Grace Fellowship Church

Johnson City, Tennessee

Challenge: Build new facilities to accommodate growth

Over the past few years, the leadership at Grace Fellowship Church had contemplated a capital campaign a number of times to increase the size of their overstretched facilities, but a variety of circumstances had always seemed to prevent their fundraising efforts from getting underway.

"We have needed space in every area of the ministry for two or three years, but it just never seemed to be the right time," said pastor Tom Oyler, noting that the church had identified a need to expand its sanctuary from 600 to 1,500 seats, as well as add new areas for children and youth ministries and new space for parking.

"Our growth had leveled off because we didn't have any empty seats at good times for people," he added. "It became the right time last summer, and it was time to get the campaign going as well as the building [renovations] going -- basically a redo of our entire campus."

Tasks: Connect the campaign to the church's spiritual mission

Basing its campaign on the theme "Imagine," the church worked with Generis consultant Don Linscott to craft the message of its fundraising efforts around vision statements that "had nothing to do with bricks and mortar," said Oyler.

"We succeeded in keeping attention away from solely the bricks and mortar and more on why we're doing this," he added. "That was the key to it being a healthy campaign, as well as it being a spiritual approach. We've traditionally had a low key approach to buildings and finances, so something like this was a huge step for us."

One of the keys to Grace Fellowship's successful campaign -- which kicked off in January 2006 and was completed by late March, raising $6.5 million in pledges -- was involving the membership in the creation of a month-long prayer guide for each day of the public campaign.

"Each day's prayer devotional was written by a member of the church, with their name attached," said Oyler. "The tenor of the messages were about the ministry-oriented vision, about the building as a tool -- that we're not in the building-building business, we're in the people-building business, but we've got to have this building to do that."

Solution: A hugely successful campaign, with a new focus

In working with the church and lay leadership, Linscott and Generis were also able to add a dimension to the campaign that Grace Fellowship had not yet employed in its previous fundraising efforts: developing a major gift donor base.

"Don was very helpful about the importance of that, and it made a huge difference -- to get to nearly three times your annual budget, you have to have some major gifts," noted Oyler.

"In the past, we had the philosophy that you don't talk to anybody about specific gifts," he added. "We still didn't ask for specific amounts [from major donors], but what we tried to emphasize was the value and importance they could play that perhaps others couldn't play, and how much of a difference their gift would make."

Individualized Guidance

Throughout the campaign and even since, the leadership at Grace Fellowship has treasured the guidance Generis provided. "We were fortunate to have Don Linscott work with us," said Oyler. "It was so much on a different level of guidance and direction that was extremely helpful. He was very sensitive to our unique environment and culture, with great wisdom in answering questions and very flexible in trying our approach."

"I was extremely impressed with the content of the approach, as well as the resume of the churches [Generis] had worked with," he added. "For us it came together beautifully. We will probably do a campaign after this one's over, and I would definitely want Don to do it again."