear.

Jim: Somebody should do a highlight blooper reel. It would be worth seeing.

Frank: Maybe once every six months we could do an extra session of Next Sunday bloopers. But today we’re talking about something important. There can be a misunderstanding about this topic.

Jim: That’s right.

Frank: We’re going to talk about how the Generis One Fund concept works. We’ve been doing one fund initiatives for about 16 years now—hundreds, probably thousands of them. Yet we still hear questions and misconceptions, even from some of our clients. We recently held a session for our consultants on what a one fund is, what it isn’t, and how to clarify those misconceptions.

In any given year, about half of the church generosity initiatives we do are one fund initiatives, and half are traditional, three-year, above-and-beyond initiatives. Both have their place. We’re not pushing one direction or the other. It’s about what best serves the church.

We want to explain the Generis One Fund specifically. Other people use the term “one fund,” and I don’t know how each of them implements it. Using the same name for different approaches may contribute to some of the confusion.

Jim: A couple of things to say at the outset, Frank. The one fund concept wasn’t new, but it was new to the church world. Colleges and universities had been using versions of the concept for a while. Julie had served on staff at a major Christian college, where she had seen a version of it, and she brought the initial idea to us. It wasn’t new to fundraising. It was new to the church landscape.

Another distinction is the unified budget. Some firms used that approach for years. A one fund is not a unified budget where someone makes one commitment to the ongoing ministry budget and another to a capital campaign.

Frank: It realigns the focus of the giving initiative around mission and vision rather than budgets and projects. Ongoing ministry and capital projects still need funding, but they aren’t the focus of the invitation.

Jim: I often encourage clients not to fill their materials with pictures of every project. One church took that advice literally. They were planning a beautiful new building, but the first draft of the campaign book didn’t include a single photograph of it. I said, “There’s not a picture.” They said, “We thought that’s what you said.” They did put displays around the church so people could see the plans. The point was to place the emphasis on mission and vision.

That lets you make discipleship the main focus rather than simply funding a project or a budget. When this approach came along, I was already trying to find a more stable, sustainable, and growing plan for ministry funding.

With a traditional capital campaign, people make a two- or three-year commitment. Once they finish giving toward the new building or another project, their giving may return to their regular ongoing ministry giving. A one fund gives us a different way to have that conversation.

Here’s an important concept: It is one fund to the giver. It’s not one fund to the church.

Frank: I love that. Say it again.

Jim: It’s one fund to the giver, but it’s not one fund to the church—especially not to the finance office.

Frank: Every dollar that comes in still has to be allocated to the things the church plans to fund over the next two years.

Jim: Exactly. Some people wonder whether this approach is less disciplined or less transparent. If you do it properly—and I want to emphasize if you do it properly—the finance office has to pay close attention to where the money goes. It needs to put funds into the right categories so the money is available when needs arise.

Frank: The way I like to say it is that a one fund may be undesignated from the giver’s side, but that does not mean it is undisciplined, unbudgeted, or unallocated. You have to watch it closely to steward it well.

With two separate funds, you can see what came in for the building and what came in for operations. A one fund requires the church to do the work of planning and tracking those uses within the overall fund.

Jim: At its most basic, a one fund plan starts with two years of ongoing ministry funding. Say a church currently receives $4.5 million a year. It might plan for $5 million in the first year and $5.5 million in the second. That’s $10.5 million for ongoing ministry.

Then the church might add $8 million for capital projects or other one-time investments over those two years. Together, that would make an $18.5 million, two-year one fund initiative.

For the giver, it simplifies giving. They don’t have to write several checks or choose among several options in an online giving portal. It brings everything together behind one mission and vision for those two years.

The other side is that the finance office must do its job. Leaders need to allocate the money and show the congregation that they used it for the categories they said they would support. The campaign materials become a guide to what the church promised. Then leaders report back with updates, stories, and the impact of that giving.

It isn’t unbudgeted, undisciplined, or unallocated. The giving is simpler for the person making the gift, while the church remains responsible for deciding and communicating how it is used. The essence of that is integrity and trust.

Frank: I’ve worked with churches that had integrity or trust issues in the past. Even if those issues were resolved, some people still remember them. When something raises a similar concern, that history can surface again.

