Tips on Youth Ministry Budgeting

It’s the end of the year and the beginning of a new one - at least annually speaking and not necessarily youth ministry speaking.

I have seen so many different times where budgets are submitted and done for what the church calls, “budget year”. Some times the budget year runs concurrent with the annual year, or sometimes it runs from say June to June. No matter which way your church runs the budget year, they still want to know what you have come up with for your youth ministry budget.

Here are some tips that I have found to be useful as you think about how much money is needed to do youth ministry within your church:

1. Look over and pray about your vision and goals for your ministry- I say to do this first because the whole reason that you should be doing ministry is to accomplish what you believe God is wanting you to do specifically in your area. I believe that we are supposed to be making disciples of Jesus, however, there is a uniqueness about your church, your area, so knowing what it is that God wants you to accomplish is huge. It’s the vision that people will give to not just filling positions to make something work as “status quo”.
2. Take a look at last year’s budget - Don’t look at what was spent yet, but rather your budget that either you, a board, or the guy before you came up with on what they believed would be the right amount to get the job done. Looking at the budget for the last year will give you a great starting point on structuring a new budget. It will help remind you of the things that money is being spent on. It will allow you to see what was important and not so important.
3. Review what you actually spent- Someone might be saying, “please don’t remind me as I always go over.” Actually this is a great reminder then because you may find that your budget needs some more money in certain categories. Maybe you’re finding out that you spend about 200 more on pizzas then what you projected. All you need to do is make a decision on if buying those pizzas got you closer to your vision and goals and how necessary or valuable it is to have in your ministry. You also may notice that you are spending money that wasn’t categorized - that’s why us youth workers like a big miscellaneous line in the budget:) But seriously you may have to consider either adding a budget line for money that you are spending, or be diligent about not spending money unless it fits within that budget to which the financial board will cheer you.
4. Share your pre-budget with some trusted leaders before presenting it - You need some key leaders to review what you have done with your budget before sticking your neck out there and getting it chopped off. The reason for this is because sometimes they can see areas that may look a little weak or may look a bit over excessive. At this point then you can do some more tweaking after recommendations have been made.
5. Be able to back up why you need the money for any category - Let’s face it, when you are dealing with money, people look closely at what is being spent. You need to be able to present a vision for the why. What do I mean? You need to be able to get people on board with why it’s going to cost X amount of dollars for that new stereo system in the church van. You will get questions like, “what’s wrong with tape player that’s in there? - seriously. Maybe make a presentation on what a CD player looks like or better yet what  MP3 players are. Don’t get ridiculous, but in this case share with them how important music plays on impacting teens. With this new system, we will be able to better impact them for Christ. That’s way better then saying that you’re current system sucks and sounds like crap.
6. Don’t make your categories too general or too specific - Want to get your church people or your board asking lots of questions about your budget? Me neither. It’s important that you think about your categories and if they are giving enough information for people to understand, but not too much information that people are wondering why you need 100 rolls of duct tape this year. For example: Use the word “Supplies” with maybe a few examples in parenthesis instead of “duct tape”.
7. Share it with your youth leaders for final review - Volunteers probably don’t want to be apart of the whole process, but would be glad to see what you have come up with before it’s presented. They may be able to remind you of something that was left out, or they may bring up something that may be important for the future to think about budgeting for. It might be wise to share early with a couple of volunteers that are insightful from the beginning of your budget building process.

Other helpful tips:

• Know where you are at with spending on a monthly or quarterly basis
• Utilize fund-raising to help subsidize important trips
• Ask key people in your church that may be willing to or know of people that would give gifts such as prizes for a lock-in.
• Budget a little high so that if the board tells you to cut back, you won’t be as devastated.

Other tips welcomed!

If you have some budgets in word or excel send them to me for some examples.