If questions about trust or integrity remain, leaders need to think carefully about whether a one fund is right for their church. This approach relies on trustworthy decisions about how the funds will be used.

A change of plan can also affect trust. Suppose a church has communicated that it will renovate a building, and then an opportunity arises to open a campus because another church wants to donate a location. Leaders may decide that reallocating some money would be wiser stewardship. But how will they communicate that? How will they involve the elders, board, or trustees and help the congregation understand the decision? The opportunity may be better than the original plan, but the change still needs to be communicated clearly.

There’s another benefit to clarity. After the public preaching phase of a generosity initiative, new people will begin attending the church. They weren’t there for the sermon series. They may only have a landing page for context. If they appreciate what God is doing through the church and want to give, several giving options may be difficult to understand without the story behind them.

With a one fund, the invitation can be clearer: this is how you support the work of this church. People can choose whether to participate, but if they do, they understand how their giving supports the mission and vision.

In a traditional two-fund arrangement, new people may arrive after the major initiative and have less clarity about what is happening and when. For a growing church, I appreciate that new families can understand how their giving supports the church’s mission across the two-year plan.

Jim: From that standpoint, Frank, it can be easier to engage new givers in a one fund initiative than in a traditional capital campaign. Someone arriving after a building is completed may assume it has already been paid for. Explaining that the church is still raising money for it can take more context than inviting them to support the church’s mission and vision over the next couple of years.

And when people make commitments, the church still needs to encourage them and receive the gifts over that two-year period.

Frank: In every generosity initiative, we work hard to focus on the giver—their heart, their journey, and the discipleship behind it. How can a one fund help a person or family on that generosity journey?

Jim: This is another distinguishing point. Because we’re talking about all of a person’s giving, not just an above-and-beyond gift for a traditional campaign, we can have a different conversation.

We can start with what someone is giving now and what they might be willing to move toward. That isn’t just a campaign move. It can be a discipleship move. A family might decide to give more over the next two years because something has shifted in their hearts, and they want that generosity to become an ongoing part of their lives.

Even a decision to move from giving five or six percent toward ten percent is not necessarily just for a campaign. Our hope is that it becomes a lasting move because we have taught generosity as discipleship. A one fund opens up that conversation.

Frank: In our work with churches, we often talk about the contrast between Luke 18 and Luke 19. I won’t unpack all of it, but I do want to point out one thing.

Jim: You’re not going to preach today?

Frank: I might. We’ll see where this goes.

In Luke 18, we meet the rich young ruler. He asks Jesus what else he must do, and Jesus tells him to sell what he has and follow him. The man walks away sad. He heard the invitation to follow Jesus and missed that opportunity.

Then in Luke 19, we meet Zacchaeus. After an encounter with Jesus, he speaks about giving and making right what he had done wrong. His response communicates that something has changed in his heart.

When I read the New Testament accounts of Jesus speaking about generosity, I see this movement of the heart. That matters when churches teach about giving. Jesus invites people into a different way of living—one that is sacrificial and generous—and we need help learning how to live that way.

I believe generosity initiatives can help people and families grow in that area. Yes, a building may be funded, a project may move forward, and more ministry may happen. Those things matter. I also care about what happens in the hearts of individuals and families as they grow in their relationship with God and money.

That is why I’m excited when a church or faith-based nonprofit enters a season of generosity. I believe it can have an impact on families across generations while advancing the mission. I can’t think of someone who has told me, “I grew in generosity, and I wish I hadn’t.”

Jim: The contrast between Luke 18 and Luke 19 is striking. In that setting, people might have expected the wealthy ruler to respond positively. They would not necessarily have expected that response from a tax collector like Zacchaeus. Yet their responses to Jesus are very different.

To me, when the Bible talks about money, it points to an underlying question: Who or what owns your heart? Because a one fund lets us talk about all of a person’s giving, it gives us an opportunity to address that question as part of a discipleship conversation.

The goal is not simply for the church to receive money. God is at work in people. As their thinking and hearts are transformed, their actions change too. Giving becomes an expression of that surrender.

Frank: And God could do his work without us, but he chose to involve us. I’m grateful that the one fund is one of the tools we can use to help people grow in generosity and faith.

That’s another episode of the Next Sunday podcast. We hope you found it helpful. We’ll talk to you again soon.